Ali Wong and Hannah Gadsby paint different celebrity portraits

The last time we saw Ali Wong doing standup, she was paying serious tribute to her husband and their relationship. The last line of “Don Wong,” her 2022 special, read: “And that, singles, is what a healthy marriage looks like.”

Later that year, she was divorced.

In Hollywood, it’s a tale as old as time. But in stand-up, where the parasocial relationship with fans is more intense than ever, this news ignited group chats and created anticipation. What would Wong, who has talked about her husband in three specials, add to the fertile genre of comedy about divorce?

Two years after his 2016 breakthrough, “Baby Cobra,” turned Ali Wong from a veteran but obscure comic into a phenomenon, “Nanette” did the same for Hannah Gadsby. To the extent that Netflix established a reputation for making — as opposed to promoting — stand-up stars, it’s largely because of these two artists, whose new hours present perspectives on fame from such different angles that it almost feels as if they are in conversation.

Gadsby, whose excellent show, “Woof!,” currently runs at the Abron Arts Center on the Lower East Side, looks dark and worries that success, and specifically money, has had a corrupting influence. Wong’s latest Netflix special, “Single Lady,” is a juicy, hopeful portrait of a celebrity single that oozes optimism.

Taking the stage to songs from pop divas (Beyoncé for Wong; Madonna for Gadsby) and referencing past specials, they both aim for thematically cohesive productions mindful of their reputations. But Gadsby, using they/them pronouns, considers and confronts their own brand and presents their experiences as eccentric. Wong takes the comic tack of teasing generalizations out of his experience. Describing the realization mid-breakup that the experience would be a good joke, Wong said: “We turn it into lemonade really quickly.”

Wearing a flowing white dress, Wong addresses her divorce at the top, saying in a soft voice that she felt “really embarrassed and ashamed.” Embarrassment and shame are fertile comedic territory, but not areas Wong has dug deep into in the past. She’s not here either, moving quickly to the back of a very public separation: Tabloid coverage, she says, has been a “bat signal” for men.