Comedy News Roundup: September 20, 2026

Via Deadline: The comedian Salma Hindy accused Chelsea Handler of dropping her as an opener after she spoke to Handler about Palestine. Handler denied the accusations and claimed that the relationship broke down over a dispute about travel reimbursements. In response, Hindy said her manager told her that pushing the travel reimbursement issue would jeopardize her relationship with Handler, and that “he believed I was being pushed out because of Palestine.” Handler has apparently threatened legal action over the claims, and Hindy is seeking an attorney.

Via Seth Meyers’ podcast: Tiffany Haddish credits her portfolio of 17 properties to one vital piece of advice she received from an accountant many years ago. That advice? “When you start making money, buy a piece of property every year for 15 years.”

Via the San Antonio Current: Carlos Mencia, charged with felony tax evasion, says he never evaded his taxes, and once he files the taxes he never filed, “there’s no more tax evasion.”

Via Turning Point USA: Chris D’Elia will be headlining the University of Nevada, Reno stop of Turning Point USA’s “America: Love It or Leave It Fall Campus Tour,” sponsored by student loan refinancer Yrefy. Good luck, Chris D’Elia!

Via i-D: In a wide-ranging interview, Stavros Halkias condemns his “bootlicking” peers who have turned comedy into “a right-wing art form” and are being “used as a fucking stooge to put forward propaganda for, at this point, an almost purely fascist administration.” To which I must once again respond: Those are your friends, tell it to their faces!

Via Slate: In a different wide-ranging interview, John Wilson discusses his love of found footage, the risks he took making The History of Concrete, and how he pays his bills. “I can’t believe that this isn’t a 101 introductory class in every single cinema undergrad program, because the stuff that I learned the most from growing up and throughout my whole life has just been the stuff that is really honest about how art is made, with specific facts and figures.”

Via Twitter: Dave Smith, the white nationalist who has spent the last few years receiving praise from left-wing pundits and outlets for his outspokenness about the Gaza genocide, argues that states should not use their power to stop genocides:

Via the New York Times: Anthony Jeselnik discusses his favorite books, why men don’t read fiction, and the books that have made him laugh out loud. “I don’t think a book could hit me emotionally without reaching me intellectually. And I find that an intellectual book without emotion cannot reach me at all.”

Via The Baffler: an interesting essay about the past, present, and future of improv. “Even at its height, it was hard to believe that the improv boom would last forever, in part because the seeds of its decline had been planted back when the training center was invented.”

Via YouTube: Here is Theo Von asking a Catholic bishop, "The Israel that we see that gets talked about in the Bible, is it the same as the government of Israel that's running the country that's there now?”

And here he is struggling to pronounce the word “pedophilia”:

And I'll leave it there for today.