Comedian Josh Johnson saves politics for his day job

By Nick A. Zaino III Globe Correspondent,August 22, 2019

Josh Johnson is not a political comedian. Those who see any of his four shows at Laugh Boston this weekend are more likely to hear jokes about how he was terrified by an opossum or getting bullied by New York City middle-schoolers as an adult than a riff on President Trump wanting to buy Greenland. But in his day job as a writer for “The Daily Show With Trevor Noah,” he does have to find a way to make the news funny.

Jokes about politicians or daily headlines are good for Twitter or conversation, but they generally don’t make it into Johnson’s act. He feels a lot of that material is already “well-worn before lunch,” and there’s not much left he can add. “I’m actually rarely topical at all unless it serves a bigger purpose in an overall point I’m trying to make,” he says, speaking by phone from New York City. “You’ll rarely see me rattle off things that will feel old tomorrow because I do want every clip that I put up on the Internet, every shot of a special, everything I’m in to be as timeless as possible. And I feel like that’s the road to actually building a legacy.”

Click here to read the full article:

Comedian Josh Johnson saves politics for his day job