Join Eitan Levine, a comedian and master storyteller, as he navigates life's challenges with humor. From battling cancer to crafting award-winning adult film parodies, Eitan finds light in the darkest moments. Dive into the New York comedy scene, where rejection inspired his iconic Apartment Fest. Explore the unconventional paths to comedic success and enjoy a hilarious escape from jury duty in New Jersey. This episode isn't just about laughter; it's a lesson in transforming adversity into unforgettable stories. Get ready for a comedic journey that entertains and leaves you with a few tricks up your sleeve.
Follow @eitanthegoalie
Your hosts: @lynnhazan_ and @tonydoesknow
follow us on social @ltkpod!
Join Eitan Levine, a comedian and master storyteller, as he navigates life's challenges with humor. From battling cancer to crafting award-winning adult film parodies, Eitan finds light in the darkest moments. Dive into the New York comedy scene, where rejection inspired his iconic Apartment Fest. Explore the unconventional paths to comedic success and enjoy a hilarious escape from jury duty in New Jersey. This episode isn't just about laughter; it's a lesson in transforming adversity into unforgettable stories. Get ready for a comedic journey that entertains and leaves you with a few tricks up your sleeve.
Follow @eitanthegoalie
Your hosts: @lynnhazan_ and @tonydoesknow
follow us on social @ltkpod!
Hey, welcome to the Lynn and Tony Know podcast. I'm your host, lynn.
Speaker 2:And I'm Tony. We are both wellness coaches and married with kids.
Speaker 1:Join us as we talk about all things health, wellness, relationships, life hacks, parenting and everything in between unfiltered. Thanks for listening and let's get into it. Welcome back. I'm very excited. Today we have a very special guest. I'm a huge fan. A little background. So about a week after October 7th I think it was about a week Tony and I were like kind of depressed and we're like okay, what can we do to like get out of this funk? And we like to go to comedy clubs, Like that's our thing, that's like our perfect date, and I we like to go to a comedy club dinner, et cetera. So Tony bought tickets.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I bought tickets to go see somebody I know, mike Cannon, and this is also several days after you sent me his reel, because he referenced it was a real estate thing right. And you referenced Corcoran and you sent it to me. Ha ha ha. And then I messaged Tim and, like I don't remember the specific context around it now, but that was my first introduction was you sent me a reel of him like making some real estate jokes, and then that's how I became aware.
Speaker 1:And then, next thing you know, we're at the comedy show and I remember like sitting in the chair and being like fuck, like I hope nobody says something, because it's like really fresh, it just like the massacre just happened, it's like really like triggering, and I'm Israeli and I'm like fuck, like I hope nobody's going to say something. That's going to be crazy, that I have to like walk out of here. You know, but, and like every time somebody was like Israel, palestine, I was like you know, just like waiting but it was really good.
Speaker 1:And our guest tonight, Aitan. He did a set and it was hilarious and it like got us out of the funk and I started like I guess the algorithm was algorithming and I saw a lot of his content relevant to anti, the rise of anti-Semitism and the war and he just has a really good way of like making these really heavy topics funny, you know, and relatable. So we have Aitan Levine. He's a New York based writer and comedian, human theme park. His work has been featured on Jimmy Kimmel Live, late night with Stephen Colbert, the Daily Show extra and more. He's also written for the New York Times Not sure about that one, We'll talk about it. New York magazine.
Speaker 2:No, no, no, no, she's not saying you didn't, she was, she was raising the suspicion around where we've all turned against the New York Times now. Yeah, it's all good.
Speaker 3:I will say it was. It was after October 7th. I was doing a. I did a comedy festival in my apartment that was called apartment fest and it was like a five day comedy thing and it got covered by the New York Times and I remember that, like, I did a show in a synagogue like two weeks after the October 7th and I got brought up with that credit and I was like, all right, you don't normally be very proud of this credit. I don't know if this room is exactly.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's a little, it's a it's definitely a sticky subject when it comes to the New York Times. Wait, you're still not supposed to be.
Speaker 2:hold on, I still need to talk about it. Oh, you're still in the green room.
Speaker 1:And then, around October 22, aitan went viral with his Jewish man on the street videos, especially a series called Jewish or anti-Semitic. To date, the video series has over 28 million views and 5 million likes. Since October 7th at, aitan has been posting some amazing content relevant to the war and the rise in anti-Semitism. I honestly don't know how he makes these things funny, but he does, and today we are going to hopefully get inside his brain. Aitan, welcome to the show. Thank you so much for being here.
Speaker 2:Welcome.
Speaker 3:I'm here now definitely wasn't here.
Speaker 1:We're not here. Oh yeah, no.
Speaker 2:Um, yeah, welcome to the show. I don't. We'll start with your name on Instagram. I don't know how many of our followers will get the reference, but it's a very good mighty docs reference, I'm assuming.
Speaker 3:No, it's not I. It's actually very simple. Where I my name is, it's aton the goalie. Um, and my name is aton and I play goalie, and uh, that's the extent of the name.
Speaker 2:I went so much further with with my explanation aton the goalie Goldberg. The goalie Goldberg is Jewish goalie and the mighty docs Aton lifted that and made it his Instagram name.
Speaker 3:No, this is what happens if you make your email when you're in like sixth grade and it just sticks.
Speaker 1:That's hilarious, like this was a.
Speaker 3:It was my first email and then it kind of just like stuck all the way through.
Speaker 2:That is way different than the story I told myself. That's just for sure. This was a mighty docs reference.
Speaker 3:This is more sophisticated.
Speaker 2:Yeah, we can do that.
Speaker 1:So let's start from the beginning before we get into the like, like relevant stuff, Like can you tell us more about your journey into the world of comedy and how you got started as a comedian and writer?
Speaker 3:You know, I actually think that we can. Um, okay, I'll give you a broad career breakdown and then I I think that just my comedy journey and my life journey and to why I've been able, why I think that I've been able to like joke about October, everything after October 7th has been I've been able to do, and that's just because I'm from a Holocaust survivor's grandparents. I had cancer when I was a kid, you know, and my family was always very, very funny. So you know the Levines are inherent way that we parse information and we parse trauma is usually through comedy. So I do think that growing up in you know, an environment where my mom is making the funniest jokes I've ever heard in my entire life about the Holocaust. You know, like that's just like the way it is. I remember my grandmother is was always like very like well to do, very dressed. You know makeup. You know always like dressed to the nines. And I remember one time I was on the phone with my mom and she, very off hand it, just made some comment Like you know, when Bobby was in the Holocaust, she was in barric 13, but she would always be caught in barric 14 because they had the better mirror, you know. So, like growing up with stuff like that, or like my dad going like you know how they punish the Jews in the Holocaust they had your grandmother cook for her. You know, it's just like there was this like inherent, like just dark comedy that I was raised with and then when I was 10, I got cancer and you know it very much transferred over there where like it's the worst thing that can happen, you know. But it was a lot of, you know, laughing. It was a lot of acknowledging the awful stuff that is happening and then at certain points, you know, you just have to laugh at it and say, like this is so uncontrollable and so terrible. Um, I think that that's given me a basis. I think that's why so many Jews have been able to make I think. I think, like Jewish comedy after October 7th has been like pretty decent and it's been because, you know, we've been forced to deal with trauma and deal with this stuff for years and years and years. Um, my background, you know, is that I was a I do stand up comedy since I was 15. I won Israel's last comic standing in 2008. I don't think it ever aired anywhere, but I came back to America.
Speaker 3:In college I was touring as a standup. I did a lot of like Hill Hall, habbahs and colleges and stuff like that. After college I worked as a journalist and I was a writer for this place, heavycom, which was like a bro website that I thankfully was able to get out of. I went over to Mashable where I was a fellow at Mashable for a while. After Mashable I was given my first full-time writing job at Elite Daily where I was covering internet and celebrity gossip. I used to write like five or six articles about the Kardashians every day. Absolutely loved it and the videos took off and they did this like three-part mini-documentary series on me where I did a bunch of weird jobs. I was in the paparazzi in LA for a week. I was in Brighamley Brothers Circus for a couple of days and then what I always like to point out is you guys know the musical Hamilton.
Speaker 1:Of course yeah.
Speaker 3:Got all I wrote the adult cinema version of it. That got made called Hamilton and won two AVN awards for it. Eight, stop it. Yeah, here we go. Oh my God.
Speaker 1:I swear to God, wait, can I tell you something? You're real, so I've been to the AVN.
Speaker 3:You're not ready.
Speaker 1:So I've been to the AVN awards twice. I used to work. Fun Fact, I used to work for an adult movie production company.
Speaker 3:Not as H-Thor which one.
Speaker 1:In Montreal. It's guys years, it's like in the year 2005 or something like that. I was like 22 years old and it was a job like while I was in college and I just got the job and it was kind of awesome because it was like female owned and so they sent me two years in a row to the AVN convention and it was like the best and it was in it's in Vegas. So it's like the best time, yeah, and it was the funniest thing. It's so, so funny.
Speaker 3:It was, it was I got. So I dressed up as like Alexander Hamilton. It got to like walk down the red carpet and stuff like that.
Speaker 1:Were you in it, were you in the film.
Speaker 3:No, no, no, no. You know it's funny. I the whole thing that happened was that I got to pitch. I got to pitch the porn.
Speaker 1:Can I say porn on this? I don't know how to use this thing. You can swear, you can do all the things. I got to pitch the porn.
Speaker 3:I got to pitch the porn to Wood Rocket Studios. Wood Rocket Studios is famous for doing parody porn like Stroke Aemon and Fap to the Future and Sponge Knop, square Balls and all of that stuff. And I pitched to them Hamilton, and it got made, and the funniest story from this is that so like it got caught in like development hell. After it got written I wrote like 10% of the script that they ended up using. I came up with the name. Someone else like wrote the music and everything and I remember. So it gets delayed. And then at some point the I get a call, sorry, and then Elite Daily shuts down, elite Daily gets sold or something, so we all get fired. So like six months after we all get fired, I get a call from a friend of mine who goes like hey, aiton, I just want to say like they're making the porn. Like they are like I got hired to do the music for it and I was like oh, that's crazy.
Speaker 3:I thought that they canceled, I thought that they weren't making it in the end. So I call the guy in charge of the studio and I go like hey, are you guys making the porn? He's like yeah, we've been trying to email you and I'm like oh, you know, they shut off my email cause. Everyone got fired and he was like oh, we've also been tweeting at you, but I never got the tweets and my name is Aiton Levine. So that just means that somewhere there's a dude named Aiton Levine who's getting a bunch of tweets from Wood Rockets Studio on his Twitter, just being like hey, dude, we're making your porno and it's like the most Jewish name of all time, so there's gotta be someone that's like Maryam, I don't know what porno they're talking about. You know, I put the Twitter, leave me. Anyway, that's all we're here to talk about, but that is one of the many credits.
Speaker 1:Wait, this is great. I did not anticipate this conversation to lead to porn, but it's all good.
Speaker 2:We are off the rails.
Speaker 1:You got two. I love it. I'm gonna. I need to see this now. I need to see this. We're gonna have to.
Speaker 2:Do you have a good picture of you holding both of the awards that we can use to promo this?
Speaker 3:Yeah, I just want to throw everybody off the scent of what we're really gonna talk about.
Speaker 2:They have no idea what this conversation is.
Speaker 3:You know, the thing is why I think I was able to do stuff at the ABNs was because, you know, like it wasn't like I was there, like oh, this is cool, I'm porn guy, you know, it was so fish out of water, like I went to Jewish day school.
Speaker 1:So, speaking of what did your mom say about you know Jewish moms, like, how did she feel about it?
Speaker 3:My mom, the opening scene. I can send you the doc stuff that we never released yet. There's a larger story here. But like I called my mom and I go mommy, I'm going to write the porn. I've got to go to Vegas to write this porn. And she just goes no, you're not. We're an Orthodox Jewish family. Your sisters will never get married. I would rather you join ISIS than do this to me. And then I just like what? And it was what. And then when I got, my mom hates it. And you know what's funny, we got the trophies, and trophies are like two people embracing each other. So I, when we got them, I was like. I was like mommy, like you don't have to worry, in honor of you guys, I named the mister and Mrs Wayne will be in the end. My mom was like stop bringing this on our family.
Speaker 1:I'm sure she's very proud of you, though it's just tough, you know. Jewish mothers, you know you're not a doctor, you're not a lawyer, you're not an accountant you know what I mean.
Speaker 2:So it's kind of like what did your mom say about you working at the studio? Or just how she's gonna find out.
Speaker 1:So she was kind of like no, she knew Actually. Well, when I was in Vegas for the AVNs like my parents were also in Vegas at the same time and my dad kept. And my parents are Israeli, so I think Israelis are a little bit more like laid back when it comes to stuff like that. So my dad's like get me Tiki, it's new Yala, let's go together.
Speaker 1:I'm like dad, I'm not taking you to the porn convention. He's like come on, let's get me Tiki and I took a bunch of photos that day. He's like let me see the photos and it's like me with like Jenna Jamieson and like these like huge porn stars, like hugging me and like it was funny.
Speaker 3:He was cool.
Speaker 1:He was like I'm next.
Speaker 3:The thing about the AVNs? First of all, I bet like the top 100 porn stars Like and it was also crazy because it was right before. Like only fans happened, so now they're all billionaires, which is hilarious. The thing about the AVNs is that if you have like a porn addiction, if you go to the AVNs because it's overload, like you'll never look at porn again, like it is plastered on the walls. It's like just so much all at once. It's like if you like cake, like this is like being baked into a cake and then you have to eat your way out.
Speaker 1:It's kind of true, like the expo, it's like exposure therapy. Like when I worked at the company I was working for, like one of my jobs when I walked into the office every day was to choose a porn and to put it in the DVD and like. So every day I was like with my coworker. I'm like, do we want, like you know, like these weird names that I don't even want to say?
Speaker 3:like on air. Just put that like, do you?
Speaker 1:want this one or this one Like what are we feeling today?
Speaker 2:You know background music, what, what?
Speaker 1:Well, yeah, cause we put it in like the waiting room.
Speaker 3:Like it rips off. Yeah, so we, yeah, you know, yeah, you don't like how you go into, like you don't like how when you go to a hospital, they have CNBC playing.
Speaker 1:So we're playing porn.
Speaker 3:It's like, and it's like, 9 am.
Speaker 1:I'm like with my Tim Horton's coffee, cause we're in Canada, right, and like, like and you just get so desensitized by it, because it's like you see it every day, that it's just like not a big deal. Anyway, enough with the porn.
Speaker 3:We do have a lot of questions I have to like stop it there. And now we move to the Israel-Palestine War For the worst time in our people's lives.
Speaker 1:So you're. I want to talk about your Jewish man on the street. Videos, which is before October 7th, gain tremendous popularity. What inspired you to create this series and how do you navigate humor when addressing sensitive topics like Jewish identity and antisemitism?
Speaker 3:Okay. So the idea for the thing came from, and it's interesting that the original idea for it was because I listen Jews. Occasionally we use the term antisemitic very loosely, very freely. That being said, I say that all pre-October 7th, I think. Like October 7th, the metrics on this have very much changed. I do think, though, that, as a people I think we all acknowledge that we occasionally have made ourselves gatekeepers of what trauma is and stuff like that, and we've used the term antisemitic occasionally just like a little bit too loosely. You know, it's almost like how we are being labeled as Zionists. Now, you know what I mean, when, if you just like use the term just because it's a term that you hear all the time, then occasionally it loses meaning. So the concept of antisemitism when I came up with the Jewish or antisemitic, it was just like an idea that like listen, either things are Jewish or they're not Jewish and they hate Judaism. So that was what the idea for it was was to kind of play off that idea, and the Jewish or antisemitic game was like, if I would just say a regular word like the Pope, you know the Pope Jewish or antisemitic. Like the Pope said Jewish, he's old Jewish guy, you know, like he's vibes Jewish. You know Christianity, though, is antisemitic, you know. So the idea was just to play on concepts of like if something is Jewish, then it is not really Jewish. If something isn't Jewish, then it is inherently not just not Jewish, it is inherently antisemitic. That being said, so that video series did very, very well. You know, I still do it. I release like new videos of it every like week or so.
Speaker 3:Then October 7th kind of happened, and October 7th, after the response after October 7th, has been one of the most surreal experiences on a personal and like an internet level. Like I get called kike all the time, like if I put up a video that is about bagels, it gets free Gaza. You know, palestinian flags over all of it, which is very frustrating because, like I sympathize, I hated Netanyahu. I'm a fucking liberal Jew. I, if you're acting like I'm some sort of like Israel is without rebuke, israel's without retribution, like I'm not the devil for it. So it was always very shocking that I would have people use that language against me, and it was almost like they were co-opting the concept of like Palestinian suffering to just attack me in my common thread. So it was very personal. That's the thing that I've been getting like a lot on the internet.
Speaker 3:The personal side of it has been seeing how, like the global response has been denying that stuff has happened. You know it's very close friends, people that like I see on a frequent basis, you know in the comedy community and stuff like that, have said things that are like full on, like a just hatred towards Jews and Jews specifically, denying atrocities that happened to us, just because it is Jewish or just because it goes against the thing that they believe in. Because that would involve them acknowledging that it's a gray area. A friend of mine named Amy, who's a comic in the city I'll say Amy Shanker, she's open about this, but like she had a post where she was. Like if I had been in Israel, like I go to those kinds of raids, like I go to the beaches there, if I had been killed, the response from people in the comedy community in New York and people that I know would be very much like, hey, she deserved it, or there would be no caring. Like I know that.
Speaker 3:Like if something had happened to me or my family who lives there I family that lives there the response wouldn't have been like oh, aeton, I'm very sorry. Here is sympathy, here is, you know, like what can I do? I know the response now would be to attack me and my family and, to you know, deny the awful stuff that has happened. So it's, it's the worst time. All of that being said, the stuff I was saying about the cancer, the stuff I was saying about the Holocaust earlier I have no other way to parse this information. It is what it is. So whenever I make these videos that talk about anti-Semitism, that talk about the rise anti-Semitic hate crimes that have happened, it gets filtered through a very comedic way and there's a very frustrating tone. I think I've taken a lot of my videos because so much of it is from a place of throwing my hands up in the air and going like, what do you want me to fucking say? It is what it is. Does that answer any questions? Yeah, no, absolutely.
Speaker 1:You actually answered a few of my questions because I think, as a comedian, it must be really hard to take something that's really so tragic and so painful. I consider myself a funny-ish like. I'm not a comedian, but I'm a funny-ish person. I keep things light and lighthearted and even through my own social media I've channeled this anger towards. I'm a liberal Jew too, but I'm Israeli and my whole family lives in Israel. And seeing people that I've worked with my peers go against Israel and not even message me and say, hey, how are you doing? Or hey, I would love to learn more what happens, listening and learning what happened to when it directly affects me I'm talking about people who are not Jewish, not Palestinian, who have no skin in the game, who don't even know where it is on the map, putting in their two cents and not even acknowledging the pain of the people who are actually involved, it's hard for me to be just like fuck all you anti-Semites.
Speaker 3:I think what you're speaking to, about the fact that it's so often as people that are not involved, is so frustrating the people. I don't know why. I know Jews failed. We failed the marketing test. I don't think that we did a good job of explaining what is happening there. I think it's bullshit when the ADL and the ACLU and fucking Jew belong and stuff like that, they're the ones in charge of the messaging and branding behind this and that is why you have fucking people in the Midwest who think that Israel is exactly the same thing as Nazi Germany and it's because we lost the branding argument there.
Speaker 3:I think that when I see people, it's also weird because I don't fucking trust the Nittanyahu controlling the war there. I agree, I feel awful. I have nothing but horror for what is happening to Palestinians and at the same time, I'm like whoa. The response has been just factually inaccurate in a way that rings every single anti-Jewish dog whistle throughout history this past week and the fucking blood libel went trending because of the Khabad stuff. Clearly there's bigger repercussions.
Speaker 3:We talk about what has happened on college campuses, which is weirdly a thing that I've had some exposure to because they performed in Hillel houses and stuff the messaging that was going out to kids who thought that they could act this way against Jews, against the Hillel houses, because of their sense of Israel, without acknowledging that if you want a kosher meal on campus, then you have to go to the Hillel. Why was that nuance never taught to these kids? There's just so many things that we failed to explain an entire situation over there and it left the door open to get the entire Palestinian cause taken under by BLM and by other minority. Very rightful and very just I don't know how to say it protest or causes in America.
Speaker 3:I do police brutality very real, very awful. I have marched anti-abortion very real, very. I've marched, I've donated, I've done all those things. It is so fucking crazy that the Palestinian cause, in a very specific way, has been co-opted by these. It's like, oh, there's no space for us at the anti-abortion rally because I think that there should be a two-state solution. That is what it has become.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's a mind fuck, especially as a liberal Jew.
Speaker 2:I think you nailed it with the. There seems to have developed this blueprint for mobilizing and protesting, starting during the pandemic. That has just. It's almost like a one-size-fits-all thing where you pick your team.
Speaker 1:Pick your side, yeah.
Speaker 2:But the interesting thing that came to me when you were talking about it is I remember so specifically during BLM, when the conversation started happening and the movement to educate became part of the equation, where it was very clear early on it is not your African American friends responsibility to educate on what is happening. During this time that was something that was front and center Don't ask them to educate you on this. Go out and do it. Then it's almost the reverse now during this, where the vocal minority is like you guys need to educate yourselves. As if we would have told the BLM activists during that time if we went to the other side and were like no, you guys need to educate yourselves on why you're wrong. It's like this crazy reversal of what has happened where not.
Speaker 1:People are telling me in my DMs what is and what isn't anti-Semitic. Are you kidding me? That's crazy.
Speaker 3:Absolutely crazy. It is absolutely insane. Another major thing that has happened I don't think people acknowledge enough and we're going to put on a little bit of a conspiracy theory had here. We love it 2016, when we were talking about the Facebook ad issues, where Russia was using internet misinformation, and then we're using them to turn the right wing extreme and they used Facebook ads and Instagram ads and all of those platforms correctly. They were able to fuck with the algorithm and that was how there was so much anger. It was how Trump ended up winning. I don't doubt that there is foreign involvement in how so much of this information is being pushed out there and how the algorithm is handing it, but it's proven, it's proven, though I just saw an article today.
Speaker 1:Qatar is sponsoring this school program in Brooklyn, this public school program.
Speaker 3:No, no, no, no. I'm not even talking about that. I'm talking about the algorithm specifically. I'm saying that I was on the internet, I worked, I was a journalist. I was specifically a digital media journalist in 2016. I was working in this field in 2016.
Speaker 3:And the thing that you would like the thing one of the reasons why Hillary lost the election was because there was all that Russia misinformation that was getting pushed out very effectively onto different social media platforms Years later. It was that Sheryl Sandberg, I think, was the one that had to resign because of it, because she was accepting foreign ad revenue and stuff like that During those elections, knowing that it was misinformation, knowing that it was like making the situation worse. I don't doubt that right now, so much of the information and the tone of the information, the lack of nuance and the tribalism on both sides getting hit each other, I don't doubt that there is some sort of other entity out there. I don't doubt that the Qataris are out there. I don't doubt that there is someone else that is kind of making this worse.
Speaker 1:A hundred percent Like TikTok, like TikTok is. I can't even go on TikTok. Oh my God, tiktok is absolutely fucking crazy.
Speaker 3:And also I see a dead person on TikTok every day. That is like it's just, it's wild. Now I see a lot of hoof trimming and a lot of people, a lot of what Hoof trimming. I don't go to bed without three hours of hoof talk every day.
Speaker 2:We're just going to be that, no context. Yeah.
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 1:You know, hoof talk, hoof talk. No, I've never.
Speaker 3:I didn't hear about that, oh, let me tell you right now, what is hoof talk?
Speaker 2:It's the elevator pitch on hoof talk.
Speaker 3:It's just, you're watching dudes trim hooves and you think it's nothing and you just I'm telling you, go to the hoof. Gp, it's just the way that they treat cow. I'm not crazy. I've said this on stage and I've had large chunks of the audience go. Okay, this is a. He has millions of followers of GP.
Speaker 1:Okay, we're gonna have to go down the rabbit ball.
Speaker 2:This is road tested. We are the weirdos for not knowing what it is.
Speaker 1:You know you're a New York based Comedian. Like, let's talk about New York a little bit. A little love to the New York City. What do you think sets the comedy scene in New York apart from other places, and how has it shaped your comedic style?
Speaker 3:Okay. So I think back in the day I will say that there's like a little bit of a shift now where it used to be the only way to get to rise the ranks was to be in, you know, la, new York, chicago for a while. You know I I Thankfully, like the pandemic has made it so that you can really really really have like career traction and live in other, in other States. Now I will say a very not a controversial thing amongst the comedy community, but New York is honestly the worst audience city in the world. If you want to do Shows for better audiences, longer sets in bigger rooms, you have to go out of New York to kind of get that. If there's one thing that I kind of like regret you know I kind of started in New York it is that I didn't get like the years of smaller like a city. You know feet, you know I 10,000 hours in like a smaller city In New York though Forces you because of who you're going up against and who you're following and stuff like that.
Speaker 3:You have to have like top-notch material like I think that the in other cities what I've talked to people have come up in other cities, the thing that they comment on the most is that, like you know, at open mics you'll give a joke in other cities, the joke that people laugh at more stuff. You know people will give jokes a little bit more of a leash. I love a little more like yeah, I'm like a leeway with it in New York. I think people are so like expecting the best, especially like in the open mics where you're seeing the best comedy. People will cut jokes earlier because you're like oh no, this is bullshit. You know, this is a. This is crazy. So I think it forces you to like really hone material and like just Get better at coming up with material quicker. That is like good.
Speaker 1:Love that. What so what's? Do you have any like upcoming projects that you want to promote or talk about?
Speaker 2:Let me also ask you real quick before you answer, that is, do you ever perform in comedy clubs? Because I feel like every show that you promote is in a deli, is in your apartment, yeah, the synagogue. Like you do comedy in so many Different, like very different places, is it? And obviously that's intentional, but like it, it's so funny to me that, like every show I see promoted is some random ass place.
Speaker 3:No, you know what you're actually. That's a good question because you know I, first of all, I do perform in a lot of clubs. In New York comedy club, where you guys saw me, I perform at your stand in New York. You know Caroline's was a Broadway renaissance. You know I perform at all the last stop in a sorry, the last tour in Jersey City. I have a bunch of shows coming up on during the pandemic when all of the the comedy club shut down. You know all the regular ways that people were performing. They shut down.
Speaker 3:So it forced the comedy community in you know to kind of like figure out ways to make their own shows. You know there was a whole movement of outdoor park shows that happened, you know, in 2020 through like 2021, 2022, I that you know, all of a sudden, like you just had to learn how to make your own show and doing that, it forced a lot of comedians to learn a couple things, like you need a spotlight that was the thing we didn't know about. You know how do you have a microphone outside? You know, like what are all of these things that it forced you know, the comedy community to learn just how to kind of just make pop-up shows in random spaces and those pop-up shows became very big. Those pop-up shows have led to major juggernauts like comedy you up or the sorry don't tell. Comedy is massive. Now don't tell. Comedy you can make the argument At this point is at is bigger than comedy central in a lot of respects. So you know the scene in general. We learned how to put up these pop-up shows. I love these pop-up shows because you could control the space a lot more and I've been fortunate enough to do a lot of pop-up shows in Very random places PJ Bernstein's, by the way. On January 25th we're gonna be going out there and doing another PJ Bernstein show.
Speaker 3:I Apartment fest happened. You know it was in my apartment. Now I that the idea for a pertinent fest is the second one that we did. The first one was in 2019, for my best is a weekend of shows that are in my living room. In 2019 I came up with the idea because I had gotten rejected from a comedy festival in Boston that I never applied to.
Speaker 2:They just rejected what they just say Don't even think about it.
Speaker 3:Yeah, they were like just letting you know you didn't get in here. I was like I, who are you guys? So so that was like festivals are a joke. Like I can just make my own festival. So I could just make a joking festival. So I, as a joke, I made a logo and I made a submission form for comics and I was planning on just doing one kind of show, which was gonna be 10 people in my apartment and 137 comics apply.
Speaker 3:Because we're all desperate and when they all applied I had to like expand it. So I made like four shows, so it's gonna be like a weekend of shows. And then all of a sudden, because I had a weekend of shows, I was able to go out against sponsors. So we got like sticky sphinger joint gave a bunch of like chicken fingers and fries and New Belgium brewery gave us like 10 cases of beer and stuff like that and turned into like a big thing. You know, we ended up having like 50 comics perform over the four shows. Over the weekend. We had an industry panel which I thought was hilarious. Two people got representation out of the festival.
Speaker 3:My favorite story with it, though, is that I, when we got the first day of the festival, I got jury duty, so I had to go to New Jersey to serve jury duty. So I get there and I make it past the first round and I get into, like the, the actual courtroom, and they tell us, you know, they give us the whole like spiel, and then they hand us a pamphlet and they go we're gonna break for lunch, but in this pamphlet are the dates for the trial. If you can't do these dates, you have to let us know. So I see one of the dates is that started the festival. So I, during lunch, I get blade, I get so high like so, so so, stoned outside of the courthouse. I then walk back into the courthouse, reeking of me perfect. I walk up to the judge and I go your honor, which is the look. I actually said that I said your honor. I go to the judge and I go your honor.
Speaker 3:I am in charge of a comedy festival in my apartment that is happening this weekend, and I need I'm getting chicken, that is being I have to pick up the chicken. I have to get the chicken from the store to the, to the to the apartment and so I can't be there for that day. But what I could do, your honor, is you could record the trial and then I could listen to the audio and let you guys know how I am, as I'm saying that he goes, stop talking and I go, okay, and then I start walking. Oh yeah, I could go. It's like you walk that way for a second. So I start walking and as I'm walking I hear the other four lawyers in unison. Just go, you can dismiss him. That's how you get out of jury duty noted we're in New Jersey.
Speaker 3:We're in New.
Speaker 1:Jersey.
Speaker 3:This was I was registered at. It says is newer Okay, yeah, I was registered to vote in Jersey, interesting.
Speaker 1:So so, yeah, they tell us, like, what you have going on, so people can check out and all this stuff.
Speaker 3:Yeah, totally so apartment fest which got New York Times coverage is we're doing shows here occasionally and.
Speaker 3:We've also partnered up with. You know, bregg don't tell comedy, who has like a million and a half YouTube followers. They're absolutely massive. So they're doing we have two shows here in February. On February 17th I'm doing PJ Bernstein's the deli. We did a show there on Christmas and the show crushed and they're having us back. So we're gonna do it again on January 25th. The YouTube I started the, the tick tock, the Instagram follow me on all of that stuff. You know I do try to cover the anti-semitic stuff with a little bit of humor. You know. Hopefully you guys all like it out there.
Speaker 1:You're doing an amazing job.
Speaker 3:We love you.
Speaker 1:Okay, last question. I'm trying, yes, yes, yes, hopefully they're right too much.
Speaker 3:No, you're amazing.
Speaker 1:I like we could talk to you for hours, but I know you're on a time crunch. I have one last question. Top three favorite places to eat in New York City go oh.
Speaker 3:Oh, okay, p, I said the first one. The number one, like there's no number two, is the straw me queen on the upper.
Speaker 1:East, wow, okay.
Speaker 3:I'm a queen on the upper East side, has the best for straw me in New York better than the other straw me is Mm-hmm, it's different, is a big thing about it?
Speaker 3:Cat's is. Is Cat's is, you're eating a pile of cow and it's awesome. It's like truly, truly awesome. P J Pistroma, queen's, a little bit of a different, a little bit of a different. Five, it's like a sandwich, you know. Um, that's number one. Number two Is at fay da bakery. Um, which is a Japanese bakery. The mochi at fay da bakery is, I think, one of my favorite like single bite things in New York. Uh, the mango mochi is absolutely unreal. There's one that what used to be my grandmother's house, it's not kosher. Uh, so I would. On the way out, it was what I used to get on the subway home. Uh, but uh, that would. So that's number two. Number three is um, my god, wait, this is normally an easy question. I had, you know, I recently had the tuna melt at uh, at s and p, and that was like phenomenal. Um, I mean.
Speaker 3:But yeah, I would say that tuna melt at s and p was really freaking. Good, yeah, that's what I'll say. I think we can look at that. Okay, yeah, we'll lock that in there. I love it, thank you. So what's your favorite? Oh my god, here we go.
Speaker 1:Yeah, we can't do this now.
Speaker 2:I can't.
Speaker 3:What is it?
Speaker 2:No, I can't if you had to give me your number one.
Speaker 1:Just give me your number one in New York City, or just in general.
Speaker 3:No, in New York I'm thinking of New.
Speaker 1:York specifically um, off the top of my head, uh, probably, uh, qval in brooklyn, which is a really good israeli restaurant, all the israeli restaurants like bala busta isn't like amazing? Like I don't know, I'm thinking 19 cleveland 19, cleveland. Like I don't know, I think every israeli restaurant is like my favorite. Like tony and I have a goal of eating at every israeli restaurant in New york city.
Speaker 2:No.
Speaker 3:Good luck. There's a lot of jews.
Speaker 1:Way more than I thought actually.
Speaker 3:I mean, you know, last year I was, I was I hosted a show on amazon. Uh, for about a year, uh, I hit a daily sport show and uh, the kairi thing would happen while I was on the daily sport show on amazon and I remember, uh, during a moment when I talk about like how there's like this frustrated comedy thing where you just say a crazy fact and it's like very funny, I remember that I was debating with someone about the kairi thing and I just was like there's so many jews in brooklyn and that was my entire thesis behind the hatred for for kairi. I was like what are you? I was like why are we even bringing him here? He's a flat earther. The kairi thing was always very funny to me because the pipeline between flat earthers and anti semi, it's like right size of an elbow.
Speaker 3:It's the same, you know, it's literally the same so bottom to the most jewy population of all time, and they're like uh, a little, work out sports.
Speaker 2:You know sports on that note a time.
Speaker 1:Thank you so much for being on the show. It was a pleasure. We could talk to you forever and we'll tell everybody to follow you and we'll follow you and we'll probably come to your One of your shows pretty soon.
Speaker 3:So yeah, we would love to come out. Uh, you got to come to the apartment show at february 17th.
Speaker 1:Okay, we'll be there. We'll be there.
Speaker 2:Sick. Are there gonna be chicken fingers and do you need help picking them up?
Speaker 3:Oh yeah, you gotta get me these shoes. I am during juridine that day. I gotta get out of my way there.
Speaker 2:Awesome. Thank you so much. Thank you so much.