Jonah Hill said Saturday night at SiriusXM’s Smartless LIVE at Hollywood’s Palladium that he is ready to return to comedy after pulling back from public life. He told the crowd that he had been away for a while, had gotten serious, and was not as happy until he built a family with Olivia Millar.
Hill said he and Millar have two children, a 3-year-old boy and a baby, and pointed to her in a private box on the venue’s second floor as he spoke. “Real quick, before we go any further, my wife is here. My best friend. Shout out to my beautiful wife, Liv. Where is she? Oh, what’s up baby,” he said, adding that his family had given him the “vibe shift” that brought him back toward performing.
The actor said the change began after he and Millar moved from Los Angeles to San Diego around the time their first child was born three years ago. He said he wanted to leave Los Angeles and raise a family outside the city, and described life in a small town in San Diego as amazing, with incredible neighbors. Hill said that once he had his family, he got happy and wanted to be funny again.
That move and the return to the stage come after Hill released a lengthy statement in August 2022 saying he would step back from media appearances and public-facing events because of 20 years of anxiety attacks. He had kept a low profile in recent years after earlier major film roles, and had not appeared in any major films after Kenya Barris’ You People and Adam McKay’s Don’t Look Up before talking about his comeback.
Hill tied that comeback to the work that first made him love comedy. He said The Simpsons made him fall in love with it, and recalled recording episodes on VHS, pausing during the credits to write down the writers’ names, and sending them fan letters. “The first thing I thought about when I had my kids and was so stoked, it was like I connected to back when I was just like 12 and I was just being funny for fun,” he said. “That’s the thing I fell in love with my whole life.”
He also made clear what comes next. “That’s why I said yes [to being on Smartless]. I’m, like, I want to go fucking be funny in front of a crowd and that’d be awesome,” he said, before adding, “I’m about to go on a run of just the dumbest shit you’ve ever seen in your entire life.” Hill’s remarks left little doubt that his family, and Millar in particular, helped push him back toward the work he says he missed.