Comic Ariel Elias is being celebrated on social media for how she handled a pair of hecklers at a gig in New Jersey over the weekend.
After a back-and-forth with one of the hecklers over Donald Trump, a man later identified as the heckler’s husband threw a can of beer at Elias during the show at Uncle Vinnie’s in Point Pleasant Beach.
The can was full, or close to it, based on the loud splat as it hit the wall just behind Elias.
But if she was rattled, she didn’t show it.
She calmly picked up the beer… and chugged it.
“Five stars for this flawless performance,” Jimmy Kimmel raved on Twitter.
Elias posted the exchange on Twitter, where it racked up more than 3 million views over about 12 hours:
“I knew I had to chug it,” she told Rolling Stone. “I was so relieved that there was still some left in there after it exploded against the wall. Also my adrenaline was going crazy, so even though normally I don’t drink before or during sets, I felt like this was a valid exception.”
She told the magazine she typically doesn’t talk politics, and offered up some advice to the hecklers.
“My message to last night’s hecklers is that therapy is great, I highly recommend it,” she said. “Or just write down your feelings. I promise you’ll feel like throwing things less.”
She added on Twitter:
“We heard a pop and we thought someone popped a bottle of champagne,” club owner Dino Ibelli told Entertainment Weekly. “And then as we noticed what happened, he was already running out the door. So we contacted the local authorities and everything, [filed] a police report, and we figured out the guy’s name and where he lived.”
He called Elias’ response ― chugging the beer ― “phenomenal.”
“What a perfect ‘screw you’ when she opens the beer and drinks it,” he said. “She did a great job and I apologized up and down.”
Comics were in awe of her performance under pressure: