Review: Comedian speaks to Minnesotans tired of a ‘woke’ America

Theo Von, through his podcast, “This Past Weekend,” and his ongoing Return of the Rat tour, has struck a chord with fans fed up with being politically correct.

Von’s podcast is one of the most popular in the country. He’s known for going after taboo topics harder than, say, Dave Chappelle ever has. Friday night was no exception.

He quickly labeled his Friday show at Xcel Energy Center as a “Juneteenth recovery seminar,” then launched into bits about a Black girl with Down syndrome and “short buses” that cater to students with mental disabilities.

“I’m not racist,“ he said early in his set. ”Unless you are.“

Von has been tied to President Trump’s MAGA movement. But his place in pop culture is more complicated than partisan loyalty. There were a few MAGA caps, but I spotted more shirts with images of Johnny Cash than images of Donald Trump.

Von pointed out several times during the show that the audience of about 8,000 seemed to be nearly all white people. But I spotted plenty of people of color in the crowd, including Andres Zanbrano, who came to Minnesota six years ago from Colombia.

“He’s just naturally very funny,” said Zanbrano, who had brought along someone who didn’t speak English. “It’s different from what you usually see.”

“A lot of comedians are afraid to say certain things.” said Joe Kern, who traveled from Mankato with his wife to see the show. “He says what he thinks, Right, wrong or indifferent. You should enjoy comedy for what it is.”

For roughly 80 minutes, Von marched back and forth across the stage in camouflage pants and a black shirt, bellowing like a Baptist preacher who addresses his congregation as “brah.”

Everyone was a target: Somalis, gays, Jews, people from Wisconsin and autistic people. He described George Floyd Square as a “fentanyl dance hall.”

Von is at his best when he tells tales about growing up in small-town Louisiana, vividly bringing to life people like Alan — a kid so tiny he needed two hands to eat a butterscotch — and the grandmother who wouldn’t let him visit her for a decade because she thought he stole some chocolate from her house.

They’re characters who have a lot in common with Bill Cosby’s Fat Albert gang or the working-class people in the best-selling memoir, “Hillbilly Elegy,” by JD Vance, a frequent guest on his podcast.

His one joke about Joe Biden went over a lot better than his one joke about Trump. When he told the audience he was thinking about buying a gun, the place went wild (they were less enthusiastic about a bit in which he mused over where the next 9/11 should take place).