A few weeks ago, Paul wrote about the impending return of Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert to their respective Comedy Central television shows and wondered:
Am I the only one who thinks Jon & Stephen have something up their sly little sleeves in returning to their shows?
[…]
Do we really think they’ll be anywhere near as funny?
I’m a regular viewer of late night TV, and I have to tell you, “Strike TV” has been “Must See TV”.
First of, Jon Stewart was on fire during his recent interview of Jonah Goldberg:
Also, Jon was very classy in changing the name of his show from “The Daily Show” to “A Daily Show” out of respect for his writers. Stephen Colbert, OTOH, relied on some pre-strike taped segments to get him through the week:
Leno, who sucks with his writers, sucks extra hard without them. David Letterman and Craig Ferguson agreed to terms independently with the writer’s guild, so they came back fully staffed. Letterman, however, returned with a crazy “old guy who lives in the woods” beard, and had it shaved off during the show. As guest Tom Hanks remarked, “Dave, that’s the kind of bit shows without writers do.”
More than any other program, “Late Night with Conan O’Brien” takes the cake for strike-related mischief. Whether it’s spinning his wedding ring on his desk, playing German techno set to a laser show, or riding down a zip line from the balcony to his desk, Conan has been making the best of a bad situation. Perhaps the best example of goofy-ass shit on “Late Night” is the giant rat maze that guest Tom Brokaw had to navigate just to get to the stage:
[Unfortunately, the clip won’t embed properly, so click here to check it out.]