It wasn’t on my 2026 theatrical bingo card to come away from a Jewish comedian’s stand-up show with “Awesome God,” a popular Christian anthem from the late 1980s and ’90s, running through my head. But that’s exactly what happened at Alex Edelman’s “What Are You Going to Do,” now playing at Steppenwolf Theatre after a previous Chicago appearance at the Den Theatre last year.
Edelman first performed at Steppenwolf in 2024 with “Just For Us,” a show that won him a Special Tony Award for its Broadway run and an Emmy Award as an HBO special. The 37-year-old Bostonian, who grew up in a modern Orthodox Jewish family, crafted that production around an incident when he infiltrated a gathering of white supremacists in New York. So, it’s safe to assume that most of the sold-out crowd at Steppenwolf on Wednesday night was already aware of his Jewish identity.
On the contrary, Edelman insists in his opening monologue, “I’m not Jewish. I’m a big fan of (pauses to check notes) Jesus Christ.”
The line is played for laughs, of course, but it also sets up a key tension at the heart of Edelman’s musings on faith, identity and trauma. Raised in cultural and religious traditions rooted in uncertainty, and living through a time when being Jewish feels especially (though, he notes, not unprecedentedly) fraught, he finds himself envious of the certainty displayed by many American Christians. “Jesus is an answer; Judaism is a series of questions,” he says.
As someone who was raised an evangelical Christian, I found Edelman’s riffs on these two Abrahamic religions hilarious and apt. Millennial church kids will especially enjoy his bit about meeting Christian music stars Michael W. Smith and Amy Grant at the Kennedy Center Honors. Toeing the line between sincerity and tongue-in-cheek humor, Edelman claims to have developed an obsession with contemporary Christian music after Smith invited him to a concert.
In addition to being a hallmark of his religious background, uncertainty characterizes how Edelman treats the inevitable elephant in the room: Israel’s ongoing military conflicts in the Middle East following the events of Oct. 7, 2023. Anyone looking for an unequivocal statement of Edelman’s personal views will be disappointed here. Rather, he offloads the discussion onto anecdotes about his group of friends from New York who regularly debate these topics, somehow maintaining their close relationships despite clashing opinions.
Edelman’s coy framing is an outlier in today’s political environment, when audiences tend to expect clear stances from celebrities and entertainers of all stripes. His approach can certainly be interpreted as risk-averse, since he hints at holding views more defined than he’s willing to share, but in a more generous reading, it’s an honest reflection of Judaism’s questioning ethos.
This show isn’t solely about faith (or lack thereof) and geopolitics, though. Edelman spends significant time sending up his own neurodivergence and his absurd experiences of being tested for autism — a condition that’s gentrifying as quickly as Wicker Park, he quipped to the Chicago crowd. He also rhapsodizes about his collection of 900-plus seashells, which are organized in his home according to how they make him feel.
In addition, Edelman opens up about seeing a therapist for trauma and insomnia, which is partially driven by a recurring dream that echoes a violent event he once witnessed in Jerusalem. There’s plenty of gallows humor about Jewish history, too. At one point, he imagines a conversation between his most pessimistic cousin and a 19th century ancestor who was killed by the Cossacks.
“What Are You Going to Do” is driven more by recurring themes than an overarching narrative, and some of its tangents work better than others. Edelman’s attempt to bring together several threads at the end needs a bit more finessing, too. Though he didn’t say when filming would occur, he alluded to another special for this show, and with live performances booked through November, maybe there’s still time to work out the kinks. Regardless, it’s already a very entertaining evening of comedy.
Emily McClanathan is a freelance critic.
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“What Are You Going to Do” plays through Sunday at Steppenwolf Theatre, 1650 N. Halsted St.; 312-335-1650 and www.steppenwolf.org