ST: Each time Trump announces a new Desi for his cabinet, do you start your research for new material? “Kash Patel, another Gujarati I need to know about.” You have a great Vivek Ramaswamy joke.
VD: I like Vivek Ramaswamy, he has super “pick me” energy. Kash Patel, I know nothing about. I just wasn’t consuming anything last year. So I have locked myself in a room for a month right now, and I’m just consuming fun sh*t. I’m not updated on Kash Patel for that reason.
ST: Your name, Vir translates to “the brave one,” which is tragically ironic at this point because to be a stand-up comic in India requires a certain bravado right now. Does that make you want to seek out an international audience?
VD: No. You’ve been to a show of mine.
ST: Multiple.
VD: Yes, it definitely interlaces with politics, because as you get older, politics is just a bigger part of your life. It’s not the bulk of my routine. Look, in any case, to be a comic, you need a certain amount of delusional bravado. And it takes different forms. In India, it may be, “I know that this will get me into trouble, but I’ve thought of it. Now, what am I supposed to do with it?” I took in a breath and something changed, and my body converted, you know, whatever to whatever. Do I not exhale? A thought is born in me. I can’t leave it in there. It seems biologically and mentally unnatural to do so. So you’re never approaching it with a sense of bravado.
By the way, you don’t know what you’re going to get into trouble for. If you try and second guess you’ll go insane. It’s never what you thought it was going to be. Yes, there are four or five bears that you know not to poke, and that’s just common sense, but there’s a creative way to do that as well. On the flip side, there is a new American bravado in stand-up comedy. This, “I can’t get canceled now. America’s back baby,” right? Kind of a great, straight reclamation of American stand-up that is happening because the pendulum swung from the very, very sensitive and woke to the complete opposite direction. And so that cancel culture grift, I think, will stop existing as well and find nuance.
Let’s not discount the immense level of privilege I come from. I (speak) English, I’m Hindu, and I’m heterosexual, those three things make it very, very easy for me to have a little bit of edge to my comedy.
From left, comedian Vir Das and writer Sucharita Tyagi after a show last year in Washington, D.C.
Courtesy of Sucharita Tyagi
ST: The day Trump won, I went to a taping of Seth Meyers’ show. It was a somber room, but the jokes were coming. You started your American tour the same week in Arizona. Was there a vibe you could sense?
VD: Honestly, and I say this with no arrogance, I get to talk about America with more freedom than an American comic. American comedy is ideology connected. American mainstream comedy is now conservative. Ironically, it has gone from being punk rock to very conservative right down the middle, or you’re very far liberal. You’re supposed to identify with a certain camp so that you can gravitate towards that audience. But when you come in with an outsider perspective, “I’m just visiting, and I don’t want to be part of any of these camps,” that’s freedom that no American comic has, where you have no dog in the race, as such. I’m enjoying tremendously doing political humor in America, but trying to show Americans what I see.
ST: You recently sold out a venue in Chicago, close to the place where you had a dishwashing job years ago. What was that like?
VD: It’s weird as hell, you know. What I remember most about that time is…I was undocumented. Or overstayed my visa. So I was existing in a cash-only universe. That’s the one thing that nobody talks about when you talk about illegal migrants or undocumented workers, is we live in a cash-only universe. You can’t get a debit card or credit card. You can’t get a bank account, so you have to store your rent in cash, in your shoes rolled-up in socks or under mattresses. Now, I walk around Chicago and am fascinated by how accessible everything is through plastic and just online. I can order Uber Eats in Chicago on my phone! I used to be a banquet bartender at this place called Carol’s Event Staffing. My manager found Carol, she came for the show, and she’s like, “Listen, I have one of your old paychecks, $290 that you didn’t collect.” Because I’d left America overnight. I was just like, “F*ck you. I’m done.” And I bounced. So I got a paycheck from 20 years ago, which is also insane.
ST: Wild.
VD: I used to walk by the Chicago Theater on the way to one of my jobs, and it felt like it might be warm on the inside. And it was. So that was nice.
