Comedian Pete Holmes Told Malia Obama to 'Shut the F**K Up' at his Show & It's Not OK

Louisa Ballhaus

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While Barack Obama was in office, we fell in love with his whole family — and to this day, I firmly believe that Malia and Sasha are national treasures, to be protected at all costs. So, when I hear 40-year-old Pete Holmes telling a story in which he calls 21-year-old Malia “hot” (repeatedly!) and recounts telling her to “shut the f**k up” at one of his shows, I get just a little bit worked up.

Comedian Holmes recounted this story on Conan Thursday, and he seems to think the punchline is that he didn’t know the young woman he was yelling at was Malia Obama. “I was watching the show before I went on,” he began. “And there were these two hot women — young women — in the front that, the whole show, were whispering.”

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This, to Holmes, is totally unforgivable. “It’s worse than heckling, they were going like this,” Holmes complained, miming an obnoxious whisper to host Conan O’Brien. “At every comedian! What a Black Mirror nightmare to be doing standup, and there’s two attractive girls — which is what made every nerd into a comedian — in the front row whispering and laughing at the people on stage, but in the bad way.”

First of all, can we please retire these stereotypes of nerdy guys and the hot women they’re desperate to impress? They serve no one. And second of all, while Malia’s behavior might have sounded a little rude, I can’t help but think this is an overreaction — I mean, they’re laughing. At a comedy show. Right?

The outrage continued when Holmes took the stage: “I just go, ‘what’s going on? I can see you, please stop,'” Holmes recounted. “And they keep doing it…I get a little bit more like, ‘shut up’…’please shut the f**k up!'”

“At a certain point, I take the curtain and I go, ‘I don’t care, enjoy the show however you want, I just don’t want to see you.’ And I cover them with the curtain,” Holmes added. “I thought this would get a big laugh. Nothing!”

And I’m suddenly remembering why I avoid most stand-up shows (put on by men, that is)! Yes, how hilarious that you physically wrapped two women in a curtain because you didn’t like how they were reacting to the show. Even if they were being rude, Holmes crossed a line with this — and it’s awfully telling that he only expressed regret for his actions when he finds out the woman in question was famous.

“After the show, I find out it was Obama’s daughter. It was Malia! And her hot friend!” the 40-year-old comedian concluded. “She looked great. Terrible comedy audience.”

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