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Alison Stewart: This is All Of It from WNYC. I'm Alison Stewart. We've all told little white lies that are pretty harmless, but what if that white lie is about how brown and Black people are treated by law enforcement? What if someone exaggerates his, her, their life story and reaps financial gain? Last Friday, The New Yorker published an article about the comedian Daily Show alum, and former host of Patriot Act on Netflix, Hasan Minhaj.

Titled Hasan Minhaj's “Emotional Truths”, the Reporting found a number of instances in which Minhaj had apparently in his standup and on his show, embellished details from his life, and in some cases, pedaled stories that were not true. In one example from his 2022 standup special, Minhaj tells a story about an encounter with an undercover FBI informant in his parents' mosque, an encounter that led Minhaj to be pinned against the roof of a police car, but turns out that never happened.

In an interview, Minhaj all but admitted to lying in these stories, but continued to justify doing so. The author quotes him as saying, "Every story is my style, is built around a seed of truth. My comedy, Arnold Palmer, is 70% emotional truth. This happened. Then 30% hyperbole, exaggeration, fiction. The story has sparked a lot of conversation about the role of truth in comedy. Most people condemning Minhaj's behavior, but some like Whoopi Goldberg defending a comedian's right to exaggerate.

The story has also shone a light on the hard-to-define gray area between comedy and journalism. Think about programs like The Daily Show, or Last Week Tonight with John Oliver. In addition, the article details a troubling work environment on Patriot Act, which brings to mind another story from Rolling Stone alleging a toxic workplace at The Tonight Show With Jimmy Fallon.

Joining us to talk about all of it is Jesse David Fox. He is a critic and hosts the podcast, Good One for Vulture and the author of the upcoming book, Comedy Book: How Comedy Conquered Culture and the Magic that Make it Work. In fact, there is an entire chapter in this book titled Truth. Jesse, welcome to all of it.

Jesse David Fox: Thank you so much for having me.

Alison Stewart: Listeners, are you a comedian or a comedy writer? How do you think about the role of truth in your work? Even if you're just a comedy fan, what do you expect when you head to a show, or when you watch one of these political shows? 212-433-9692, 212-433 WNYC. You can call in and join us on the air, or you can text us at that number. Social media is available as well @allofitwnyc. As someone who is a professional critic of comedy and has written this really good new book, what was your gut reaction, Jesse, when you read The New Yorker piece?

Jesse David Fox: I went through waves. First, I was like, "Oh, no, is this going to completely invalidate the chapter I wrote about this one specific topic." I was just like, "What are the chances?" Then I go knee-jerk, like, "You can't fact-check this. You won't fact-check a painting based on its accuracy." Then I was reading it and I can see-- Then the bigger revelation was with the reaction, and then it was me coming to terms with clearly people see people like Hasan differently.

Then it's really a matter of like, "It's not just how truthful a comedian should be, but it's how truthful should certain comedians be, and what do their audience expect from them?" It's really complicated. It is a very fascinating debate that really has never happened before. I don't know of an example where people went back and go, which part of this act was true or not.

Alison Stewart: At the end of the story, the writer writes, "When it came to his stage shows, Hasan told me the emotional truth is first, the factual truth is secondary." What do you make of this idea of "emotional truth?"

Jesse David Fox: Let's remove it from the greater context of the story of what he was lying about. Just talk about the idea of emotional truth, because I do think some comedians would relate to that idea. For my podcast, I interview a lot of comedians. I've interviewed, let's say, 200 comedians, and one of my favorite things to do is go, "Did that happen? Is that part of the story true?" Often I can have a good barometer of what was maybe the lie.

The first time I ever had a comedian admit they were making a part up, I was like, "Finally they're revealing the curtain." It's not uncommon. If anything, I've had comedians tell me that when they were too truthful in stories, the audiences would get hung up on it. Actually by condensing characters, by removing certain things, exaggerating certain parts, the audience did register more with the emotional truth of the story. It does reflect what is different about standup than these other art forms that might be mentioned, which is these exaggerations or lies are done with an audience. The audience is telling them, "We believe you."

At some point during the process, Hasan and his collaborators were like, "What if you put this character here," and the audience he could tell was more invested. He probably goes, "That's more emotionally true than what actually happened." I get that. That's what all comedians are doing. Any comedian storyteller's doing that, but clearly, when you're lying about public figures and you are a public figure and you're treated as not just a comedian, you're a public figure, then your work is being consumed in a different context.

Alison Stewart: I also want to make sure we have a shout-out to the author of the piece. It's Clare Malone from The New Yorker. Just wanted to make sure I said that out loud. We had Hasan Minhaj joined us last year to talk about The King's Jester, a special that featured that story about the FBI informant, the one we know that is now false. When he was on our show, he emphasized repeatedly how personal the material in that special was supposed to be. I'm going to play a couple of excerpts from that interview now. Here's one in response to a question about how he makes eye contact and connects with his audience.

Hasan Minhaj: One of the things that I try to include in my comedy storytelling style is this level of confession, and to me, the best comedy is confessional in nature. It's, "I'm going to tell you something that I haven't told other people. Hey, can I trust you? This is just between us tonight. Can I tell you a secret?" All of my favorite comedians have had that feeling, and anytime I've watched them on stage, I feel like they're pulling me into a secret. That's what I love most about the art form. I try to have that element of secrecy, of confession in my show, of like, "Okay, we're having this moment right here, right now. Here's something that I've been hiding the past couple of years. Let me tell you. Let me tell you this story."

Alison Stewart: Oh, but wait, there's more. Here's another from later in the interview when I asked him what he'd learned about himself working on the special.

Hasan Minhaj: I think what I found through this project is the type of comedy that I find most interesting, to me, is the type where I analyze myself. I point inward and go, "Hey, this is what's funny, strange, or weird about me." "Hey, based on these anecdotes, this is what I've learned in my life about me." I found that to be deeply satisfying for myself personally, just as a person. I think the audience can see, "Hey, even if I disagree with his final take or perspective, he's telling his story. He's being sincere and authentic at what he's saying." That's worked for me.

Alison Stewart: Thoughts on those two clips, Jesse?

Jesse David Fox: I have a lot of thoughts, so I just want to-- I think there's two things going on, and I've talked to Hasan before. I know him a little bit. I've talked to him recently and I think there's two Hasans. There's the part of him that does show that, to him, I think the most honest revealing part was the stuff about the infertility issues that him and his wife were facing, and the part where he admitted to wanting to be famous. That is actually when I watch the special, shocking. Comedians are very rarely prone to talk about the desire to be loved and all that stuff on stage. That is surprisingly confessional, honest, or whatever.

He also has the part which he admits to in that show about being this sort of person who's taken seriously. I think where he got into trouble is the blending of those things together. The things that he did to exaggerate the personal story about him as a person who wants to be taken seriously, he exaggerated truths that were not in his story to tell part of it. The other thing that that brings up is, I think a greater thing that I believe about this idea of truth and comedy and this idea of confession, which is, it is extremely overrated.

We as a society have really fallen over this idea that comedians are so truthful and honest on stage, but they're in control, so how truthful are you being when you are controlling exactly the details? What I think should be a better barometer is vulnerability. How much are you actually risking and what are you getting from being risky? Are you talking about your struggles with mental illness to help the audience members feel better about themselves? Confession is basically absolved me from your sins. That is not to the benefit of the audience, that is to the benefit of yourself.

That is the thing that I take away from those quotes, which is he used the stretching, this emotional truth to ultimately make it seem like he was more important, that he was more central to a lot of things. That was, in some ways, counter to what the ultimate points of the special were.

Alison Stewart: I have feelings about this, so I want to be completely honest about that.

Jesse David Fox: Sure.

Alison Stewart: Obviously, though we're open to all opinions and positions. In fact, we have somebody supporting Hasan online, one who will get to in a minute. This emotional truth idea, I argue it was emotional fraud, given the subject matter and how he's exaggerating and making up-- The things he's talking about have real-life consequences, like law enforcement brutality. It feels manipulative to me to ask the audience to believe this brutality happened to you.

Certain things just have emotional elements. Like if you come and say, "I have cancer," but you didn't really have cancer. Maybe you had a mold that needed to be removed. Those are two very different things. "I grew up in poverty." Maybe that didn't exactly happen. You weren't in a shelter, you were in subsidized housing, which is difficult too, but there are shades there.

When I heard it and read it and have really thought about it, that's what's processed through me, so I'll just be honest about that. You made an interesting point about what we've come to think about our comics and their role in society. How has that expectation changed over the time? When we think about traditional standup comedy versus the different-- There's sub-genres within the genre of comedy.

Jesse David Fox: Yes, it's fascinating because 70 years ago, no one cared when Henny Youngman said, "Take my wife, please." No one cared about his relationship to his wife. No one cared if Rodney Dangerfield got respect or not. No one even thought to care if the comedian was telling the truth or not. In some ways, they just assumed they were. It was just nothing. This is a change that has happened over the last 30 years, for one, because distrust in other media sources has been increasing. I can't remember the exact stats, but trust in the media has decreased significantly over the last 30 years. There has been a vacuum for other people to trust.

Comedians seem trustworthy. They're doing a thing that looks like journalism. Then you had The Daily Show effectively tell people the news. John Stewart and everyone who's ever worked at The Daily Show was like, "No, we didn't. We didn't provide people the news. We're just doing jokes." The data does not back it up. Anyone you talk to doesn't back it up. I can tell you from anecdotal experience, that's where I got the news when I was a young person. It is a comedian backout that has been able to happen, which is like, "Oh, we're just comedians." That's happened at the same time, while comedians continue to be taken more and more seriously and looked to for these things.

It is telling that we care about this story. 30 years ago, we wouldn't care if a comedian was telling the truth or not. That was the thing that's noteworthy. He said like, this matters. As much as right or wrong, if comedians should not be taken this seriously or not, they are-- I think a lot of comedians who are in this space will think differently about how they do certain parts of their act if they're going to do a politically adjacent emotional storyteller. You have that, the political truth, and we've fetishized this idea of emotional truth, that you've seen in one-person shows, and stuff like that.

I personally feel that truth is we should also be more, have side-eye towards. They're pretending up there and they should be allowed to, but we as an audience member should be savvy to that fact. It's created this perception, as comedians are so heavy considering what they do. I don't think they shouldn't do comedy like that. I just think it's muddled it. I do think there needs to be a sorting out of what all these different things are.

Alison Stewart: My guest is Jesse David Fox. He's a book out in November called Comedy Book: How Comedy Conquered Culture, and the Magic That Makes It Work. You wrote an entire chapter about truth. I want to get some other points of view in here. Caitlyn is calling in from Harlem. Hi, Caitlyn, thank you so much for holding. You're on the air.

Caitlyn: Hi, thanks for having me. I'm calling in support of Minhaj as an amateur comedian myself. I suppose you'd have to ask him directly what his vocation as a comedian is because I don't want to assume what it is. I know that one of mine is to help people heal from trauma because when you make somebody laugh, you can't think and laugh at the same time. It's the way of being of service, especially in these times in our lives with just how much, even just vicarious trauma we are exposed to all the time. Being able to laugh about things that are traumatizing is, I feel like, I don't know.

I don't know who he is prioritizing in the audience, but I understand it. My interpretation of it is that for the people in the audience who aren't concerned about whether this is true or not, who don't need to even wonder, who've probably experienced something similar or exactly what he is describing, that by him defending his way of doing the art of comedy, that he is prioritizing those people. I think that's a profound position to take against the secondary audience members who need to wonder whether or not something like that could happen. For those audience members, the challenge is important as well.

Alison Stewart: Caitlyn, thank you so much for calling in. There's a text that says, I feel like with the police violence, it gave him a way to talk about it and how it's not right. He did make himself the star of the story, but it's his act, so I appreciate his way of bringing up complicated topics and calling them out. He got some support from Whoopi Goldberg. We have actually two female comedians with different points of view. From here, is Whoopi Goldberg.

Whoopi Goldberg: There's a writer from The New Yorker, called him out for making up stories. That's what we do. That's what we do. We tell stories and then we embellish them.

Alison Stewart: We had Samantha Bee on the show yesterday, a fellow Daily Show alum. Of course, had her own late-night comedy politics show. We brought up the stuff and asked her to explain her own approach to truth and personal storytelling. Here's what she said about the standard she sets for herself.

Samantha Bee: I think that if I'm going to tell really personal stories, they have to be true. I have to be able to stand in truth because that is where I feel comfortable, and I think it's really important. I think it's important if you're telling personal stories for them to be personal stories, not someone else's stories.

[laughter]

Alison Stewart: Jesse, what do you think? It's so interesting, right?

Jesse David Fox: Yes, it's my favorite thing to talk about, honor. It's interesting because truth is treated as a monolith. We all know there's the truth, but clearly, especially we've now heard from four comedians. There's Hasan and these last three people, including the caller. They all have different versions of what truth means. There's myriad.

I think what is noteworthy is, let's say there was like five different things that were brought up. Some of their truths were used to basic timeline things to make a story a little bit more heightened to clean it up. I can see where a comedian would do that. The anthrax thing to me is the closest to an emotional truth thing, as well as the prom story, which is that's what it felt like I'll raise the stakes. The Brother Eric thing --

Alison Stewart: I will say an Anthrax story.

Jesse David Fox: I'm sorry. Yes.

Alison Stewart: He said that he had anthrax, I believe sent to his apartment, and then it caused his child to have to go to the emergency room. The latter half was not true.

Jesse David Fox: Yes. That, I can imagine, maybe he got a letter, it was scary. How do I tell that story in a way that the audience would believe? That to me is the cleanest version of emotional truth. I think that's what Whoopi's talking about. When you are talking about the Brother Eric thing, is when you're taking news stories and putting yourself in--

Alison Stewart: Brother Eric is somebody pretending to be in a mosque, the FBI informant.

Jesse David Fox: Yes. If you're taking news stories and putting yourself in them, and you're a person whose work also exists in the news, that creates messiness that might have the opposite impact as what the caller was saying, which is it might result in some people feeling their stories being invalidated either by that or in the future. That is where it's dangerous, but I understand what they're saying. There's a greater goal, and I'm sure a lot of his audience does not care or won't hear about it. I think every comedian will now think about this, and that is interesting. I think that's what's probably necessary.

Alison Stewart: Let's dive in and see if we can get another caller in here. Alina. Alina, you've got about a minute.

Alina: I did see The King's Jester and didn't think it was very good. When I recently read The New Yorker story and a very good piece that followed it up in the New York Times, to me there's a great difference between a comedian joking about his wife or his parents or something and it's not true. That's the contact I feel as the audience as opposed to things that are very serious and political.

To me, if I were someone who some of this stuff had happened to, the things he described, and later found out they weren't true, I would just feel very cheated and betrayed. I feel like it's not that complicated. As far as I understand, Minhaj has never said until this New York article, "These were not true." These clips you played. He didn't say, this didn't happen to me. I just feel that's a lie.

Alison Stewart: Thank you for calling in. Ira Madison III and Louis Virtel, the host of the podcast Keep It discussed this story yesterday. I made a distinction about the genre of comedy that Hasan Minhaj operates in. Let's take a listen.

Ira Madison III: Comedians in general, I think, generally, if you're going to see stand-up and a comedian is making a joke, I take most jokes with a grain of salt.

Louis Virtel: Yes, right.

Ira Madison III: You can joke about your breakup, something your girlfriend said, something your ex-boyfriend said, something your parents said to you. You can exaggerate that. Or if it was an uncle, you can make it your dad, you do whatever. It's just comedy. I think that Hasan Minhaj was in a different genre of comedy than that.

Alison Stewart: Is that right?

Jesse David Fox: That is not my personal perspective on it. There is the comedian out perspective, right? There's the intent and then there's how it's received. I do think it's important for comedians to understand how the audience is receiving their work. There's that aspect. I understand what Ira is implying. I do think the exaggerations that Hasan did are the exaggerations in a comedic piece. Though they were not directly attached to a joke, they were in the process of creating a comedic piece so that when he does tell jokes, there are more stakes to it.

It's not completely divorced from a comedian out perspective. That's how I imagined he would see it, but I do think what is clear, and this should not be a novel idea because the audience often dictates where comedy goes. That is what I think what Ira captures is that you're doing this in a theater. You're working on the soft Broadway. There are certain expectations that are maybe different.

Alison Stewart: The book will be out in November. I hope you'll come back and talk about it.

Jesse David Fox: I'd love to.

Alison Stewart: It's called Comedy Book: How Comedy Conquered Culture and the Magic that Make it Work<i data-stringify-type="italic">. Jesse Davis Fox, thank you for joining us, and thanks for sharing your reporting. Thanks to everybody who called and texted. That's All Of It for today. I'm Alison Stewart. I appreciate you listening and I appreciate you. I will meet you back here next time. We have a climate week wrap-up tomorrow on the show. Stay with us. We'll see you then.

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