Welcome to Better Know a Guest, your weekly guide to the wonderful and diverse array of personalities appearing on ‘The Late Show with Stephen Colbert’ each week.
Welcome to the last episodes of The Late Show for 2015! What a wild ride it has been. Thankfully, we here at the Hub have had our seat belts on (most of the time.) Stephen closes down the year with some big names: J-Law, Quentin Tarantino, and Robert DeNiro in the first guest spot Monday thru Wednesday. Things will likely get political on Thursday with friend-of-the-show Michael Moore. Friday’s episode featuring Mandy Patinkin should leave us all feeling warm and fuzzy before the holidays. There better be singing! (There will be singing.)
Tell us which guests you are looking forward to in the comment section! And don’t forget to take our poll!
Monday, December 14th (2015)
Jennifer Lawrence (Actress – “Joy“)
Jennifer Lawrence is an American actress who can currently be seen in cinemas in ‘The Hunger Games: Mockingjay Part 2’. In her new film ‘Joy’, Lawrence re-teams with writer / director David O. Russell, in which she plays the title character Joy Mangano, a struggling single mother of three children who invented the Miracle Mop, turning it into a home-shopping phenomenon and who became the president of Ingenious Designs. Despite mixed reviews on Rotten Tomatoes and Metacritic, the biographical dramady has already seen Lawrence nominated for a string of awards for ‘Best Actress’. Todd McCarthy of The Hollywood Reporter notes “that the film itself is nearly as chaotic as the clan it examines can either be regarded as an admirable artistic correlative or a crippling defect, but the splendidly dexterous cast ensures that this goofy success story […] keeps firing on all cylinders in the manner of the writer-director’s previous few outings.” Justin Chang of however, feels that “it’s hard not to wish ‘Joy’ were better — that its various winsome parts added up to more than a flyweight product that still feels stuck in the development stage.”
Doris Kearns Goodwin (Author – “Lyndon Johnson and the American Dream“)
Doris Kearns Goodwin is a world-renowned American presidential historian and Pulitzer Prize winning author. Goodwin’s political biography ‘Lyndon Johnson and the American Dream’, originally published in 1991, is now available an ebook for the first time. Goodwin first encountered President Johnson at a White House dance while still a student at Harvard, and went on to become a member of his White House staff, and soon become his close personal confidante. This unique relationship allowed Goodwin to write, as the New York Times calls it, “the most penetrating, fascinating political biography I have ever read […] No other President has had a biographer who had such access to his private thoughts.” Cosmopolitan sees the book as “an extraordinary portrait of a generous, devious, complex, and profoundly manipulative man . . . [Kearns Goodwin] became the custodian not only of LBJ’s political lore but of his memories, hopes, and nightmares . . . We have it all laid out for us in this wrenchingly intimate analysis of a man who virtues, like his faults, were on a giant scale.”
Sleater-Kinney (Album – “No Cities to Love“)
Formed in 1994, Sleater-Kinney is an American rock band featuring Corin Tucker (vocals and guitar), Carrie Brownstein (guitar and vocals), and Janet Weiss (drums). The band released seven studio albums between 1994 – 2005, before announcing a hiatus in 2006 to work on solo projects. The band reunited in 2014, and released their new album ‘No Cities to Love’ in January 2015. The album has received universal acclaim from music critics and is considered by many to be on of the best albums of 2015. No one sums up fans excitement at the groups return quite like Mike Diver of Clash Music, “They keep us waiting 10 long years, and this is what we get? This… this… This absolutely golden, skin-electrifying, guts-knotting album-of-the-year contender. I appreciate that absence is supposed to make the heart grow fonder, but bloody hell: ‘No Cities To Love’ goes and bursts vital organs from the outset, flat-lining any expectations of a will-this-suffice comeback and representing, quite probably, this band’s best-ever album.”
Tuesday, December 15th (2015)
Quentin Tarantino (Writer / Director – “The Hateful Eight“)
Quentin Tarantino is an award winning American actor, writer and director whose new film is the American Western, ‘The Hateful Eight’. The film is set in Wyoming some years after the Civil War, and revolves around eight strangers who each seek refuge during a blizzard in a stagecoach stopover on a mountain pass. The longest of his films to date, Tarantino edited two versions of the film. The general release film is six minutes shorter and contains alternate takes of some scenes, while the 70mm version of the film contains an overture and intermission, and is the version of the film he intended. Thus far, the film has received much awards buzz ahead of its release in the New Year.
Jonathan Groff (Actor – “Hamilton“)
Jonathan Groff is an American actor and singer, who currently plays the role of King George III in the Broadway musical, Hamilton. The bio-musical created by Lin Manual-Miranda is based on Ron Chernow’s biography of Alexander Hamilton, and is an exploration of a “political mastermind who went from a bastard orphan to Washington’s right hand man, rebel to war hero, loving husband caught in the country’s first sex scandal to Treasury head who made an untrusting world believe in the American economy.” Terry Teachout of the Wall Street Journal calls “‘Hamilton’ the most exciting and significant musical of the decade. Sensationally potent and theatrically vital, it is plugged straight into the wall socket of contemporary music. This show makes me feel hopeful for the future of musical theater. ”
Squeeze (Album – “Cradle to the Grave“)
Squeeze are a British new-wave post-punk band that rose to prominence in the new wave period of the late 1970s and contiuned recording into the 1990s. Having disbanded and reformed several times, but continuing to tour and re-record old material, ‘Cradle to the Grave’ is the band’s first new album since 1998. Rob Mesure of Music OMH writes “warm, melodic and acutely observed, Cradle To The Grave is a convincing return from two of our very finest songwriters.”
Wednesday, December 16th (2015)
Robert De Niro (Actor – “Joy“)
Robert De Niro is an American actor and producer, who stars alongside Jennifer Lawrence in ‘Joy’. De Niro plays Rudy Mangano, the exasperating father of the title character Joy, who has recently moved into her basement, after being dumped on her doorstep by his ex-partner, whom he describes as being “like a gas leak: we don’t see you, we don’t smell you, but you’re killing us all silently.” If the film, Rodrigo Perez of Indie Wire notes that the film “can make for some occasionally chaotic and overwrought moviemaking, but the film’s enlivening feeling often trumps any wonky grammar. For better or worse, Russell isn’t about the details; rather, it’s the symphonic arc of emotion that he hopes to sweep you up in.”
Daniel Gilbert (Social Psychologist and Writer)
Daniel Gilbert is an American social psychologist and writer, who is currently the Edgar Pierce Professor of Psychology at Harvard University. Gilbert is a high school drop out who originally wanted to be a science fiction writer, but signed up for an introductory course to psychology at his local community college because the creative writing class was full. Gilbert went on to earn a Ph.D. in social psychology from Princeton University and write the New York Times bestseller, ‘Stumbling on Happiness. Most recently, Gilbert has co-authored ‘Still a thrill: Meaning making and the pleasures of uncertainty’ and ‘Just because you like
it doesn’t mean I will too:’ Cross-cultural similarities in ignoring others’ opinions.’
Henry Rollins (Actor – “Henry Rollins“)
Henry Rollins is an American musician, writer, journalist, publisher, actor, television and radio host, spoken word artist, comedian, and activist, who currently stars in “He Never Died”. In the film Rollins plays Jack, “a social outcase and loner who must combat his inner demons as he embarks on a fierce battle to save his long-lost daughter who has been taken by the city’s crime syndicate.” Critical reception for the film has been some what mixed, with Howard Gorman of SCREAM: The Horror Magazine describing the film as “an inspired, gruesome, violently funny and, at times, truly touching take on the subgenre.” While Matt Donato of We Got This Covered stated that “He Never Died is a genre movie that refuses to let itself be defined, but the film’s guessing game grows tiresome as the questions only continue to mount.”
Thursday, December 17th (2015)
Michael Moore (Director – “Where to Invade Next”)
Michael Moore is a an American filmmaker, famously known for his documentaries, such as ‘Bowling for Columbine’ and ‘Fahrenheit/911’. His latest documentary is called ‘Where to Invade Next’, in which Moore goes to other countries to see what America can learn from them, especially in their social and economic aspects. As Variety mentions the film covers many issues America is dealing with, “‘Where to Invade Next’ covers a range of topics, from the benefits of female leadership to prison reform, and appears to be timed to coincide with next year’s presidential election. The documentary compares European countries’ approaches to healthcare, gun control and education with the way the U.S. tackles those issues.” The film is set to be released for one week in New York and Los Angeles starting on December 23, 2015, and then will re open again in February of 2016 nation wide.
Samantha Power (United States Ambassador to the United Nations)
Samantha Power is the U.S Permanent Representative to the United Nations. She was appointed to office in 2013, and is the major leader of the U.S. Mission. Power is also an author, and has written ‘A Problem from Hell: America and the Age of Genocide’ and ‘Chasing the Flame: Sergio Viera de Mello and the Fight to Save the World’. On December 13, 2015 Power spoke in New York about Israel, and the current issues going on there. According to an article on Forward she spoke about the following in her speech, “Speaking for the Obama administration, she delivered a grim survey of the ongoing threat of global anti-Semitism. She segued from that to the persistence of Arab-led mistreatment of Israel at the U.N. and the U.S. battle against it. She described Israel’s key contributions to the fight against Ebola and earthquake relief in Haiti. She reviewed the Obama administration’s “unparalleled” security aid to Israel. And she recalled America’s continued support for the two-state solution and opposition to Israeli settlements.” Power will continue to work as the U.S Permanent Representative to the United Nations.
Michael C. Hall (Actor – “Lazarus”)
Michael C. Hall is an American actor and Broadway star. He is famously known for “Dexter” and his recent Broadway performance as “Hedwig” in “Hedwig and the Angry Inch”. He will be starring in the latest off-broadway show called “Lazarus”, which is based on the novel “A Man Who Fell to Earth” by Walter Tevis. In an article for Out Michael had this to say about the show “It’s not a retelling of the movie or the science fiction book. It’s an interior fever dream of the character, there’s an interior intimate energy that will be required. But it’s also a musical with some pretty dynamic music there will be a more expansive energy too. So I hope it will be a broad-spectrum experience.” The show opened on December 7, and can now be seen at the New York Theater Workshop.
Friday, December 18th (2015)
Mandy Patinkin (Actor – “Ali and Nino”)
Mandy Patinkin is an American actor. His latest role is in the film ‘Ali and Nino’, which is a film based on the novel of Kurban Said, and tells the romantic story of a Christian girl and a Muslim boy during the time of World War I in Azerbaijan. In an article for ScreenDaily the director Asif Kapadia had this to say about the film, “We have a brilliant screenplay, an amazing team of international actors, incredible epic locations and a fantastic crew. It’s going to be an amazing adventure for everyone involved.” The film is set to be released in January 2016.
Leon Bridges (Album – “Coming Home“)
Leon Bridges is an American soul and gospel singer/songwriter. His debut album ‘Coming Home’ was released in June of this year. NPR had this to say about the album, “throughout Coming Home: Bridges wraps his creamy-gritty vocals around memories of Cooke, early Marvin Gaye and gospel groups like the Valentinos as Jenkins and Block do their own creative dance with the legacies of producers like Bumps Blackwell and Smokey Robinson. What on the surface seems like mere replication becomes powerful evocation through extremely well-considered details.” The album is now available for purchase on ITunes.
Better Know a Guest – December 14 – 18, 2015
Welcome to the last episodes of The Late Show for 2015! What a wild ride it has been. Thankfully, we here at the Hub have had our seat belts on (most of the time.) Stephen closes down the year with some big names: J-Law, Quentin Tarantino, and Robert DeNiro in the first guest spot Monday thru Wednesday. Things will likely get political on Thursday with friend-of-the-show Michael Moore. Friday’s episode featuring Mandy Patinkin should leave us all feeling warm and fuzzy before the holidays. There better be singing! (There will be singing.)
Tell us which guests you are looking forward to in the comment section! And don’t forget to take our poll!
Monday, December 14th (2015)
Jennifer Lawrence (Actress – “Joy“)
Jennifer Lawrence is an American actress who can currently be seen in cinemas in ‘The Hunger Games: Mockingjay Part 2’. In her new film ‘Joy’, Lawrence re-teams with writer / director David O. Russell, in which she plays the title character Joy Mangano, a struggling single mother of three children who invented the Miracle Mop, turning it into a home-shopping phenomenon and who became the president of Ingenious Designs. Despite mixed reviews on Rotten Tomatoes and Metacritic, the biographical dramady has already seen Lawrence nominated for a string of awards for ‘Best Actress’. Todd McCarthy of The Hollywood Reporter notes “that the film itself is nearly as chaotic as the clan it examines can either be regarded as an admirable artistic correlative or a crippling defect, but the splendidly dexterous cast ensures that this goofy success story […] keeps firing on all cylinders in the manner of the writer-director’s previous few outings.” Justin Chang of however, feels that “it’s hard not to wish ‘Joy’ were better — that its various winsome parts added up to more than a flyweight product that still feels stuck in the development stage.”
Doris Kearns Goodwin (Author – “Lyndon Johnson and the American Dream“)
Doris Kearns Goodwin is a world-renowned American presidential historian and Pulitzer Prize winning author. Goodwin’s political biography ‘Lyndon Johnson and the American Dream’, originally published in 1991, is now available an ebook for the first time. Goodwin first encountered President Johnson at a White House dance while still a student at Harvard, and went on to become a member of his White House staff, and soon become his close personal confidante. This unique relationship allowed Goodwin to write, as the New York Times calls it, “the most penetrating, fascinating political biography I have ever read […] No other President has had a biographer who had such access to his private thoughts.” Cosmopolitan sees the book as “an extraordinary portrait of a generous, devious, complex, and profoundly manipulative man . . . [Kearns Goodwin] became the custodian not only of LBJ’s political lore but of his memories, hopes, and nightmares . . . We have it all laid out for us in this wrenchingly intimate analysis of a man who virtues, like his faults, were on a giant scale.”
Sleater-Kinney (Album – “No Cities to Love“)
Formed in 1994, Sleater-Kinney is an American rock band featuring Corin Tucker (vocals and guitar), Carrie Brownstein (guitar and vocals), and Janet Weiss (drums). The band released seven studio albums between 1994 – 2005, before announcing a hiatus in 2006 to work on solo projects. The band reunited in 2014, and released their new album ‘No Cities to Love’ in January 2015. The album has received universal acclaim from music critics and is considered by many to be on of the best albums of 2015. No one sums up fans excitement at the groups return quite like Mike Diver of Clash Music, “They keep us waiting 10 long years, and this is what we get? This… this… This absolutely golden, skin-electrifying, guts-knotting album-of-the-year contender. I appreciate that absence is supposed to make the heart grow fonder, but bloody hell: ‘No Cities To Love’ goes and bursts vital organs from the outset, flat-lining any expectations of a will-this-suffice comeback and representing, quite probably, this band’s best-ever album.”
Tuesday, December 15th (2015)
Quentin Tarantino (Writer / Director – “The Hateful Eight“)
Quentin Tarantino is an award winning American actor, writer and director whose new film is the American Western, ‘The Hateful Eight’. The film is set in Wyoming some years after the Civil War, and revolves around eight strangers who each seek refuge during a blizzard in a stagecoach stopover on a mountain pass. The longest of his films to date, Tarantino edited two versions of the film. The general release film is six minutes shorter and contains alternate takes of some scenes, while the 70mm version of the film contains an overture and intermission, and is the version of the film he intended. Thus far, the film has received much awards buzz ahead of its release in the New Year.
Jonathan Groff (Actor – “Hamilton“)
Jonathan Groff is an American actor and singer, who currently plays the role of King George III in the Broadway musical, Hamilton. The bio-musical created by Lin Manual-Miranda is based on Ron Chernow’s biography of Alexander Hamilton, and is an exploration of a “political mastermind who went from a bastard orphan to Washington’s right hand man, rebel to war hero, loving husband caught in the country’s first sex scandal to Treasury head who made an untrusting world believe in the American economy.” Terry Teachout of the Wall Street Journal calls “‘Hamilton’ the most exciting and significant musical of the decade. Sensationally potent and theatrically vital, it is plugged straight into the wall socket of contemporary music. This show makes me feel hopeful for the future of musical theater. ”
Squeeze (Album – “Cradle to the Grave“)
Squeeze are a British new-wave post-punk band that rose to prominence in the new wave period of the late 1970s and contiuned recording into the 1990s. Having disbanded and reformed several times, but continuing to tour and re-record old material, ‘Cradle to the Grave’ is the band’s first new album since 1998. Rob Mesure of Music OMH writes “warm, melodic and acutely observed, Cradle To The Grave is a convincing return from two of our very finest songwriters.”
Wednesday, December 16th (2015)
Robert De Niro (Actor – “Joy“)
Robert De Niro is an American actor and producer, who stars alongside Jennifer Lawrence in ‘Joy’. De Niro plays Rudy Mangano, the exasperating father of the title character Joy, who has recently moved into her basement, after being dumped on her doorstep by his ex-partner, whom he describes as being “like a gas leak: we don’t see you, we don’t smell you, but you’re killing us all silently.” If the film, Rodrigo Perez of Indie Wire notes that the film “can make for some occasionally chaotic and overwrought moviemaking, but the film’s enlivening feeling often trumps any wonky grammar. For better or worse, Russell isn’t about the details; rather, it’s the symphonic arc of emotion that he hopes to sweep you up in.”
Daniel Gilbert (Social Psychologist and Writer)
Daniel Gilbert is an American social psychologist and writer, who is currently the Edgar Pierce Professor of Psychology at Harvard University. Gilbert is a high school drop out who originally wanted to be a science fiction writer, but signed up for an introductory course to psychology at his local community college because the creative writing class was full. Gilbert went on to earn a Ph.D. in social psychology from Princeton University and write the New York Times bestseller, ‘Stumbling on Happiness. Most recently, Gilbert has co-authored ‘Still a thrill: Meaning making and the pleasures of uncertainty’ and ‘Just because you like
it doesn’t mean I will too:’ Cross-cultural similarities in ignoring others’ opinions.’
Henry Rollins (Actor – “Henry Rollins“)
Henry Rollins is an American musician, writer, journalist, publisher, actor, television and radio host, spoken word artist, comedian, and activist, who currently stars in “He Never Died”. In the film Rollins plays Jack, “a social outcase and loner who must combat his inner demons as he embarks on a fierce battle to save his long-lost daughter who has been taken by the city’s crime syndicate.” Critical reception for the film has been some what mixed, with Howard Gorman of SCREAM: The Horror Magazine describing the film as “an inspired, gruesome, violently funny and, at times, truly touching take on the subgenre.” While Matt Donato of We Got This Covered stated that “He Never Died is a genre movie that refuses to let itself be defined, but the film’s guessing game grows tiresome as the questions only continue to mount.”
Thursday, December 17th (2015)
Michael Moore (Director – “Where to Invade Next”)
Michael Moore is a an American filmmaker, famously known for his documentaries, such as ‘Bowling for Columbine’ and ‘Fahrenheit/911’. His latest documentary is called ‘Where to Invade Next’, in which Moore goes to other countries to see what America can learn from them, especially in their social and economic aspects. As Variety mentions the film covers many issues America is dealing with, “‘Where to Invade Next’ covers a range of topics, from the benefits of female leadership to prison reform, and appears to be timed to coincide with next year’s presidential election. The documentary compares European countries’ approaches to healthcare, gun control and education with the way the U.S. tackles those issues.” The film is set to be released for one week in New York and Los Angeles starting on December 23, 2015, and then will re open again in February of 2016 nation wide.
Samantha Power (United States Ambassador to the United Nations)
Samantha Power is the U.S Permanent Representative to the United Nations. She was appointed to office in 2013, and is the major leader of the U.S. Mission. Power is also an author, and has written ‘A Problem from Hell: America and the Age of Genocide’ and ‘Chasing the Flame: Sergio Viera de Mello and the Fight to Save the World’. On December 13, 2015 Power spoke in New York about Israel, and the current issues going on there. According to an article on Forward she spoke about the following in her speech, “Speaking for the Obama administration, she delivered a grim survey of the ongoing threat of global anti-Semitism. She segued from that to the persistence of Arab-led mistreatment of Israel at the U.N. and the U.S. battle against it. She described Israel’s key contributions to the fight against Ebola and earthquake relief in Haiti. She reviewed the Obama administration’s “unparalleled” security aid to Israel. And she recalled America’s continued support for the two-state solution and opposition to Israeli settlements.” Power will continue to work as the U.S Permanent Representative to the United Nations.
Michael C. Hall (Actor – “Lazarus”)
Michael C. Hall is an American actor and Broadway star. He is famously known for “Dexter” and his recent Broadway performance as “Hedwig” in “Hedwig and the Angry Inch”. He will be starring in the latest off-broadway show called “Lazarus”, which is based on the novel “A Man Who Fell to Earth” by Walter Tevis. In an article for Out Michael had this to say about the show “It’s not a retelling of the movie or the science fiction book. It’s an interior fever dream of the character, there’s an interior intimate energy that will be required. But it’s also a musical with some pretty dynamic music there will be a more expansive energy too. So I hope it will be a broad-spectrum experience.” The show opened on December 7, and can now be seen at the New York Theater Workshop.
Friday, December 18th (2015)
Mandy Patinkin (Actor – “Ali and Nino”)
Mandy Patinkin is an American actor. His latest role is in the film ‘Ali and Nino’, which is a film based on the novel of Kurban Said, and tells the romantic story of a Christian girl and a Muslim boy during the time of World War I in Azerbaijan. In an article for ScreenDaily the director Asif Kapadia had this to say about the film, “We have a brilliant screenplay, an amazing team of international actors, incredible epic locations and a fantastic crew. It’s going to be an amazing adventure for everyone involved.” The film is set to be released in January 2016.
Leon Bridges (Album – “Coming Home“)
Leon Bridges is an American soul and gospel singer/songwriter. His debut album ‘Coming Home’ was released in June of this year. NPR had this to say about the album, “throughout Coming Home: Bridges wraps his creamy-gritty vocals around memories of Cooke, early Marvin Gaye and gospel groups like the Valentinos as Jenkins and Block do their own creative dance with the legacies of producers like Bumps Blackwell and Smokey Robinson. What on the surface seems like mere replication becomes powerful evocation through extremely well-considered details.” The album is now available for purchase on ITunes.