In the same week CBS announced Colbert’s show would be cancelled, Paramount was in the final stages of a multi-billion-dollar merger with Skydance Media. In July, the deal was approved by the Trump administration<\/a>.<\/p>\n In Jobrani’s mind, the axing of Colbert’s show is no coincidence.<\/p>\n “I love Colbert \u2014 I get my news from Colbert \u2014 he makes the news fun,” he told ABC News in a Melbourne interview last month, after landing from Los Angeles for the start of his latest Australian tour.<\/p>\n Stephen Colbert’s The Late Show will end its 11-year-run on CBS in May 2026.\u00a0 (AP: Scott Kowalchyk)<\/p>\n The tour across six Australian cities ended on Sunday, but Jobrani’s been coming to Australia since 2008.<\/p>\n He says Melbourne, as home of the annual International Comedy Festival, has “good comedy audiences”.<\/p>\n Colbert has vowed to continue speaking “unvarnished truth to power” and sharing “what I really think about Donald Trump”.<\/a><\/p>\n Jobrani, who also regularly speaks out against Trump in his comedy skits \u2014 most commonly against the administration’s deportation policies \u2014 says he intends to do the same.<\/p>\n “I knew that Trump was going to come after the late-night talk show host, but I didn’t think it was going to be this way, where their own company can them,” he said.<\/p>\n “I thought Trump would maybe send the IRS out to audit them or something, just make their lives hard, because Trump unfortunately does not have a sense of humour, he doesn’t know how to take a joke, which is what dictatorships usually are like.”<\/p>\n Maz Jobrani is a comedy veteran. (ABC News: Darryl Torpy)<\/p>\n The job of the comedian<\/p>\n Since CBS announced the axing in June, there’s been much talk in the US entertainment and media industry about how far the Trump administration might go in censoring free speech.<\/p>\n Loading Instagram content<\/p>\n Jobrani has united with some of the biggest names in entertainment and late-night television to show support for Colbert<\/a>, and to fight for free speech.<\/p>\n “The job of the comedian is to reveal the emperor has no clothes. I think we need to keep doing that \u2014 if we don’t, we’re going to lose our democracy,” he said.<\/p>\n Jobrani has called on others in comedy and the wider entertainment and media industry to stand their ground.<\/p>\n “I always say the whole point of America is, I can make fun of the president in America. I couldn’t make fun of the president of Iran, that wouldn’t work,” he said.<\/p>\n “We are slowly seeing, maybe even fastly seeing, the American democracy crumble, and I think now it falls on our shoulders more and more as comedians to make fun of Trump, poke at him.”<\/p>\n Jobrani’s family left Iran for the US in 1978, when he was six years old.<\/p>\n It was just a year before Iran’s Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi fell to Islamist rulers, and his family, like many others at the time, made the decision to flee.<\/p>\n In our interview, he talks of how growing up as an Iranian in California at that time was a struggle.<\/p>\n But he says it framed the backdrop to much of his comedy, which focuses on the weird and often hilarious events that occur as a child of immigrants.<\/p>\n The Shah of Iran and his wife visited the White House in 1962. (JFK Library & Museum)<\/p>\n While his parents hoped the UC Berkeley graduate would become a doctor, lawyer, or engineer, he had other plans.<\/p>\n And now he’s among several Iranian Americans showcasing Iranian culture on stages around the world, and making audiences laugh with Iranians, instead of at them.<\/p>\n This was something Jobrani never envisaged back in November 1979 \u2014 when 52 Americans were taken hostage in the US Embassy in Tehran and held for 444 days.<\/p>\n “For my entire life in America, I’ve had to explain Iran \u2026 I just try to find funny ways to explain to people what I’m feeling. Like I say, ‘I wish I were Swedish’ because if you’re Swedish, you wouldn’t have to explain anything, right? You just talk about IKEA, ABBA.<\/p>\n “[Being Iranian] has been a challenge, but it also obviously is giving me plenty of material because I have been able to try and present people from Iran and other people from that part of the world, hopefully in a positive light versus what you see when they show us in the news.”<\/p>\n Blindfolded US hostages and their Iranian captors outside the American embassy in Tehran in 1979. (Reuters)<\/p>\n A path for Iranian American entertainers<\/p>\n Jobrani’s career took off in the post 9\/11 era.<\/p>\n Young Australian actor backs scholarship for migrants<\/a><\/p>\n Mojean Aria has starred alongside Hugh Jackman and Jason Momoa; now Mojean Aria wants to help Middle Eastern and North African youth get into the industry.<\/p>\n He had first toured with other “brown comedians”, including Ahmed Ahmed, Aron Kader and Sam Tripoli, on a show called the Arabian Nights, which was aimed at showcasing the voice of Muslim\/Middle Eastern people a year before 9\/11 happened.<\/p>\n But as they toured under that name, they decided to change the title.<\/p>\n At that time, then-US president George Bush had called Iran, Iraq, and North Korea an “Axis of Evil”.<\/p>\n So the trio settled on “Axis of Evil Comedy Tour” as the show’s name.<\/p>\n Since then, Jobrani has gained worldwide fame and in many ways paved the way for a new generation of comedians from Iranian backgrounds to make it to the world stage.<\/p>\n On his Australian tour, Jobrani was joined by another rising star, Iranian African American comedian Tehran Ghasri.<\/p>\n “Comedy is part of the Iranian heritage,” Ghasri tells ABC News.<\/p>\n “To have representation is very important. Why not us, especially with all the tragedy that’s going on in Iran right now.” Iranian-American comedian Tehran Ghasri toured with Maz Jobrani in Australia in July 2025. (ABC News: Darryl Torpy)<\/p>\n Jobrani says when he started out, being a comedian was frowned upon by the Iranian diaspora, including his parents.<\/p>\n “I was of the generation where I should have been a doctor, lawyer, engineer, but I fell in love with comedy and performing at a young age,” Jobrani explains.<\/p>\n He says he was an anomaly when he first started.<\/p>\n “Now 20-some-odd years later, there’s Tehran and there’s Max Amini, and there’s Amir K \u2026 there’s Melissa Shoshahi, and there’s Peter the Persian, and there’s Omid Djalili \u2014 and it really does make me happy to see all of these people in this business now.<\/p>\n “Once the next generations realise, ‘Oh, you can make a living doing other things’ or you should live your life doing what makes you happy, they start doing it.<\/p>\n “It’s really something that’s just great for our community \u2026 because until we’re telling the stories, no-one’s going to tell our stories the way we want to tell them. They’re just going to keep making us the bad guy.”<\/p>\n Maz Jobrani started his career when Iranian-American comedians were not common.\u00a0 (ABC News: Darryl Torpy)<\/p>\n Comedy can ‘humanise’<\/p>\n In recent years Jobrani’s played a prominent role in diaspora activism against the Islamic Republic, particularly in the aftermath of the #Women, Life, Freedom protests<\/a> spurred by the death in custody<\/a> of Mahsa Jina Amini<\/a>.<\/p>\n Loading Instagram content<\/p>\n “I grew up in America, so I always say that I’m not in Iran, but Iran is in me. I feel an affinity towards the country of Iran. I feel an affinity towards the soccer team when they play,” he said.<\/p>\n “I feel an affinity towards the people [of Iran]. The Iranian people are some of the most hospitable people. It has a place in my heart.”<\/p>\n Jobrani says the various waves of massive protests inside Iran, the recent Israel\u2013Iran war<\/a>, and people’s suffering under Iran’s regime<\/a> is “heartbreaking”.<\/p>\n He points to the forced veiling of women, “discrimination against women<\/a>, the discrimination against the LGBTQ community, the discrimination against religious minorities like the Baha’i’s <\/a>and others” as examples of that.<\/p>\n “I do feel that I want to support the people of Iran, and I do pray and hope for a day where Iran can become a functioning part of the world.”<\/p>\n Maz Jobrani fears Trump’s America is becoming more like Iran’s repressive regime. (ABC News: Darryl Torpy)<\/p>\n Jobrani fears Trump’s America is becoming more like Iran’s repressive regime.<\/p>\n “Iran is a cautionary tale of what happens when you mix religion with politics, and currently living in America, we are moving closer to becoming the Christian Republic of America, the same way Iran is the Islamic Republic of Iran.”<\/p>\n He says comedy can be a unifying force and a way to fight rising antisemitism and Islamophobia.<\/p>\n “I think that there’s people out there that are waiting to pounce” he said.<\/p>\n “Hate and hatred, it’s easier to go that way and I think that comedy can counter that.<\/p>\n “Like when I do a show, I have people from all backgrounds, all religions in the room, we’re laughing together and we’re humanising each other. What war does is it dehumanises.<\/p>\n “You get a room where you have a Palestinian, and you have a Jew, and you have a Muslim \u2014 people from different backgrounds and we’re laughing together \u2014 then people realise, ‘Oh, he’s human. I’m human.'”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Iranian American comedy veteran Maz Jobrani believes US President Donald Trump is trying to censor free speech in…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":63688,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[620,35486,9903,64,63,3871,9785,50897,9771,2490,134,2586,13326,50910,50895,50909,50896,50898,50903,50904,50906,12621,44825,50900,50901,50893,50902,50908,14627,84,50905,50907,3869,50894,6514,50899,1346],"class_list":["post-63687","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-entertainment","tag-american","tag-americans","tag-antisemitism","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-cbs","tag-censorship","tag-comedians","tag-comedy","tag-donald-trump","tag-entertainment","tag-entertainment-news","tag-free-speech","tag-iran-hostage-crisis","tag-iranian","tag-iranian-revolution","tag-iranians","tag-islamic-republic-of-iran","tag-islamophobia","tag-israel-iran-war","tag-jokes","tag-laughing","tag-laughs","tag-mahsa-amini","tag-mahsa-jina-amini","tag-maz-jobrani","tag-maz-jobrani-australian-tour","tag-mohammad-reza-pahlavi","tag-paramount","tag-politics","tag-religious-hate","tag-reza-shah","tag-stephen-colbert","tag-tehran-ghasri","tag-the-late-show","tag-women-life-freedom","tag-world-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/63687","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=63687"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/63687\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/63688"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=63687"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=63687"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=63687"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}<\/p>\n
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