HOUSTON – Look, put your personal views to the side for a moment and just hear me out: these are weird times we’re living in, right?
It’s almost comical how frightening the news is getting about what’s happening in today’s political climate, but you know that saying, “It’s funny until it happens to you.” I’m not even talking about national politics; in Fort Bend County, my colleagues have been extensively covering an alleged social media hoax involving the judge and his former chief of staff.
The way the story has developed continues to baffle me and many Houstonians like Ashton Womack, a standup comedian and three-time Emmy-nominated writer for The Daily Show who currently lives in New York.
SEE ALSO: Indicted New York City mayor adopts familiar defense: He was targeted for his politics
We’re not political experts by any means, but it doesn’t take much to know what crazy times are upon us, so when we spoke via Zoom, I was focused primarily on how we can keep our laughter from turning psychotic.
But as he reassured me, we can’t just laugh off our problems and hopefully, the jokes will encourage people to get involved in how things (or at least should) work.
“I think we ought to turn we turn to laughter to make light of things, but obviously, comedy isn’t going to solve our problems,” Ashton admitted. “So, I think the main thing we got to do is in order to remain a functioning society is handle our problems... Because if we don’t and we’re all into the entertainment, we’re just like dumping our minds in to make us laugh, we’re going to go crazy if we’re just all doing are we’re just focusing on entertainment and not solving our problems.”
The thing about comedy most may not know is there’s a lot of thought that goes into telling a joke. Behind the silliness, there’s a serious element to what is said and how it’s conveyed, which is something Ashton argues makes his art form so underestimated. There is limitless potential, so if something is funny, a comic will say it even if it can be controversial.
RELATED: Too soon for comedy? After attempted assassination of Trump, US politics feel anything but funny
However, that has to also be done carefully by a comic who has accepted their responsibility and vulnerability when they’re on stage.
“It’s cathartic!” Ashton exclaimed. “You handicap yourself from thinking further... Whenever you have a thought and you’re like, ‘That’s good, but I can’t say that. I’m going to take that away,’ that might have been a great joke that you just threw away because you were scared to say it. And it’s a silly joke... I have so many jokes that are just the stupidest thoughts I had that week, and I said, ‘I’m going to do that on stage. I don’t care how dumb this is,’ that’s the whole purpose of it; I’m going to go say this completely idiotic thing that just no normal human being would ever utter.”
SUGGESTED: Finding humor in Ukraine war? It’s (always) the Onion’s way
That’s why for one example, one of Ashton’s jokes on stage involved poking fun at his father a year after he passed away.
“This is my thinking: I’m going to transform this dark, dark feeling into something positive and light and something silly,” Ashton explained. “I love my dad, but you know, he didn’t become super active until I became a teenager and when he was there, I mean, I’m here sitting in a seat talking to you, partially because my dad did everything he can to get me on stage, support me in the most goofiest ideas I had.
SUGGESTED: Late-night comics have long been relentless in skewering Donald Trump. Now it’s Joe Biden’s turn
“The guy has done a lot for me,” he continued. “I genuinely am just making a joke, and I truly try to come from the heart with it, whenever I’m saying things like, you know, typical things you don’t typically say that are like kind of out there, and like I try to come from the heart with that and some people see it, they’re like, ‘He’s just being a silly person,’ I hope when I’m saying something that’s wildly out there, people aren’t going like, ‘He really means that!’ and I hope they’re able to have the joke literacy pick up on that.”
After getting his feet wet in Houston’s stand-up comedy pool, Ashton moved to New York where he found himself... homeless (at least for the first year). But after getting his bearings, was hired as a researcher in November 2019 for what was then called “The Daily Show with Trevor Noah.” He was later hired as a writer, got nominated for an Emmy three times, and served as Noah’s comedy writer when he hosted the Grammy Awards four years in a row.
“I didn’t even know that was a dream I could have. But it’s like dreams come true,” Ashton recalled. “Just the experience every time, and the team just gets so much better at it every single time... but we come in now, we’re like the varsity.”
With the triumphant return of Jon Stewart, the Daily Show’s longtime host, Ashton says the internal pressure feels intensified, but it’s admittedly a welcomed stress.
“They both have their own way of like, conveying a message,” he said. “So the pressure (my own pressure) that I put on myself is amplified because I’m like, ‘My God!’ This is the guy who when I turn the TV on and watched him as my inspiration, and now I’m like contributing to helping his ideas, so I might be speaking from a perspective of like, ‘I want to contribute to the bigger idea’ and he’s always like, ‘What IS the big idea?’”
RELATED: Jon Stewart’s return to ‘The Daily Show’ felt familiar to those who missed him while he was away
In the current political epoch, where jokes write themselves in a sense, laughter does seem to be a good cure for the blues—especially on the heels of an already heavy news cycle.
“It’s tough because like writing comedy, you’re like, you want to exaggerate, but it’s like everything is already reality feel so exaggerated that I’m like, ‘Okay, I have to take it to another level,’ and taking it to another level feels crazy in thought,” Ashton explained.
SUGGESTED: Authoritarian governments a threat, not comedy: Jon Stewart
“I definitely think comedy has an element of like, there’s a part of it that feels when we speak to the masses,” he added. “I think sometimes a good joke, a good 100%, a good political joke or just a joke about like something that’s happening.... can shake us from the spell of something that’s hypnotizing society, like, we’re all following along with this and then a good joke or something can come along and just highlight the hypocrisies or the absurdity of this thing that we’re all just hypnotized by.”
It doesn’t need to take a curious mind to wonder though how that helps us going forward once the laughter dies out.
“I don’t know what’s happening but I’ll definitely be sitting back and watching it,” Ashton said. “This is what we voted into office, apparently and this is what we’re getting: an actual reality T.V. show. I hope we fix it; I hope we course correct, but until then, I’m going to make jokes.”
MORE ENTERTAINMENT NEWS STORIES
Obviously, you won’t find that answer from a comedian, but that’s cause it’s not their job. When did a king ever ask a jester for governing advice?
“The ultimate goal is to do comedy that unifies,” Ashton concluded. “I do pray and hope we get on a track to where we have policies and people in place who do genuinely have the people’s wellbeing in mind. And I don’t have to watch them every 2.5 seconds or have to worry about them... but, you know, fingers crossed, I’m going to put it on my vision board will manifest. Get the crystals, get the girls together, we’ll do as much as we can and make this happen.”
You can find more of Ashton Womack’s comedy on his YouTube page and follow him on Instagram.