[Update: At of 8:42 p.m., the festival advised via its mobile app that Stagecoach will resume momentarily. “We are working to open doors and prep the site for your safety,” the alert said. Just before 9p.m. the gates were reopened.
Stagecoach updated its schedule for Saturday night after a temporary evacuation due to high winds. Journey, which had been scheduled to play the Mustang Stage, will no longer perform; Riley Green, set to play the Mane Stage will also not perform. Lainey Wilson, who was set to headline the Mane stage, will play an hour later than originally scheduled at 10:30 p.m.]
Due to high winds at Stagecoach, the festival promoter Goldenvoice postponed the festival Saturday night until further notice and crowds are currently being evacuated.
An “Emergency Evacuation” message showed up on screens on the festival’s Mane Stage saying “the festival is been postponed until further notice. Please move quickly and calmly to the nearest exit.”
The city of Indio where the fest is located is under a strong wind advisory until 11 a.m. Sunday morning. The advisory issued by the National Weather Service was in effect at 2 p.m. but the gusts didn’t pick up until Teddy swims’ Mane Stage set just after 5 p.m.
Thousands of people poured out of the festival. Despite there being messaging on the screen to evacuate, some emergency exits were still closed by security staff between the main stage and the main entrance. In addition to messaging on screens, the Stagecoach app sent an alert for people to evacuate.
Fans at the festival reported that the winds earlier were much stronger than the evening gusts that resulted in the spontaneous postponement.
“The show was pretty windy when we got there but we went into a saloon to see one of our friends do karaoke,” said Krystine Malins, 58. “When we came out palm trees were like bending in half.”
Malins, who has attended the festival since the first installment in 2007, said an evacuation was “the best call.”
“I just feel bad for these girls walking around half-naked in this wind,” she said.
Two Stagecoach festival attendees, Ellie, 27, and Angelique, 22, sat at tables farther back from the stage watching people filing out of the festival.
“We were trying to see Pitbull at the end of the night, so that’s kind of like our whole night, I don’t know, ruined I guess,” Angelique said. “We were kind of hoping for a refund.” Asked about whether the wind felt seriousness enough to stop the show, the pair were cautiously optimistic. “Honestly I would say yeah [it’s bad], but I feel like there could still be potential for it to go down, but it felt worse earlier,” Angelique said.
Despite the evacuation, the general atmosphere among many festival goers was calm as crowds were walking back to their cars.
“I didn’t even know what was going on until I saw the screen [at the Mane Stage] and then I started hearing “Hey they’re evacuating, get out,” one festival goer told the Times. “But then we had to sit it out because there was a clog at the exit. It’s not that bad.”
Anyone who thinks Coachella’s biggest surprises are reserved for Weekend 1 was proven wrong Friday night as Sabrina Carpenter welcomed Madonna on stage during her Weekend 2 headlining set. The crowd exploded with waves of cheers as the iconic pop star came on stage.
Madge joined Carpenter as a surprise guest during “Juno,” in which Carpenter reemerged in a gown that was a nod to Botticelli’s “The Birth of Venus” for a torch-passing duet of Madonna’s 1990 pop-house gauntlet “Vogue.”
The classic was followed by the debut of the gloriously upbeat “I Feel Free,” the first track from the pop icon’s forthcoming new album “Confessions II,” due out July 3.
The singer announced the record, a sequel to 2005’s “Confessions On A Dancefloor,” on April 15, alongside a 60-second teaser video for “I Feel Free.”
The Coachella performance, however, marks the first time the song has been heard in full — a fitting full circle moment 20 after Madonna played the Sahara Tent in 2006, complete with the same boots and costuming from that gig. “Confessions II” will be Madonna’s first full-length album since 2019’s “Madame X.”
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“Let’s try to be together. Let’s try to avoid disagreements,” Madonna said as she spoke about the moon and planets aligning.
Before the pair ended with “Like a Prayer,” accompanied by a choir, Madonna had another reason to be grateful.
“This is probably the first time I’ve ever performed with someone shorter than me,” Madonna said to Carpenter as the crowd laughed. “Thank you for giving me that experience.”
Senior Audience Editor Vanessa Franko contributed to this report.
Coachella’s 25th anniversary was more than just a milestone in the festival’s history. It’s a year that showcased its vitality and vision for the future — and yes, it’s still a great place to take a selfie. While the amount of great music we absorbed as a staff left us a little delirious, it ensured we’d have plenty of moments to recall for a highlight reel of Weekend 1. From Radiohead’s immersive bunker experience, to Sabrina Carpenter’s triumphant return, Justin Bieber’s YouTube karaoke set and Karol G becoming the first Latina to headline the fest on Sunday night, here’s our list of the 21 most memorable moments we caught during Weekend 1.
FRIDAY
(Mark Potts / Los Angeles Times)
Radiohead’s bunker is Coachella’s version of Disney’s Tiki Room
Finally! Coachella has its own version of the Enchanted Tiki Room attraction from Disneyland — and it comes from the most unlikely of artists: British alt rockers Radiohead.
Here’s what I mean by that.
Say you’re in search of an air-conditioned place to rest your weary feet while a visual and musical spectacle plays out before you. Where do you go? If you’re a parent taking your kid to the happiest place on Earth, you go to the Enchanted Tiki Room. If you’re a desert festivalgoer in Indio, you go to the Bunker.
Tip: The ushers appeared to be letting festivalgoers into the experience throughout the runtime of the movie, so there’s a possibility you’ll be able to get in even if you didn’t land one of the scarce time slots. And seeing as how the experience was only about a quarter of the way full by the time it ended, you might be in luck. (David Viramontes)
Devo performs at the Mojave Tent during Coachella.
(Christina House / Los Angeles Times)
Devo’s new wave dance party at sunset
Look, it’s a very different Coachella than when we last saw Devo here in 2010. The Mojave Tent should have been more packed for these legends.
However, those of us who hightailed it here were treated to a set of the band’s best. Early on in the performance, the band played “Girl U Want” into “Whip It,” and during the latter, Mark Mothersbaugh tossed a handful of red “energy domes” — you know them as the Devo flowerpot hats — into the crowd.
Similar to Bini earlier, Devo had a costume change from the navy worksuits into their signature yellow Devo suits for a rousing performance of “Uncontrollable Urge.” There was even some choreography. (Vanessa Fanko)
A festivalgoer holds a Coachella sunset cocktail.
(Danielle Dorsey / Los Angeles Times)
A Coachella sunset served as a cocktail
One of the best parts of Coachella is catching the sherbet-colored sunset at the end of the day, not just because cooler temps are ahead but because of the Lisa Frank explosion of colors that bleed into the horizon as it shifts to night. That event was made all the sweeter today when I paired the actual sunset with the Coachella sunset cocktail, which layers citrus and a speared kumquat with tequila, served in a branded cup that doubles as a souvenir. (Danielle Dorsey)
The xx performs on the Coachella Stage.
(Kayla Bartkowski / Los Angeles Times)
Indie minimalists the xx come back bigger, brasher than ever
The xx’s return was among the most buzzed-about sets of the festival this year, a credit to how well their catalog has stood up on its merits. At their debut, they almost singlehandedly inaugurated a shift toward hyper-intimate headphone pop — it’s hard to imagine Billie Eilish sounding quite the same without them.
Yet on Friday, they bolstered that purity with the confidence, swagger and precision of the veteran rock act they’ve become.
Dressed in their typical all-black palette, their faces carrying a little more gravity and composure with age, the set slipped between the ships-in-the-night duets of “Shelter” and “VCR” to the after-hours whomp of Romy’s “Enjoy Your Life.” “On Hold” best married the band’s two worlds, sample-soaked yet rock driven; “Angels” remained a peerless devotional ballad. (August Brown)
Katseye performs on the Sahara Stage.
(Christina House / Los Angeles Times)
Katseye performs ‘Golden’ with ‘K-Pop Demon Hunters’ at Coachella
Katseye proved no this ain’t their debut at their first Coachella performance, bringing out Ejae, Audrey Nuna and Rei Ami for a kinetic performance of “Golden” from “K-Pop Demon Hunters.” Despite the absence of Manon, the girl group packed the festival field with Eyekons packed shoulder to shoulder as far as the Do Lab. (D.V.)
Turnstile performs at the Outdoor Theatre.
(Kayla Bartkowski / Los Angeles Times)
Turnstile’s hardcore roots and tender hearts on display at Coachella
Turnstile’s set on the Outdoor Theatre on Friday night had some unexpectedly poignant moments from the Baltimore band with hardcore roots.
Before the band took the stage, there was footage of interviews with fans and also a previously recorded message from Bill Yates, the father of Turnstile singer Brendan Yates.
“We love you, Turnstile loves you and enjoy the ride,” he said.
The band played a 55-minute set split between its last two albums, 2025’s “Never Enough” and 2021’s “Glow On,” in a condensed version of the tour they brought through Southern California last fall. Highlights included “Seein’ Stars” off the latest record, where Blood Orange’s Dev Hynes joined the band on the cello before his own late night set in the Mojave Tent, “Mystery” and “Holiday” off “Glow On” and set-closer “Birds,” which won a Grammy earlier this year. (V.F.)
Sabrina Carpenter brings her hits (and Susan Sarandon?) to Coachella
“How you feeling, Sabrinawood?” Sabrina Carpenter asked as she gazed out at the tens of thousands of fans she’d gathered into a makeshift city Friday night. “I can’t believe I’m headlining Coachella.
“I mean, I can a little bit.”
Indeed, when Carpenter made her Coachella debut in 2024, the Disney kid turned pop icon vowed that the next time she played the desert festival, her name would be atop the bill.
She returned as promised this weekend as one of music’s biggest acts, with two No. 1 singles and a pair of Grammy-nominated albums under her belt and a story to tell about her rise to stardom. (Mikael Wood)
SATURDAY
Jack White draws a crowd at the Mojave Tent.
(Christina House / Los Angeles Times)
Jack White kicks off Coachella’s rock-tastic Day 2
I thought Jack White’s opening riffs were a beacon. Then he ended his surprise Mojave Tent set with the White Stripes’ “Seven Nation Army.”
It will not surprise you that the tent, which attracted an overflow crowd once he played the iconic riff, had people singing along and jumping and pumping their arms in the air to the track that has become a sporting event staple (including for my beloved Baltimore Ravens).
What did surprise me was that the crowd was also ridiculously loud for a sing-along to the Raconteurs’ “Steady As She Goes” a few songs before.
White ended the set by telling the crowd that he was planning to catch Geese and the Strokes that day and that music is sacred.
Rock is indeed alive and well at Coachella, especially as the fans kept singing “Seven Nation Army” after White and his band had left the stage and the set was over. (V.F.)
A visit to Coachella’s coolest rock club, literally, to catch Ecca Vandal
I know my phone says it isn’t as hot as it was Friday but maybe it was rocking out with Jack White that made us all a little more sweaty.
I booked it over to the Sonora Tent to catch a little bit of Ecca Vandal to confirm that the Sonora Tent still has the vibes of a cool rock club in the middle of the festival. I mean cool both figuratively and literally since the AC is always blasting.
The blue-haired singer leaped onto the stage — wearing a short poofy dress and tall boots — accompanied by a drummer and a multi-instrumentalist with a lot of flashing lights.
The beginning of her set was leaning on more of her pop crossover songs than the punk vibes that initially drew me to her, but I did catch her do the rocking “Bleed But Never Die” before I needed to move on to catch another set. (V.F.)
The Goodyear blimp flies over the Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival on Saturday.
(Kayla Bartkowski / Los Angeles Times)
We sent our reporter to see what Coachella looks like from the Goodyear Blimp
The ride on the Goodyear Blimp over the Coachella grounds was gentler than I’d anticipated — kind of like a boat ride in a harbor. We took off from a giant dirt field at the Jacqueline Cochran Regional Airport in Thermal, Calif., and tooled around for 30 minutes or so; when we got over Coachella, we could see a few hundred Beliebers camped out as close to the main stage as they could get — nine or 10 hours before Bieber’s performance was scheduled to begin.
They looked so little down there — so small in size, so big in Beliebf. (M.W.)
Giveon performs at Coachella on April 16, 2022.
(Dania Maxwell / Los Angeles Times)
Giveon bottles the magic hour
Long Beach’s R&B savant Giveon kept his Coachella stage to a monochrome motif during his sundown set. Black suit, white lights — he didn’t need anything more to bottle the magic hour on Saturday.
An old soul with with a huge, commanding voice, his catalog hovers between the orchestral swoon of pre-rock ballads, the pristine melodies of Anita Baker and the rangy, resilient yearning of his hometown’s soul tradition. Kendrick Lamar and SZA may have formally kicked off the Luther Vandross revival, but Giveon has inherited it, especially on his latest 2025 LP “Beloved.”
Backed by a big, throwback live band, “Lost Me” beautifully papered over a failed relationship with an uncertain young bravado; “Backup Plan” gave his one-of-kind baritone room to roam and plead. He brought out Kehlani for “Folded,” another perfectly regal ballad that revels in a small aperture. But by the time he got to “Heartbreak Anniversary,” his suit was coming off and the mood was positively lusty.
Giveon should be counted among the great SoCal voices, and his Saturday show proved his ambitions for it have no ceiling. (A.B.)
Sombr performs at Coachella on Saturday.
(Kayla Bartkowski / Los Angeles Times)
Sombr’s star burns brighter when he brought out Billy Corgan
Sombr’s performance happened on a day when Coachella had a notable number of rockers — Jack White kicked things off in the Mojave Tent in a set announced earlier this week and there was much excitement for the Strokes on the Coachella stage Saturday night before headliner Justin Bieber.
But one of the moments that simultaneously proved that rock never died and that it’s on the rise was when Sombr brought out a special guest, who Boose said was making his first visit to the festival. Billy Corgan of Smashing Pumpkins came out to join in on a cover of his band’s mid-’90s alt-rock hit “1979,” which was more recently trending audio on TikTok and Instagram. (V.F.)
David Byrne performs at the Outdoor Theatre at Coachella.
(Christina House / Los Angeles Times)
David Byrne and the art of performance as an experience
More than an hour before Justin Bieber decided to have a YouTube karaoke party to headline Coachella, David Byrne closed out the Outdoor Theatre on Saturday night in stark relief.
Byrne’s set started 25 minutes late and he arrived on stage wearing an orange jumpsuit and holding an acoustic guitar. He was soon followed by a dozen or so instrumentalists and backing singers in matching garb for “Everybody Laughs,” a track off his 2025 album “Who Is the Sky?” (V.F.)
Nine Inch Noize performs at the Sahara Stage.
(Christina House / Los Angeles Times)
Nine Inch Noize revamps industrial rock for a ghoulish rave
Performing in a cutout in the middle of a huge elevated ramp, Reznor, his Nails bandmate Atticus Ross and Boys Noize hovered atop a dense rack of synths and samplers. They built on the ethos of their arena show, stripping the NIN catalog — including “Closer,” “Heresy,” “The Warning” and “Copy of A” — for parts, and then rebuilding the songs for this strobe-licked club setting.
One surprise for Coachella fans driving out was a billboard announcing Nine Inch Noize had a whole album of collaborative material en route, and the segments they played revealed how crucial Boys Noize is to this new setup. His bone-snapping breakdowns and vicious, detuned clangs wouldn’t be possible without Reznor’s ‘90s industrial vision, but here he returned the favor to ensure this combo translated on a dedicated rave stage. (A.B.)
The Strokes perform at the Coachella Stage.
(Kayla Bartkowski / Los Angeles Times)
It’s kind of a joke that the Strokes are still this good
Ninety minutes or so later, JB was indeed due to take over the space. But while Casablancas and his bandmates had control of it, it was theirs: This was an almost laughably strong showing by a band of rascally garage-rock veterans who somehow might sound better now — tighter, punchier, more effortlessly tuneful — than they did a quarter-century ago.
With an upcoming album to hype, the Strokes did their new single “Going Shopping,” a characteristically droll critique of late-capitalist apathy. (“Solidarity can be difficult when you got cool stuff to lose,” Casablancas sings.) But for the most part they stuck to the indelible hits, each as ingeniously structured — and as bitterly romantic — as the last: “Hard to Explain,” “Someday,” “Last Nite,” “New York City Cops.”
“You guys excited about the draft?” Casablancas asked at one point. “I hope to lead one of the Coachella units — the sexiest unit in our proud military.” (M.W.)
Justin Bieber performs at the Coachella Stage.
(Kevin Mazur / Getty Images)
Justin Bieber (and his laptop) headlining Coachella Night 2
This is how we found out Justin Bieber is a YouTube Premium subscriber.
The 32-year-old teen-pop survivor headlined Coachella on Saturday night, and for roughly half an hour in the middle of his set, what Bieber did was sit behind a laptop and sing along to his old music videos — often an octave down from where he recorded them — as he searched up the songs on YouTube and played them over the festival’s state-of-the-art sound system.
YouTube Premium, that is, given that he (and we) faced no ads during the performance. (M.W.)
SUNDAY
Clockwise from top left, Los Angeles Times staffers David Viramontes, Kayla Bartkowski, Rebecca Castillo, Danielle Dorsey, Mark Potts, Kailyn Brown and Christina House gather inside the Party in My Living Room activation at Coachella.
(Courtesy of Kailyn Brown)
Times staffer takes the stage at Coachella
For most artists, landing a gig at the most prestigious music festival happens at the zenith of their career. For reporter Kailyn Brown, playing Coachella is a side gig. But after seeing her set at the festival, at least one reporter anticipates that, sooner or later, being a Times journalist might become the real side gig.
On Sunday afternoon, Brown, a.k.a. KailynHype, played a DJ set at Party in my Living Room. The activation is a collab with GV Black, “a commitment and opportunity for Black, Indigenous, and People of Color (BIPOC) to be seen at the festival,” according to the Coachella website. “We actively promote diversity to change the narrative of what it means to be at Coachella.” (D.V.)
Wet Leg performs on the Coachella Stage.
(Kayla Bartkowski / Los Angeles Times)
Rock still isn’t dead at Coachella: Wet Leg edition
Even without rock headliners at Coachella, the genre is alive and thriving with a new generation. This afternoon’s evidence? A blistering set from British rockers Wet Leg.
Opening with “Catch These Fists,” the set seemed to wake up Coachella’s typically sleepy Sunday with a jolt of rock. Other early highlights included “Wet Dream” and “Liquidize.” (V.F.)
Less Than Jake performs at Coachella’s Heineken House on Sunday.
(Vanessa Franko / Los Angeles Times)
Less Than Jake transports us from Coachella to the Warped Tour
Less Than Jake at the Heineken House was definitely one of the most unexpected moments in my years of covering the festival — especially considering that Sean Paul had the venue, an open-air beer hangout that includes a modest stage without a metal barricade near the Indio Central Market, so overflowing Saturday night that the Coachella app sent an alert to people that it was at capacity.
But for us Xennials and millennials in the crowd who remember the OG Warped Tour, the ska punk band’s set was a fun break from the more traditional Coachella fare.
Singer and guitarist Chris DeMakes made some jokes about how out of place the band was compared to the likes of Saturday night headliner Justin Bieber, but even on a small stage, Less Than Jake brought out its production tricks of toilet paper guns, inflatable dancing wind socks and a gaggle of balloons. (V.F.)
Iggy Pop performs at the Mojave Tent.
(Christina House / Los Angeles Times)
At 78, Iggy Pop still has a lust for life
I was worried that Iggy Pop would have suffered the fate of Devo and David Byrne on Friday and Saturday, respectively, of not having nearly enough fans watching these legends. I shouldn’t have.
On Sunday evening, a respectable crowd showed up in the Mojave Tent to pay their respects to the Godfather of Punk, who first played Coachella in a reunion with the Stooges in 2003.
Not only did Pop have a full band that included the Yeah Yeah Yeahs’ Nick Zinner on guitar, but and also a full horn section.
The set kicked off with “T.V. Eye” before “Raw Power” (a song I never knew could be so enhanced by the aforementioned horn section), but the early highlights also included “Gimme Danger,” “The Passenger” and “Lust for Life” in a 1-2-3 punch of perfect Pop. (V.F.)
Karol G performs on the Coachella Stage.
(Christina House / Los Angeles Times)
Karol G’s historic headlining set was lusty, powerful and overdue
On Sunday night, Karol G became the first Latina to headline Coachella. Along with all her pride in that achievement, she seemed a little angry at that fact too.
“It feels late,” the Colombian superstar said onstage, in a brief English-language address to the audience in a set otherwise fully in Spanish. “ It’s been 27 years of this festival going on. … Before me, there were so many great Latino artists that gave me the opportunity.”
“Latinos have been struggling in this country lately,” she continued. “We stand for them. I’m proud this brings out the best of us — unity, resilience, a strong spirit. We want everyone to feel welcome to our culture, our roots, our music, I want everyone to feel proud of where you come from.”
Karol let those lines here serve as her brief indictment of the present, jackbooted environment around immigration and repression in the United States. Making belated history by headlining Coachella would seem far removed from those concerns.
Yet as this sweeping, heady, spectacularly ambitious and relentlessly lusty set showed over its hour and half, the body is the first site of liberation. If you can’t move like you want, where you want, you’re not free. Karol G finally commanding this stage was living proof it’s possible to kick that door in. (A.B.)
So this is how we find out Justin Bieber is a YouTube Premium subscriber.
The 32-year-old teen-pop survivor headlined Coachella on Saturday night, and for roughly half an hour in the middle of his set, what Bieber did was sit behind a laptop and sing along to his old music videos — often an octave down from where he recorded them — as he searched up the songs on YouTube and played them over the festival’s state-of-the-art sound system.
YouTube Premium, that is, given that he (and we) faced no ads during the performance.
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Expectations were insanely high for this show — Bieber’s first large-scale concert after a few years he spent in the pop-star wilderness recovering from various health ailments of both the physical and mental variety.
Invite-only warm-up gigs he played over the last couple of weeks in L.A. led to widespread speculation that at Coachella he might play only material from last year’s “Swag” and “Swag II” comeback albums.
And indeed that’s what he did for the first half-hour or so, singing songs like “All I Can Take,” “Speed Demon” and “Butterflies” — and singing them with extreme precision — accompanied by prerecorded backing tracks; after that, he brought out Carter Lang and Dylan Wiggins — two of his closest “Swag” collaborators — to do more of the “Swag” material “up close and personal with you guys,” as he put it.
“This is a night I dreamed about for a long time,” he said, dressed in a red hoodie, shorts and Paddington-gone-Balenciaga rain boots.
Together the three did gorgeous Christian-youth-group white-soul renditions of “Things You Do” and “Glory” and “Everything Hallelujah,” the last of which Bieber used to shout out his wife, Hailey Baldwin, who was in the crowd and made herself available to Coachella’s roving cameras.
Then: “Feels like we gotta take you guys on a bit of a journey,” Bieber said. “You guys remember this song?”
That was his own cue for a YouTube deep dive — it started with “Baby” and included “Never Say Never” and “Beauty and a Beat” — that made you wonder about the unresolved trauma he’s still dealing with from his child-star days. (Second night in a row for that, by the way, after Sabrina Carpenter on Friday.)
“How far back do you go?” he asked the crowd at one point. “Are you really with the s—?”
Bieber went on to play much-memed videos of himself running into a revolving door and himself falling off a stage; that led to an unfortunate little digression about the paparazzi and their rapacious ways.
“These guys won’t leave you alone, bro,” he said before playing that famous video of the guy freaking out over the double rainbow.
The final portion of the show had Bieber doing “Yukon,” then “Devotion” with Dijon — the vocals! — then “Essence” with Tems and Wizkid.
“Tonight has been beautiful,” Bieber said before bringing out Mk.gee to close with “Daisies,” and he was right: This was a radical reframing of what a headlining Coachella performance is supposed to be, and I loved it.
Several Palestinians were rushed to hospital with severe injuries after an Israeli air strike hit a crowd near the Al Jazeera Club in central Gaza City. Near-daily Israeli attacks have killed more than 700 people since the so-called “ceasefire” entered into effect in October 2025.
WASHINGTON — Inside the Supreme Court, as justices heard oral arguments in the case over birthright citizenship, President Trump became the first sitting president to attend such a proceeding.
Outside the court, the great-grandson of Wong Kim Ark — the San Francisco man whose landmark Supreme Court case affirmed birthright citizenship in 1898 — addressed a crowd of hundreds of people.
“Wong Kim Ark’s victory ensured that people like me and millions of others would be recognized as fully American, not outsiders in the country of our birth,” said Norman Wong. “This case transformed the 14th Amendment from words on paper into living promise. Today, that promise is still being tested.”
Surrounded by protesters in favor of birthright citizenship was a lone counter-protester. The woman, who wore a red baseball cap and a sweatshirt stating “Chicago flips red,” yelled into a megaphone as speakers addressed the crowd.
“Freedmen stand with Donald Trump,” she said as the Rev. William Barber II spoke. “America first. Americans first.”
The Rev. William Barber II speaks during a rally on protecting birthright citizenship outside the Supreme Court on Wednesday.
(Al Drago / Getty Images)
Undaunted, Barber noted that the 14th Amendment, ratified in 1868, makes clear that anyone born in the U.S. is a citizen.
“The 14th Amendment protects babies from a caste system,” Barber said. “They didn’t allow evil in 1868, and we’re not going to allow evil in 2026.”
“Stop lying, pastor,” the woman taunted him.
After Barber finished his remarks, the woman was drowned out by Aretha Franklin’s “Respect” playing over the speakers.
Inside the building, justices heard arguments over a Trump executive order which aimed to end birthright citizenship. The administration has argued that children born of parents who are in the country illegally or temporary visas should be denied citizenship.
A man from Cameroon said he chose to speak out because he doesn’t want future generations to become stateless and feel what he has felt. The man said he had been authorized to work in the United States Temporary Protected Status until the Trump administration terminated it last year.
“I know what it feels like to have your sense of belonging taken from you overnight,” he said.
Nancy Jeannechild, 69, traveled from Baltimore with a handwritten sign asking the justices to “Do your job.” She said Trump has amassed too much power and that the Supreme Court hasn’t stood up to him enough.
“This is another opportunity for them to do the right thing, and I hope that they will,” she said. “Just because Trump doesn’t like it doesn’t mean it’s not what’s in the Constitution.”
Araceli Hernandez, 29, attended the rally with her 1-year-old son. She said she immigrated from Honduras five years ago and that her son being born here means he has better opportunities to study, access to healthcare and a safe environment to live in.
“We came to represent the children who are not yet born because they also have a right to have a better future in this country,” she said.
Sen. Alex Padilla (D-Calif.) said he was confident birthright citizenship would prevail because the Constitution is clear. The fight is personal, he said, as the a proud American and son of immigrants.
“The moment I was born on U.S. soil I was born a citizen, and I’ll be damned if Donald Trump tries to take that away from me,” he said. “What’s on the line isn’t just a question about citizenship — it is about upholding the Constitution, respecting the rule of law and keeping the promise that the 14th Amendment has held for more than 150 years.”
After the arguments wrapped up, Cecilia Wang, who led the defense of birthright citizenship for the American Civil Liberties Union, addressed the crowd. She said she was confident that the Trump administration would lose the case.
“Whether you’re an indigenous American, whether you are descended from African Americans who were enslaved and free, whether you are the descendant of someone who came on the Mayflower or someone who arrived just before your birth, we all are Americans alike,” she said. “That is the principle that we stood up for together, all of us, in the Supreme Court of the United States today.”
CHESSY, France — A 118-foot mountain of ice rose over the suburban Paris countryside this weekend as Disney opened its Arendelle kingdom to the world — Elsa’s palace glowing at the summit, a “Frozen” Nordic fishing village below, and the company’s new chief executive standing before a crowd of celebrities.
World of Frozen, an immersive land themed to the blockbuster animated franchise, opened Sunday as a centerpiece of a $2.2-billion transformation at Disneyland Paris.
The transformation renames one of Disneyland Paris’ two parks from Walt Disney Studios Park to Disney Adventure World. The inauguration drew Penélope Cruz, Naomi Campbell and Teyana Taylor.
It is the largest expansion in the 34-year history of Disneyland Paris, and one node in a roughly $60-billion global build-out of Disney’s parks, resorts and cruise lines.
A new CEO’s first stage
It is also the first major international stage for Josh D’Amaro, who took over as Disney’s CEO on March 18 — 11 days before the French gates opened — after nearly three decades in the company’s theme parks division.
The parks-and-experiences business reportedly generated 57% of the company’s $17.5 billion in segment operating income last year, the force that observers say propelled D’Amaro from parks chief to the corner office.
“The Walt Disney Co. was built on one man’s dream, and for more than 100 years we’ve shared that dream with the world,” D’Amaro told the inauguration crowd.
“Storytelling is fundamental to everything that we do, whether that’s on screen or stage, in our theme parks, on our cruise ships, or even at home.”
He called the opening “a transformational moment” and paid tribute to the creative team behind the attraction, including “Frozen” writer-director Jennifer Lee — who are all now at work on “Frozen 3.”
An Associated Press journalist accompanied D’Amaro on the “Frozen” ride Saturday night.
The carriage splashed through water to childlike cheers from riders and laughter from the new CEO as they glided past Elsa singing in the dark. Some stepped off lightly wet.
The evening’s emotional peak came when Lou, an 11-year-old whose wish was granted through Make-A-Wish France, took the stage to sing a few notes of “Do You Want to Build a Snowman?”
A next-generation robotic Olaf walked out to join her. It was the 25,000th wish fulfilled for a sick child at Disneyland Paris since 1992.
A French reversal
On Friday, D’Amaro had stood alongside Emmanuel Macron at the resort.
The French president used the visit to claim the park as a national economic asset, calling Disneyland Paris “the leading tourist destination in Europe” and describing it as “a genuine ecosystem of success.”
Macron said the latest expansion would create 1,000 additional direct jobs.
“Since the beginning, that’s 13 billion euros invested on this territory,” Macron said, a figure equivalent to about $15 billion.
Disneyland Paris says it has recorded more than 445 million visits since 1992, accounting for 6.1% of France’s national tourism revenue.
Macron’s presence underscored a remarkable reversal.
When the park opened as Euro Disney in 1992, French intellectuals derided it as a “cultural Chernobyl.” The president at the time, Francois Mitterrand, dryly derided the new attraction as “not exactly my cup of tea.”
Now a French president was standing in front of cameras calling it an engine of national prosperity.
European roots
“‘Frozen,’ of course, has its roots in European storytelling,” said Michel den Dulk of Walt Disney Imagineering.
“It’s very loosely based on Hans Christian Andersen. So to have a northern European, charming wooden little village here in Disneyland Paris — it just made sense.”
The new Tangled family ride, too, draws from European folklore — the Brothers Grimm’s Rapunzel.
The land re-creates Arendelle around a lagoon, its timber buildings painted in muted Scandinavian pastels, facades adorned with rosemaling, a traditional Norwegian decorative art.
At the center is Frozen Ever After, a boat ride featuring state-of-the-art animatronics and immersive projection effects.
Guests can meet Anna and Elsa inside Arendelle Castle, have a conversation with a responsive baby troll named Mossy who talks back, and watch a lagoon celebration called the Snow Flower Festival — featuring an original song.
Visitors praised the scale of the mountain and the detail of the village, even after delays and minor glitches.
“Despite the wait, it was well worth it. The attention to detail is incredible, and the perspective of the ice mountain is breathtaking,” said Daniel Weber, 41, an architect from Munich, Germany, after the ride Sunday.
“You forget you’re outside Paris. For a few minutes, it really feels like Arendelle,” said Léa Moreau, 27, a graphic designer from Lille, France.
Beyond World of Frozen, the rebranded park brings a vast new lake called Adventure Bay, a Tangled family ride, 15 new dining locations — including the posh Regal View Restaurant — and a nighttime spectacular called Disney Cascade of Lights featuring more than 380 drones.
A Lion King land, already under construction, will follow.
More than 90% of the second park’s offerings will have been redesigned since it opened in 2002, and Disney says the footprint will roughly double once the full transformation is complete.
Disney’s streaming has swung from deep losses to profitability, but the parks remain the company’s most dependable earnings engine — and D’Amaro is the man who ran them.
“We continue to dream bigger and bring stories to life in brand new ways,” D’Amaro told the crowd.
Pyrotechnics lighted up Arendelle Village.
The ice palace on the mountain turned blue.
And 34 years after Euro Disney became a punchline, a brand-new kingdom opened in the fields east of Paris — for the first time in forever.
Ranting about the decline of comedy specials while releasing a new one at the same time feels a bit like an oxymoron. But somehow it still makes sense coming from alt-comedy pioneer David Cross, who isn’t just complaining; he’s finding his own route to making specials feel special again. The only way to do that is by putting one out in the manner he’d like to see more often — starting by making the whole crowd stand up too.
Capturing the energy of a concert at the famous 40 Watt Club in Athens, Ga., was the first step in differentiating “The End of the Beginning of the End” from the typical hour you watch on a big streamer. And, with this new special, Cross is able to get back to his own beginnings of touring across the country with love bands as his openers, performing for crowds for as long as he could until he had to run offstage to pee.
Premiering the special earlier this month on his website (and on April 7, it will be available on YouTube via production company 800 Pound Gorilla), Cross is hoping the special connects with comedy fans in a way that we’ve forgotten specials could.
This interview has been edited for length and clarity
Your new special is called “The End of the Beginning of the End.” What does that title mean to you as it relates to the impending doom of what we’re all living right now.
David Cross: Well, you can look at it in a couple different ways. To me, it signifies that the beginning of the end has occurred. And we are now at the end of the beginning of the end. And from where you go with that, that’s for you to decide.
One of the things I love about the special is the fact that you shoot it at a club in the style of a live–music concert.
I’ve shot specials in theaters and it’s just different, not that one is better than the other, but they’re just different. You have a different relationship with the audience. When I first started touring, I would go to music venues and I’d have a band open for me and then I would just go up and pretty much [perform] as long as I could until I had to pee. Sometimes I’d have a band playing, sometimes two bands, then I’d go out. And I did that a couple of times, and then stopped doing that and did theaters, and I decided for the last two specials I’m going to go to, when I shoot it, I’ll go to a music venue, and I was at the 40 Watt Club in Athens this last time, I was at the Metro in Chicago before that, both places I played on earlier tours, and, you know, it’s not seated. People are standing there at the stage, and I prefer it. It’s more fun. It’s not as lucrative but, to me, a more fun show to do.
Comedian David Cross
(Jason Armond / Los Angeles Times)
The ambience of it was great.You can hear people shouting and drinking and having a good time, and the crowd work is also a little more spontaneous and fun than it would be in a regular venue.
Yeah, well, there’s more opportunity for that. But my thing has never been about crowd work. I like engaging with it, it’s kind of a nice distraction from the set that you’ve been doing 100 times, 150 times at that point. So it’s always fun to have that thing happen and that feeling of spontaneity. And like the guy [who I talk to in the crowd during the special], I could not have asked for [someone better]. I mean, even if it was scripted, it wouldn’t have been as good. The guy who [I talk to] during the stuff about hiking Machu Picchu [with Bob Odenkirk], that’s just… [chef’s kiss].
Speaking of Bob Odenkirk, you guys have this long relationship. How would you describe the dynamic of working with Bob and just how you guys bounce ideas off each other?
I mean, it’s great. We have an inordinate amount of respect for each other, both as people and as creative partners. And so there’s never any real issues. There’s things we will definitely disagree with, but we’re both decent people. So you know somebody backs off and says, “OK, let’s do it that way.” But even then, there aren’t that many of those [issues]. We just have really worked well at building something or molding it, creating it and shaping it. And our aforementioned hike to Machu Picchu, we have a documentary about that, that will be premiering at a fancy festival at some point in the near-future. And so we got that doc and we’ve been working on that. And for the way we work now, because he lives in L.A. and I live in New York, and it’s been like that for a while, he’ll write a bunch of stuff, I’ll make notes, I’ll write my things, send it back. And so we’re able to do that and not necessarily have to be in the same room because we’ve had 30-plus years of working with each other.
It’s a kind of like an unspoken language you guys probably have in terms of comedy, which is super important, I imagine, just for collaborating.
Yeah, and it’s something we discovered very early on … before there was even “Mr. Show,” what would ultimately become “Mr. Show,” when we got together to write sketches for this bigger kind of comedy collective thing, and these shows that we would all do with each other, for each other, and the stuff that we would write together was just, like, really good, easy writing — again, one person adding this thing and one person saying here’s a switch yeah and another person adding this thing in. It was fun, it’s cool, still is. One thing he doesn’t get credit for is he’s a really decent human being. And with all the awfulness in the world that’s magnified, every sense is bombarded with it — it’s just good to be hanging with somebody whose energy is a good person, a decent person and an equitable, nice guy, so that’s good as well.
Comedian David Cross poses for a portrait ahead of his comedy special “The End of the Beginning of the End.”
(Jason Armond / Los Angeles Times)
One thing you guys also have in common is you both have kids, and he has a comedy show for kids called “The Appropriate Show.” Have you taken your daughter to see it?
It’s a sketch show [in which] all the sketches are appropriate for kids to watch. And the sketches have been done in other sketch shows onstage, live. And he puts together this thing once, twice a year here in L.A. And I took my daughter to it last year. It’s just sketches that kids can [understand]. At least if they don’t understand the actual references they get the archetype. “Oh, that’s the boss, that’s that uh… And it’s great, it’s a really cool idea uh… “ And would an ass— think of [a show like] that? No, one good decent person; a good man. But listen, this interview isn’t about me, it’s about Bob Odenkirk, so let’s get back to that.
Well, speaking of having comedy geared toward kids, your daughter’s at an age where she’s probably consumed or seen some of your comedy at this point.
Not, not really. No, no.
Do you shield her from your stuff, or are you not so concerned about it?
I don’t actively shield her, but I don’t introduce her to anything. So I was a little bummed out, and I got over it pretty quickly, but when I found out that she had seen a little bit of “Alvin and the Chipmunks,” and only because I don’t want to spoil the enjoyment of what movies are and what kids’ movies are and how things work. And I feel like that would introduce an element of reality that I want her to be able to just enjoy these things without — she’s seen “Kung Fu Panda”when she was younger, like, I don’t know, three, four, five times, has no idea that I’m in that, that my voice is in there. She knows I do stand-up, she gets that now. And when she was younger, she’d say, “Daddy’s silly for a living.” … I’m just trying to ride the balance of letting her have those childhood joys and experiences.
Comedian David Cross.
(Jason Armond / Los Angeles Times)
Does having a kid make you think about what’s coming up in the future of comedy, or what kids are gonna maybe find funny, or what they find funny now? Do you have any thoughts on kid comedy in general?
Not really. I mean, I can see that she and her friends, who are kind of like-minded, are naturally funny, and then that’s kind of encouraging and heartwarming and they’re silly, but I’ll be long gone when that generation is is providing comedy. And I’m still, although I’ve kind of given up, I’m still trying to grasp what works now. I mean, it’s short-term TikTok, Instagram stuff. There are some amazing, like really, really great things being done as far as film sketches for YouTube channels. “Almost Friday,” they’ve got genius-level stuff. I mean, really good. And where the sketch goes in a place, you’re never ahead of it, goes in a place where you’re not expecting. It’s really well written and well performed.
What are your thoughts on what a comedy special is nowadays or what it should be?
I mean, that’s a great question. I think anybody who plays with the form, whether I think it’s that funny or not, is different. But I’m happy when anybody kind of tries at least to play with a form. I just went to Rory Scovel‘s taping last week of his latest special. I don’t know when that’ll air, but if you’ve seen the beginning to his first special, stuff like that where you’re like, “Wait, what’s happening? What’s going on?” I love stuff like that.
I still get excited to watch specials by some of my favorite comics, but there’s a quality that’s missing. And these are stand-ups I love, and they’re not that great. They’re not bad but they’re not special, you know? And all those guys I mentioned, and more, have great specials. Like, you can go back and they’re great. And I don’t know why that is. I mean, there’s still funny stuff, but I don’t ever want to get to that place where its just feels a little phoned-in a little bit… that is, in part, why the last two specials were shot in this more intimate setting that feels special. And … as I said, the energy’s different, it’s a little bit different, and it’s less slick. It feels like you’re in the moment. You don’t need a million dollars to shoot a special. You don’t 28 camera angles, it‘s just bull—. And it takes something away.
Comedian David Cross
(Jason Armond / Los Angeles Times)
It all should feel the right amount of unsafe as well, I think.
That’s never gonna happen at a theater show. You’re never gonna feel that. And I don’t know, it really does feel almost like maybe we peaked in a sense, like there’s too much, and because of that, these things aren’t special. They’re not revelatory, they’re not unique. I dunno, can 18,000 people in an arena really relate to a … billionaire talking about how they’re gonna get canceled. I mean, is that a thing I guess? Those other big, slick specials that are shot in, like, a 3,200-seat, 3,500-seat theater, it just feels like, “Oh this person is up there and I’m listening to their jokes.” There’s nothing wrong with that. They’re often very funny jokes, but it doesn’t go beyond that. It’s just like, “All right, tell me your joke.” It might as well be an audio thing, you know?
Well, hopefully the robots aren’t coming for your job anytime soon.
Absolutely not. I mean, this could be naive, but I feel 100% safe that you are never going to replicate an evening of stand-up at a nigtclub like that. And not sitting down at tables while you’re having drinks and waitresses are coming by. I’m talking about everybody’s up on the stage, sold-out, maximum capacity; everybody’s there, focused, we’re all sharing that thing. You can’t. AI’s not going to be able to do that.
Yeah, the robots can’t do that, Terminator can’t do that..
Oh, I forgot about Terminator. He could do that. G— it.
“What happened to my dreams? Simply put: they changed,” reads Phil Augusta Jackson aloud to a crowd in a furniture store. Tonight’s theme is change. From a podium, the television writer reflects on the long, thorny odyssey of his career. A pinball machine blinks in the background. Behind him, dreamy abstract prints hang on the wall, their shapes seeming to melt in the unseasonable spring heat.
Alongside mid-century furnishings and art in Echo Park, siblings Madeline Walter and Evan Walter host their wildly popular reading series, Essays. It’s a warm spring night. In a tender essay, Evan considers what he’s inherited from his idiosyncratic father. “I scream-sneeze like him now,” he reads. “It feels like a mess figuring out what parts of your parents you’re going to keep.”
In March 2024, the Walter siblings began the reading series in a friend’s backyard. “It was cold and wet, and we were so nervous nobody would come,” says Madeline. Since then, the show has moved through a series of venues before settling into a home at The Hunt Vintage. In just two years, it has grown into a local phenomenon, regularly drawing crowds of more than 150 people into the singular space.
The idea for Essays took shape during a conversation about creative constraints. Both writers and comedians, the siblings wanted to host a show that pushed beyond snappy punchlines and polished half-truths. “The objective is different from just being funny,” Madeline says. “It’s to tell me about yourself. Tell me something you’re thinking about.”
Siblings Madeline and Evan Walter host a popular monthly reading series called Essays at Echo Park’s Hunt Vintage.
(Ryan Wall )
Like many readings across Los Angeles, Essays taps into a growing appetite for sincerity. “People are really craving a space where you can be funny, be vulnerable, laugh at yourself — and where there’s an earnestness,” Evan says. That sensibility feels familiar to them. They grew up in what Madeline describes as a “very NPR-coded household that loved David Sedaris-style stuff.” She adds: “Doing something in the essay space feels like a surprising return to form.”
“One of my roommates describes it as a church-like experience, because everything is just so emotionally0driven and connective,” says Kaitlyn Kilmer, a longtime attendee.
The legacy of the series has begun to ripple outward. Their reading series has created a complementary Substack. Kilmer is now hosting a reading in her living room among friends.“We decided that we wanted to do our own, so I gathered a few friends who had been fans of the Essays show,” she says.
Essays exists in a larger network of reading series that make up Los Angeles’ diverse and ever-evolving literary scene. “There are so many readings now,” explains non-fiction writer Diana Ruzova, who frequently attends readings. “I’m not mad at it, though, mostly grateful that L.A. has a thriving literary community.”
In Los Feliz, Skylight Books continues to host intimate book launches for some of the most anticipated literary releases, drawing local favorites and celebrities.
“Our vibe is cozy,” says Mary Williams, general manager of Skylight Books. “We set up chairs under the big tree that grows in the middle of the store, and we hope this is a go-to place for our community to see their favorite authors while mingling with other book lovers.”
Elsewhere, at Heavy Manners Library, the tone of literary events leans more toward the experimental. “Experimental, unpolished writing can be shared and reflected on in an accessible, communal setting,” says program assistant Jane Shin.
This spring, literary events across the city run the gamut — from independent book fairs to poetry workshops, from the bizarre to the deeply vulnerable — welcoming everyone from curious newcomers to die-hard bookworms.
Comedians Jo Koy and Gabriel “Fluffy” Iglesias are used to delivering big laughs on large stages. But in the world of major L.A. venues, there’s big, there’s massive, and then there’s SoFi Stadium.
The show starring both comedians was billed as a record-breaking feat for stand-up when they sold out the 70,000-seater. Though the pressure to fill up the stadium was off, it still remained to be seen how the two comics would make their most dedicated fans laugh from more than a football field away. By that criteria, Saturday night was definitely a win.
Kicking off the early portion of the show at 7 p.m., fans were already filling the seats as opening acts from Iglesias’ camp, including Matt Golightly, Joey Guila, Alfred Robles, Martin Moreno (who celebrated his 58th birthday on stage) and ventriloquist funnyman Jeff Dunham got the crowd warmed up for about an hour before Iglesias took the stage first.
Comedians Jo Koy and Fluffy perform Saturday at SoFi Stadium.
(Christina House / Los Angeles Times)
It was almost 8 p.m. when Iglesias emerged following a video skit playing on the jumbo screens and the stadium’s massive halo scoreboard with his funny misadventures of a routine doughnut run at Randy’s Donuts that turned into the plot of “Sons of Anarchy” spinoff “Mayans M.C.” featuring lead actors Emilio Rivera, a.k.a. Miguel Golindo, and Clayton Cardenas, known for playing Angel Reyes. Reyes caused the first major eruption of noise in the crowd by pressing a detonation device that triggered columns of smoke that filled the stage as Fluffy made his entrance in a white flat cap and custom Los Angeles button-up to greet the sold-out stadium.
“Thank you for being here, all I have to say is we did it!” Iglesias proclaimed as the crowd cheered.
Pointing and waving to fans in the nosebleeds, he took time to embrace the moment that topped his previous triumph of performing at Dodger Stadium.
Fluffy takes the stage at SoFi Stadium in Inglewood.
(Christina House / Los Angeles Times)
Though the stage couldn’t have been bigger, both comedians used their ability to make a large event feel intimate by drawing the crowd in through storytelling and making them feel like they were part of a conversation. Iglesias set the tone of his set right away by telling us about the chisme (a.k.a. salacious gossip) surrounding his newly married stepson that weaved into stories about his travels all over the world including his controversial stop at the Riyadh Comedy Festival.
Iglesias also took a pause to relate one other historic fact about the two stadiums in L.A. he’s now been able to sell out.
Santino Villalovos of Tracy, Calif., shows his Fluffy tattoo during the Jo Koy and Fluffy show at SoFi Stadium.
(Christina House / Los Angeles Times)
“The two biggest shows in comedy were Dodger Stadium and SoFi Stadium. … And what did they both have in common? They both featured a Mexican,” he said.
Even though he thought about retiring as a comedian after filling up Dodger Stadium (twice) to film his special “Stadium Fluffy,” Iglesias said the SoFi show inspired him to keep pushing himself. And alongside Koy he knew they could do it.
Fans react to special guest Jamie Foxx during Jo Koy’s performance at SoFi Stadium in Inglewood on Saturday.
(Christina House / Los Angeles Times)
“Jo I know you’re in the back, thank you for trusting me man, we did it brother. And I’ll say it in front of an entire stadium, love you. Things like this for me is a huge deal because it inspired me and gave me another reason to keep doing what I love to do. And tomorrow I’m gonna be in the same situation I was after Dodger Stadium — what am I gonna do now? But until then I’m enjoy the hell outta tonight and I still have more stories to share with you.”
Fluffy’s most controversial (and true) bit of the night was breaking the news to his fans that his name is mentioned in the Epstein files, which sent collective shock through the stands.
“I’ve never been to the island, I’ve never been on the plane and I have never met Jeffrey Epstein,” he clarified.
Fans light up SoFi Stadium during Fluffy’s set on Saturday.
(Christina House / Los Angeles Times)
The comedian said that according to reports in the Epstein files, the late convicted pedophile apparently tried to buy tickets to his show at an Improv in West Palm Beach, Fla., in 2014 but was told by his assistant via email that both his shows were sold out.
“Jeffrey Epstein, one of the most diabolical human beings to ever walk the face of the earth. Had the ability to connect with politicians, with influencers, with celebrities. He put people in very compromising positions. He got people on planes. He put people on islands. He was involved in trafficking. He was able to accomplish all these evil, crazy things, but at the end of the day, he still couldn’t get tickets to see my show,” Iglesias said.
Jo Koy reveals himself with the Jabbawockeez at SoFi Stadium.
(Christina House / Los Angeles Times)
After a brief intermission, things transitioned to Jo Koy’s portion of the show featuring warm-up sets from TikTok skitmaster King Bach and longtime friend and stand-up star Tiffany Haddish, who came to the stage looking ready for the red carpet with a flowing silk dress, hair blowing in the man-made wind to deliver her brand of high-energy stories about becoming a real estate tycoon in South-Central.
When it was Koy’s turn to enter the stadium, he slipped in undercover, dressed as one of the Jabbawockeez — the legendary masked hip-hop dance troupe that danced onstage to a medley of West Coast hip-hop dressed in red with acrobatic swagger. At the end of a brief routine, Koy unmasked himself as one of the dancers, eliciting cheers from the crowd as his son helped him change onstage into his regular attire, Dodgers hat and a jean jacket.
Jo Koy performs at SoFi Stadium in Inglewood on Saturday.
(Christina House / Los Angeles Times)
Always a man of the people, his set also reminded us that he’s also a man of the pets, specifically dogs, launching into a long bit that felt worthy of a slightly more adult version of a Pixar movie. But beyond jokes and stories, Koy kept coming back to the idea that laughter, more than fame, marketing or money, is what helped the comedians’ big plans for SoFi come together.
“This place is full, all the way to the top, people laughing and having a good time. I know there’s a lotta s— going happening in the world right now but guess what, we don’t wanna hear it right now. We came to have a good f— time. I’m not here to debate s—, everybody’s in here, everything they said wasn’t supposed to happen happened. Look around, every f— color of the rainbow is in SoFi Stadium tonight.”
Jamie Foxx, left, sings with Jo Koy at SoFi Stadium.
(Christina House / Los Angeles Times)
The vibe of the set was all about escaping the problems of everyday life. For most of the night that was taken care of by comedy. And sometimes that escapism was aided by the power of R&B. Twice during the night Koy shocked the crowd with special guest sing-alongs, first with Babyface coming out to serenade the crowd with a brief yet un-relenting hit fest he wrote and/or sang including “Can We Talk,” the ‘90s hit he wrote for Tevin Campbell, and the Boyz II Men anthems “I’ll Make Love to You” and “End of the Road.”
The second surprise came courtesy of Jamie Foxx, who popped out in shades and 10-gallon hat to sing the Ray Charles homage-driven hook of Kanye West’s “Gold Digger.”
Aside from any historic accolades, Saturday night was the culmination of a show that was a year in the making and a victory lap for the careers of two comics who’ve been in the game for decades. It was also a moment where comedy’s past met its stadium-size future in the L.A. comedy world. Though it’s hard to say when the next big comedian will have enough fans to fill a stadium in L.A., Saturday didn’t feel like it was the last time comedy fans will show up to fill SoFi for a pair of comedians who put in the work to make themselves a team worth rooting for.
A crowd celebrating Chaharshanbe Suri in Tehran were forced to flee after gunshots disrupted their event. Iranian security forces have reportedly been breaking up gatherings marking the Persian festival this week.
