Aziz Ansari on Giving Up Social Media, Starting a Family and More ‘Master of None’: “That Would Be a Dream for Me”

At one point during his new Netflix special, Nightclub Comedian Aziz Ansari produces a vintage accessory from a seemingly bygone era — a flip phone — as a way to show just how far he is away from today’s social media-obsessed culture. In a new interview with fellow comedian Kevin Hart on SiriusXM to promote the show, Ansari goes into more detail about the distance he keeps as a way to protect what he refers to as “a mental diet.”

“However, many years ago, I kind of started turning off the internet, and I deleted all social media and all this stuff, and I’ve slowly just kept going further and further. I stopped using email, maybe, four years ago. I know all this stuff is like, oh yeah, I’m in a position where I can do that and have certain privileges to be able to pull it off, an assistant or whatever, but all that stuff I do helps me get more done. Whether it’s working out or meditating and all that kind of stuff,” Ansari says on the episode of Comedy Gold Minds with Kevin Hart, which debuts tonight.

“Everyone thinks about their diet and what they eat [and] at a certain point, it’s also about thinking about your mental diet and what you’re putting in your head,” he continues. “Whether it’s looking at the same four websites, constantly checking The New York Times 50 times a day. At a certain point, that’s not really helping.”

Though he doesn’t specify why he switched up his lifestyle, Ansari retreated a bit from public life following the 2018 publication of a controversial article on the now-shuttered website Babe.net. In the article, an anonymous woman called Grace detailed a date she had with the comedian, one she claims ended with sexual misconduct. The piece inspired a wide range of fiery opinions amid a cultural reckoning happening with the #MeToo movement. Ansari apologized and later addressed the swirl in a 2019 special titled Right Now.

With the new special, Nightclub Comedian, Ansari has already snagged a slew of headlines for jokes about Aaron Rodgers and Nicki Minaj and the respective dust-ups surrounding their stance on the COVID-19 vaccine. Of Rodgers, he jokes, “He read some articles. He got skeptical. He did some research. Are you stunned he came to the wrong conclusion? Did you really think he was gonna crack the case? Did you think Fauci was gonna be out there, like, ‘I just got off the phone with Aaron Rodgers?’ This poor guy. It’s like we’re all in high school, and we’re making fun of the quarterback for doing bad on the science test.”

Like he’s doing on the stand-up stage on tour and in a new Netflix special, making jokes and creating content seems to be a sweet spot for Ansari. He tells Hart that he hopes to continue both and possibly do more seasons of his critically acclaimed series Master of None. The Netflix series pivoted amid the pandemic and featured a storyline for Season 3 centered on Lena Waithe’s character Denise and her relationship with girlfriend Alicia (Naomie Ackie), with Ansari behind the scenes as writer and director.

“I’m really happy where I’m at now,” he says. “If I can just kind of keep getting to do stand-up every now and then, and put out specials and do tours, and then in between that, work on writing and directing projects that I’m passionate about, whether they’re films or other seasons of Master of None or whatever, that would be a dream for me. I’m all good.”

That dream also includes a family. “I’ve done stuff where I’ve gotten the awards and all this stuff, and I’ve done stuff where maybe that didn’t come. But at the end of the day, what’s left is the work you’ve made, and if you feel good about it, then you’ve won. That’s what I’ve realized. I just want to be creatively fulfilled, and I want to follow your path and have some kids and have a family and all that,” says Ansari, who reportedly got engaged late last year to girlfriend Serena Skov Campbell. “And that’s enough.”

Comedy Gold Minds with Kevin Hart premieres tonight on Laugh Out Loud Radio channel 96, and the full episode can be heard here.