Updated at 10:05 p.m. Dec. 16
Since her mother’s death in August, San Francisco comedian Lisa Geduldig has found it hard to hold back tears during performances.
“I’ve been onstage five times since she died, and I’ve cried each time,” the “Kung Pao Kosher Comedy” show host told J. “It is comedy, but I’m human, and it’s such a Jewish thing to be able to draw comedy from pain.”
Geduldig has produced and hosted the annual “Kung Pao” show since 1993. She schedules it on and around Christmas at Chinese restaurants in San Francisco’s Chinatown — building on the great Jewish American tradition of eating out at the only restaurants that are reliably open on Dec. 25.
For the past four years, her mother, Arline Geduldig, was part of the event’s guest comic lineup. This year’s production, with six shows running from Dec. 24 to 26 at the Cantonese Imperial Palace restaurant, is dedicated to Arline’s memory and her sense of humor. All of the shows — one with dinner and one with cocktails each evening — will take place in-person and on YouTube Live. J. is among this year’s “Kung Pao” sponsors.
The 2024 lineup includes Ophira Eisenberg, former host of the NPR show “Ask Me Another,” and current host of the comedy podcast “Parenting Is a Joke.” Eisenberg has also appeared on CBS’ “The Late Late Show,” Comedy Central, HBO and “The Moth Radio Hour.”
British comic host Matt Kirshen, who came to the U.S. as a finalist on NBC’s “Last Comic Standing” in 2007, will make his “Kung Pao” debut. Kirshen has also appeared on Comedy Central’s “@Midnight” and “Late Night with Jimmy Fallon.” He is a regular guest co-host of “StarTalk” with Neil deGrasse Tyson and hosts “Probably Science,” a comedy-science podcast.
Becky Braunstein, who riffs on growing up Jewish in Alaska, will be onstage too. A cancer survivor, she has used her experiences to write and produce a scripted comedy pilot called “Cancer Culture,” a 2022 finalist in the Yes, And Laughter Lab showcase. Braunstein has appeared on “Trinkets” on Netflix, “Chad” on TBS and “Shrill” on Hulu. She has been featured at top comedy festivals including SF Sketchfest and the HBO Women in Comedy Festival.
Although Geduldig remembered her mother as quiet and reserved when she was growing up, she discovered Arline’s sense of humor while quarantined in her home in Boynton Beach, Florida, during the first 17 months of the Covid-19 pandemic. The two began making use of their mutual isolation by putting on a monthly show online called “Lockdown Comedy.”
Lisa kept the show running for the next four years. The final “Lockdown Comedy” show in September featured a compilation of her mom’s greatest hits.
“She was like my little wind-up doll in the last 4½ years living with her,” said Geduldig, who frequently returned to Florida to visit her mother after living there full time at the start of the pandemic. “My prized possessions these days are the videos of her. She was really funny. And she loved, loved, loved doing the show.”
That wasn’t the first time Arline took the stage, virtual or otherwise. During the third “Kung Pao” show in 1995, Geduldig recalled bringing her mother up to sing a duet of her high-pitched “Irv calls,” Arline’s preferred method for calling her husband to dinner.
As a result of her popularity on “Lockdown Comedy,” Arline returned to “Kung Pao,” starting online in 2020. Soon enough, Geduldig’s friends started calling her “mamaleh,” Geduldig’s term of endearment for her mother.
“Because on Facebook, I’ve posted about our relationship over the years… everyone refers to her as ‘mamaleh,’” she said. “I ran into someone the other day, and they said ‘I’m just thinking about your ‘mamaleh.’”
Similar to the recent tribute to Arline on the final “Lockdown Comedy,” “Kung Pao” will feature a clip of one of her past performances.
Since the second “Kung Pao” show in 1994, partial proceeds from ticket sales have been donated to local organizations and causes. This year’s beneficiaries are Shalom Bayit, a Bay Area nonprofit that seeks to prevent domestic violence in the Jewish community, and the Chinatown YMCA’s food pantry and grocery distribution programs.
“Last year, I realized that… even though I had been producing this event in Chinatown for 30 years, I wasn’t giving back to the community, except for supporting a Chinese restaurant,” Geduldig said. “So I decided to name the Chinatown YMCA food pantry last year [and] to support them again this year.”