A few months after he was accused of making a woman feel “really pressured” into sex after a date, Aziz Ansari was already back to doing standup, playing a handful of shows across the country for sold-out crowds in the hundreds. On Wednesday, less than a month after Louis C.K. performed at New York’s Comedy Cellar—his first show since he admitted to sexual misconduct—Ansari popped up on the same stage for a surprise set, Brooklyn Vegan reports.
Whereas C.K. gigged at the venue on his own, Ansari had backup from heavyweights in the comedy world: Chris Rock and Kevin Hart performed, along with Keith Robinson and Wil Sylvince. Rock even gave his own personal stamp of approval on the show, sharing a photo of he, Aziz, and Hart on Instagram saying, “Aziz was on fire.” There’s no word on exactly what Ansari’s set was about, but fans didn’t seem to bristle at the fact that he was back onstage.
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“They lost it when he came out,” an audience member told Page Six. “It was pretty awesome, he was hilarious.”
This isn’t the first time Ansari has returned to the venue since the allegations were made, having performed a few sets there back in May. And after letting C.K. come back to perform, the club’s owner, Noam Dworman, recently told the Hollywood Reporter he doesn’t think there’s a “clear standard” as to when a comedian should be “denied an audience.”
“The Aziz thing is a great example, because who the hell knows what went on there? So this is the risk: If I ban Louis, now the next thing is Aziz comes up, and I’m supposed to ban Aziz, even though I’m not sure,” Dworman told THR. “All of a sudden it’s not the court system, it’s not the criminal justice system, it’s not even a procedural HR system, it’s that the guy who owns the comedy club is supposed to decide what happened, who’s guilty, what the punishment is and make sure the world never sees this guy again.”
With the support of the audience and two insanely popular comedians, not to mention Dworman, Ansari seems to be forging right on ahead with his comedy career: He just announced a new slate of shows on Wednesday.
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