Hasan Minhaj’s Daily Show Setback

🎙️ Listen to this episode:

▶ Spreaker  | 
🍎 Apple Podcasts  | 
🎵 Spotify


Full Transcript

Caloroga Shark Media. If you host a podcast seven days a week and you can’t hear yourself, the answer might be maybe you should plug the headphones in Hello, I’m Johnny Mack with your Daily Comedy News. Hasan Minhaj’s bubblicist. You get a raise for the wax job a new cover story in Esquire magazine. Minaj confirmed to Esquire that, yep, the daily show job was his.

Hassan says, we were in talks and I had the gig, and we were pretty much good to go. Then there was that infamous profile of Hassan and The New Yorker that fact checked some of his jokes. It was revealed that Hasan Minhaj had embellished several stories for stand up as and because of that, no daily show for you, he said, that’s part of show biz. Esquire says. In the aftermath of the story, Hassan minhajh spoke with other comedians were friends and mentors.

Mike bur Bigley and Rama Yusef reached out, so did John Mulaney and John Stewart. He spent hours on the phone with them. Hassan says, I remember John Stewart called and he said, why the f are they doing this and who does this benefit? Well benefits John Stewart, He’s back on Mondays. It was painful, There’s no doubt about it.

It was the first time I saw the speed velocity of the Internet and how quickly a story can take off. That part of it was new to me and disorienting. The most painful thing is my wife and parents, to see them hurt, to see them engage with so I’m reading this on the internet. That’s so painful. I’m the eldest.

I feel really, really sad that I let my parents down. I’m very lucky they got to see many beautiful highs of my career. Watching them experience a painful moment and embarrassing moment in your career, I wish I didn’t put them through that, And that’s the tough part. After the Big kerfluffle, Hassan told Variety, all my stand up stories are based on events that happened to me. I use the tools of stand up comedy hyperbole, changing names and locations, and compressing timelines to tell entertaining stories.

That’s inherent to the art form. You wouldn’t go to a haunted house and say, why are these people lying to me? The point is the ride stand up is the same. You know, all that is really fair. But I also I’ll understand why the Daily Show was like, oh, we can’t do this.

At the time Hassan spoke to Ronny Chieng Ching’s reaction, I didn’t think it was as serious as it was, and in some ways I still don’t think it’s so serious as it was. The cultural gatekeepers loved him. I found it surprising that the cultural gatekeepers would turn on him so quickly and not give him the benefit of the doubt. Nikki Glaser told Indy Wire popping down on the couch after that set, the Brady Roast was maybe the greatest feeling I’ll ever have in my life, the amount of relief of nailing it when it’s live, when you’re on your period and you thought it ended, but it just started again right before you walked on stage. And there were no tampons in the key of form, so you had to use a folded up napkin and make yourself a pad which was only being hung in plaze by a tiny strip of spandex on your thong that could fall out at any second.

There were so many things that could have gone wrong on live TV in that moment. I don’t know if I’ll ever have a moment in my career like that again. And I’m totally okay if I don’t, because I felt it once and that was enough. The Daily Mail spoke to Matt friend. Friend says, while studying at NYU, he took any chance he could get to immerse himself in the world of comedy.

Matt says, I was very obsessed and focused. It became my extracurricular activity. I’d go to class and I I’d go an open mic, and I was getting a name for myself. I was getting paid spots in the comedy club while I was still in school, and I was feeling the momentum build.

And then the pandemic hit.

I’m sitting in home with my parents and my sister, and I was like, what do I do? He created a mini late night talk show he called Quarantine. He produced more than fifty episodes of the sketch Show. He wrote a topical monologue and conducted interviews. He did Now, I don’t claim to know everything, Okay, I really don’t, but I’ve been hosting this particular podcast since twenty nineteen, pre pandemic.

And believe me, during the pandemic, I was looking for things to talk about. You know, it’s not like everybody was on tour. It’s not like any of us were leaving the house every single day. I minimum prep will google the word comedy, and I will google the word comedian. I don’t recall ever hearing one thing until just now about quarantine.

Really, this exists. I gotta google this, Okay, it exists. One video from four years ago, Quarantine with Matt Friends. He’s in two premiere has six hundred and eighty seven views. That’s not a lot anyway.

He produced more than fifty episodes of the Sketch Show. He wrote a topic called monologue, and conducted interviews. Really, but it was pivoting the social media that really changes his life. During the pandemic, Jimmy Kimmel started talking about Friends Impressions, which triggered a wave of media interest, including getting a spot on Hoda and Jenna. Matt says they did a bit with them, and then all these media appearances started to happen, and my following was starting to build.

As for working on the Impressions, he says, it just kind of happens. I watch a lot of the movies, I read a lot of the books, I watch a lot of shows. I’m very up to date with what’s happening in pop culture and politics. And as a result of that, I just kind of hear the voices of the character and then I start doing it. I couldn’t tell you it’s a process.

I don’t sit down in practice. It just starts. It just sort of happens. When Howard Stern got wind of the impression he had friend on his show, yeah, I mean, I guess my opinion is coming true here right. Howard is okay?

But like Howard hasn’t been relevant in twenty years. Like yeah, and we all do, Jimmy Stuart, we all do Ronald Reagan. So let me move on Cracked. Talk to Jay Farrow. He does some impressions.

I personally, you may disagree. I think Jay Farrow’s impressions are way better than mad friends. Jay Farrow said, I remember the first time I made a crowd laugh. I was five years old. I pressed through security to get to my pastor.

He had security like the club. I just pushed. I don’t know how I did it. I know how I was allowed to do it. I pushed through everybody.

They said, excuse me, excuse me. A little five year old and I’m talking to him and he asked me, hey, man, can you fight? And I’m like yeah, I’m like Muhammad Ali, you want to see and everybody starts laughing. I would always say slick stuff as a kid. Uncle Patrick he would pay attention.

He was keen to it. I was really shy around my parents. Everybody else knew, but they didn’t because I was shy around them. My parents are hilarious. They’re really funny.

So my measure of comedy will always come from them. Are they laughing even when they come to a show or something. I don’t give a damn about anybody else in the room. I’m looking at them. My first impression was Gilbert Godfried.

There was this thing called the Virginia Idol Talent Search where I got up at a comedy club three hundred people. I got fifth place. The only people in front of me were four singers. I’m good with that. I’m not going to beat Beyonce.

I was sixteen years old. To be that young and get that was a boost of confidence. Other impressions, he says, will Smith was one at first, but then a lot of mini mes were born. They started doing him. People have it down like seventy five percent, but they’re not one hundred.

Will Smith finally commented on the video I did, and he was like, yeah, next time I got to do some ADR, I’m definitely calling you Shannon Sharp. He didn’t like it at first, then I refine it. Now he likes it. Looking back at it. It wasn’t as good as it is now.

When I first did it, it was like I was mocking him and not really doing the impression. Once I dialed into it, it became one of the good ones.


And then Kanye, but you know that doesn’t count because he just has a problem…

And he talked about Saturday Night Live because I don’t know if you know this, SNL’s turning fifty. We were going to talk about SNL every day for the next nine months. He said, come on, man, it’s SNL. I feel like I’m getting old, but I feel good to be part of such a prestige institution. You’re not going to get higher than that.

As far as sketch comedy goes, it’s literally the NFL of sketch comedy. I feel good to be part of that history and actually be invited back for the fiftieth. You know, everybody I can get the invite really interesting. I wonder who didn’t get the invite, So the fact that I got sent three of them, I thought one was spam. Then I’d show up, but it would just be a check.

I won’t talk about the SNL premiere tomorrow. I had to record this one rather early to accommodate my schedule. Because I recorded a few episodes early to accommodate for said schedule. I haven’t had a chance to tell you about Ellen DeGeneres a special which I watched. I like it.

I’ve added it to my list of things that I will mention at the end of the year when I do an episode or two of best specials of the year. It’s not in the top group. My takeaway is twofold. I like Ellen’s stand up comedy. Some of you are going to throw your phone through the window as I remind you for the million time that I used to program serious XM comedy and I currently program the comedy on the Live one app.

By the way, sidebar, I should probably remember to promote the weekly comedy thing. It is a weekly show I host on the Live one app, So it’s like this, except I can actually play the bits, so I talk a lot less. For example, the Jay Farrell story, I’ll tell the fifteen second version of that and then play Jay Farrow. I’ll tell you fifteen seconds about Ellen and then play Ellen. So it’s called the weekly comedy thing.

The app is called Live one. The app is free, the show is free. You should do it. Having program comedy for who is it twenty five? You know it’s twenty to twenty something like that twenty something years.

I have always been a fan of Ellen DeGeneres’s stand up work, and in her current special you see bits and pieces of it. She has a wonderful bit about a pigeon that I don’t want to spoil. What I didn’t like about the special is it’s such a victory lap, like that review I shared with you about the standing Oh, they weren’t kidding. The standing oh goes on and on and on and on, and there’s a couple of points in the special it’s not even clapped. It’s just Ellen says a sentence and the audience just claps.

It’s like an athlete’s final game. I know it’s positioned as her final special. The whole thing is just weird. Somewhere in there is some really good material, but the pacing is just off. Not because of Ellen, but because of the crowd.

Though she did stand there for four minutes and soak in the standing ovation, she could have easily put up her hand and told the audience to shut the hell up so I can get back to stand up. She didn’t. In Soviet Union podcast downloads You, Yakhov’s Smirn Office launched his first ever podcast, The Comedy Couch. In the new show, Yakov combines his comedic genius with his psychology degree to analyze what makes the world’s top comedience tick. That.

Isn’t Neil Brennan doing that, isn’t Craig ferguson’t doing that? Doesn’t Mark Marra do that? Yakoff digs into their past, childhood and family stories while sharing his own unique journey. Funny, insightful, and packed with unforgettable moments, this podcast offers a fresh take on comedy and what’s behind the laughter? Sure, I mean, what’s a fresher take on comedy?

Then Yakov’s off Sean you’re a hater today, am I? I guess? Ben Stiller is working on a pickleball movie called The Dink. Jake Johnson will lead. He plays a washed up tennis pro in order to save a club in crisis.

Does the one thing he swore it never do, play pickleball. Ed Harris will be in this movie. That’s great. How old’s ed? Now?

Though Ed’s seventy three, all right, I can see him playing some pickleball. Ben Stiller and former tennis champion Andy Roddick will have supporting roles. And let me clear this one out. I’ve been sitting on this one for a while, and I think I can get my half assed impression of work today. Matt Barry spoke to The New York Times.

They were curious, what can we learn from your character Laslow? Matt Barry said, he attacks and grabs life. I suppose to letting things happen. He has no interest in technology or any kind of science. He thinks it’s mostly nonsense, and I quietly envy that.

What’s the fun of playing Laslow? Matt Berry said improvising was obviously encouraged and expected. That’s where I’m happiest to sit and trade insults with the others in character. It’s such good fun as ever a bit of scene so outlantish that you’ve resisted it. No, because I’m in favor of things being highly ridiculous and hopefully memorable, I would encourage it.

Are there any vampire powers that you would enjoy? I don’t think so. Other than advance hearing, there isn’t anything that I be interested in. I mean, I suppose the flying bat thing, but you’ve got to turn into a bat. That’s your comedy news for today.

If you enjoy the program, tell a friend about it too. If you would like this thing without commercial interruption, there’s a link in the show notes tell you how that thing works. Yep, yep, yep. You could do that. See anymore