My name is John Rizkallah.
I'm 22 years old, and my parents are
from the Middle East!
Thank you.
But luckily, they came to America
a year before I was born,
so they gave me number one
on American Baby names,
which is why
my name is John.
(audience laughing)
It beat Abdul Rahman.
(audience laughing)
I got away with the names,
didn't get away with some
of the characteristics of being
an Arab.
Like, I have a lot of body hair.
I grew this beard 30 minutes
before I got here.
It's already back.
And you know, the babies in America,
they come out looking all shiny
and bald, and I came out looking
like a coconut wrapped in a towel.
(audience laughing)
Crazy.
My body kind of looks
like the Amazon rainforest,
but I tried putting air in it
the other day.
Now, it looks like the Amazon
rainforest after the fire.
(audience laughing)
Speaking of fires,
I'm from California!
(audience laughing)
I live in the non-smoking section
of California.
And it's legal to grow weed now.
So with these fires,
our firefighters are just hungry
all the time.
(audience laughing)
One of the fires
was started by a gender reveal.
I hate gender reveals.
Your baby--
[audience member] - Whoo!
- Yeah, me, too.
Your baby needs to be the Messiah
if you think I'm going to the gender
reveal and the baby shower.
That is too much time and money
for a baby who could turn out
to be a TikToker.
It's not worth it.
I feel bad for this baby
in particular.
Imagine being born and owing
the government $8 million
because it took a wildfire to reveal
your gender.
I can imagine his parents now
being like, "all right, Sparky,
"you just turned--
"you just turned two.
"It's time to get a job, please.
"What are you saying?
"Dada?
"Debt, debt, he's saying debt.
"OK, good, he knows."
And like.
There's no point to gender reveals
in California because why would I
go to one when you're a baby when I
would have to go to another one
when you turn 17?
{audience applauding}
(audience laughing)
I've lived in California for 22
years, and I finally got around
to surfing last month for the first time
and boy did y'all lie to me,
said it was fun.
It was a CrossFit workout
in a washing machine.
I imagined a hula girl would come out
of the water, jump on my board,
we'd ride off into the sunset.
Now, it's just a bunch
of 13-year-olds paddling
faster than me trying to give me
advice.
I accidentally hit one
with my board, but I wasn't trying
to surf.
(audience laughing)
My mom is all like, she's like,
"John, you can't surf, OK?
"You're going to get bit by a shark."
And I'm like, Mom, no shark likes
hair in their food.
(audience laughing)
Thank you.
(audience laughing)
This man gets it.
He's like, call back!
He knows.
I am Palestinian.
Sorry.
Palestinian.
I found out I was Palestinian
because my Jewish friends started
moving into my house.
(audience laughing)
I can say that!
I can say that joke.
(audience laughing)
As a Palestinian,
I have the solution
to the Palestinian-Israeli conflict,
OK?
Hear me out.
If you're a global leader,
write this down.
We just want what the Americans gave
to the Native Americans
when they took their land--
casinos.
That's all we want.
Open up the Aladdin, open up
the Alibaba, maybe the Gaza Strip
Club right next to it.
(audience clapping)
Right?
The Saudis will flock in, I promise.
I don't get it why Arabs have such
a bad rep in America, you know?
Like, especially in the South.
We have the same culture
as the South.
We both love guns, we both love
fireworks, and we both marry
our cousins.
It's the same thing.
Even the census gets it.
They get that we're the same thing,
you know?
Because Arabs have to mark White
on the census.
Unless there's a terrorist attack,
we have to mark "other."
(audience laughing)
There are some things
in the Arab culture that I wish
transferred over to America,
like arranged marriages.
I don't want to go out and find
my soulmate.
I want to know that I'm legally
binding to a woman named "Fatima"
and my family's three goats richer
because of it, right?
Like, I have such a hard time
with dating.
I'm so good at talking to girls,
they instantly think I'm gay.
They like showing me pictures
of the guys they like and all I have
to say is, eh, he's pretty cute.
(audience laughing)
Have y'all ever heard of the friend
zone?
I've been in the friend so many times
I started paying the electric bill.
I had one of my female friends come
to me be like, "John,
"I want you to be the Mate of Honor
"at my wedding."
I'm like, so you don't only want
to friend zone me now, you want it
up on display at your wedding?
Imagine this,
I'm going to be up there
in a pink suit, matching with all
the other bridesmaids.
They're all mad at me
because she picked a guy over them.
They're gonna be watching you walk
down the aisle,
standing behind the groom,
were both crying
for different reasons.
And then, we'd be at the reception
giving a speech, be like,
you know what?
I hope your mom's right,
and you're miserable.
Cheers.
(audience laughing)
I went to a private Christian
University, and the girls
at a private Christian University
are way different.
There's two extremes of them.
There's the girls who will marry you
in under a week and the girls who
are too busy because they're already
in a relationship with Jesus.
(audience laughing)
So I'm going for that front.
I'm growing out my hair,
growing out my beard,
posting my carpentry on Instagram.
(audience laughing)
My mom thinks it's her job now
to find me a woman,
so she follows the Instagram page
of my university
and sends me the girls
into marketing and just goes,
find them.
And so I'm running around campus
being like, hey, you looked really
hot on that poster.
My mom thinks we should date.
(audience laughing)
My dad's also trying.
He takes me aside at family parties
and goes, "hey, what do you think
"of her?
"She's pretty cute, right?
"Get her number."
I'm like, Dad, I have her number.
She's my cousin.
(audience laughing)
He's like, "it makes it easier.
"I know her parents."
(audience laughing)
I found out quarantining is pretty
easy for us
because, apparently, my parents have
been quarantining us our whole life.
They've kept us locked in away
from the virus of sin.
But we definitely caught sin.
Thank you.
I'm jealous of homeschooled kids,
though.
Homeschooled kids were prepared
for the pandemic, OK?
Right?
They're probably mocking us right
now.
Like, oh, you don't get to go
to prom?
I've had prom in my living room five
years in a row.
(audience laughing)
I had to ballroom dance with my dad.
Oh, you don't get to drive
your nice car to school?
I wake up I'm, at school.
I spent nine months
in my professor's stomach.
Yeah, so homeschooled kids win.
I wish I was homeschooled,
but then again, my parents hardly
know English, so I probably wouldn't
be able to be up here right now.
Like, have you seen Alexa and Siri
at my house trying to understand
my dad's accent?
Uh, it's rough, man.
Alexa just quit last week.
Apparently, phlegm is not a letter
they understand.
And every time my dad goes up
to Syria and goes, "call home,"
she calls Homeland Security.
(audience laughing)
(audience applauding)
I love that guy.
(audience laughing)
But they sent me to public school
where I learned the right form
of English.
And public school was great,
but there was a little bit
of bullying.
Like, I got bullied by this guy who
worked at Chick-fil-A, which wasn't
bad because I would just
walk into his shift
and have him be nice to me
for hours.
Drop a tray, talk to the manager.
Brandon, you didn't say,
my pleasure.
(audience laughing)
You're cooking the Lord's chicken.
Put some more sauce!
(audience laughing)
My dad tried to give me advice
on bullying.
He's like, "John, we're Christian.
"So you take him by the arm,
"put it behind their back,
"push them up against the wall,
"and say, I forgive you."
(audience laughing)
But I get why I was bullied,
though, you know.
My parents tried to raise us like we
were still in the Middle East.
While all the other kids went
to Disney World, they would take us
to the Middle East for vacation.
And looking back, it kind of
was like Disney World--
the water was murky like the Pirates
of the Caribbean ride,
there were fireworks,
but they came down,
and Princess Jasmine was
in the parade, but she was holding
an AK
and wearing a "Death to America"
t-shirt.
(audience laughing)
It's kind of the same.
Public school helped though,
because I learned how to act
in public school, and my theater was
the school nurse's office.
That's where I learned how to act,
OK?
There's a couple steps to it.
The first step is you've got
to pick, is this video game worth
the next two hours
of a brilliant performance as a kid
who is sick.
Once you got past that, you've
got to go to step two,
pick your condition-- stomach pain,
head pain.
You can't say fever because she's
got one of the best thermometers
in the game.
Third thing, you gotta
pick your walk up to the nurse's
office.
You gotta do the limp groan,
or the flailing arms, or the crawl.
Yeah, I don't have to do it.
You get it.
So once you've walked up
to the nurse's office,
you're going to want to sit there,
still act sick.
Ah, Nurse Becky, it hurts.
Just call my mom.
And then, you hear it, your standing
ovation, your mom on the other end
of the phone.
You pick it up, you go, Mom, I'm not
lying this time.
Come pick me up.
You pass all the other kids who are
being sent back to common core.
(audience laughing)
You get in your car, boom, go home,
you're an actor.
It's perfect.
And so I try to use my acting skills
at my private Christian University,
but the nurse there was like,
"oh, you're sick?
"It's just the Holy Spirit runnin'
"through ya.
(audience laughing)
"Go back to class."
And I was kind of worried
because our campus safety is just
a room of people praying.
(audience laughing)
Our campus safety officer,
he doesn't have a belt with a gun.
It's the belt of righteousness.
Yeah.
I got hit by a car in junior high,
which probably explains everything.
I got hit by an old lady
in a smart car who made
a wrong left, hit me,
and I flew back, landed
on my backpack.
Paramedic took me over to the side.
He's like, "John, count to 10."
I'm like, why?
He's like, "we've got to check
"if your head's all right."
I'm like, shouldn't we check if
the old lady's head's all right?
And I was like, OK,
also, can you tell the nurse
I'm not lying this time.
(audience laughing)
(audience applauding)
Yeah, I tried to sue the old lady,
but my dad wouldn't let me.
He's like, "John, we're Christians.
"We don't sue."
Now, he's being sued by the student
loan company from my university.
Dad, we're Christians,
we don't take loans.
I'm waiting until he makes
a final payment before I tell him
I could've learned everything
online,
could have Photoshoped that diploma
easily.
And now, we're paying six figures.
Whoo!
My dad's great and all,
but he's developed
this new addiction that's hurting
our family to Fortnite.
Yeah, he's addicted to Fortnite.
He plays it all the time.
Have any of you ever played
Fortnite?
No?
You're probably better than my dad.
Way better than my dad at Fortnite.
Yeah, it's hard to watch.
It really is.
It's hard to respect a man who's
consistently disrespected
by 13-year-olds online.
And I have to sit there and watch him
be like, Dad, just turn off
the Xbox, please.
Dad, don't talk back, please.
My dad's going to get canceled one
day, I know it.
Just because he likes playing
this game where he guesses people's
ethnicities right to their face.
He's like, "Chinese?"
They're like no, Nigerian.
"Oh, that was close, my second guess."
I'm over there like, please, he's
our only income.
Don't post the video on Twitter.
Please.
My dad thinks I'm entitled.
And I get it why I am entitled.
I'm in my room every day
like, Spotify, play
my favorite song.
Uber, take me to McDonald's.
You know what, forget it, Postmates,
bring me the McDonald's.
Tesla, you drive.
OK, I got my own kingdom going on
in there.
The only way to conquer me
is to change the Wi-Fi password.
(audience laughing)
(audience applauding)
I love it.
I love the clapping.
It boosts my narcissism.
We'll cut that out.
Have you guys heard of this new app
called "Find My Friends,"
where you can track your friends
wherever they are?
Oh, it's great.
I don't have to text my friends
to hang out anymore.
I can just bump into them
at Chick-fil-A. I go, oh, what are
you doing here?
What are the odds,
we bump into each other.
You want to hang out?
No?
OK, I'll find another friend who's
in public.
(audience laughing)
My dad's trying to make me more
of a man--
get me weight-lifting.
We went hunting.
He paid $200 for the gear.
The outfits were all
in the cold shivering.
I turned to him, I'm like Dad,
we could have just gone
to a petting zoo
and asked for an old deer
we could stab.
Right?
(audience laughing)
Sorry, PETA, sorry.
Sorry, the only PETA I know
is pita bread.
That's the only pita.
Yeah, I try to go to camp,
but my dad is like, "you shouldn't go
"to camp."
I'm like, why, Dad?
And then I realized that the camps
in his country are training camps.
I don't know how they sing kumbaya
with ski masks on, but it happened.
My dad's mom lived with us,
my grandma.
She's about this tall.
She's got the anger issues
of Charlie Sheen without the drugs.
And I had to be the one to teach her
how to use her new iPad.
And I thought it'd be easy.
Like, Grandma, this is Fox News,
this is your Arabic TV shows,
this is the weather.
But, no, it's the basics.
It's like, Grandma, just the finger,
not your whole fist, not
your whole fist on the iPad.
We don't have Apple Care, grandma.
Please.
No, she's great.
She puts money in her bra.
So every time I need money,
I'm like, Grandma, let's belly
dance.
Come on, shake it!
Shake it!
(audience laughing)
I got her a TikTok--
(audience laughing)
that's great.
Anybody have a Middle Eastern mom
in the audience?
Nobody?
God bless you.
Ugh, I love that woman,
but she puts the fear of God in me.
She's got a tight grip.
One look, I'm like, Mom, I get it.
Sorry.
One time, I came home
past my curfew,
and I drove past the freeway
and saw my car on the AMBER Alert.
Yeah.
I'm actually in film school
so I can make a horror film
with my mom as the main villain.
Listen, first.
You'll get it.
Because I'd rather have Michael
Myers in my closet than her taking
off her shoe, throwing it at me,
and doing a Matrix thing,
going around the corner,
hitting me every time.
I'd rather have Freddy Krueger
in my dreams
than checking my phone
and seeing I have eight missed
calls from mama.
Yeah, you don't want to do that.
When she goes shoe shopping,
it's just target practice for her.
She's just like-- ugh, a little too
much on the left.
(audience laughing)
She still hits me.
I don't know how she did it
the other day, but she hit me
while driving,
and I was in the back seat.
I don't know how that works.
Thank you.
I love this man.
What are you doing tonight?
- Eating Chick-Fil-A.
- Yeah, exactly.
(audience applauding)
That's good.
Good thing they're not recording
this.
(audience laughing)
My mom is the voice
of my moral compass.
I don't know when she did
the voiceovers, but she's always
in my head.
Like, I accidentally walked
into a bar, OK--
I accidentally take a sip
of my drink, and I hear, "John, what
"are you doing?
"I will rip your lips off."
(audience laughing)
Or, I'm in the movie theater
by myself and
an unnecessary naughty
scene comes up.
And all I hear is,
"John, close your eyes.
"God is watching you."
And I'm covering my eyes by myself
at this movie theater.
Or even I'm up here doing standup
and I hear her, "you better not
"be doing my accent."
Thank you so much!
I'm John Rizkallah, great to be
with you.