Comedy Central
Hey, kids! It’s time for a quick round-up of highlights from this week’s episodes of The Daily Show and The Colbert Report. For the love of all things good and holy, is the election over yet? It’s super-close, but it still feels so far away. Remember that Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert will be hosting an hour-long spectacular live on election night, starting at 10 PM. I bet that regardless of what happens, at least one of them will be crying at the end of the night. And by “one of them,” I’m referring to myself.
The most notable moment from the week was TDS’ interview with Barack Obama. Since Senator Obama did it via satellite from Florida, there was that inevitable awkward delay. I didn’t look at the screen most of the time, because no amount of smooth-talking and charisma can completely eliminate the weirdness of pregnant pauses and self-conscious facial expressions. It didn’t turn out too horrible, but not looking at the screen was probably for the best. Check it out for yourself:
There was also this great piece from John Oliver on Monday. His frustration was delightfully palpable, and I liked that he seemed equally exasperated by the Republicans and the Democrats. Only Mr. Oliver could pull this off so beautifully: “That’s not a saying at all, that’s just a selection of words that you made up.”
TCR had their own special guest this week, in the form of Wilco. Man, Stephen Colbert and the gang are really bringing in the musical guests, aren’t they? During the first year or two, musical guests were a rarity, but in the past few months, it’s been crazy. His Christmas DVD is loaded with musical guests, too (Feist, John Legend, and Willie Nelson, to name a few), which makes me wonder what power fake pundits have over the music industry. Anyway, Wilco did an interview and then played a super-extra-exclusive song, which you can grab from the always wonderful No Fact Zone.
The interview with The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian‘s Sherman Alexie was also pretty solid. I love it when an interviewee holds their own against Mr. Colbert without overpowering the interview.
Okay, that’s all for now, for I am all politics’d out. In case you’ve forgotten because you’ve been slamming your head against a rock, November 4th is the day to vote, so do your duty and feel like you’re in on the joke when Jon and Stephen do their thing.
Clacked by Annie Wu 
on Nov 01, 2008 @ 17:00 EST5EDT
Spot on summary. You selected all the stuff I still remember from this week.
I actually thought about those street interviews of John Oliver again yesterday and how it would be if me (or for instance you) would see him on the street. I thought about just standing behind the camera, watching, and following them whereever they go and in case anybody would ask me I’d just say I was wondering if that really was the guy from The Bugle because his voice sounded so familiar and if he could get me an autograph of Andy Zaltzman.
You know just to throw him off ;-)
Oh and thanks for the link to the Indecision08 announcement. Patton Oswalt live-blogging. Woohoo!