The Comical Heathen Podcast

In early December, I had a scintillating (yes, I said SCINTILLATING) conversation with the amazing Jay Whitecotton. We cover a lot of ground here, but our launching-off point is, as always, satire. Originally livestreamed on December 17, 2025, this episode has been slightly edited for your enjoyment. It includes the popular segment “PSAs” by my comedy brother Jeff Gedert. Post-production assistanc...

Last May I had the honor of running a livestream with two comedians who mean a lot to me--my comedy brother Rob Coleman and my mentor and good friend Steve Sabo.  Then, technical difficulties prevented Steve from joining us, so I wound up interviewing him separately.  The result was a podcast episode that required more than my usual amount of post-production.  Then, my life took 27 unscheduled tur...

In this episode, my guest is Jeremy Elwood, one of New Zealand's leading comedians.  During the years I lived there, I met Jeremy, seen him perform comedy as well as act--just one of my favorite parts of being there, for sure.  My guest co-host is John Hensler, one of my partners in heathen-flavoured comedy.  Originally a livestream from January 8, 2025--this is slightly edited for your enjoyment....

In this episode, my guest is Mark Riccadonna (one of my personal favorite comedians) and my guest co-host is Jesse Pimpinelle (who puts the comedy "pimp" into comedy).  We discuss the qualities of good comedy clubs as well as topics from listeners, such as "what is punching down?"  Originally a livestream from January 4, 2025--this is slightly edited for your enjoyment.  Includes the popular segme...

Originally a livestream from June 23 (2024), in this episode Jerry is joined by Steve Mers and John Armstrong.  In June of 2024 there was suddenly a bunch of stories in the news about religion and we decided to dissect them and also make fun of them.  Some of the stories covered included Louisiana adding the 10 commandments to classrooms and several states allowing students to skip school for bibl...

Show notes: In early May of 2024, I spent a week in the beautiful country of Iceland!  I had the opportunity to wrangle myself on to some local stand-up comedy shows there, where I met a bunch of people from the local scene.  After one show I sat down in a pub with two of the country’s leading professional comics, Eggert Smári Sigurðsson and Þórhallur Þórhallsson.  They gave me the lowdown on Icel...

In October of 2023, I had the pleasure of doing a livestream about anti-science conspiracy theories with science commuicator AND comedian Brian Malow.  We were joined by Lake Erie College Professor of Biology Dr. Zane Johnson.  On a personal note, let me add that Dr. Johnson is a colleague of mine, and he is not only erudite and well-read, he is sardonic and one of the most hilarious people to sit...

In September of 2023, I had the pleasure of doing a livestream about Conspiracy theories with professional skeptic and author Ben Radford and professional magician and comedy club owner Bobby Borgia.  Here is the slightly edited version for your enjoyment.   Ben's website:   http://benjaminradford.com/ Ben's podcast, Squaring the Strange:    https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/squaring-the-stran...

Originally recorded in August or 2023, my interview with Prof Jeremy Dauber.  Prof Dauber is the Atran Professor of Yiddish Language at Columbia University, specializing in Yiddish and Jewish literature, American Jewish culture, and American studies   Find Jeremy's books on his website:  https://www.jeremydauber.com/books Jeremy's X:  https://twitter.com/JeremyDauber   Get a Comical Heathen coffee...

Show Notes   Welcome to our most recent Live Q&A episode!  With special guests Marv Connor and Dan Crowder, and guest co-host John Hensler, we tackle fan and social media comments and questions. This episode originally broadcast one week after the Nov 8 2022 US elections, so we focus on fall out and questions from the time.  Included topics are Donald Trump running again, the importance of appoint...

Show Notes   Welcome to our most recent Live Q&A episode!  With special guest Bill Boronkay and guest co-host Jim Hagan, we tackle fan and social media comments and questions. Included topics are recent SCOTUS decisions, flopping in sports, and "is cheating at board games ever justified?"  We receive a phone call form Toledo-based friend-of-the-show David who asks how we interact with friends/fami...

Heathen Highlights is a new feature here at The Comical Heathen.  We share some of our favorite clips from the past 2 seasons.   Today's episode features a previously unpublished outtake from my Season 2 episode with Ben Radford.  Along with guest co-host Aaron Kozbial, we talk horror movies!    Full episode here:  https://comicalheathen.podbean.com/e/the-comical-heathen-s2-e11-talking-ghosts-w-be...

Heathen Highlights is a new feature here at The Comical Heathen.  We share some of our favorite clips from the past 2 seasons.   Today's episode features a clip from my Season 1 interview with PZ Myers.  He explains what makes Creationism so objectionable.   Full episode here:  https://comicalheathen.podbean.com/e/the-comical-heathen-episode-sixteen-pz-myers/   PZ Myer’s Blog Pharyngula:  https://...

Heathen Highlights are a new feature here at The Comical Heathen.  We share some of our favorite clips from the past 2 seasons.   Today's feature features my Season 1 rant about the reaction from some Maori leaders towards Playboy model Jaylene Cook posing topless on a sacred mountain in New Zealand.   Full episode here:  https://comicalheathen.podbean.com/e/the-comical-heathen-episode-nine-chad-z...

Heathen Highlights is a new feature here at The Comical Heathen.  We share some of our favorite clips from the past 2 seasons.   Today's feature is from our Season 1 interview with Steve Hofstetter.  In this one, he answers my question, "Is religious satire important?".   Full episode here:  https://comicalheathen.podbean.com/e/the-comical-heathen-episode-one-steve-hofstetter/   Steve Hofstetter's...

Heathen Highlights are a new feature here at The Comical Heathen.  We share some of our favorite clips from the past 2 seasons.   Today's feature is from our Season 2 interview with Lewis Black.  In this one, he discusses how September 11th affected him and his comedy.   Full episode here:   https://comicalheathen.podbean.com/e/the-comical-heathen-s2-e8-lewis-black/   Lewis Black's website:  https...

Heathen Highlights is a new feature here at The Comical Heathen.  We share some of our favorite clips from the past 2 seasons.   Today's feature is from our Season 2 interview with Lewis Black.  In this one, he discusses how September 11th affected him and his comedy.   Full episode here:  https://comicalheathen.podbean.com/e/the-comical-heathen-s2-e8-lewis-black/   Lewis Black's website:  https:/...

Welcome to our most recent Live Q&A episode!  With special guest Myq Kaplan and co-host Jeff Gedert, we tackle fan and social media comments and questions on the theme of "Religion vs Spirituality."  Included topics are, what does this even mean, a second foray into Jedi-sim, and the role of 'shrooms in ones spiritual journey.  We also discuss whether or not comedy is an art, who would win in a Ce...

  After coming across some recent "news" reports of ghost sightings during the ongoing pandemic, I realized it was time to bring back special guest Ben Radford, investigator of the extraordinary extraordinaire!   Ben is a Research Fellow at the Center for Inquiry, having researched many topics in addition to ghosts, such as UFOs, chupacabra, and Killer Clowns.  He also recently published his own a...

Season 2 Episode 10: John Poveromo   Show Notes   Featuring a conversation from February of 2021, shortly after John and I had just done our part to help set the record for longest live-streamed comedy show!  Crazy stuff like running for city council and directing The Merry Wives of Windsor knocked this one back a smidge but I am proud to share it with you now!  Includes my rant about the importan...

Show Notes   Welcome back to the comical heathen podcast!  We had a bit of a hiatus and there's a reason why:  your host Dr. Jerry Jaffe just spent the past Fall 2021 running for City Council in Painesville, OH!  In this special behind the scenes episode, Jerry sits down with two of closest comedy friends and talks about the experience.  Joining him are Jeremy Sheer and Dan Brown.  Completely unsc...

Show Notes   On June 25 2021 the Office of the Director of National intelligence issued a report called "Preliminary Assessment: Unidentified Aerial Phenomena."  This generated some media interest and some buzz around the topic of UFO's.  So we here at The Comical Heathen thought this would be a good time to bring in an actual expert, so today we present my conversation with author Ben Radford.  B...

Show Notes   This episode features my recent conversation with Lewis Black.  From his many comedy specials and TV appearances, including The Daily Show, and his work as an actor as seen on The Big Bang Theory (2009), Inside Out (2015), The Last Laugh (2019) and many more, Lewis is known as one of this generation's leading satirists.  We discuss his 2002 Comedy Central Presents episode in which he...

Season 2 Episode 7 (Bonus material) Show Notes   This episode is a supplement to my S2 E7 interview with Leighann Lord.  Since her website bio describes her as a nerd AND she sites her favorite science fiction film as Terminator 2, I had to ask her about these things.  And sure enough, a 20+ minute digression broke out on some of our favorite nerdy fandoms.  Turns out she's a huge Star Trek fan (s...

Show Notes   Nerd. Comedian. Science communicator.  Star Trek fan.  And a theatre kid??  Finally getting to interview Leighann Lord was a fantastic and fun moment for me.  We discuss her background in theatre and her experiences in comedy.  She has her recent Dry Bar special and, oh, not to mention, she is the 2019 recipient of the Humanist Arts Award.  She had a lot to say about approaching comed...