Sarah Silverman said she primarily remained in the background during the 2024 presidential election because she felt Americans weren’t interested in hearing from celebrities.
“I was on the road with this tour, for one thing,” Silverman said in an interview with The Minnesota Star Tribune. “A lot of people asked me if I was going to make a video or something. But my feeling was that no one wanted to hear from celebrities right now.”
She continued, adding that she would have liked to have brought back her video call to action “The Great Schlep,” a joint effort organized by the comedian and the Jewish Council for Education and Research that urged “young Jews to get their lazy rotund rear ends to Florida to persuade their grandparents to vote for Senator Barack Obama” in 2008.
“Maybe I was wrong. I just focused on reposting thoughts from smarter people,” Silverman said. “There is one thing I wish I had done. In 2008, I did something called ‘The Great Schlep’ where I told young Jews to tell their grandparents they wouldn’t visit them again unless they voted for Obama. I should have done something like that again. Not that it would have made a difference.”
As far as addressing the political climate in her ongoing tour “Sarah Silverman: Postmortem,” the star said her show will focus on the familial struggles she’s overcome, including the deaths of her stepfather and biological father.
“This show is not at all political, for better or worse. I think it’s better, to be honest,” Silverman explained. “What happened was, my stepmother and dad both died nine days apart and all I wanted to do was talk about them, starting with my dad’s eulogy. It’s happened organically. I’ve never thought of myself as relatable. I’ve always thought of myself as niche. But I was at a point where I wanted to roll into a ball, so I needed to be in touch with people, and it’s been awesome.”
