Hasan Minhaj will do whatever it takes to get to the punchline — and that includes lying.
The 37-year-old comedian and “The Daily Show” alum admitted to fabricating details to embellish his stand-up sets, including his 2022 Netflix special “The King’s Jester.”
“Every story in my style is built around a seed of truth,” Minhaj told the New Yorker in a profile published Friday. “My comedy Arnold Palmer is 70% emotional truth — this happened — and then 30% hyperbole, exaggeration, fiction.”
However, Minhaj defended his tactics in a lengthy statement to The Post.
“I use the tools of standup comedy—hyperbole, changing names and locations, and compressing timelines to tell entertaining stories,” he said, in part.
“That’s inherent to the art form,” he added. “You wouldn’t go to a Haunted House and say ‘Why are these people lying to me?’—The point is the ride. Standup is the same.”
One popular story Minhaj told in “The King’s Jester” was the chaos that ensued among his family when an envelope with white powder was sent to his house.
Minhaj recalled thinking the powder was anthrax and rushing his daughter to the hospital when it spilled onto her. Luckily,