After Musical Success, Ami Kozak Has Decided To Answer His Comedy Calling

Ami Kozak was thrilled when “Are You Ready? (On Your Own),” by his group Distant Cousins, was used in the soundtrack for the 2014 film “This Is Where I Leave You” starring Jason Bateman.

He even got to walk the red carpet and attend the premiere. But a few years ago, Kozak decided he was ready to launch the second act of his career — comedy— while continuing to perform music and write songs for film and television.

And, for Purim, he was able to combine both music and comedy with a parody of Adam Sandler’s “The Chanukah Song.” Instead of listing people who are Jewish, he listed antisemites, from Henry Ford, David Duke, Mel Gibson, Kanye West and Whoopi Goldberg’s comment that the Holocaust was not about race.

He credits comedian Eli Lebowicz with the idea for the song. On Twitter, Lebowicz asked what if Sandler had written a song listing antisemites. Kozak decided to actually do it; he chose Purim because it’s a festive time when things are supposed to be turned upside down. Kozak, who is also a gifted impressionist, has amassed more than 227,000 TikTok followers and 7.6 million likes with the handle of @aj_Comedy.

While some artists with a big social media following shy away from their religion or cultural identity, fearing a loss of fans, Kozak said he has no such fear.

“I think an audience wouldn’t be turned off by my being Jewish, but would like people to embrace who they are, be authentic and be proud,” he said. “If someone has a problem with your identity, the problem is theirs, not yours.”

Kozak, a Modern Orthodox father of four, attended Torah Academy of Bergen County in New Jersey, where he was the lead singer and bass player of a band called The Big Blue Accident, and graduated from The Berklee College of Music. He moved to Los Angeles and formed Distant Cousins with Dov Rosenblatt (who fronted Blue Fringe) and Duvid Swirsky (co-founder of Moshav) and discovered he loves collaborating.

“I think Paul McCartney said, ‘I’d rather have a band than a Bentley,’” Kozak told the Journal. “I am an extrovert and I always like performing and creating music with people.”

That desire to collaborate extends to his other projects. Kozak joined Jewish screenwriter Michael Weber for their podcast “Buckle Up” which deals with everything from the entertainment industry to Judaism. And he recently joined up with Lebowicz and comedian Mikey Greenblatt to create sketch comedy videos.

How does Kozak find the time for his varied projects?

“I have a very good wife,” he said, adding that “while it can be challenging there is also flexibility that I wouldn’t have in a corporate job.”

That doesn’t mean he won’t take corporate work. After Kozak’s video of his impression of Jewish business mogul, author and speaker Gary Vaynerchuk, known as Gary Vee, went viral, Vaynerchuk was so taken with the video, he asked Kozak to introduce him at the conference known as VeeCon.

Kozak said his impression of Bernie Sanders came easy, but author and media personality Jordan Peterson was a bit tougher. His Prince Harry impression has been especially popular and went viral, and he’s currently working on one of Russell Brand. A video of the latter two can be seen here:

Kozak said he first did stand up about a year-and-a-half ago at the Fourth Wall Café in Los Angeles and has since performed at clubs there as well as in New York City. He now lives in his hometown of Englewood, New Jersey.

He said he has a comfort level of being on stage as a musician, but comedy is different.

“Stand up requires working out stuff in front of an audience,” he said. ”You have to go through the process of putting it on display to see what makes people laugh. Music provides a certain amount of protection of the ego that comedy doesn’t. The challenge of music is there is a barrier of entry. Not everyone can just pick up a guitar. You have to put in a lot of time to be able to play a song on stage from A to B. With comedy, anyone can get up on stage, but they’ll find out the hard way if they’re not ready. Comedy is a little more audience dependent.”

He said the people he works with respect his religious observance.

“You do have to turn down gigs that would be on Shabbos but that sacrifice is well worth it,” he said.

He added that he is able to tailor his material to perform for either Jewish or secular events.

Although his comedy career is off to a hot start, Kozak hasn’t forgotten about music. Distant Cousins is working on a new album that should be out this year and Kozak said that while networking is important, there is no secret formula to success, other than hard work, which he has learned in both music and comedy.

“You are trying to get your art to find a home, but the industry is always full of surprises,” he said. “You sharpen your sensibilities to do what you like but also what you think people are looking for. Having success gives you confidence and validation to not worry as much about what other people will like and do more about what feels good to you.”