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Oh. Thank you so much
for coming.

- Thank you for being here.

Thank you for watching.
My name is Alex Edelman.

I'm a comedian,
and I'm gonna tell you a story.

I'm gonna tell you a story

about something
that happened to me.

But first I wanna tell you

about something
that happened to this gorilla.

- Ooh. Okay.

So there's this gorilla
named Koko.

Has everyone heard
of Koko the gorilla?

- Yes. Some for yeses.

Koko the gorilla,

for those of you
that don't know,

is a gorilla that spoke
fluent sign language.

And in 1999, this is true,
Koko met Robin Williams.

And a couple of years ago,
they told Koko

that Robin Williams
had passed away.

And Koko went,
"Koko friend, Koko sad."

Aw!
- Yes, which is sad,

but on the plus side,
how funny was Robin Williams,

that even gorillas are like,
"This guy!"

-"He's unbelievable."

My comedy barely works

if you're not
from the Upper West Side.

Robin Williams crossed
the species barrier.

- Brilliant comedian.

Also, and obviously,
did they have to tell...

...the gorilla
that Robin Williams

had passed away?

She wasn't gonna catch it on CNN
or anything like that.

I heard about this
in, like, September of 2017

and I couldn't stop imagining

somebody walking
into a gorilla enclosure,

just like, "No. I'll do it.
I'll do it. Let me."

-"Hi, Koko?"

-"Can you put down the banana?"

"We have some bad news."

And they tell Koko
and Koko's like...

- "Oh, no."

-"But Prince is fine, right?"

Like, "Get the gun. Koko. Koko,
calm down." And Koko's like,

"Why was the last
David Bowie album so sad?"

- And they're like, "Koko!"

And Koko's like,
"What else do you know--"

And they're like, "Koko, no."
And Koko's like...

And they're like, "Koko, no."
And Koko's like,

"Who is the president
right now?"

Those are the kind of jokes
I write.

I write jokes
that are so dumb and simple

that part of it is like,

"Oh, I can't believe
someone took the time

- to think about that."

"I can't believe
that someone thought

that was worth informing
an audience of."

I can't believe--
This is true sadly,

that in the middle
of a pandemic,

someone spent 500 dollars

on sign language lessons
over Zoom...

...for a joke about a gorilla.

I love a dumb joke.
I love a silly joke.

It's my job. It's my currency.

I wrote a joke a while ago
that was so dumb,

it took a month
and a half to realize

it was actually too dumb
to ever grace a stage.

- Here it is.

I don't think I've ever seen
a fat horse.

I don't think I've ever seen
a fat horse.

Maybe that's because

they get four times
as many steps as we do.

- I... I know, I know.

And a month and a half later,

I was walking through
a Whole Foods

and out of nowhere I was like...

-"Twice as many steps."

They don't have
eight goddamn legs.

- It's twice as many steps.

And that's what
this show was gonna be

when I started writing it.

It was gonna be
a show full of benign silliness,

like I've done
my whole comedy life,

and then something happened.

So, I write radio comedy shows
for the BBC.

Nobody listens to these things.

- No one.

People my age don't even know
what a radio comedy show is.

Like, I'll tell people,
"I write radio comedy shows."

And they're like,
"What's a radio comedy show?"

And I have to explain
that it's like a podcast,

but for the dying.

And like,
this radio show comes out

and there's this massive wave
of indifference, right?

No one cares.
It's a radio comedy show.

But there are two tweets.
Just two.

And one tweet's
actually very nice.

It's very complimentary,

because the tweet
is from my Aunt Nancy

- in Teaneck, New Jersey.

- And it said--

Her fans are everywhere,
of course.

And the second tweet

is from someone
I'm not related to.

And this guy's just listened
to the show.

And this guy's very upset.

And this guy's very upset,
largely by the fact that I...

- ...am a Jew.

And sometimes people can tell
that I'm Jewish

because of my name, or my face,

or anything
about my personality.

But this guy's very upset
by the fact that I'm Jewish,

and he lets me know,
and I make a mistake.

- I respond to the tweet. I know.

And then he writes back
and then I write back,

and then he writes back,

and then other people
get involved.

And then I go to bed,
and I wake up the next morning,

and my Twitter feed,

it's just this avalanche
of antisemitism.

Nothing but anti--
And it bothered me.

It's never fun to see
that stuff directed at you.

And then it stopped bothering me

because I started adding
these people to a Twitter list.

Do you guys know
what I mean, generally

- when I say Twitter lists?

A couple of yeses,

- a couple of blank stares.
All right, fine.

By the way, you don't...

you don't need to know
what this is. I promise you,

it's an obscure function
of a dying platform.

- Like, you don't truly need
to know.

But on Twitter--
Yeah...

But on Twitter, the way it works

is you follow folks.
You know that,

you follow people,
everybody knows.

But imagine you're interested
in, like, a common area.

Imagine you're interested
in, like, opera or the NBA,

but you don't feel
like following

a whole bunch of NBA players.

What you can do is,

you can make
a list of NBA players

and then follow that list

and check it occasionally, right?

So I did that,
but with anti-Semites.

And because of certain issues
within the NBA at the moment,

there would indeed
be some crossover

between the two lists.

But I made this list
of anti-Semites

and I like it immediately.

I like it for two reasons.

Reason number one,
let them be on a list for once!

- Okay? Okay?

Even Schindler, not a Jew,
we make the list now.

And reason number two,

these guys got a notification

when they were added
to the list.

- And the name of this list,

and they saw this
when they were added,

was Jewish National Fund
contributors.

And I got so many tweets
from anti-Semites going,

"Take me off your goddamn list."

-"I have never contributed

to the Jewish National Fund."

And I would always write back,
"There's still time."

"We're planting a million trees
outside of Haifa,

be part of the Zionist dream."

And I love my list.

I love my list
for these two silly reasons,

but then I get to love it
for a third reason,

which is that it's got
all of the worst opinions on it.

And that's one of the reasons
you go on social media.

- Right? You wanna be offended.

Right? Same reason you watch
cable news.

You're not a moron, you know
you're not getting real news.

But you get to be upset.

Right? You get to be upset
at something

someone on the other team
did or didn't do,

or something they did
or didn't say.

And I have a list.

I have a digital terrarium
of assholes.

And occasionally,

with great sanctimony,
obviously,

I go down the list and be like,
"Oh, my God, that's so racist.

Oh, my God, that's so sexist.

Oh, my God,
that's so homophobic.

I don't have
any of these opinions.

I'm such a good boy."

Anyway, it's a Tuesday night
and I'm doing my favorite thing.

When I'm alone,

my favorite thing to do
is I lie on my couch

and I hold my phone
like an otter,

- like an inch from my face.

Do you know what I mean?
Just a brisk nine,

ten hours in a row,
just going like this?

And I see this tweet
from someone on the list.

And the tweet says, "Hey!"

-"Hey."

"If you live in NYC

and you have questions
about your Whiteness,

come to 441, 27th Avenue,"
which is in Queens,

"Tomorrow night at 9:15."

- And I saw the tweet.

And I thought to myself,
I live in NYC.

And as an Ashkenazi Jew,

I have some questions
about my Whiteness.

And I'm free tomorrow night
at 9:15.

And I took a screen grab.
I took a picture of the tweet.

And I sent it to my best friend
in the world,

this guy named David Burstein.

And I wrote,
"David...

...do you wanna come with me
to this meeting of Nazis

- in Queens?"

And I saw the three dots
on the iPhone,

that means
someone's texting you back.

And then the dots disappeared,
then they reappeared,

- then they disappeared again.

And then he called me.

And he said, "What's going on?"

And I said,
"I'm gonna go to this Nazi bar."

And he said, "Why?"
And I said,

"I'm gonna listen
to everything they have to say.

I will learn something.
It'll be fascinating,

- illuminating."
- And he's like,
"You're so brave."

And I was like,
"I know, I am so brave."

And the next night around 9:15,
I take the subway into Queens,

and I get off and I walk
to the address of this Nazi bar,

and it's not a bar.

- It's an apartment building.

And I thought to myself...

-"How brave are we?"

It was January. It was so--

I stood outside this building,
freezing, dithering,

for like 20 minutes,
being like, "Maybe I'm an idiot.

Maybe my mouth is writing checks
that my butt can't cash."

And there was one moment
where I was like,

"Well, obviously
I'm in the wrong place."

But I knew I wasn't.
I knew I was in the right place

'cause there was a sign
on the front door

of this building and the sign
just said third floor,

but it said it
in Comic Sans font,

the most radical
of all the fonts.

And after a while,

I sort of rediscover
the intestines

that I left on the 7 train.

- And I go upstairs...

to the third floor
of this building.

And there's this long corridor,
long,

doors on either side of me,
overhead lighting, bad.

And there's one open door
in this hallway.

And when I walk in,

the first thing I see
in the foyer of this apartment

is this older lady.

She's in her seventies,
at least, or like eighties,

but she moisturizes.

- And like...

And she's got this table
in front of her.

And on this table
is the biggest jigsaw puzzle

I have ever seen.

A jigsaw puzzle.
Here's how big it is.

When I walked in
and I saw the puzzle,

involuntarily,
I just went, "Oh, wow."

And without looking up,
she went,

"12,000 pieces."

She knew exactly
what I was talking about

from, "Oh, wow."

And I said,
"That's so much puzzle."

And she went,
"This isn't even all of it."

"This is, like,
a quarter of the puzzle.

I've been working on this part
for, like, six months."

And I thought to myself,

"You should be further
into that puzzle, probably."

Although,
maybe White supremacists'

- jigsaw puzzles are harder.

You know, 'cause, like,
all the faces look the same.

She's sitting. I'm standing.

We're making small talk
about her tonnage of puzz.

- And like--

And she tells me how much
like, the puzzles mean to her.

And for what it's worth,
I like jigsaw puzzles.

And I like people that do them,
like,

it's a very, like,
thoughtful, fulsome exercise,

there aren't
a ton of those left.

And it's even, like,
a tidy metaphor

for why I'm here, right? Like--

Because, as with the world,
with a puzzle,

you need every piece
for a complete picture.

You need every piece
for a full perspective.

If you're missing
even one piece of your puzzle,

it is suspect or worthless.

But even a metaphorical puzzle,
I can do quicker than this lady.

Like, she's making
zero progress,

and at some point she just went,

"You know the last one
of these...

- took, like, three years."

And I said, "Last one?"

And she points behind herself,
down this hallway.

And I follow her finger.

And as I go down in,
I pass two enormous, framed,

- framed jigsaw puzzles. Framed.

And then to my right,
there's like a threshold.

Like a doorway with no door.

And when I walk through
this threshold,

I'm in this living room.

And it's like a... It's a pretty
spacious living room.

And there's, like,
a hodgepodge of chairs around,

and folks
are walking around talking.

And of all--
Oh, and to my-- Sorry.

To my left,
there's, like, a big table

of, like, pastries
and orange juice.

And even though
I was a little scared,

I was like,
"Oh, sick! Pastries!"

So, I'm eating
this Whites' only muffin.

And on the other side
of the room...

- I see this cute girl.

And this is
how dumb of a moron I am.

I saw the girl and I thought
to myself with no irony...

- you never know.

You never know, right?
You gotta shoot your shot.

So, I put down my racist pastry

- and I went over.

And I said, "Hi, I'm Alex."

And she went,
"Oh, hi, I'm Chelsea."

And we start chatting
and it's good chat.

But a few moments in,
Chelsea just went,

"Ah! Hey, Alex!
The White House! Hmm?"

And I thought to myself,
"This could go... anywhere."

I actually have
a thing for this.

I have a thing for this.

If anyone ever asks you
a question

and you know they want
a specific answer from you,

but you're not sure
what that answer is,

there are four words

that will save you
every single time.

Every--
Sir, sorry to bother you.

Would you mind asking me
if I saw the game last night?

Did you see the game
last night?

Oh, can you believe it?

- Well done.
That was very nice.

Okay. Very nice.
"Can you believe it?"

- Guys, this works. It's amazing.

"Can you believe it?"

It means people's
three favorite things
in a conversation.

It means I know
what you're talking about,

I agree with you,
and most importantly, you talk.

- It works every single time.

By the way,
I'm from New England.

There is
a New England version of this.

If you're ever caught
in a stalled conversation

with a New Englander,
just go, "Fucking Brady, right?"

- It works every single time.

But this is better?

It is evergreen.
"Can you believe it?"

I have a neighbor in L.A.

I never know
what he's talking about.

I use this
in every conversation with him.

He'll be like, "Oh, recycling!"

And I'll be like,
"Can you believe it?"

And he's like, "They should
take it out on Thursdays."

And I'll be like, "Okay."
Or he'll be like,

"Minor League Baseball."

And I'm like,
"Can you believe it?"

And he's like, "They should pay
the players more."

And I'm like, "Absolutely."

And my favorite one ever,
this is like six months ago.

He just went, "Hey, Alex,
the Kennedy assassination."

And I was like,
"Can you believe it?"

And he said, "Bobby did it."

- And I was like, "Oh."

"Well, he got his, didn't he?"
I mean...

"Can you believe it?"

It is a mirror of a question
of an answer, and it works here.

Because she just went,
"The White House! Hmm?"

And I said,
"Can you believe it?"

- And she went off on this rant

about Jared Kushner.

- Trump's Jewish son-in-law,

and she goes off
on how "Kushner and his friends"

are ruining
the Trump administration

and the country.

And I so had to stop myself
from doing

what I desperately wanted to do,

which was go,
"Oh, I hate Jared Kushner.

He sits behind me in synagogue
on the Upper East Side.

- He's so goddamn loud."

That's true, by the way.

It's 1,000 percent true.

Kehilath Jeshurun
on 85th and Lexington,

it's where he goes.
He's fucking loud.

- And he's arrogant.

That's the word. He's so--

Like when they call him up
to the Torah,

he walks up like he wrote it.

He's got a problem,
I'm telling you.

And-- Anyway,

she's off on her rant
about the Kush.

- I'm standing there.

I'm nodding, I'm trying to focus
more on the face,

- less on the opinions, you know.

And we talk for like 15 minutes.

And she does
most of the talking,

which is a red flag,
but not a deal breaker,

- you know.

And after about 15 minutes,

I feel someone kind of, like,
lurking in my periph.

- Like I'm being haunted.

And when I turn around,
there's this guy standing there.

And this guy's sizing me up
with a look on his face

that I would honestly
most accurately describe as...

"This is a Jew!"

Like, "I'm pretty sure
this is a Jew!"

And he said to me,
"Hey, can I help you?"

As if I was gonna be like...

"Yes!

Well, I was on my way
to synagogue for Yom Kippur!

But I got lost
and I stumbled in here.

Do you know if these muffins
is kosher?"

But I tried to be neutral
and I said, "Hey, man."

And he said, "Can I help you?"

And I said,
"I'm here for the thing."

And he said,
"You're here for the meeting?"

And I thought about saying,
"Can you believe it?"

But I had just used it,
so I said,

"Yeah, man,
I'm here for the meeting."

And he said,
"Chelsea, he's with you?"

And Chelsea just went,

"Oh...

...we just met,
but he seems cool."

And I thought to myself, "Nice."

- You never know, right?

And then this guy,
like, fumfers for--

Like this guy's
not quite sure what to say.

But when he recovered,
he just said,

"Okay. All right. But who is he?

Excuse me, who are you?

Like, what's your name?"

Here's the thing.

- Here's the thing. Growing up...

...I always wanted to be White.

- Yeah, yes.

I'm aware there are a few of you
looking at me like,

-"Mission accomplished, buddy."

"Does he not...?" I am White.

I'm definitely White.
But I grew up in a place

where there were different kinds
of White people.

I grew up in a place where
there was a strict hierarchy

for Whiteness.
I grew up in Boston.

I grew up in this really
racist part of Boston

called Boston.

- And in Boston...

And in Boston,

there are different kinds
of White people,

there are different kinds
of Whiteness, right?

Like, there are Ashkenazi Jews,
like me,

and we're in places
like Brookline and Newton

and an outer suburb way
to the south

called Sharon,
there are the Russians.

In Eastie, in East Boston,
there are the Greeks.

In Dorchester, there are
the Italians in the North End.

And of course,
Irish Catholics, right?

ICs practically synonymous
with Boston,

and they're scattered all over,

but a lot of them
very famously concentrate in,

anybody know?

Southie.

Southie, South Boston. Yes.

And they've had
an amazing century.

No, truly,
an incredible 100 years

for the Bostonian
Irish Catholics.

They've gone up a couple
of socioeconomic classes

as a whole.

They've had their own president,

who was apparently killed
by his brother.

- Right? Like,
there's any reason...

But they've not ascended
to the top of this totem pole.

'Cause at the top
of this pyramid

of Bostonian Caucasian, unquestionably?

WASPs.
- WASPs. Exactly.

The WASPs. And let me tell you,

that is the kind of White
you wanna be...

...in Boston.
You know what I mean?

The sort of, like,
any country club you want White.

Or, like, had a relative
on the Mayflower White.

Or, like, "I can't read,
but I got into Harvard!"

Like, that's the White
you wanna be in Beantown.

And growing up,
I became so keenly aware of that

and I started changing things
about myself

to appear a little less Jewish.

Like, when I was a kid,
no one called me Alex.

Everyone called me David
or David Yosef.

- My--

My full name isn't Alex Edelman.

My full name, get ready,

is David Yosef Shimon Ben Elazar
Reuven Alexander Halevi Edelman.

That is my full name.

- I go-- Sure.

I go by Alex now and my family
has noticed the shift.

My father's name is Elazar.
That's the name that he goes by.

And he's like, "You're not proud
of your real name?"

And I'm like, "No."
And he's like, "Why not?"

And I'm like,
"I don't know, Elazar.

Maybe because it sounds like
we're all in Slytherin.

- That's why."

I have cousins Mikal
and Penecost.

You can't even spell
their names right in English

'cause there's no English letter
for phlegm.

I don't wanna get into a game
of like, "How Jewish are you?"

This is how Jewish we are.
My brother AJ,

or Adam Yitzhak Chaim...

...qualified
for the last Winter Olympics

for Israel.

This is not a joke.

AJ-- I mean, like,
it is eventually a joke,

- but like this...

AJ qualified for the last
Winter Olympics for Israel.

And whenever I tell people that,

they always have
a few questions.

They're like, "Your brother?"
"Yes."

-"Your brother?" "Yes."

"Your brother's an Olympian?"
"Yeah."

If you're wondering,
turns out it's nurture.

"Your brother's an Olympian?"
"I know."

"For Israel?" "I know."

"The Winter Olympics?" "I know."

"Does Israel have winters?"

"Not really.
He had to train in Munich,"

in what must be the irony
to end all ironies.

"What's AJ's sport?"
"AJ's sport is called skeleton."

Which is like...

Which is like luge
but head-first.

By the way,
my father says on television

that I have to inform audiences

that AJ is a hero,
it's an accomplishment,

and we're so proud of him.

- There. Okay. Skeleton--

Oh, are you--
No, no, no, no, no. It's...

It's the dumbest sport
in the world,

it's not a real sport,

it's a lunch tray
and an icy hill.

- Here's...

Here's how dumb this sport is.

We went to go see AJ qualify
upstate Lake Placid,

and this guy from Italy
named Cicini,

named Jean-Luc Cicini,

he crashed
at the top of the run,

and his little sled went down
without him,

and the sled on its own

finished in fourth place.

And I think
about that every day,

'cause my brother's always like,
"It's a skill sport."

And I'm like,
"It's gravity, AJ!"

A corpse and some duct tape
would medal in this event.

You turn on the Olympics

and Bob Costas would be like,
"Wow, Tom!

Look at Simmons keeping
his shoulders so still

in those corners."

Also, I had no faith in him.

No. Like, whenever
they interview athlete families,

they're always like, "We knew."
I'm like, "You knew?"

"Oh, we knew that Megan
was special

and she would lead
the women's team to the World--"

There was none of that
in my house.

I made fun of my brother
every day.

I called him "The Frozen Chosen"
for like four years in a row.

And then my mom was like,
"Stop calling him that."

And this is gonna be too Jewish
for a couple of you,

but I switched over
to "Shul Runnings"

- and I am so proud.

Shul means synagogue in Yiddish.

We had T-shirts made.
It's like a whole thing.

We're at...
We're at the Olympics.

We're sitting on this bus

from the Olympic village
to the venue.

And this Israeli reporter
was interviewing AJ

and he was like, "Adam...

...what was it like
when you found out

you were going
to be...

- ...an Olympian?"

And AJ was like, "Oh, Guri,

no one was more surprised
than I was."

And out loud on Israeli TV,
I just went, "That's not true."

"It's not true.
I bet my dad 50 dollars

that he wouldn't make
the Olympics."

- But he did.
He made the Olympics.

He's one of
the 30 best skeleton athletes

on the planet,

out of the 42 skeleton athletes
on the planet.

And he did it for Israel.

And that's a whole
separate kettle of fish,

but we are proudly
and emphatically Jewish.

And it's a huge part
of my background

and my upbringing

and the filter through which
I see the world, but...

- but...

...when I'm standing
in this apartment

in Queens and this guy says,

"What's your name?"
I tell him my name's Alex,

'cause I'm not gonna give him
the backstory.

- I said, "I'm Alex."

And of course,
I said, "How about you, man?"

"Like, what's your name?"

And the guy thought about it.

- He just went...

"My name's Cortez."

And I said, "I'm sorry,
your name is Cortez?"

And with a real knife
in his voice,

the guy just said,
"We don't give real names

to people who are here
for the first time."

And he looked directly
into my face.

And I'm trying
to look back at him,

like not too aggressive,

but also not like a coward,
and it's very awkward.

There's like a real moment
of tension.

But that tension
is broken fairly quickly,

'cause this guy
just came crossing

from the other side of the room

and he looked at us,
and he just went,

-"Hey, Matt, we're starting."

And I was like,
"Nice to meet you, Cortez."

And then we start.

We start.

There was a moment
before I walked in

where I was like,
"All right, if I get scared,

I won't... I won't try
anything fancy, I will leave.

I will excuse myself
to the bathroom and just go."

But nothing scary
is happening yet.

People are just
pulling up chairs

to the middle of the room,

and everything's like
a little higgledy-piggledy.

But we wind up
with like a ragged circle

of chairs
that doesn't quite close

all the way on the end
over here.

It's like a semicircle
or like...

an anti-semicircle.

- It's...

I'm over here.
I'm over here.

I'm over here.

There's, uh...
There are 17 of us, okay?

I'm gonna say us.

I'm gonna lump myself in
logistically.

Seventeen of us.

Twelve men, five women,
including Chelsea, my new love.

Chelsea's, like, two,
three seats away from me

on this side.
This side of the circle,

a little bit younger
than this side of the circle.

But this side of the circle
seems to know each other.

Much better,
a little more engaged,

a little more hardcore.

This side, of course,
has Cortez, my pal.

He's, like, um,

five, six seats away from me
on this side,

jigsaw lady's sitting
next to him, and we start.

We start.

And for the first 15
or so minutes of this meeting,

these guys talked
about the royal wedding.

Meghan and Harry.

It had happened
since they last got together,

and they were upset about it.

And it took me
way longer than it should have

to realize why they were upset.

Meghan Markle's mixed race.
Of course she is. I forgot that.

I forgot.
You know who didn't forget?

- White nationalists.
They're very upset.

They prefer that he marry
a first cousin as per usual.

Uh, real quick,

I have a connection
to Prince Harry,

which is that my friend Jack
once did cocaine with him

- in a London nightclub bathroom.

All right,
that did not get the reaction

- that I wanted from you.

I will sidebar for this.

Prince Harry had
a cocaine problem.

It's the best thing.

We don't talk about it enough

as a culture.
It's in the new book.

It's fantastic.
I don't approve of cocaine,

but I love that Prince Harry
had a cocaine problem.

Because in America,
we forget this.

But in England, the Queen
is on all of the money.

So that means at some point,

Prince Harry rolled up
a picture of his grandmother

to do drugs that he bought

with other pictures
of his grandmother.

That will never happen
to any of you.

None of you can walk
into Times Square after this

and the drug dealer's like,
"Excuse me,

that'll be 300 dollars."
And you're like, "Excuse me.

Here's a picture of my grandma
at her 50th Jubilee parade."

He's like, "What?"

You're like,
"Here's a picture of my grandma

with Winston Churchill."

And he's like,
"How'd you get this?"

And you're like,
"Here's a picture of my grandma

planning the death of my mom."
It only works for him.

What are you gonna do
about it though, huh?

What, are you gonna tell people
not to watch the special?

Fuck you. What are you gonna do?

Just 'cause it's not
in The Crown,

doesn't mean it didn't happen.
Grow the fuck up.

By the way,

just so you know,
cocaine has no effect on me.

- None. Zero.

Because I'm part
of this generation

of over-medicated ADHD children.

Do you know what I mean?
Like, someone offered me cocaine

a couple of years ago,
and I tried it,

and they were like,
"How do you feel?"

And I was like,
"Like there's homework to do!"

"Do you feel like dancing?
We're going dancing."

And I'm like, "I can't,

I'm putting a bibliography
together, aren't I?"

I'm gonna get started
on the secondary sources.

You fact-check
the primary sources.

Where are you going?
We need 3,000 words

on Moby Dick by Thursday.

Anyway. They're upset.

And this is a huge group
of nodders.

Like, if anyone ever agreed
with anything, they were like,

"Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm."

And someone's like,
"It's a disgrace."

And everyone's like,
"It's a disgrace!"

- "It's a disgrace."

And someone else was like,
"It represents

the sorry state of the West."

And everyone's like, "The West?

What happened to our standards
in the West?"

And jigsaw lady.

Jigsaw-- I'm fascinated
by this person.

Not much for eye contact.

Always looking at her shoes,
like they owed her money.

- Always straight down.

But whenever she spoke,
you knew who was talking.

No one else had a register
like this.

And at some point,
she just went,

"Didn't just happen though,
did it?

Didn't just happen
is what we've come to.

This is what we've come to.

A member of the royal family
marrying a--"

And then...

- she uses the N-word.

And Chelsea just said...

"You know...

I'm not crazy
about that word actually."

And I thought to myself,
"There's a spectrum of Nazi?"

I kept falling in love
with Chelsea a little bit.

I did, for two reasons.

- First of all, you never know.

Second of all--
Right? You never know.

Second of all,
I love romantic comedy films.

Right? You wouldn't watch this?

What a great meet-cute
for a rom-com, no?

We meet at this meeting.
She's played by Anne Hathaway.

I like to imagine
I've booked the role of myself,

but if we're being honest,
it's Jesse Eisenberg

- or skinny Jonah Hill.

And like,
we meet at this meeting.

And we start dating,

and I have to hide the fact
that I'm Jewish.

And eventually,
we start sleeping together,

and she's like,
"Why are you circumcised?"

And I'm like,
"Don't worry about it."

And, like, things are going
really amazing,

and I get down on one knee
towards the end of the film

at the top
of the Empire State Building,

in the rain, it's a rom-com.

And as I open up
my ring box to propose,

I lock eyes
with my TALMA teacher

from fifth grade,
and I'm like, "Rabbi Klammer?"

And he's like,
"David Yosef Shimon Edelman?"

And she's like...

And she runs away.

But her best friend,
Rebel Wilson, is like,

"Girl, you gotta go back to him.
He is a good man."

And so we reunite, and we kiss,
and the last scene of the movie,

we're married
in my parents' synagogue, right?

Like that's how that would go.

You know, on Broadway,
I've had to explain that to--

The stomp to people.

So, like,
if you guys don't know,

when Jews get married,
they wrap a glass up in a napkin

and then they crush the glass
because the glass represents...

happiness.
So, you're just like, bam.

Here's the problem
with my rom-com.

I date very assertive women.
I always have.

So, what would really happen is,
we'd meet at this meeting,

we'd start dating,
and then three weeks later...

...I would be a Nazi.

I'd be standing
on my parents' front lawn

in Brookline, Massachusetts,
holding a brick,

and she'd be like, "Do it."

And I'm like...

-"Hi, Eema."

"Hi, Mom, this is Chelsea.
This is Matt--

- Sorry, this is Cortez."

There's so much complaining
in this room.

That's the first thing that--

There's so much kvetching
in this room.

This is around the time

they were taking down
Confederate statues.

Remember that?
They're very upset about that.

They talked a lot about how
White history is being erased.

They're taking down statues
of White people.

They're pulling White people
out of textbooks.

Someone over here says,

"They don't even teach
about White men

in public schools anymore."

- And everyone's like, "Mm-hmm."

"Mm-hmm."

And White people
aren't just being replaced

in the classroom.
It's happening in real life.

It's happening in real life
in their own country,

in their own country,
it's a disgrace.

It's a disgrace.

And what's enabling
this replacement?

What's enabling,
as the guy next to me says,

"The slow-moving genocide
against Whites in America"?

It's this myth.

It's this myth
of White privilege.

And this myth drives
so much of the stuff they hate.

It drives diversity
hiring initiatives.

It drives a popular culture
they despise!

Despise.

And it drives reverse racism,
which is when people are racist

against White people
just because they're White.

And then someone over here says,
"It's the biggest problem

in the country today,

and no one is brave enough
to talk about it."

- And everyone's like,
"Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm."

And I can give you
two guesses...

...at who they blame
for this kind of thing.

And you might not need
your second guess.

Because running
through this meeting

is this thick vein
of antisemitism,

but I've never seen this kind
of antisemitism before.

It's almost exhilarating.

It's like thick,
Technicolor, weapons-grade,

conspiracy-theory level anti--
Like, at some point,

this guy two seats away
from me, he just went,

"Jews are sneaky
and they're everywhere!"

- And I was like...

"Seems like the wrong time

to argue
with this guy actually."

"That's a disgrace."
"That's a disgrace."

I see myself very much as a Jew.

Obviously. But I see myself more
than anything else as a Jew.

Like when I wake up
in the morning,

my first thought is like,
"Jew waking up."

And not just Jewish religious,

observant, thoughtful
about what it means in my life.

If I was very secular,

I'd be a completely
different human being.

Complete-- If I was very secular
in a fun,

liberal city like New York
or San Francisco,

I think I'd consider
myself bisexual.

But because
I was raised religious

in a place like Boston,

I consider myself straight
with a couple of secrets.

And I remember the first time
I was aware of being Jewish.

I should have been aware,
like, eight days in.

- But the first time
I was aware...

The first time I was aware,
I was, like, five years old.

I'm at a Chuck E. Cheese
at a children's birthday party

in Natick, Massachusetts.

And I reached for
a slice of pizza

that had some sausage on it
or pepperoni,

something not kosher.

And my grandfather was there,
and he saw me reaching,

and he kicked my hand. Kicked.

And he said,
"You can't have that, David.

We're Jewish." And I said,
"What does that mean?"

And with a totally
straight face, he just went,

"It means you'll never
be happy."

And I said, "Be'emet?"
which means, "For real?"

And he went, "Oh, yeah."
And I said, "Why?"

And he said,
"It means you'll never be happy

with the way things are.

And you'll always
question things.

And even when things
are pretty good,

they won't seem
that good to you."

And I said,
"Papa, I don't wanna be Jewish!"

And then my grandfather
laughed at me.

And he just went...
"Sweetie,

that's the most Jewish thing
there is."

And it blows my mind
when I meet non-Jews,

and they say things to me
like, "Oh, well, I get it

'cause I used
to be a Christian, so."

"Sorry, what?"
"Well, I was raised Christian,

but a couple years ago,
I decided I was nothing, so."

- No--

I understand
that intellectually.

I respect that, of course.

But that is not
how it works in Judaism.

You can't leave
when you feel like it.

Judaism is the Hotel California
of religions.

It is a mailing list,

you can never
"unsubscribe" from.

And I worry
that I'm not Jewish enough.

I worry that.

I-- Which is crazy,
'cause to my comedy friends,

I'm the most Jewish person
they've ever met.

I'm a beard away
from their conception of rabbi.

And to my family, I'm Lady Gaga.

I called my father once.

My father is this lovely,
thoughtful professor

at Harvard Medical School,
religious,

wears a yarmulke,
a kippah.

Every single day of his life.
If something goes well,

he says, "Baruch Hashem."
"Thank God."

And I called him,
I said, "Dad, Abba, I worry

that the life that I lead
isn't Jewish enough."

And he said, "Alex,
I understand that concern."

And I said,
"Do you ever worry about that?"

And he said,
"Of course. I worry every day

that the life that you lead
isn't Jewish enough."

And I am so tough on other Jews.
I am relentless with other Jews.

It's my least favorite thing
about myself.

Like... Like,
I was at a friend's house.

I'm meeting my friend's baby.

So many of my friends
are having babies or adopting.

I'm thinking a lot
about adoption, but I'm 34.

And I think for adoption,

that's right on the line,
age-wise.

Right?
Like, I think that's too old.

I don't think anyone
is gonna take me at this point.

- But like--

I'm holding...
I'm holding this baby,

and the baby starts to cry.
Oh, baby's name is Yasi.

My friend's name is Mati.
His wife's name is Rahel.

- These are normal names
where I'm from.

They are.
Those are normal names.

And I'm holding the baby,

and he starts to cry,
which is fine.

He's a baby. But Rahel,

who I don't think's
ever really liked me,

- just went, "Huh."

"Looks like he's not
a fan of yours, is he?"

And I said,
"It's fine. He's a baby."

And she said, "He actually has
a really good sense for men."

And I said, "He doesn't have
a good sense for anything.

He doesn't even know
he's alive yet."

And apparently,
never say this to a new mother.

I said, "He's just like
a brisket with eyes right now."

And she said,
"He's very intuitive."

And I said,
"He's not. He shits himself."

And the husband,
who I've known forever,

he's seen enough
and he just went,

"Whoa! Whoa--"
Still calls me David.

That's how long
I've known this guy.

I've known this guy forever.

And he went,
"Whoa! Sorry, David,

we're a little uptight-- We are.
We're a little uptight,

'cause people have been
judging us

for the way
that we're raising the baby."

And I said,
"What do you mean?"

And he said,
"Well, we've decide--

We've decided
that we're not gonna vaccinate

until we know a bit more."

And I was like, "Against COVID,

you don't need to.
He's an infant."

He's like, "Not against COVID,
against like mumps and measles

and the other stuff."

- And I was like, "Oh!"

"Oh, well, first of all,
here's your disease baby back."

"Second of all,
what are you talking about?"

And he said, "Well, we've read

that the vaccines
can cause autism."

And I said, "That is not true."

And Rahel went,
"What do you know about autism?"

And I was like, "First of all,
I've been tested 11 times."

"You think you get like this

without people asking
a couple of questions?"

I am so neurodivergent.

I saw so many
child psychiatrists growing up

in the Greater Boston area,

the last one was free.

And I just have, like,
one memory.

I'm sitting on this brown couch
in this doctor's office,

and my mom is outside

in the waiting room talking
to the doctor.

And I just remember
hearing her go,

"What do you mean, 'He's fine?'"

And I was like, "Yeah,
vaccines don't cause autism."

"Mati, you know that."

And like,
it ends the conversation.

He just went, "Well...

it's our opinion, isn't it?

We're his parents.
It's our opinion."

And I don't know
that I would do this

with someone who wasn't Jewish,
but I just went,

"Oh, and you guys
are embarrassed."

"Right, you're mortified,

'cause it's such
a low-information opinion."

"'Cause there's no basis
in science,

and it's so bad for the child,

so you probably
don't tell people."

"Something so ill-informed."

And he said,
"Excuse me, we're his parents.

You don't have children.

You've never had to make
this choice.

You're judging us
for our opinion?"

And I was like,
"That's how we judge people!"

"Their opinions
and their actions,

and the content
of their character.

It used to be skin color,
but someone had a dream."

And he said to me, in Hebrew,

in Hebrew,
"David, you can't judge us.

Only God,
only Hashem can judge."

- And that worked with me.

No, but that calmed me down
immediately,

'cause it reminded me
how I know this guy.

I know this guy 'cause
we went to a yeshiva together,

which is a Hebrew day school.

And in a yeshiva,
you study Torah every morning

from 8:00 a.m.
to 6:00 p.m.,

because "yeshiva"
is a Hebrew word

- that means "miserable."

In a yeshiva,
when they teach you about God,

they teach you
that he acts through you.

If you are kind,
that is God showing kindness.

If you're empathetic,

that is Hashem
manifesting empathy.

In Hebrew, the word is "kli."
It means "vessel."

You are a vessel
for God's action.

And so he said to me,
"David, you can't judge us.

Only God can judge us.
Alex can't judge us.

Only Hashem.
Only Hashem can judge."

I calmed myself down,

and I remembered that we have
this common language

and lineage, and that on paper,
we're basically the same person.

And I explained to him
that it's possible

that God was judging him,
but that I was the vessel

through which he had chosen
to judge him.

And we have not been invited
back to that house.

But it's worth asking
why this guy and his wife,

who I have everything
in common with,

that's who I go toe-to-toe with
in their own living room,

I show them
so little understanding.

In this living room in Queens,

where I have so little
in common with anyone,

I sat there listening to them
for an hour.

All right.
Guys, I sat in a conversation

- without talking one time...

...for an hour, which for me...

unprecedented.
I couldn't even nod.

Everybody else was like,
"Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm."

I had to nod at things
out of context.

Like at some point
someone was like,

"What it means to be a man
in the workplace is changing."

And I was like...

"That's absolutely--

Yeah, there's a reckoning
going on.

I agree with that.
It's way better now.

You can't just, like,
throw your interns

out the windows. Mm-hmm."

And someone's like,

"Billionaires and corporations
control our elections."

And I was like,

"I'd like to see meaningful
campaign finance reform
in the United States."

"Such a progressive value,
isn't it? Yeah, that's good."

And finally,
I get a chance to talk.

There's this guy two seats away
from Chelsea,

and his name is Witt.

And if such a thing can be said,
he's my favorite.

You know how some people
can be in their early thirties,

but they have
a vibe of teenager?

That's Witt.
He's a little blithe and slumpy.

And, at some point, he's like,

"You know what's really hard
for us now?

It's really hard for us
to reach new people

on social media."

And I said,
"Do you know why that is?"

And Chelsea went,

"Alex, do you know something
about social media?"

And I said, "Chelsea,

I know a lot
about social media."

And I started explaining
this thing

called the meaningful
content algorithm.

This is so interesting.
All right,

it used to be in the early days
of social media,

when you logged in,
you'd see stuff chronologically.

Remember that? You'd see things
based on when they were posted.

But now when you log in,
you don't see that anymore.

You see what the algorithm
thinks you'll enjoy most first.

That's because of this thing

called the meaningful
content algorithm.

And it's Balkanized us

into these social media
echo chambers,

which has made it so hard
for new ideas,

or in this, like,
one specific instance,

the oldest ideas in the world
to reach new people.

And so I start explaining
the algorithm,

I start explaining
social media echo chambers,

I start explaining
Cambridge Analytica,

the company that's, like,
best at this,

and everybody's listening to me.

And, at some point,
I looked around the circle,

and people have got
their arms crossed,

and they're nodding
at each other,

and they're nodding at me.

And I thought to myself
all at once,

"Oh, I'm positively contributing

to this meeting
of White nationalists."

I came as an observer.
I'm gonna leave as, like,

the "youth outreach officer"
or something.

But there was a moment...

where I actually started to feel
very badly for these people.

I don't want to be gratuitous,

but these
are not life's winners.

Hashem has not given
with both hands

- to anyone in this room.

They are not the brightest.
They are not the wealthiest.

They are very badly informed.
And most importantly...

...these guys
are racists in New York City!

They're racists in Queens,
the most diverse borough

and the most--
Guys, it's Queens.

In Queens, you can't even
get 17 Nazis together

without a Jew being sat
right there

in the middle of you.

This isn't Arkan-ssippi.
Are you kidding me?

We're two blocks away
from Little Ethiopia.

Things are going not well
for these people.

And at some point,
I had a thought,

which was so, like...

I had a thought
that was so self-aggrandizing,

it took me two years
to tell anyone about it.

But at some point,
I looked around the circle,

and I thought to myself, "Wow."

"Look at me empathizing."

"Look at me feeling bad
for these people

when they're so horrible,
but I'm such a good boy."

"Am I the hero
that we need

in these difficult
and divided times?"

And then I thought,
"Do I have a duty as a Jew...

to hear these people,

'cause there's actually
something to that?"

If you raise
Jewish children correctly,

empathy is the default.

Empathy is the true north
for every Jewish value.

And all of the best
Jewish moments of my life

are moments where those values
showed up in places

you would never look for them.

Like, once when I was a kid,
my family had Christmas.

This is totally true.

My mom had this friend
named Kate.

And over the course
of a calendar year,

Kate lost her last parent
and her last sibling.

She had nowhere to go
for the holiday. My mom said,

"Kate, why don't you come
to our house?

We'll do Christmas."

That's the kind of person
my mom is.

- My father...

- ...did not want that.

Mom is a Jew from Cincinnati.
She's a Midwestern Jew.

- It's a slightly
gentler existence.

My father grew up Jewish
in Boston like me,

but in a time
when it was so hard

to be Jewish there,

which is
between the years 1500 and 1991.

And he said, "Cheryl,
I will not have Christmas

in a Jewish home."
And my mom was like,

"Elazar,
we're having Christmas."

And he's like,
"Over my dead body

are we having Christmas."

So they compromised
and we had Christmas.

- So...

Yeah, obviously. Obviously

AJ and I come
downstairs one day.

My parents are sitting
in the living room.

I don't know if any of you
grew up in a home like this.

We were never allowed
in our living room.

Never. The living room
is for guests and tragedies.

Those are the only times.

And every piece of furniture
is covered in plastic,

in case the real owners
of the house show up one day.

We come downstairs, no guests.

AJ and I look
at each other like,

"Oh, no. Bubbe died again,"

- and we sit down...

...on the couch.
And my mom just said, "Boys...

this year...

we're having Christmas."

And AJ and I
were so young and insulated.

We looked at each other

and we looked at my dad
and I just went, "Okay.

What's Christmas?"

And my father said,
"It's like Hanukkah."

And my mom undermined him
immediately and went,

"Yeah, but maybe even
a little bit more fun."

Hanukkah sucks, by the way.

Hanukkah-- I appreciate
the politically correct world

that everybody lives in
where we all pretend

that all the holidays are equal.
They are not equal.

Every-- Hanukkah's very much
the Diet Coke

to Christmas' black tar heroin.
There is no comparison.

No-- Go into a supermarket
come December.

Christmas is everywhere.

Hanukkah's one little nub
at the end of the shampoo aisle,

there's Passover matzah in there
for some reason.

And non-Jews are gorgeous
'cause they're always like,

"Well, you're so lucky.
You get eight days of gifts."

I have never met a single Jew

who got eight days
of decent gifts.

Here's how it works.

You get one gift
over the course of the--

Like if you're getting a bike,

you get, like,
a pedal on the first day,

handlebars on the second,
then the wheel.

- It is absolute bullshit.

Anyway, we do Christmas

and oh, my God,
do we do Christmas.

We do the lights.
We do the Christmas dinner.

My... My mom put up stockings
above the fireplace

with our names on them
in Hebrew and we...

...we went whole hog.
No hog. Kosher, Christmas.

But we decked these halls. Deck!

And Kate comes into our house.
And Kate...

...White.

Princess Diana haircut,
chunky gold earrings,

Hermès scarf,
shocking blue pantsuit.

White.

But she walks into our house
like a little kid.

Just like...

And she starts
to cry immediately.

And my mom said,

"Boys, whatever she wants to do,
we're gonna do."

And we did all
this deep cuts Christmas stuff.

We strung popcorn together
on a string.

We ate our way through an entire
chocolate Advent calendar

- in, like, 25 minutes.

And we watched Christmas movies.

Please try to imagine
being a young Jew

and you've never heard
of Christmas,

and then on the day
you find out about it,

you watch, like,
seven Christmas movies in a row.

AJ and I are like,

"Oh, so this holiday's
a huge deal, huh?"

And the one that sticks out

is the Peanuts
Christmas special.

Snoopy, Charlie Brown,
best thing we've ever seen.

AJ and I are like vibrating
an inch from the TV.

AJ's like, "The meaning
of Christmas, Snoopy."

And I'm like, "The spirit
of Christmas, Charlie Brown."

My dad's in the corner,
like, praying for lightning.

- Like...

And at some point,

a character on the screen
just went,

"Linus, we need
to put out cookies

for Santa Claus, don't we?"

And AJ and I look at each other.

And we look at my dad,
and I just went, "Abba...

- who's Santa Claus?"

And my father says
this didn't happen.

And it is
the single clearest memory

- from my childhood.

My father rarely cursed
in front of us

and maybe he thought
we couldn't hear him,

but he looked at my mom
and he just went, "Cheryl...

- Jesus fucking Christ."

And my mom said, "Elazar."
And he said, "Come on."

And she went, "Just do it."

This is a direct quote.

This is a direct quote from,
like...

...twenty-five years ago.

My father walked up to us
and he said...

"Santa Claus, boys...

he is a fat man."

"But it's a good fat."

-"But it's a good--"

You know, like,
Santa's an avocado or something.

"But it's a good fat.

And he comes down
non-Jewish chimneys

in the middle of the night

and he gives gifts
to young Christians."

And AJ and I are like...

And AJ just said,
"And he's coming here?"

My father's like, "Sure.
I guess he's coming here."

We put out cookies
for Santa Claus.

We're very skeptical, obviously.

We go upstairs. We go to bed.

We come downstairs
the next morning.

The cookies are gone.

Guys, they're gone.

And AJ and I see that

and we lose consciousness
immediately.

We, like, black out,
and I know it's happened,

'cause there's home video,
and on the home video,

we're going crazy.

We're like,
"Oh, my God! Oh, my God!

He was here! He was here!

Eema, he was here!
Dad, he was here!"

And, at some point,

AJ's standing on the couch
and he looked at me

and he just went, "Santa came!"
And I went, "Baruch Hashem!"

And we ran out
to the garage.

Why? Because
this is the one concession

my father got from my mom.

He's like, "Cheryl,
I will not have a Christmas tree

in a Jewish home."

And my mother was like,
"I can respect that, Elazar.

We'll put it in the garage."

And there are two photos
of this.

Weird photos.

We're wearing pajamas
'cause we're children,

but we're wearing jackets

'cause we're in a Boston garage
in December,

and we're wearing yarmulkes
'cause we're Jews.

But we're standing in front

of a fully-decorated
Christmas tree

with a teddy bear

wearing his own yarmulke
on top of it.

And we've got
headphones on. Why?

Because this is
how long ago it was.

We got cassette tape Walkmen.

Remember the square dealies?
We were thrilled.

That was Santa's gift.

Kate had gotten us her own gift.

Kate had pulled
my parents aside

the night before
and she was like,

"Don't worry, Cheryl."

"Don't worry, Elaser."

"I got your boys Jewish gifts."

My father was like, "Oh!"

"Okay, um, Kate,
when you say Jewish gifts,

what do you mean?"
And Kate's like,

"I got them gifts
from the Torah."

This was Kate's gift
from the Torah.

To put in
our cassette tape Walkmen,

Kate got us, on cassette,

the cast recording
of Andrew Lloyd-Webber's

Joseph and the Amazing
Technicolor Dreamcoat...

...where the role of Joseph
was sung by-- Anybody know?

Donny Osmond.
- Donny Osmond, thank you.

Donny Osmond.
Two photos. Weird photos.

Pajamas, jackets, yarmulkes,
Christmas, teddy bear,

yarmulke, headphones,
and on the headphones,

an Old Testament story
from the Torah

adapted into a musical
by a British aristocrat

where the lead role,
sung by a Mormon.

- It's very interfaith.

And we go to school that day
because yeshiva,

Hebrew day school,
not canceled for Christmas.

And we come home that night
and my father gets a phone call.

It's exactly what you think.

And the first thing
the principal says to him is,

"Professor Edelman,
your sons have a lying problem."

My father said,
"What did they do?"

And the principal said, "Well,

the teacher tried to explain
to the children

the very delicate topic
of Christmas

and Alex raised his hand
and just went...

- 'We had Christmas.'"

And the teacher's like,
"You didn't have Christmas."

And I was like, "Hmm,
pretty sure we had Christmas."

"Lights, stockings,
Snoopy, Charlie Brown,

meaning of Christmas,
spirit of Christmas.

Pretty sure we had Christmas."

And the teacher's like,
"You didn't have Christmas.

You had Hanukkah
three weeks ago,
or four months from now,

depending
on the Jewish calendar year."

- Anyway...

...non-Jews believe
in this guy called Santa Claus.

And in my mind's eye,

I see AJ raising his hand
and saying,

"We had Santa Claus."
And I'm wrong.

The teacher came to the show.
I'm wrong about two things.

First of all, apparently,
AJ didn't raise his hand.

Apparently,
AJ lifted two fingers,

in the words of the teacher,

like he was
"ordering his second martini".

And AJ didn't say,
"We had Santa Claus."

Apparently, AJ just went...

"We know Santa Claus."

And the teacher's like,
"You don't know Santa Claus."

And AJ's like, "Hmm.
But we do know Santa Claus."

And the other kids are like,
"Who's Santa Claus?"

And AJ's like,
"Oh! He's amazing.

He's a fat man,
but it's a good kind of fat.

And he comes down
non-Jewish chimneys

in middle of the night,

and he gives gifts
to young Christians.

But...
But, last night,

because he's friends
with our dad...

...he came to our house

and he left this Walkman
underneath the tree

that my parents put
in the garage,

and he ate all of the cookies."

And the principal said,

"Professor Edelman,
is this true?"

And, apparently,
my father just went, "No."

-"It... It's not entirely true."

And Rabbi Falk said,

"What do you mean
it's not entirely true?"

Then my father said,
"Cheryl and I ate the cookies."

"Santa Claus didn't come
to our house."

And my mom says
there was a significant pause

on the other end of the phone,
and then the principal said,

"I'm aware Santa Claus
didn't come to your house."

"You had Christmas?"

And my father explained.

My father explained
that this woman was bereft.

She had nowhere to go.

And he had reservations
about it,

but he let it happen

because he thought it was such
a valuable, teachable moment,

right, where he could show
his children

that doing the thing centered
in Jewish values,

the good deed,
may not always appear...

- conventionally Jewish.

Principal says,
"Professor Edelman,

I understand where you're
coming from but you're wrong,

'cause what you've actually done

is you've introduced
this holiday,

that is foreign and corrosive,
into your home

and you've clearly confused
your children

and perhaps
harmed them permanently...

...when you've given them
this holiday.

Next year,
are you gonna take it away?

Will you keep celebrating?
What are you gonna do?

And more than anything else,

this isn't a good deed.
It's idol worship.

It's the most serious sin
a Jew can commit.

And you and your wife need
to begin atoning for it

right now."

And my father,
to his credit, said,

"Well, clearly, Rabbi,

you don't understand
the meaning of Christmas,"

and then he hung up the phone.

And, look,
I love that story.

I think it reflects so well
on my parents,

but there's such a good question

at the center of it,
very Jewish one, actually,

which is, like,
to what do our empathies extend?

Is it unconditional?
Does it matter who they are?

Does it matter
how they feel about us?

Does it matter
why we're empath--

Does it matter
why we're empathizing?

'Cause, for a while,
I was empathizing.

In this room,
these people feel powerless,

they feel voiceless,

even if they
are 1,000 percent wrong!

Those are universal struggles.

It's hard
to hate people up close.

But once I realized
I was empathizing,

I was like, "Look at me."

By the way,
not just empathizing.

- Connecting.

Once I started talking,

I was in the flow
of conversation so effortlessly,

I thought to myself,

"I'm gonna be a grand wizard
in like two weeks at this rate."

I'm getting my hood tonight.
Like, it's happening.

I keep making eye contact
with Chelsea.

That's going amazing.

But like-- But now my fantasy's
not just Chelsea anymore.

Now, it sort of flowered out
to the rest of the room.

Like, obviously,
everybody here's

gonna be a table at the wedding,

- but like besides that, I'm--

No. I'm gonna fix these people.

Guys, me. I'm gonna fix them.

By the time this meeting
starts to wind down,

my "good guy" fantasies
are like a runaway train.

I have spoken

more than two-thirds
of the people in this room.

I am in. They like me.

And there's this guy sitting
almost directly across from me,

right where the circle gaps,

and he's sort of running
the meeting.

And, at some point, he was like,

"All right, guys.
We're gonna take a break.

Anyone who wants to get
a pastry, can get a pastry.

When we come back,
we'll talk next steps."

And I'm nodding at this point.
I'm like,

-"Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Next steps."

And Cortez, whose eyes
have very rarely left my area,

just went, "Hold on one--
Brian, excuse me.

Hold on one second."

And he said, "Alex?"
And I said, "Mm-hmm."

And he said,
"Where are you from?"

And I said...

"I'm from Boston."

And he said, "Cool.

How long have you lived
in New York City?"

And I said, "Oh, I've been here
about nine years."

And he went, "Great.

What's the ethnic origin
of your grandparents?"

And there was a little voice

in the back of my head
that just went,

"Wow, that third question
was so different

- from the first two questions."

And I was like,
"Well, my father's family

is from Poland

but my mother's family...

is also from Poland, actually."

And the guy starts peppering me
with questions, one after the--

He asks me where
in New York City I live.

He asks me if I live alone.

He asks me
how much money I make in a year.

And, at some point,
I got a little offended.

And I was just like,
"This guy's got a problem.

He's obsessed with me.

Everyone else in this room,
they like me.

It's so weird
that they're not stopping him.

It's weird
that he can read that."

And he's like,
"Where did you go to college?"

And I was like,
"I went to New York University."

He said, "What did you study?"

And I said,
"English Literature."

He said, "Where did you go
to high school?"

And I said, "I went to a school
in Boston called Maimonides."

And he went, "Maimonides?"
And I said, "It's a yeshiva."

Oh!

And halfway around the circle,
this lady just went, "Oh, boy."

And Witt went,
"What's a yeshiva?"

And I said,
"It's like a Hebrew day school."

And Chelsea,

looking for any sort of out
at this point I assume,

just went,
"Your parents made you go

to a Hebrew day school?"

And I said, "Kind of."
And she said, "Why?"

And jigsaw lady, of course,
not looking at me, of course,

just went, "Chelsea!"

"So very clearly a Jew."

And because it wasn't
that big a deal, I just went...

"I mean, yeah."

"Yeah, I'm... I'm Jewish."

You know...

people say
that political correctness...

is a big part of our culture,

but maybe it's great,

because I think
political correctness

is the reason
that after I said I was Jewish,

there was a split second

where everyone in the circle
kind of looked at each other

with a real energy of like...

"Are we cool with that now?"

"Did I miss an email
or something?"

"I don't wanna be rude,
but isn't that, like,

one of our big things?"

And then one person
starts to talk,

and then another,
and then... and then I realized

I may have misread
how welcome I am.

And people are yelling,
but no one's yelling at me.

They're yelling
at the guy running the meeting,

and I felt a little bad for him.

I was like,
"They're not gonna get

to the next steps
for a while, probably."

- And Cortez,

this guy's out of his seat
like he's won a basketball game.

He's like, "I told you.

I fucking--
So obvious. Look at him."

And I look at Chelsea.

And as soon as I do,
I regret it.

She has such an expression
on her face.

She looks so aggrieved.
She has an expression

like a shattered
and re-glued plate.

She looks so upset.

And I find it so hard
to look at her after that.

And this guy running the meeting
calms everybody down,

no small feat.

He's like,
"Okay. Okay. No, I didn't know."

And he said, "Alex?"
And I said, "Mm-hmm."

And he said, "Why are you here?"

Which, in retrospect,
is an excellent question.

And this is my favorite detail
from the whole meeting.

This is my favorite detail
from the whole night.

He said, "Why are you here?"

And I said,
"Oh, I saw this tweet

that said if you have questions
about your Whiteness,

then come--"
Before I can finish,

Witt, almost brightly,

just went,
"Oh! That's my tweet."

"Oh! That's my tweet,"

with a real energy of like,
"See?

We are reaching some new people
on social media."

And even then, I was like,
"Yeah, bud, I saw your tweet.

And as a White man,
I actually--"

And I don't get
to finish that sentence.

Everyone starts yelling
except for--

"No. You're not White.
You're Jewish.

You're Semitic. It's different."

Someone over here went,
"He's not even a real Jew."

And I was like, "Dad?"

And he said, "He's an impostor
from the Khazars."

And I said, "Oh, I-- Okay.

Well, I don't know
where that is,

but I am Jewish and I am White."
And everyone says, "You're not."

And I thought
this would help me.

I really did. I went,

"Guys. Guys,

I know it's complicated given...

...given that Whiteness
is largely a social construct...

...but I actually benefit
an enormous amount

from White privilege."

And everyone's like...

"No. No. Are you kidding?

Haven't you been listening?
White privilege isn't real.

White privilege is bullshit."

Someone over here just went,
"You have Jewish privilege.

It's different." I was like,
"That's so interesting.

I never thought
about that before.

But actually, I benefit
a great deal from my Whiteness."

And Cortez is incensed.
He's out of his seat.

He's like, "It doesn't exist."

And I said, "Come on, man."
And he went, "Really."

And I said, "I benefit from it."
He went, "When was the last time

you got something
for being White?"

And I said,
"Matt, I got a free muffin

for it like an hour ago."

I...

I don't wanna spoil
the ending of this for you...

...but Chelsea and I,
we're not gonna work out.

Although it'd be so cool
if I could say,

-"And here she is."

"Come on out, sweetie!"
And she's like, "Ah!"

I actually started
dating someone.

I actually started
dating someone

a couple months after this.

And when I told her
about this night,

the first thing she said to me,
she said, "Just so you know,

this is the epitome
of White privilege."

And I said, "What do you mean?"
And she said,

"Nothing says
White privilege more

than a Jew walking into
a meeting of racists

and thinking,
'This'll probably be fine.'"

"Things usually work out
pretty good for me, honestly."

"Oh, look.
Muffins. Those are for me?"

I'll be out there afterwards,
by the way,

if anyone wants
to ask a question.

I answer every question.

But obviously,

if you're watching at home
and you have a question,

I'm obscenely easy to reach
on social media.

Even if you hated the show,
tweet at me.

There's a list I can add you to,
you know?

And the two questions
I get the most are,

one, "Were you scared?"
Not really.

Here's the thing. Nazis, hmm,

far less intimidating
than the way

that my grandfather
described them.

Also, they're not Nazis.

But-- I hate to clarify a joke,
but being a Nazi

is actually such
a specific thing

from an extremely
specific moment in history.

These guys wish they were Nazis.

Like, you ever see kids
in the park,

and they're hitting each other
with tinfoil swords?

These guys are Nazis
the way that those guys

are the Knights
of the Round Table.

These are Nerf Nazis, you know?

And the second question
I get asked every single day is,

"Why'd you go?"

"Did you really go?"

"My wife
and I can't believe you."

"Why'd you go?"

Thought I could make it work.

It's my job.

I make it work.

I get on stage every night,

and I am pandering
and solicitous.

And I hope that it's enough
to make people enjoy the show

or tell a friend.

Please tell a friend.
And it's gross.

And there's a huge part of me

that genuinely walked
into this room thinking

like they're just anti-Semites

'cause they haven't
met Alex yet.

Haven't met David Yosef
Shimon Ben Elazar Reuven.

This...

not that different
from the meeting.

Not for me.

I'm only telling you stuff
I think you'd enjoy.

Right, like,
if you really knew me,

you might not like me, right?

There'd be a political opinion
you couldn't stand,

or I'd be too something.
I'd be too pretentious,

or ambitious,
or lazy, or too Jewish,

or not Jewish enough.
There'd be something.

You know
who I think about constantly?

Robin Williams.

A gift for connection
no one else could--

- A gorilla!

A gorilla was like, "Oh, my God,
the talent is undeniable."

- A gorilla!

If Robin Williams
can make it work with a gorilla,

I should be okay
with 16 White people in Queens.

Trying to acknowledge
their humanity

with this analogy,

but I am aware
that in this analogy,

these guys are gorillas

and I'm one
of the greatest comics

- who's ever lived.

But if you think about it,
who gets dehumanized?

Right? 'Cause for a second,
I'm in.

I'm White. Finally.

Right? Childhood dream achieved.

And then they find out
that I'm Jewish...

- ...and the walls go up.

But it doesn't reflect amazing
on me,

'cause I wanted them to like me.

I was performing.
I am always perform--

I got kicked out
of this meeting,

and it bothers me...

...on a craft level...

...'cause that's what happens.

This guy calms everybody down

and he's like, "Okay. Okay.
We're gonna take that break

and anyone who needs
to leave can leave."

And even though I'm not amazing
with social cues,

I was like, "I bet he means me."

And this is
the kind of dumb joke

the whole show could have been.

Everybody else...

...gets up and they all move...

to the far right corner
of the room.

And I'm getting my stuff.
I look sad now.

I look like I've lost Wimbledon
or something.

- I'm like, "Oh, God."

"Can't believe
they would do this

to the good boy."

And Chelsea...
Chelsea.

Chelsea crosses

this vast expanse
of floor to me.

And I felt so bad for her

in that-- I remember thinking,

"Man, horrible time
and place for you

to discover
that this is your type."

And she gets to me.

She said...

"You're Jewish?"

And I said...

"Can you believe it?"

And for the first time,
it doesn't work.

And she went,
"So you're fully Semitic

or partial? What's going on."

And I said,
"Both my parents are Jewish."

And she said,
"That's so interesting."

She's very calm, actually.

"That's so interesting.
You know why?

Because this
is a private residence."

And I said,
"Well, I was invited."

And she said, "You were...
You weren't invited.

You're committing
a crime right now.

You're trespassing.
You can't be here.

This is just for us. Go!"

So...

So the next morning,

call David Burstein...

tell him what he missed.

And he's quiet
all the way through.

He just lets me talk.
I talk for like 40 minutes.

But when I got
to this part of the story,

he interrupted me.
And pardon the language,

but he was like,
"And you looked at her

and you said, 'Fuck you, lady.'

And then you looked
at everybody else in the room

and you're like,
'Fuck every single one

of you racist, bigoted,

anti-Semitic assholes.'"
And I was like...

-"Yeah."

"Of course I put a finger
in her face

and I'm like,
'Screw you. And screw--

Screw all
your little Nazi budd--'"

But that's not what happened.
What really happened is,

I got scared
by the trespassing thing.

And I quailed immediately,
and I just went...

"Okay."

And on the way out,
this is so much worse,

I looked at everybody else,
and I just went,

"Sorry, you guys!"

And I left. I left.

You know, I had a conversation
with someone

the day before this run
on Broadway started

and... and he said to me,
"Would you go back?"

"A thousand percent."
And he said, "Really?"

I said, "Yeah. What,
I'm supposed to lock myself

in a room with people
who agree with me?"

"That's how you
wind up like this."

But I get his point,
because whenever anyone is like,

"Oh, the way to reach
these people

on the far right or the far left

is to extend this hand
of brotherhood and connection,

and let them know that
in the marketplace of ideas,

they are welcome--"
Like that's a lovely notion.

That's how I feel.
That's a Jewish value.

But some of them want us gone.
And when I say us, I mean, us.

Like even if you guys
aren't Jewish

or a person of color,

the fact that you bought
a ticket to this show...

...I feel bad for you guys.

You guys are screwed.
See you on the trains.

They hate you so much.

I'm glad I went.

I really took something
away with me.

Not like a lesson
or anything like that.

I really took something away
with me and it's very small,

but I think it's significant.
And I think it's significant

because it's one piece

from a 12,000-piece
jigsaw puzzle.

♪ ("SECTION 14
" BY
THE POLYPHONIC SPREE PLAYING) ♪

♪ And I know there's a lot
Outside the window ♪

♪ Woo-hoo ♪

♪ It seems a lot
For you and me ♪

♪ Woo-hoo ♪

♪ It takes the sun
To make the sidewalk ♪

♪ Woo-hoo ♪

♪ It takes the moon
To burn my feet ♪

♪ Woo-hoo ♪

♪ It means a lot
To take some time ♪

♪ I know it's right
You gotta be good ♪

♪ You gotta be strong ♪

♪ You gotta be 2,000 places
At once ♪

♪ You gotta be good
You gotta be strong ♪

♪ You gotta be 2,000 places
At once ♪

- ♪ You gotta be good ♪
- ♪ It seems a lot to show ♪

- ♪ You gotta be strong ♪
- ♪ You've got the time to grow ♪

♪ You gotta be 2,000 places
At once ♪

- ♪ You gotta be good ♪
- ♪ It seems a lot to show ♪

- ♪ You gotta be strong ♪
- ♪ You've got the time to grow ♪

♪ You got 2,000 places ♪

♪ Whoo! ♪

♪ And time will show the way ♪

♪ And love will shine today ♪

♪ And time will go away ♪

♪ So love can grow ♪

♪ (SONG CONCLUDES) ♪