Hilarious HBO Special Explores What Happens When a Jewish Comedian Infiltrates a White Nationalist Meeting

Erin Strecker
·8 min read
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Let’s get this out of the way right off the bat: Yes, Alex Edelman’s new HBO special is funny. Like, very funny. One would be forgiven for being hesitant upon hearing the elevator pitch. “Just for Us” is Edelman’s third solo show, this one the true story breaking down his experience (as a Jewish man) of infiltrating a meeting of white nationalists in Queens.

“The first thing I did [after that meeting] was I called a couple of friends being like, ‘Oh my God, you’ve got to hear this stuff,'” Edelman said to IndieWire during a recent interview. “And then some of them are like, ‘That’s stand up.’ And I [said,] ‘No, it’s not stand up. You’re out of your mind.’ Turns out, they were kind of right.”

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The 90-minute special debuted as a downtown NYC show back in 2018, then evolved into a Broadway show that was taped for an HBO special that will premiere on the channel on the evening of April 6.

“I really make sure the show is funny because it was developed in nightclubs and comedy clubs,” Edelman said. “But I also gave it a story because I wanted it to feel like a play to people who don’t like comedy. That blend is actually kind of new for most people. I’ve been inspired by Mike Birbiglia [who executive produces] and international comedians. I’m not claiming this is reinventing the wheel. I’m just saying I took a bunch of other wheels and [tried] to mash them together.”

The result, full of pathos and silly observations, plus one hell of a buzzy hook, makes “Just for Us” the kind of show that gets someone capital-N Noticed. Edelman has been touring it around the country, and the wide range of people who have found his musings on everything from gorillas to family dynamics relatable has had an obvious lasting effect on someone who jokes in “Just for Us,” “My comedy barely works if you’re not from the Upper West Side.”

“There’s true romance in being seen,” Edelman said. “In the show and then people’s response to it, [I] found real romance [with] people, even as it’s ended my relationships because of the amount of travel and stuff like that. It’s not great for actual romance. Who I am, and because of my very specific upbringing and because of the very odd person that I am, I’m the type of person who benefits much more in terms of being seen from an hour-and-a-half of explanation.”

The following interview has been edited and condensed for clarity.

IndieWire: Mike Birbiglia was an executive producer on the show, and in the comedy space does a similar thing with his work: one long story. When did you first connect with him? And what have you learned from him?

Alex Edelman: Mike has actually done this before, he did it with the [Netflix] Jacqueline Novak special. He gave her all these pushes in the right direction. He championed her work very early. It’s like having Tom Stoppard produce your play or like having Tom Brady as your quarterback coach. He gave a couple of notes, only a few notes, but they were really, really, really, really good ones and really, really big ones. … I take all of the aspects of the show really seriously. I was like, “Should I put this thing in the program?” I will bother him with small things. He’s just a very generous, funny soul.

[One time, after Birbiglia’s show] we walked to Grand Central Market. And he said, “I hear you have a solo show.” And I was like, “Oh, yeah, I’ve been doing it in workshop. And I don’t know if it’s gonna go anywhere. It’s about me going to this meeting of white nationalists in Queens.” And he went, “What?” “Yeah, it was my last show, but I don’t know if it’s going anywhere.” He went, “That’s not your last show. That’s your next show.”

There’s always discussions with comedians about how true a stand-up special is. How do you think about that in terms of your own work?

My number one thing is, always it has to be entertaining. But the truth is usually more entertaining, I say, usually because my director, Adam [Brace], we we’re fighting over something in the show. I was arguing for a detail that I wanted, and he went, “Cut it.” And I went, “No, it’s good. It’s true.” And he went, “It’s not entertaining.”

The show is based on a real story, but they’re lots of composites. And I condense things or took things from other stories in my life and put them in there. I actually really love that act of curation and compositing. To me, that’s where the real artistry is.

By the way, I’m always extremely careful [to note] the show is not journalism. Until my therapist pointed this out, I was afraid that one of the people from the meeting would be like, “We never said that.” And then my therapist is like, “Oh, you think someone’s going to come to a show and be like, ‘Excuse me, I was at that meeting of white nationalists! And he is misrepresenting us!’”

I changed things to protect myself a little bit. I also say no all the time. People are like, “Will you come speak as an expert on hate groups?” And I’m like, “No, are you kidding?” I was just a guy on the internet who went to a room of people one time. Get an FBI person to talk about it.

Did you ever hear from them via Twitter or anything as the show has gotten bigger, or is that just so not their world?

No, I really think it’s far away from their purview. I thought I saw one of them in Union Square at a farmers market two years ago, but I wasn’t gonna go up to someone and be like, “Hi, do I know you from a meeting of white nationalists in Queens?”

Turning people into characters can get dicey when they’re people in your life. I’m wondering what your family thinks of the show, particularly the parts that are more directly about them.

Oh, they love it — at least they present as loving it! … The Christmas story from the special is so documentary-true, there are like two or three exaggerations in it for comedy. But they’re detail exaggerations. If you don’t know, our family [had] Christmas for a woman named Kate who had nowhere to go for the holiday. It’s a long, beautiful story.

I hadn’t seen her since I was seven years old, and she came to the show at the Kennedy Center in DC. I was like, “I’m sorry if I got anything wrong.” She’s like, “I think it’s pretty much exact.” So that part’s true. My parents are played up a little bit; I highlight an aspect of them that doesn’t take into account another aspect. My brother is less obtuse than I portray him. Stand up should offer you a little bit of leeway.

Although not that Christmas story. [That’s] pretty goddamn documentary.

I wanted to ask you about Adam Brace, your long-time collaborator who died whom you dedicate the special to. Can you tell me about collaborating with him?

I don’t know if you have this person in your life, but for a lot of people, that’s their best friend, right? That’s the person who is the coolest, funniest person whose tastes you trust and can be earnest and biting and fun, and they’re “for you” in the air quotes. I was lucky in that the person who was that for me, was my director. … It was a really personal and singular connection in my life. I wish he had lived to see the success of the show that he had a huge part of. The hardest thing about doing the show and ending it as live experiences [is] the end of that partnership.

I was not a full-time comedian, and my first show that Adam directed called “Millennial” won the Edinburgh Comedy Award which was good enough to start my career as a comedian. He had a big impact on that, and then a bigger impact on my second work. … I really hope that I can find a way to access that deep connection with him, even though I’m no longer performing this thing that we worked on together. He was a really big, lovely part of my life and I miss him terribly.

“Just for Us” premieres on HBO on Saturday, April 6 at 10 p.m. ET.

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