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Ariel Leaty and Bryan Yang are the complete antitheses of what you may have thought comedians would look like.

First off, neither of them are white Jewish men with moms incessantly asking when they’re getting married. Secondly, well, I mean, just look at them! United Colors of Benetton couldn’t have done a better job of booking a more diverse, gorgeous duo for their photo campaign. But alas, this article isn’t about how “diverse” the two are, though, we will most likely be using the word a lot because of SEO, but instead, about the launch of the new season of their incredibly funny podcast, “What’s Eating You?”.

Every week, the two comedians examine the world through the lens of food, and try to answer the question, “What’s eating you?”. Guests have included comedians Gastor Almonte (Comedy Central, Viceland, PBS, Amazon Prime), Fareeha Khan (MTV, Reductress), and Anya Volz (The Hard Times, Riot Fest, Bunny Ears).

Started from New Jersey, Now we Here

First, let’s talk about Ariel, 30, model, comedian, and actress hyphenate who made her way through the New Jersey comedy scene before settling in NY. “In New Jersey, I could count on one hand the number of comedy clubs and comics there were. Especially, female comics. But here in NYC, I found a whole group of people who were fun and funny and hustling.”

The same went for Bryan, 31, who hailed from Sacramento but moved to NYC in search of bigger, and better comedy venues. “Everyone is really trying in New York. Everyone is grinding. You feel it on the train and the streets. Everyone is literally trying to be the best at what they want to do here and I knew I had to come here”.

Together, the two boast an impressive line of comedy and life credits. Ariel produces a monthly comedy show called “Culture Vultures” that promotes women, people of color, and LGBTQ comedians. Bryan, who’s been doing comedy since he was 18, has been a finalist on Standup NBC and opened up for Michelle Wolf, Ronny Chieng, Gilbert Gottfried, and Greg Proops.

But it wasn’t always that way.

Ariel burst into the standup scene when she was 24, after a promise to herself to “do something that scared her” and a long obsession for being on SNL. Within 6 months though, she was diagnosed with Leukemia. “I was balding, making jokes about Cancer and dying. It wasn’t the most lighthearted when I did make it on stage. But the whole comedy community really came and rallied around me while I was sick.”

“Gordon, my cohost from Culture Vultures even collected singles from comedy shows and tried to make it rain on me while I was in the hospital. The doctor had to come in and stop him because money is literally the dirtiest thing on the planet. I was in a bubble!”

For three years Ariel battled Cancer and comedy, and finally, in 2017, Ariel went into remission. Today, she’s back with a vibrant approach to life and spends the bulk of her time producing comedy shows, performing, and of course, eating and talking about their love for eating on the “What’s Eating You?” comedy podcast. Her perspective on life is refreshing, to say the least, “I almost died. I need to live my life doing what makes me happy.”

“Comedians call people who don’t do comedy, “civilians”. It’s like we’ve all been to war. We’ve all gone through this trauma. When audiences see you doing really well, that’s like 5 percent of the time. The rest of the time, we’re doing horrible shows. It’s a shared bond. We must be lunatics to continue on this path“

Bryan, born in Sacramento to Hmong immigrants from Laos, had an early start to comedy. “My dad loved Johnny Carson and cut out jokes from Readers Digest for me. We always rented funny movies, especially during the 90s. I just knew I always wanted to become a comic”. After flunking out of college, and then later, community college, Bryan went full throttle with stand up. He’s been performing for over 13 years across massive shows and basement bars. “It’s the most fun and fulfilling thing for me, I think. When I do standup, I know this is what I want to be doing”

For the duo, comedy is woven into every aspect of their lives. Perhaps that’s the reason why the two get along so well. The synergy between the two is the type of best friend-ship that puts every Judd Apatow buddy-comedy flick to shame as they finish one another’s sentences, one made even more apparent on their podcast. “Maybe the reason why comedians all get along is that there’s this unspoken bond that we’ve all done trash shows, and yet we’re still here.” After our interview, Bryan is on his way uptown to do a set in someone’s apartment uptown where “everyone gets a donut. I’m not sure why, but it’s just the thing now.”

Yet, the launch of their new podcast goes beyond just talking about food, but being a platform for diverse, underrepresented comedians as well. The first episode, “#LightFlex” dives into the hustle the two go through trying to pursue acting and comedy as diverse looking comedians. Stay tuned for these funny people!

You can follow them:

@whatseatingyoupod on Instagram and Twitter. The podcast is currently available on Soundcloud, and on Apple podcasts asap.

Bryan Yang on Twitter and Instagram. His next show is at Union Hall on August 14th at 8PM. (EDIT: This event has passed)

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So there’s this a magic trick called “card divination”.

It involves a magician selecting an audience member at random and having them imagine a card, “any card” in their head. Conventionally speaking, the magician shuffles the cards and magically pulls out the exact card out of their deck, to deafening applause. If they’re extra playful, they’ll pull out the card from some nefarious location, like rolled up inside of a lemon or inside the coat pocket of an audience member’s unsuspecting husband’s wallet.

But Ben Nemzer, who currently headlines at Monday Night Magic – the longest running off-Broadway Magic Show in NYC likes to step it up a notch.

The first time I saw Ben perform, he was on stage performing card divination. Just as I thought he was going to pull out the card from thin air, he pulled out a jumbo drawing pad and started scribbling furiously on the pad. When the audience member declared his card, Ben turned the pad around to see a hand-drawn card, that then… rose off the paper like Jesus when he rose from the crypt.

The trick, I promise, was certifiably a Grade A mind fuck.

Ben’s trick is the magic equivalent of Beyonce pulling Destiny’s Child out of the ground during the 2013 Superbowl. When I ask Ben the secret to the trick, he responds with the typical magician’s mantra, “Oh, I can’t tell you”.

To which I respond sardonically…”What, is there some sort of secret magical society that keeps you guys in check or something?”

“Actually, there are several magic societies..”

And he began to rattle off several societies, including the SAM, Magic Castle, International Brotherhood of Magicians and the Magic Circle.

A quick google search reviews that ALL of these are expansive magical societies with Illuminati-Esq histories and members worldwide in the hundreds of thousands. Many had some of the world’s most influential magicians like Houdini, Len Vintus, Gene Gordon, and Don Rogers. Ben, it turns out, is a member of not one, but TWO of the organizations and was also a guest lecturer at Princeton University on Magic and Showmanship.

A native New Yorker, Ben started performing magic at the age of 8, when he was given a magic kit from his brother. He started performing in front of his friends and family, and eventually was whisked off to magic camp at Bryn Mahr College where he worked as a counselor for years. He interned at Tannen’s Magic Shop and apprenticed under famed magician, Steve Cohen for years before embarking on his own solo journey.

Since then, Ben and his comedic magic have graced the screens of Comedy Central, live stage performances and sold out Cruise Ships and everything in between. And so, I spent the day with Ben just to see what is a day in the life of a magician.

The topic of magic tends to get a bit divisive in NYC. You either love it, hate it or think that it should be relegated to bar mitzvahs in Long Island. While yes, there are the cheesy magicians that come to mind, New York City is a hub for some of the world’s finest talent.

Ben asks me to meet him at a nondescript office building in the seventh circle of Hell that is Herald Square. Fluorescent lights and a bored doorman watching soccer on his iPhone 5 guards the door, and I make the journey upstairs.

Directly in front of the elevators is a Chinese accounting office with paper signs hawking deals taped all over the doors and windows. But my destination is further down the stock image of a hallway.

Finally, I find my destination. Tannen’s Magic Store.

It’s the oldest operating magic shop in NYC. Founded in 1925, the shop is a NY institution, serving as a meeting ground for magicians from all over the city and beyond. The shop feels more like a museum than a magic shop, with glass display cases featuring all sorts of magic paraphernalia. Shortening ropes. Glass bubbles. Bite out coins and Chinese linking rings.

Black and white portraits of Houdini and other famous magicians permeate one wall while across the room, an entire wall of magic books. Along with the third, you ask? A life-size mock elephant, of course.

When I ask about the elephant, one of the staff members, whose name I’m told is simply, “Magick” is notoriously tight-lipped.

We arrive just as the place is closing, and the shop is mainly empty, with the exception of a few magicians testing out some last minute tricks. Another magician, Noah Levine preps the space for his own personal magic show, “Magic After Hours”.

Here’s a quick little rundown on magic. It’s spirited history dives as far back to 403–221 BC in China when women were revered as shamans who could traverse the spiritual and real worlds. Their ability to speak to the spiritual world was highly regarded amongst royalty and a must for angsty Kings who needed confirmation that they were indeed, as great as they thought they were.

In Europe, the first book on magic was from 1489, called “Natural and Unnatural Magic” and explained old-time-y tricks like sawing off heads. In the US, magic got out of its infancy in the late 1800s through Vaudeville performances when Jean Eugène Robert-Houdin (the OG magician that inspired Houdini) took his performances and elevated them for rich folks. Of course, I’m skipping the whole part with witchcraft, but this article is about Ben.

Another magician performs with Alan Cumming

From there we head over to actor Alan Cumming’s appropriately NSFW named bar, Club Cumming for an intimate magic show featuring Ben, and about 6 other magicians ranging from mentalists to card tricks etc. For $20, attendees were surprised with Alan Cumming being pulled on stage and various acts throughout the audience.

When I coerce him into doing a card trick for a “cool picture” in St Marks Place, a trick involving geometric shuffling that is reminiscent of an AP Algebra problem, a small crowd of bystanders forms watching as Ben impresses the shopkeeper of a hat shop. The man, thoroughly unimpressed by our game of 52 card pick up in front of his shop peeks a smile by the end of the night.

Catch Ben Nemzer and his performances when he is in town in NYC at Monday Night Magic. You can also check out his upcoming events HERE.

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You May Have Heard of Red Hook, But Did You Know There Was a Yellow Hook?

Located in the southernmost tip of Brooklyn, across Staten Island and shadowed by the Verrazano Bridge, Bay Ridge is a quaint, “family-friendly” neighborhood that rarely makes waves in the headlines. While today, Bay Ridge is filled with quaint treelined blocks, brownstones and a lively main street pocketed with mom and pop shops reminiscent of Astoria (just less hipster-y), it’s history was anything but safe. Read on to find out about the wild days of Bay Ridge.

Originally inhabited by the Nyack Native Americans, Bay Ridge was formerly a rich, luscious terrain of marshland. At its height, there were over 100 different bodies of water that once pocketed the land. When the Dutch first landed in 1652 (via The Dutch West India Company, obvi) they founded the neighborhoods, Bushwick, Brooklyn, Flatbush, Flatlands, and New Utrecht. The area we know as Bay Ridge was named Yellow Hook due to the yellow sand and clay that made up the land.

For several years, the land was primarily inhabited by the Dutch, with a smattering of enterprising sailors and merchants from Germany, England, France, and Scandinavia as well as a large number of black slaves brought from Africa. Due to its waterfront access, Bay Ridge was a land ripe for trade, and in 1674, the British captured the land from the Dutch and called it, New York.

Here’s Some Insane George Washington History

On August 26th, 1776, over 34,000 British troops snuck up on George Washington and his troops. Marching through Bay Ridge (near the Verrazano Bridge), Owl’s Head Park and up to 3rd Ave near Greenwood Cemetary, they fired on the American troops. The battle came to be known as the Battle of Brooklyn and was one of the largest in the Revolutionary War.

During the dead of night of August 29th, Washington led his troops into what would become known as one of the greatest retreats in American history, taking his 9,000 troops across the East River to Manhattan, covered by the night and thick fog. He single-handedly saved his troops and allowed them to later win the Revolutionary War.

But Wait, There’s More – Yellow Fever

Between 1848-1849 a tirade of Yellow Fever broke out aboard a ship that spread across the waterfront neighborhood. Infected sheets and clothes were tossed into the water, which then polluted the waters and spread the disease to residents of Yellow Hook. The mosquito-borne disease thought to be spread through water led to over 6,000 acres of ponds being drained in Bay Ridge.

On a side note: New Orleans, where a larger Yellow Fever outbreak had occurred years earlier had “made efforts to purify the atmosphere by firing 600 discharges from cannons. Alas, that only led to more deaths as the sick went into convulsions”. Gotta love the logic of the past where the answer to solving a disease was to shoot bullets into the sky.

By 1905, Yellow Fever was considered eliminated through the advent of modern medicine and elimination of mosquitos but, the name of Yellow Hook still held nasty memories of jaundiced children and convulsing bodies, so the locals renamed Yellow Hook as Bay Ridge for its gorgeous ridge and the beautiful views of the Bay.

Insanely Wealthy Bay Ridge

The re-brand to “Bay Ridge” was a rock-solid publicity move and the rich soon swooped in. Bay Ridge became a huge resort town for the wealthy, and glamorous hotels like the Grand View were built along the waterfront. Eventually, the mansions were torn down and turned into apartment complexes as Coney Island grew into popularity, drawing visitors and residents away.

Photo via Public Domain of the Grand View Hotel

Bay Ridge Today

Today, Bay Ridge is a family neighborhood with a huge middle eastern, Irish, Italian and Norwegian, Dutch population. Fifth Avenue is a repository of quaint, mom and pop shops including one of the oldest bars in Brooklyn (Three Jolly Pigeons), oldest ice cream parlors (Anopoli Ice Cream Parlor) and more. Bay Ridge is worth a neighborhood visit for sure.

Photo via Dave Sanders for the New York Times

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The first thing you are going to do is make a list of all of the things that made you happy this past year. These are your accomplishments.

While your accomplishments don’t have to be grandiose things like curing COVID-19 (thank you frontline workers and scientists), they could be as simple as giving a successful presentation at work via Zoom, applying for that higher up job even if you didn’t get it, donating to your favorite restaurant, getting on that trip with friends or family, working out consecutively for 4 days, hitting ten pull-ups or even, just making it to today, because hell, this has been a wild year. No matter how small it may seem, just list it.

I bet if you take more than five minutes to sit down with it, you’ll be surprised with what you came up with. Now, take a look at that list and try to break it down by category. How many of them are work-related? Relationship? Physical? Mental? Hobby? Family? Is there a particular category that you’d like to pursue more? Are you balanced more in one bucket than the other? Jot that down and put it aside.

How to Create Goals for 2023 AND Stick to Them

OK. Now, map out some realistic things you would like to accomplish next year.

Take whatever goal you have, and shrink it. Let’s take “I want to have a 6 pack by June 2023” as an example.

Smaller. I want to work out everyday for 100 days.

No, smaller. I want to work out for 30 days straight.

Smaller. I want to work out 7 days a week.

Let’s go smaller. I will work out for at least 20 minutes for 4 days this week.

Now, that’s looking good. Your goals should be mini-goals that you can actually attain easily starting today, for one week.

If you’ve been frustrated with yourself for not having been able to accomplish your goals, then start with accomplishing small goals.

Maybe you want to give up drinking for 30 days, start by doing 3 first. If you want to write a book, start by writing for 5 minutes 3 days in a row. Maybe you have no fricken idea what you want to do in life. Spend the day by yourself and you can use this trusty guide written by Gina Molfetta.

Here’s a little secret about goals. There’s no secret. You just have to stop making excuses and do it. No one wants to listen to you tell us about your idea for a Yacht Rock Cover Band. Let me rephrase that. No one wants to listen to you tell us about your idea for a Yacht Rock Cover Band and never do it. Even 1 % of progress is progress!

Here’s a little secret about goals. There’s no secret.

Some people might fault you for trying, but more often than not, your friends and family want to see you succeed. If they don’t, that’s ok. You’ll find people who will. But you owe it to yourself to actually deliver on the things that YOU want to do, regardless of financial, societal, or quite frankly, realistic obstacles.

There is no worse feeling than five years (or December 2023) later and sitting with that nagging feeling always wondering “what if”? Or worse, when someone ELSE does the thing that you always wanted to do, and knowing, you could have done it too.

You have to think of dedication and accomplishing goals like a muscle. Most successful people aren’t simply born with the ability to wake up at 6 AM and run for 5 miles…they train themselves to do it so that even when they don’t want to do it, because of muscle memory. You literally have to brainwash yourself.

If you want to be successful with accomplishing large goals, you need little spurts of accomplishment from the little goals to run the marathon. It’s the compound effect.

You have to think of dedication and accomplishing goals like a muscle. Most successful people aren’t simply born with the ability to wake up at 6 AM and run for 5 miles...
So – now that that reality check is in, how can you make that goal actually come to fruition? If it’s a large goal that you’re trying to attain by June 2023, break it down. What do you need to do in order to accomplish that?

Knowledge is Power

If you’re not sure how then ask someone who does.

If you don’t know anyone, go online. There are forums and articles. There are friends who have friends. Coworkers who have networks. Linkedin and internet strangers that you can email 100x over. It’s that simple. Goals can appear to be lofty and arduous, but if you sit and break it down into manageable chunks…sometimes the thinking is the worst part. If you have a long term goal that is hard to keep up, see if you can find someone to hold you accountable. If you have a friend who is consistent about going to the gym, see if you can piggyback off their good habits.

Put Those Goals to Paper!

We’ll also accept forms of fully written out goals and ideas on Notes or whatever modern forms of start-up tech that you’re using, but make sure it’s DETAILED. It can’t be like “I just want to be out of debt”. It should be, “I want to pay off $500 every month for 3 months”. If it’s, “I want to become a successful graphic designer”, it should be “I want to add 4 mock brand projects to my portfolio and apply to x amounts of advertising agencies”. If it’s that you want to be a drummer, then practice banging with two sticks on a rock (See Freaks and Geeks reference below). Whatever it is, write it down.

Some people say putting ideas to paper can sound like an activity for members of Oprah’s Book Club BUT we say, putting it to paper means you’re actually spending time on the goal.

You’re spending time problem solving, focusing on how to make it a reality. It’s like fixing a car or figuring out a rock wall or puzzle – you have to spend time thinking about it.

While you might not need to dedicate the Malcolm Gladwellian 10,000 hour average of becoming an expert to every goal, it would make sense that you’d have to dedicate more than a fleeting moment here and there.

So Now You’ve Got Your List, Think Big Picture to Set Your Goals for 2023

Real quick on the goals for 2023. Sure, losing 10 lbs or having an extra $1000 in your bank account is great, but I want you to think about one thing, which is…are these goals bringing you closer to the person that you would like to become?

We often think about what we want to accomplish in metrics, but it’s not always guided by the TYPE of person we want to be.

According to America’s OG hipster philosopher, Henry David Thoreau, “the mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation”. Much of the strife that we feel as humans is not because we didn’t get that perfect job, but because of misplaced value. We equate our success as human beings to C level suite jobs, Instagram perfect relationships, and the newest crop of iPhones.

We live our lives based so much on how society tells us to live, that we’ve inadvertently buried our own selves, that we no longer know who we are, or who we want to be, and worse how to find out.

Wait, All That Work for Nothing?

The only way to find out what type of person you are, who you are is to do the things that you want to do.

So look at your list of accomplishments of 2022, look at the tangible goals that you have for 2023, and ask yourself…do these accomplishments define me? Or the future me? Are these things that help to get me closer to the type of person I want to be? Do I actually ENJOY doing these things?

You’ll have a gut check on how you feel. Even if you don’t know exactly what that is, you have some semblance, even if it’s tucked deep into the recesses of your jaded, sarcastic and blackened New York City heart.

And if you really have no idea, take one of the things that you’ve always wanted to do.

A little one – schedule at least an hour a week to yourself every week to try it. Whether it’s learning to cook, write a script, or become a Tik Tok star. Even if no one wants to go with you, do it. Now commit to doing THAT one thing.

I’ll be real with you, by the end of this day, you still might have no idea what your goal is. You may not be able to accomplish ALL your goals, but the biggest thing you’ve done after this is FOCUS on yourself.

In three months’ time, you’ll be a hell of a lot further along than before if you just keep making time for all those little goals.

So there you go. Now go outside.

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(EDIT: This event has passed. Check out our EVENTS page for more.)

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