Breaking the Internet

DALLAS—I started getting panicked messages around 8:30 Friday night. “Joe Bob, I can’t get in. I think my computer is fried.” “Joe Bob, WHAT THE HELL.” Emails, texts, instant messages, tweets. “Joe Bob, something is wrong with your show.” “Joe Bob, I have forty people in my ...

The Loneliness of the Cord Cutter

DALLAS—There’s a theater in the little Greek town of Epidaurus that seats 14,000 people. It has perfect acoustics. It’s where people gather to tell stories, hear stories, and discuss stories, sometimes with music, sometimes with dance, sometimes with costumes, sometimes just with words. This ...

Heckle Nation

Back in the ’80s I worked comedy clubs, and, depending on the night, the venue, the crowd, and the level of alcohol consumption, you could sometimes get absolutely eviscerated by hecklers. One time I was working this club called Charlie Goodnight’s in Raleigh, North Carolina, alongside a ...

Donnie and Jong Un, BFFs

SupremeCommanderDude: Hey, you up? What time is it there? The sun already saluted me three times today. AwesomeHillaryKiller: The Jongster! Just thinking about ya. SupremeCommanderDude: Oh yeah? Don’t worry, all the nuke guys are being eaten by dogs 2day. JK LOL AwesomeHillaryKiller: Naw, we’re ...

One California Is Enough

NEW YORK—This November, California is gonna vote on dividing itself into three states. That doesn’t go nearly far enough, in my opinion. I would encourage all you restless Californians to endlessly subdivide, like reverse amoebas, until all 40 million of you have your own state. Isn’t that ...

Last Judgement by Fra Angelico

Pope Forgets the Lake of Fire

NEW YORK—Pope Francis was chatting with a flamboyant Italian journalist named Eugenio Scalfari several months ago, and in the course of chewing over the eternal verities, presumably while sipping some appropriate Tuscan wine, the Pope said something that Eugenio heard as denying the physical ...

Torch Those Bikinis!

NEW YORK—I don’t know about you, but I’m circling my calendar and stocking whiskey for the night of September 10, when ABC will go prime-time live from Boardwalk Hall in Atlantic City for the Miss America… ...uh, wait, can’t call it a pageant… ...the Miss ...

Falcon 7X

God Apparently Flies First Class

MARSHALL, Tex.—The most frightening thing about Jesse Duplantis is that I think he truly believes what he’s saying. I mean, at some deep, deep level, even a guy who wears a yellow plaid shirt under a navy blue blazer is woke enough to realize that having a conversation with God—and, by the ...

“Hey, Look, I’m Driving a Giant iPhone!”

NEW YORK—Question: How can you tell the difference between Elon Musk and an ordinary Tesla owner? Answer: Elon Musk will eventually stop talking about his Tesla. I never quite got the whole Tesla thing. Is there some connection between multi-millionaires and ecological crusading that I was ...

My Name Is Joe Bob, and I’m an English Major

JUPITER, Fla.—I feel like I need to confess my addiction, like a newbie in a 12-step program. My name is Joe Bob, and I’m an English major. I’m not asking for your pity. I’ve been trying to overcome this addiction on my own for several decades now, and so I’m turning it over to a higher ...