Moshe Kasher | |
---|---|
Birth name | Mark Moshe Kasher |
Born | Queens, New York, U.S. | July 6, 1979
Medium | Stand-up, television, webcast |
Alma mater | University of California, Santa Barbara (BA) |
Years active | 2001–present |
Genres | Observational comedy, black comedy, surreal humor |
Subject(s) | Everyday life, Human sexuality, self-deprecation, religion, race, politics of the United States |
Spouse | |
Children | 1 |
Website | moshekasher |
Mark Moshe Kasher [1] (born July 6, 1979) [2] [3] is an American stand-up comedian, writer and actor based in the Los Angeles area. [2] [4] He is the author of the 2012 memoir Kasher in the Rye: The True Tale of a White Boy from Oakland Who Became a Drug Addict, Criminal, Mental Patient, and Then Turned 16. In 2009, iTunes named Kasher "Best New Comic" and his comedy album Everyone You Know Is Going to Die, and Then You Are! was ranked one of the top 20 comedy albums on iTunes that same year. [4] [5] He was also named "Comic to Watch in 2010" by Punchline Magazine. [4]
Born in Queens, New York, [6] Kasher moved to Oakland, California with his mother and brother when he was one year old. [2] [6] Kasher grew up in North Oakland's Temescal [2] and Piedmont Avenue neighborhoods, [7] and his family lived mostly on disability assistance and food stamps. [8] A son of deaf parents, Kasher worked as a sign-language interpreter from the age of 17. [2] [6] [9] [10] His parents met at the World Games for the Deaf in 1967 and split up when Kasher was nine years old. [8]
When Kasher was four years old, his father Steven, a former painter who was born to secular, communist Jewish parents, [11] became a Hasidic Jew in the Satmar community in Brooklyn; Steven's grandfather, originally from Hungary, was a New Square Skverer Hasid. [12] Kasher regularly spent summers with his father in Sea Gate, Brooklyn until his death [12] — Kasher was 20 at the time. [2] His father lived with Gaucher's disease. [11] Kasher's brother is a rabbi. [13] [14]
In his autobiography Kasher in the Rye: The True Tale of a White Boy from Oakland Who Became a Drug Addict, Criminal, Mental Patient, and Then Turned 16, Kasher wrote about having been moved in and out of mental institutions from the age of 4 and using drugs from the ages of 12 to 16. He was kicked out of four different high schools. [8] In an interview with SanDiego.com, Kasher described himself as "pretty straight edge," stating that he has been clean "since I was very young." [13] He earned his G.E.D. at age 16 and later became a sign-language interpreter. [8]
Kasher attended community college in the Bay Area, where he studied theater and wrote several long-form monologues. [8] He later transferred to the University of California, Santa Barbara, where he graduated with a degree in religious studies and minored in Jewish studies. [2] [11] [13] Before his career in comedy, Kasher had considered becoming a college professor in Jewish history. [13]
In 2001, Kasher attended an open mic comedy night in New York which included a performance by Chelsea Peretti, a comedian and writer with whom Kasher had attended junior high school in Oakland. [2] [13] After seeing her perform, Kasher asked Peretti to take him along on future performances, offering to perform with her. [2] [13] For his first performance, she took him to an open mic at the Luggage Store Gallery in San Francisco. [13]
In the early 2000s, Kasher performed mainly in the Bay Area, regularly performing at the Punch Line and Cobb's comedy clubs in San Francisco. [2] [10] [13] In the mid to late 2000s, he participated in many comedy shows with fellow comedians Brent Weinbach and Alex Koll. [15] [16] [17] In 2008 Kasher moved to Los Angeles. [2] [6] [10]
2009 marked a significant year in Kasher's comedy career. He was named "Best of Fest" at that year's Aspen Rooftop Comedy Festival; [4] [5] [10] his performance in Aspen garnered him an invitation to the Just For Laughs comedy festival in Montreal that same year. [10] This was followed by an appearance on the Comedy Central series Live at Gotham . [10] [13] Kasher had also released his comedy album Everyone You Know Is Going to Die, and Then You Are! through Rooftop Comedy Productions in April 2009; [6] [10] near the year's end the album was deemed one of the top 20 comedy albums of 2009 on iTunes. Kasher was also recognized by iTunes as the Top New Comedy Artist of 2009. [4] [5]
Kasher's stand-up act has been featured on such television programs as Late Night with Jimmy Fallon in 2010 [2] [13] and John Oliver's New York Stand Up Show in 2011. [18] He has appeared on Conan , Showtime's Larry Wilmore's Race, Religion & Sex . [19] He has also appeared as a frequent panelist on Chelsea Lately . [2] [13]
Kasher has performed at festivals internationally. In addition to the aforementioned Rooftop Comedy Festival and Just For Laughs, in 2010, he appeared at Fun Fun Fun Fest [20] and South By South West [14] [21] both held in Austin, Texas, as well as Cat Laughs in Kilkenny, [22] Ireland, and the Sasquatch! Music Festival in George, Washington. [23] In 2011 he appeared at the Melbourne Comedy Festival in Melbourne, Australia. Kasher has also attended SF Sketchfest in San Francisco, California on several occasions. [10] [24] [25]
In addition to the iTunes awards in 2009, Kasher was named "Comic to Watch in 2010" by Punchline Magazine [4] as well as "One of the Top 20 Jews In The Arts" by Shalom Life in 2011. [26] John Wenzel of The Denver Post also ranked Kasher #2 on his list of the top 10 comedy shows he attended in the Denver area during 2011. [27]
In January 2012, Kasher recorded his first solo comedy special for Netflix, Moshe Kasher: Live In Oakland at The New Parish nightclub in his hometown of Oakland. [2] [28] [29]
In September 2016, Comedy Central ordered a talk show series to be written and hosted by Kasher, entitled Problematic , [30] which premiered on April 18, 2017.
Kasher is a published playwright, writer, and author. While still in college, Kasher's long-form monologue "Look Before You Leap" was included in the literary collection Monologues For Men By Men: Volume Two published in 2003. [31] In 2011 and 2012 he contributed several articles to Heeb magazine. [32] In 2012, he published his autobiography Kasher in the Rye: The True Tale of a White Boy from Oakland Who Became a Drug Addict, Criminal, Mental Patient, and Then Turned 16 published by Hachette Book Group's Grand Central Publishing. [2] [9] [33] He wrote an episode titled "Pardon Me" for the television show, The New Normal . [7]
Kasher played small roles in the independent films Sorry, Thanks (2009) [34] and Wish Makers of West Hollywood (2010). [35] He appeared on episodes of the Fox sitcom Traffic Light in 2011 [36] and the NBC sitcom Whitney in 2012. [37] Kasher played the role of Ruben — a gay, deaf man confined to a wheelchair — in an episode of the U.S. television series Shameless which aired March 18, 2012. [38] [39]
In 2011, Kasher, along with Neal Brennan (co-writer of Chappelle's Show ) and DJ Douggpound (Doug Lussenhop of Tim and Eric Nite Live! ), started a podcast called The Champs. [13] Kasher said the following of the podcast in a 2011 interview with SanDiego.com: "It’s Doug dropping sound effects and beats over me and Neal kind of hosting an hour of ridiculous chat. We have a rotating black guy guest, there’s a different black guest every week." [13] Guests of the show included actor/comedians Wayne Brady and David Alan Grier, as well as musician Questlove, adult film star Lexington Steele and professional basketball player Blake Griffin. The show has strayed from its guest format on occasion with guests such as comedian and actor Bobby Lee, former pornographic actress Sasha Grey, former Major League Baseball player Jose Canseco, and actor Aziz Ansari. In 2014 The Champs was named "Best Podcast" as part of LA Weekly 's "Best of L.A." issue. [40] The podcast ended in 2016. [41]
In October 2014, Kasher premiered a new podcast on the Nerdist Podcast Network. Hound Tall Discussion Series is a live monthly podcast that covers a single topic. It's "an hour long chat with an expert and a panel of comedians, they learn all there is to know about things". [42] The first episode was about harems and the expert was Jillian Lauren, author of Some Girls, while Pete Holmes and Beth Stelling made up the comedic panel. [43]
On 15 July 2019, The Endless Honeymoon Podcast co-hosted with his wife, Natasha Leggero, premiered on most platforms such as Apple, [44] Spotify, [45] Stitcher [46] and YouTube. [47]
In 2020, Moshe and his brother Rabbi David Kasher began their podcast Kasher vs. Kasher to explore life during the Coronavirus pandemic. [48]
Kasher married fellow comedian Natasha Leggero, who converted to Judaism, in October 2015. [49] The couple had a baby girl in February 2018. [50]
Dr. Katz, Professional Therapist is an American adult animated sitcom created by Jonathan Katz and Tom Snyder for Comedy Central. It originally ran from May 28, 1995, to February 13, 2002. The series starred the voice talents of Jonathan Katz, H. Jon Benjamin, and Laura Silverman. The show was produced by Popular Arts Entertainment, HBO Downtown Productions, and Tom Snyder Productions. The series won a Peabody Award in 1998.
Natasha Leggero is an American stand-up comedian, actress, and writer. She rose to fame after appearing as the host of the MTV reality television series The 70s House in 2005, and as a regular roundtable panelist on Chelsea Handler's late-night talk show Chelsea Lately from 2008 to 2014.
Neal Brennan is an American comedian, writer, producer, director, and podcaster. He is best known for co-creating and co-writing the Comedy Central series Chappelle's Show (2003–2006) with Dave Chappelle and for his Netflix stand-up comedy special 3 Mics (2017).
SF Sketchfest, or The San Francisco Comedy Festival, is an American comedy festival founded in 2002 by Bay Area actor-comedians David Owen, Janet Varney and Cole Stratton. It takes place every January and February in a variety of Bay Area venues and features sketch comedy, improv comedy, film and television tributes and reunions, solo performers, music, podcasts and stand-up comedy performers.
Joseph Glenn Herbert, known professionally as Jo Koy, is an American stand-up comedian and actor. He was a frequent panelist on E!'s late night show Chelsea Lately. He has since had a total of six comedy specials released by Comedy Central and Netflix. In 2024, Koy hosted the 81st Golden Globe Awards.
Ian Edwards is a British Jamaican / American stand-up comedian, actor, writer and producer from New York and based in Los Angeles, California.
Alessandro Liborio Madrigal is an American comedian, writer, actor and producer. He is a co-founder of the All Things Comedy podcast network, alongside Bill Burr. He rose to fame on The Daily Show with Jon Stewart as a regular correspondent for five seasons. Outside of the standup world, he is known for his co-starring roles in the film Night School, Showtime's dark comedy I'm Dying Up Here, NBC's About A Boy, as well as CBS sitcoms Broke, Gary Unmarried and Welcome to The Captain. He has also performed on Conan and The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon. He is currently developing multiple projects for TV within his current deal at CBS Studios.
Brent Weinbach is an American stand-up comedian, actor, director, and pianist based in Los Angeles, California. He is known for his experimental style and abstract, deadpan delivery. He is a graduate of the University of California, Berkeley and was formerly a professional jazz pianist and substitute teacher.
Kliph Nesteroff is a Canadian author, best known for his 2015 history of American comedy, The Comedians.
Myq Kaplan is an American stand-up comedian. Born Michael Kaplan in Livingston, New Jersey, he is based in Boston and New York City.
Andrew "Andy" Wood is an American comedian and a founder/producer of Portland's Bridgetown Comedy Festival. He is a native of Ann Arbor, Michigan currently residing in Los Angeles, California.
Cole Stratton is an American actor, comedian, podcaster, writer and producer, best known as one of the Co-Founders of SF Sketchfest, the San Francisco Comedy Festival and the co-host of the Pop My Culture Podcast.
The Champs is a comedy podcast hosted by Neal Brennan, Moshe Kasher, and until 2013 DJ Douggpound. It is part of the All Things Comedy podcast network.
The Bridgetown Comedy Festival was a stand-up comedy festival located in the Hawthorne district of Portland, Oregon that took place every spring from 2008 to 2017, featuring standup comedy showcases, live podcasts, panel discussions and improv comedy. It was created in October 2007 by comedians Andy Wood and Matt Braunger and filmmaker Kimberly Brady.
Doug Lussenhop, known professionally as DJ Douggpound, is an American musician, video editor, and comedian. Lussenhop is best known for his weekly appearance as co-host and valued member of "The Holy Trinity" on Office Hours Live. He is also widely recognized as the editor for Tim and Eric Awesome Show, Great Job!, which prominently features his trademark editing style. He edited and acted in many Tim & Eric projects including Tom Goes to the Mayor, Tim and Eric Nite Live!, and Tim and Eric's Billion Dollar Movie. In 2024, Lussenhop continues to support The Eric Andre Show Live Tour as its opening act.
Irene Tu is an American comedian, actor, and writer. She has appeared at comedy festivals such as SF Sketchfest, the Portland Queer Comedy Festival, Bridgetown Comedy Festival, and Comedy Central's Clusterfest, and on shows such as Take My Wife and Funny How? In 2016, she was named one of KQED's Women to Watch and SFist listed her as one of the Bay Area's 11 Best Stand Up Comics. In 2017, the San Francisco Chronicle dubbed her as an "artist on the brink of fame". In 2019, Vulture by New York Magazine placed her on their list The Comedians You Should and Will Know in 2019, tracking "23 comics that industry insiders are watching closely". The same year, SFist listed her as one of 13 San Francisco Standup Comedians to Go See Now.
Dhaya Lakshminarayanan is an American comedian, performance artist, TV host, and storyteller. She has performed at venues such as San Francisco's Asian Art Museum, the San Jose Museum of Art, the Siren Theater, San Francisco's Punchline Comedy Club and Cobb's Comedy Club, the Brava Theatre, Throckmorton Theatre, and others. She has also performed at comedy festivals such as SF Sketchfest 2015 and SF Sketchfest 2020; the Desi Comedy Fest, America's only South Asian comedy festival; and the Out of Bounds Comedy Festival. In 2019, Lakshminarayanan, Will Durst, and W. Kamau Bell appeared as guests on KQED in regard to the controversial proposed closure of the historic San Francisco Punchline Comedy Club. The same year, she regularly opened for Greg Proops at the Punchline.
Karinda Dobbins is an American comedian. She co-produces the monthly comedy show The Resistance! alongside Dhaya Lakshminarayanan, has regularly opened for W. Kamau Bell, and additionally opened for Trevor Noah, Gina Yashere, Michelle Wolf, and Dave Chappelle. She has performed at festivals such as the Desi Comedy Fest, the Portland Queer Comedy Festival, Bridgetown Comedy Festival, and Comedy Central's Colossal Clusterfest. In 2019, SFist named her one of their 13 San Francisco Standup Comedians to Go See Now.
Johnny Taylor, Jr. is an American stand-up comedian, writer, actor, and podcaster from Sacramento, California.
Daniel Humbarger is an American stand-up comedian from Sacramento, California.
{{cite web}}
: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)