What a half-decade it’s been. Since 2016, we’ve seen two polarizing presidential elections; national reckonings around race, sex, gender, and power; an alarming spike in acts of hate; and a once-in-a-century pandemic.
These are not funny times. And the terrain can be very tricky for comedians in 2022.
Exploring Hate and ALL ARTS present Can I Laugh At That? Veteran comedian Judy Gold talks to fellow comics, Alex Edelman, Mike Yard, and Negin Farsad about how they do their jobs in today’s painful, polarized world. It’s a world where a failed joke can end up on social media, dissected by millions. Where the line between an acceptable joke and one that crosses the line is blurrier than ever. Where bad news does inspire good comedy … even if we’re laughing through our tears.
This event originally streamed on Thursday June 16, 2022.
Panelists
Judy Gold is a star of screen, stage, bookstore, and your earbuds. She’s had stand-up specials on HBO and Comedy Central and LOGO. She plays Chaya on FX’s Better Things (and writes for the show). She has appeared on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert and The Tonight Show. From 1999-2010, Judy was the host of HBO’s At the Multiplex with Judy Gold, and she won two Emmy awards for writing and producing The Rosie O’Donnell Show. Onstage, Judy has written and starred in two Off-Broadway hits: The Judy Show—My Life as a Sitcom (Outer Critics Circle Nomination), and 25 Questions for a Jewish Mother (GLAAD Media Award—Outstanding NY Theater, Drama Desk Nomination, Actor). More recently, she is the author of Yes I Can Say That: When They Come For The Comedians, We Are All In Trouble, and she hosts the hit podcast Kill Me Now with Judy Gold.
Alex Edelman is a comedian and writer whose Orthodox Jewish upbringing has informed critically and commercially acclaimed work for the stage and screen. He is known both for his award-winning solo shows—sell-out hits in London’s West End and the Edinburgh Fringe Festival—and for his TV writing. At the start of the pandemic, he served as the head writer and executive producer of Saturday Night Seder, a star-studded 70-minute special posted on YouTube, that has so far raised $3.5 million for the CDC Foundation (COVID-19) Emergency Response Fund. His new, critically acclaimed show, Just For Us, has sold out multiple runs Off Broadway and will play an encore engagement beginning June 13 at the Greenwich House Theatre in NYC.
Born on the island of, St. Croix in the United States Virgin Islands, Mike Yard moved with his family to East New York, Brooklyn, in 1986. He started his comedy career at the now defunct Uptown Comedy Club in Harlem and has become one of the hottest comedians touring the country today. At the invitation of Reverend Jessie Jackson, Mike performed twice for The Rainbow Coalition/Operation PUSH national conventions, in New York and Chicago.
Mike has appeared on everything from Def Comedy Jam to Inside Amy Schumer and was most recently a writer/correspondent on Comedy Central’s The Nightly Show with Larry Wilmore.
Negin Farsad was named one of 50 Funniest Women by the Huffington Post and one of the 10 Best Feminist Comedians by Paper. She is a TEDFellow and gave a TEDTalk on social justice comedy that was seen by millions. She is the author of the Thurber Prize-nominated How to Make White People Laugh, host of the podcast Fake the Nation and a regular on NPR’s Wait Wait Don’t Tell Me. She appears on the current season of Nat Geo’s Year Million, the upcoming season of HBO’s High Maintenance, and the last season of Netflix’s Chelsea Handler Show. Negin is the director/writer/star of the rom-com 3rd Street Blackout and the director/producer of The Muslims Are Coming! She has written for/appeared on Comedy Central, MTV, PBS, IFC, Nickelodeon and others. She also sued New York State’s MTA over the right to put up funny posters about Muslims…and won.
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