After selling out 12 nights at Los Angeles’ Wiltern Theatre for Netflix Is a Joke Fest, Ali Wong capped off her residency on Sunday night by opening up about her divorce and newfound dating life in her 40s to an enlivened audience.
Back in April 2022, the comedian announced she was splitting from her husband of eight years, Justin Hakuta. Even though she’s now publicly dating fellow comedian Bill Hader, Wong used her new stand-up routine to discuss and poke fun at her trials and tribulations as a single mother on the dating scene. The packed audience who chose to spend Mother’s Day listening to Wong’s quippy misadventures was captivated by her every word.
“I didn’t expect the news of my divorce to be so widespread and public,” Wong said about announcing the news of her marriage ending. “I felt really embarrassed and ashamed, but I didn’t realize that all of these media outlets were acting like a bat signal letting all potentially interested men know. I’ve never been pursued this much in my life.”
When she initially separated from her husband, Wong said she wasn’t looking for anything serious; she joked that she just wanted “to get dicked down” because after being married for nearly a decade she had that “just got out of prison energy.” She even joined a dating app to look for prospects, but then told a story about a guy she already knew who reached out to her the day after she joined the dating app.
“I get a phone call from this guy who I met at a dinner party in the past, and he got my number from a mutual friend,” she explained. “He was like, ‘Hey, I just happened to hear the news about your divorce, and I’ve had a crush on you forever. I actually told my best friend years ago that you were my dream girl, and I know it sounds crazy, but I want you to be my girlfriend.’”
Wong then joked, “I was like, ‘I just paid $25 [for the dating app]. You seem really nice, but I gotta get my money’s worth.’”
She continued her story, saying that she left for a trip to Europe not long after their phone conversation. Each time she arrived at a new location on her vacation, the man sent flowers to every hotel where she stayed. When she told her girlfriends about the gesture, they thought it was sweet, but when she told her male friends, they said the man sounded like a psychopath.
“That’s how cheap and lazy men have become,” Wong jested. “When a fellow man commits any act of kindness, any romantic gesture, it must be a symptom of an undiagnosed mental illness.”
The audience cheered and laughed as Wong lamented about dating both older and younger men. Among many anecdotes she shared, Wong recounted a date she went on with a white guy from the Midwest who she referred to as Blake. She said she took Blake to meet her college friend at an authentic Chinese restaurant and prefaced the story by explaining she’s an adventurous eater, while Blake didn’t have an advanced palette.
“These white dudes from the Midwest, they get diarrhea every time they eat a dish that’s not a peanut butter and jelly sandwich,” she said, then relating a mishap that Blake got into while they were at dinner. “[He told my friend], ‘I try to be open to everything she introduces to me because that is a form of intimacy for her.’ Then I was like, ‘Look what Blake just did.’ Blake had poured tea for the three of us into our rice bowls. He was like, ‘I don’t understand. Where is the tea supposed to go?’ [My friend] moved the tea cups forward and Blake was like, ‘That’s too small for tea,’ and I was like, ‘It’s definitely too small for rice.’”
All in all, Wong told the audience she had the time of her life dating divorced dads and romantically spending time with men who have already experienced life’s hardships. She doesn’t want to have to teach a man anything, Wong said. “One woman’s trash is another woman’s trained trash,” she declared. “I don’t want a man that’s broke, but I want a man that’s broken.”
In an earnest moment at the end of her set, Wong leveled with the audience and said that ending her marriage is the best thing that ever happened to her, despite the stigma that’s attached to divorce. Wong is still best friends with her ex-husband, she said, and she emphasized that she wanted her fans to know just how much fun she’s having.
“I never thought I would have this much fun at this stage in my life. Divorce is so fun,” she said. “I just want to get married again, just so I could get divorced again.”
Wong told the audience that she has a new boyfriend who some people may or may not be familiar with, hinting at her relationship with Hader. She also confessed that he’s the man she told a story about earlier who called her the day after she joined a dating app and sent her flowers when she traveled throughout Europe.
“Do you want to meet him?” None other than Bill Hader walked out from the side of the stage, joining Wong and handing her a single rose. After they hugged to a cheering crowd, Wong told the audience, “None of the other shows got to meet him.”
Hader, famous for his time on Saturday Night Live and his HBO series Barry, joked into the microphone, “That was a very informative evening.”
While the two shared the stage, Hader also called back to a story Wong revealed during her set and told the audience in an unprompted admission, “You guys want a secret? I’m the guy who poured the tea in the rice bowl.”
“And when I did that, the look on Ali’s face was a mixture of embarrassment and she was so stoked,” he continued as Wong looked at him adoringly. “She had this look on her face like, ‘You’re in the act, motherfucker.’”
Transitioning into a more genuine sentiment, Hader reflected on the past year as he’s watched Wong work on her latest routine while juggling motherhood, making her kids dinner, and putting them to bed before heading out to The Comedy Store to test new material.
“I got to go on the road [with her] and I watched her work as she goes up, she tries these things … She’s taking tons of notes,” he said. “The amount of work that goes into making this look so effortless, and she just sold out 12 nights at the Wiltern.”
Before exiting the stage and wrapping up the entire evening, Hader concluded a night full of Wong’s dating anecdotes by declaring, “All I have to say is, Ali Wong is off the market.”
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