Gideon Evans Confronts Mickey Mouse
From Parenting is a Joke by Ophira Eisenberg
March 2, 2026 · 45 min · Season 4 · Episode 439
About this episode
Ophira Eisenberg talks with Gideon Evans about parenting teenagers while navigating a career in comedy and the challenges of IVF.
On this episode of Parenting Is a Joke, Ophira Eisenberg talks with writer and producer Gideon Evans about raising two teenagers while building a career in comedy that’s ricocheted from scrappy theater internships to six years at The Daily Show. Gideon shares the surreal early days of hustling in Manhattan—once driving Frank Langella around in his parents’ station wagon to pick up a giant painted portrait of the actor—before landing staff jobs with health insurance just in time for a grueling two-to-three-year IVF process that included being dropped by a clinic worried about its “numbers” and producing a sample in his endocrinologist father-in-law’s office. The conversation moves easily between the practical math of raising kids in Brooklyn, the relief of finally getting dental insurance in middle age, and college tours at McGill University and Concordia University as his son explores art and coding. Gideon also revisits his formative years working for Michael Moore on TV Nation, including the time he snuck into Walt Disney World dressed as an eight-foot “corporate crime fighting” chicken to confront executives about labor conditions—only to be detained, photographed as both man…
People in this episode
Host: Ophira Eisenberg
Guest: Gideon Evans
Topics covered
- parenting
- comedy
- IVF process
- teenagers
- career in comedy
- college tours
- labor conditions
Keywords
- parenting
- comedy
- IVF
- teenagers
- New York
- college
- Disney
Mentioned in this episode
Organizations: The Daily Show, Michael Moore
Books & works: Bad Elizabeth
Places: Manhattan, Brooklyn, McGill University, Concordia University
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