{"id":270324,"date":"2025-10-01T22:45:13","date_gmt":"2025-10-01T22:45:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/270324\/"},"modified":"2025-10-01T22:45:13","modified_gmt":"2025-10-01T22:45:13","slug":"bill-burr-defends-riyadh-comedy-fest-gig","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/270324\/","title":{"rendered":"Bill Burr Defends Riyadh Comedy Fest Gig"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n\tAs many of his peers condemn the Riyadh Comedy Festival<\/a> and its participants, Bill Burr<\/a> appears to have connected with a new fandom.<\/p>\n

\n\tThe comedian, who performed on Friday as part of the inaugural festival\u2019s starry lineup, reasoned \u201cthey\u2019re just like us\u201d as he responded to backlash to Saudi Arabia\u2019s debut comedy festival.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cIt was great to experience that part of the world and to be a part of the first comedy festival over there in Saudi Arabia,\u201d Burr said on his Monday Morning Podcast<\/a>. \u201cThe royals loved the show. Everyone was happy. The people that were doing the festival were thrilled. The comedians<\/a> that I\u2019ve been talking to are saying, \u2018Dude, you can feel [the audience] wanted it. They want to see real stand-up comedy.\u2019 It was a mind-blowing experience. Definitely top three experiences I\u2019ve had. I think it\u2019s going to lead to a lot of positive things.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tAfter Atsuko Okatsuka<\/a> turned down an appearance in the festival, she shared some of the offer contract\u2019s \u201ccensorship rules<\/a>,\u201d of which Burr claimed festival organizers were told, \u201c\u2018If you want some good comedians, this isn\u2019t going to work.\u2019<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cAnd, to their credit, they said, \u2018All right, what do we got to do?’\u201d he continued. \u201cAnd they just negotiated it all the way down to just a couple things, which were, basically: Don\u2019t make fun of royals [and] religion.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tNoting that he previously performed in the nearby island nation of Bahrain, which is more liberal, Burr explained how his initial culture shock returned when he arrived in Riyadh.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cYou think everybody\u2019s going to be screaming \u2018death to America\u2019 and they\u2019re going to have like fucking machetes and want to like chop my head off, right?\u201d he said. \u201cBecause this is what I\u2019ve been fed about that part of the world. I thought this place was going to be really tense. And I\u2019m thinking like: \u2018Is that a Starbucks next to a Pizza Hut next to a Burger King next to McDonald\u2019s? They got a fucking Chili\u2019s over here!’\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tBurr said he was able to perform most of his regular act during the set. \u201cI had to stop a couple times during the show [and say], \u2018I\u2019ll be honest with you guys, I cannot fucking believe any of you have any idea who I am. This is really amazing.\u2019 And it was just this great exchange of energy. They know their reputation. So they were extra friendly,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n

\n\tOther comedians have recently called out their peers<\/a> who have agreed to perform, noting Saudi officials\u2019 roles in 9\/11 and the 2018 assassination of journalist Jamal Khashoggi, as well as the human rights abuses committed by Saudi minister of entertainment, Turki Al-Sheikh, who is behind the festival.<\/p>\n

\n\tHuman Rights Watch researcher Joey Shea explained to CBS News<\/a>, \u201cThe Saudi government has invested billions into high profile entertainment events like these in a deliberate effort to whitewash the country\u2019s human rights record and deflect from the egregious abuses that continue to happen inside of the country.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cThese investments are a part of the broader strategy to\u2026 have people thinking about a comedy event, for example, rather than the soaring number of executions that are happening inside of the country,\u201d added Shea.<\/p>\n

\n\tSince Deadline exclusively announced the initial lineup<\/a> in July, the Riyadh Comedy Festival has grown to include Kevin Hart, Aziz Ansari, Dave Chappelle, Louis C.K., Whitney Cummings, Pete Davidson, Hannibal Buress, Jack Whitehall, Zarna Garg, Gabriel Iglesias, Jim Jefferies, Jo Koy, Bobby Lee, Jeff Ross, Andrew Santino, Tom Segura, Chris Tucker and more.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"As many of his peers condemn the Riyadh Comedy Festival and its participants, Bill Burr appears to have…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":270325,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[134364,7882,171,134989,67,132,68],"class_list":{"0":"post-270324","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-entertainment","8":"tag-bill-burr","9":"tag-comedians","10":"tag-entertainment","11":"tag-riyadh-comedy-festival","12":"tag-united-states","13":"tag-unitedstates","14":"tag-us"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115301340016797189","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/270324","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=270324"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/270324\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/270325"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=270324"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=270324"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=270324"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}