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Fresh Air

Ramy Youssef Animates A Muslim Family's Post-9/11 Life

Fresh Air

NPR

Tv & Film, Arts, Society & Culture, Books

4.434.4K Ratings

🗓️ 13 May 2025

⏱️ 47 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Actor Ramy Youssef was in 5th grade and living in New Jersey when the Twin Towers fell. His new Amazon Prime animated show, #1 Happy Family USA, draws on the experiences of his own Egyptian American family navigating Islamophobia after Sept. 11.

Conan O'Brien was the recipient of this year's Kennedy Center Mark Twain Prize for American Humor. David Bianculli reviews the Netflix special of the ceremony.

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Transcript

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0:26.2

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1:09.9

now more than ever. You help make NPR shows freely available to everyone. We're proud to do this work for you and with you. Okay, let's start the show.

1:20.9

This is fresh air. I'm Terry Gross. My guest, Rami Yousef, started as a stand-up comic. Then he created and starred in the semi-autobiographical comedy drama series called Rami,

1:32.1

about a 20-something Egyptian-American Muslim trying to make sense of how his life, including his sex life,

1:38.3

fit with his commitment to Islam.

1:40.5

The series won a Peabody Award, and he won a Golden Globe for his performance.

1:45.1

Youssef co-created the comedy drama series Moe, starring his friend Mo Amher, as an undocumented Palestinian-American.

1:52.9

Last year, Yusef hosted Saturday Night Live and had an HBO comedy special called More Feelings.

1:59.8

His acting career is taking off. He starts with Steve

2:02.6

Corel and Jason Schwartzman in the new HBO movie Mountainhead, which debuts May 31st.

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