When news stories fall through the cracks, we here at Colbert News Hub catch it for a post we call “In the Press”.
Hello, Hubsters and welcome to this special In The Press post. In honor of the upcoming release of Mr. Peabody and Sherman, starring Stephen Colbert, we are going back in time! We are featuring all articles from the past, going all the way back to when Jon first started hosting the Daily Show. It was a simpler time. (Sorry, but I think it’s illegal or something, if I don’t say that.) Seriously though, since 1999, when Jon started hosting, it really was a different world. We could get through security at airports in a flash. It was a time without tweets and instagrams and iPhones. A MapQuest was more about trying to fold it up properly and Googling something meant you had to go to Wikipedia, wait, I mean an actual encyclopedia. How DID we manage?
So get in the WABAC machine and buckle up. (again, illegal if I don’t say that.)
Stephen Colbert
‘Daily Show’s’ Stephen Colbert Gets Own Show
This was originally posted on May 3, 2005. He was apparently known as “The Daily Show’s Stephen Colbert”, which makes sense.
I had to include this article because think back to when the show first started in 2005; many many people said it wouldn’t last. I’ve read and heard things like, “He couldn’t possibly stretch the joke out to half an hour” and “even if he can do it initially, it will get stale after a few months”. Here they are, 8 1/2 years later, more popular than when he first started, and busy, busy, busy.
I also wanted to include it due to the fact that we just had another shake up in late night TV last month. In many of the conversations and articles I read about the new Tonight Show, many people talked about how the late night format has been changed by Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert.
If Comedy Central’s Jon Stewart is the comic version of Peter Jennings or Brian Williams, Stephen Colbert promises to be the same for Bill O’Reilly and others like him.
This is interesting:
One segment of his show, “Worthy Opponent,” will feature Colbert debating Colbert.
I like Formidable Opponent, it just sounds better.
This is weird, too. I guess they didn’t know right away if Stephen’s show would follow Jon’s. They gave Adam Carolla a show that was to be on in the late night hours as well.
The two shows will directly follow “The Daily Show,” which airs Monday through Thursday at 11 p.m. Eastern. Comedy Central hasn’t decided which will come first, spokesman Tony Fox said.
I really don’t understand how they could even think of having any other show on after Jon. No disrespect to Adam Carolla, but really?
The Truthiness Teller
I found this article on the internet’s wayback machine so I had to include it. It was appropos.
This was from Newsweek in February 2006, when Stephen’s show was a bona fide hit.
The show’s signature segment is called “The Wørd”-that slash through the “o” is a metaphor for Colbert’s penchant for butchering words when he really thinks he’s celebrating them.
I did not know that about the little slash through the O.
Truthiness was a common word by this point, but there were still a lot of people who didn’t know who he was. Still his name was known among the Washington crowd:
And Colbert-a man who once declared, “Anyone can read the news to you. I promise to feel the news at you”-has become the age’s semiofficial pundit. A congressman from Georgia asked him to be his guest at the State of the Union address. (He declined.) Someone at the Pentagon just invited him to lunch. (Ditto.) That’s heady stuff for a guy whose show reaches just 1.1 million or so viewers a night-and stuff’s about to get even headier. In April, Colbert will perform at the White House correspondents’ dinner, where he’ll stand next to-and poke fun at-the president himself. “I’m so excited,” Colbert says, “I’m going to levitate.” Which is exactly what you’d expect from someone filled with hot air.
Yup, this was pre-White House Correspondent’s Dinner. Remember that? I don’t. The WHCD is really when I started to pay any attention to Stephen. Speaking of the WHCD….
Making Colbert Go Away
A woman named Joan Walsh wrote this and it appeared on Salon.com on May 3, 2006, shortly after Stephen’s appearance at the White House Correspondent’s Dinner. Stephen would start a long tradition of not backing down from what may be controversial appearances. Just last week he appeared much to the chagrin of many people, at the RSA Conference and in 2010, his appearance before Congress.
Ms. Walsh says the following:
This is a battle that can’t really be won — you either got it Saturday night (or Sunday morning, or whenever your life was made a little brighter by viewing Colbert’s performance) or you didn’t. Personally, I’m enjoying watching apologists for the status quo wear themselves out explaining why Colbert wasn’t funny. It’s extending the reach of his performance by days without either side breaking character — the mighty Colbert or the clueless, self-important media elite he was satirizing. For those who think the media shamed itself by rolling over for this administration, especially in the run-up to the Iraq war, Colbert’s skit is the gift that keeps on giving. Thank you, Stephen Colbert!
Thank You, Joan Walsh, for getting it.
Stephen Colbert Breaks Wrist on Set
And the WristStrong bracelet is born. This was a post from The Washington Post from July 2007.
The host of “The Colbert Report” revealed on Thursday night’s show that he broke his left wrist while running around the New York studio before taping a recent episode. Colbert removed a large “No. 1″ foam hand to unmask a small cast.
“I didn’t want to draw attention to it. I didn’t want to play on your sympathy,” Colbert said before dramatically grimacing.
I also found this from our predecessor, “No Fact Zone“. The colboard links and the images are no more, sadly, but it was fun to read anyhow.
Internet Petitions Stephen Colbert To Hold ‘Restoring Truthiness’ Rally At Lincoln Memorial
The rally in DC in 2010 will be remembered for how many people attended it and how many more people attended it than attended Glenn Beck’s rally. Also, for the great speech from Jon at the end of it. However, I think a lot of us have forgotten the campaigns to get it done in the first place. Jon and Stephen acknowledged that they had been planning it prior to the fans’ campaigns for it, but that those campaigns meant that what they had been planning would be well received.
One of the campaign graphics, pre-rally.
A grassroots campaign has begun to get Stephen Colbert to hold a rally on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial to counter Glenn Beck’s recent “Restoring Honor” event. The would-be rally has been dubbed “Restoring Truthiness” and was inspired by a recent post on Reddit, where a young woman wondered if the only way to point out the absurdity of the Tea Party’s rally would be if Colbert mirrored it with his own “Colbert Nation.”
Of course, as we all remember, 5 billion people showed up!
Jon Stewart
For Stewart, ‘Daily Show,’ it’s Funny How Things Turn Out
This article from The Baltimore Sun was posted on New Year’s Day, in 1999. This was discussing how Jon might be different as the new host of The Daily Show.
Jon Stewart is a much shorter and more nervous version of Craig Kilborn, which is to say he’s hardly Craig Kilborn at all.
Whether this will matter once Stewart takes over for Kilborn as host of Comedy Central’s satirical “The Daily Show” on Jan. 11 is uncertain. For now, Stewart jokes, all he knows is that “a team of expatriate Russian engineers from the breakdown of Chechnya” have installed a booster seat on Kilborn’s chair, and a tailor is busy hemming Kilborn’s suits to fit a much smaller man.
I do remember people commenting about how the suits he was wearing at the beginning, didn’t fit right.
This article made me think about how much the Daily Show has changed since the Kilborn days. Jon tried to be Craig at first, I think. He did headlines for a long time. One thing I notice about the Daily Show today vs. when Stephen was on, was that Stephen was often sitting next to Jon at the desk at the end of his field pieces for a little post-piece discussion. Jon really doesn’t do that with any of the correspondents today. I’ve always wondered if it’s because of how much he loves Stephen or if that was something that Stephen pushed for that the other correspondents don’t. Feel free to discuss!
This was obviously back when basic cable had zero foothold in late night TV:
Stewart insists becoming the host of “The Daily Show,” for which he will be paid $1.5 million a year, is no booby prize. True, it’s cable. True, the audience is relatively minuscule, and he wasn’t happy to learn that network chief Doug Herzog, with whom Stewart worked at MTV, was stepping down to take over as president of Fox Entertainment.
“Having Doug leave was a blow,” he said. ‘That’s a guy I’ve known for years. He was one of the reasons that I felt comfortable going [to Comedy Central].”
But Stewart says “The Daily Show” will leave him freer to pursue other facets of his career. This year he published a book, “Naked Pictures of Famous People,” that’s more than just punch lines with chapter titles. They’re closer to humorous essays.
Somehow I couldn’t help but laugh at this:
There’s also Stewart’s burgeoning film career, which includes a co-starring role with Gillian Anderson and Gena Rowlands in “Playing by Heart,” to be released Jan. 22. Stewart also just finished shooting “Big Daddy,” Adam Sandler’s next vehicle.
I have a feeling Jon might laugh at his “burgeoning film career” too. On the other hand…
Jon Stewart ‘Crossfire’ Feud Ignites Net Frenzy
This was a significant event because for many people, Jon Stewart became more than just a comedian throwing spitballs from the back of the room. He started to become the Jon we know and love today, who hates to be a player in the media landscape but he really is.
On Friday night, the star of Comedy Central’s “The Daily Show with Jon Stewart” angered his “Crossfire” hosts Tucker Carlson and Paul Begala, saying they promote partisan political debate. The online transcript and video clips of the program immediately became an overnight sensation among Web surfers, bloggers and pundits alike.
Many people credit Jon with the demise of Crossfire. Of course, it’s back which made Jon a little pissed at the end of this clip.
Six Degrees
TELEVISION; Past Jonathan Swift To Linda Tripp (Yeah. Whatever.)
Linda Tripp? Wow, this one was written a long time ago.
In fact this was written so long ago, I did a double take. As I was looking over this article, I thought it was about The Daily Show, but the tagline had 1998 in it. I thought, “that can’t be right”. Jon started in 1999. Then as I read further I noticed the name Craig Kilborn. Oh yeah, I forgot. The Daily Show did start in 1996 with some other guy and one of those correspondents who was on when this was written, was a young Stephen Colbert.
Mr. Kilborn delivers this material with the requisite smirks and deadpan charm that it needs, helped in no small measure by the fact that he is blond and boyish and perhaps innocent-looking enough to be the male host of ”A.M. Norway.” Coincidentally, Mr. Kilborn shares the stylish cowlick-conk Huck Finn hairdo first popularized by NBC’s Conan O’Brien. This was, apparently, incentive enough for CBS to hire Mr. Kilborn recently to replace the departing Tom Snyder. Conan and Craig will go forelock to forelock in late night, beginning early next year. Replacing Mr. Kilborn will be Jon Stewart. Clear?
The show’s correspondents, notably Beth Littleford and Stephen Colbert, likewise present their taped features with the stoicism and affectless expressions that we require of our big-time news reporters or our comedy straight men.
This was a much different ‘Daily Show’ than it is now. In fact, it was called just “The Daily Show” (as opposed to “The Daily Show with Jon Stewart”) and I remember how Craig would usually open saying, “This is your Daily Show”.
I know how some people feel about Craig Kilborn, but whether you like him or not, he did get TDS off the ground and kept it going and were it not for that, we wouldn’t have The Colbert Report today.
And now, here it is, your moment of zen:
Caught Off Message
The Moment of Zen is something that goes back to the very beginning of The Daily Show. Jon hasn’t continued most of the things that Kilborn did, but the end of the show is still Zen-like.
Here is an article about the Moment of Zen, written by A.O. Scott, for the New York Times in October 2004.
Dog Eat Dog Films Paul Wolfowitz in “Fahrenheit 9/11″
JON STEWART concludes “The Daily Show” with what he calls “your moment of Zen,” usually an extended version of a video clip, offered without commentary, that was played earlier in the show. These moments of Zen might be defined as the noise that surrounds the sound bite: the dead air, unscripted chatter and sheer meaningless tedium from which we try to glean nuggets of meaning. Politicians waiting for an interview stare blankly at the camera; officials stand on a podium fidgeting before a speech; convention delegates slouch in their chairs.
Goodnight!
In The Press – WABAC Edition
When news stories fall through the cracks, we here at Colbert News Hub catch it for a post we call “In the Press”.
Hello, Hubsters and welcome to this special In The Press post. In honor of the upcoming release of Mr. Peabody and Sherman, starring Stephen Colbert, we are going back in time! We are featuring all articles from the past, going all the way back to when Jon first started hosting the Daily Show. It was a simpler time. (Sorry, but I think it’s illegal or something, if I don’t say that.) Seriously though, since 1999, when Jon started hosting, it really was a different world. We could get through security at airports in a flash. It was a time without tweets and instagrams and iPhones. A MapQuest was more about trying to fold it up properly and Googling something meant you had to go to Wikipedia, wait, I mean an actual encyclopedia. How DID we manage?
So get in the WABAC machine and buckle up. (again, illegal if I don’t say that.)
Stephen Colbert
‘Daily Show’s’ Stephen Colbert Gets Own Show
This was originally posted on May 3, 2005. He was apparently known as “The Daily Show’s Stephen Colbert”, which makes sense.
I had to include this article because think back to when the show first started in 2005; many many people said it wouldn’t last. I’ve read and heard things like, “He couldn’t possibly stretch the joke out to half an hour” and “even if he can do it initially, it will get stale after a few months”. Here they are, 8 1/2 years later, more popular than when he first started, and busy, busy, busy.
I also wanted to include it due to the fact that we just had another shake up in late night TV last month. In many of the conversations and articles I read about the new Tonight Show, many people talked about how the late night format has been changed by Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert.
This is interesting:
I like Formidable Opponent, it just sounds better.
This is weird, too. I guess they didn’t know right away if Stephen’s show would follow Jon’s. They gave Adam Carolla a show that was to be on in the late night hours as well.
I really don’t understand how they could even think of having any other show on after Jon. No disrespect to Adam Carolla, but really?
The Truthiness Teller
I found this article on the internet’s wayback machine so I had to include it. It was appropos.
This was from Newsweek in February 2006, when Stephen’s show was a bona fide hit.
I did not know that about the little slash through the O.
Truthiness was a common word by this point, but there were still a lot of people who didn’t know who he was. Still his name was known among the Washington crowd:
Yup, this was pre-White House Correspondent’s Dinner. Remember that? I don’t. The WHCD is really when I started to pay any attention to Stephen. Speaking of the WHCD….
Making Colbert Go Away
A woman named Joan Walsh wrote this and it appeared on Salon.com on May 3, 2006, shortly after Stephen’s appearance at the White House Correspondent’s Dinner. Stephen would start a long tradition of not backing down from what may be controversial appearances. Just last week he appeared much to the chagrin of many people, at the RSA Conference and in 2010, his appearance before Congress.
Ms. Walsh says the following:
Thank You, Joan Walsh, for getting it.
Stephen Colbert Breaks Wrist on Set
And the WristStrong bracelet is born. This was a post from The Washington Post from July 2007.
I also found this from our predecessor, “No Fact Zone“. The colboard links and the images are no more, sadly, but it was fun to read anyhow.
Internet Petitions Stephen Colbert To Hold ‘Restoring Truthiness’ Rally At Lincoln Memorial
The rally in DC in 2010 will be remembered for how many people attended it and how many more people attended it than attended Glenn Beck’s rally. Also, for the great speech from Jon at the end of it. However, I think a lot of us have forgotten the campaigns to get it done in the first place. Jon and Stephen acknowledged that they had been planning it prior to the fans’ campaigns for it, but that those campaigns meant that what they had been planning would be well received.
One of the campaign graphics, pre-rally.
Of course, as we all remember, 5 billion people showed up!
Jon Stewart
For Stewart, ‘Daily Show,’ it’s Funny How Things Turn Out
This article from The Baltimore Sun was posted on New Year’s Day, in 1999. This was discussing how Jon might be different as the new host of The Daily Show.
I do remember people commenting about how the suits he was wearing at the beginning, didn’t fit right.
This article made me think about how much the Daily Show has changed since the Kilborn days. Jon tried to be Craig at first, I think. He did headlines for a long time. One thing I notice about the Daily Show today vs. when Stephen was on, was that Stephen was often sitting next to Jon at the desk at the end of his field pieces for a little post-piece discussion. Jon really doesn’t do that with any of the correspondents today. I’ve always wondered if it’s because of how much he loves Stephen or if that was something that Stephen pushed for that the other correspondents don’t. Feel free to discuss!
This was obviously back when basic cable had zero foothold in late night TV:
Somehow I couldn’t help but laugh at this:
I have a feeling Jon might laugh at his “burgeoning film career” too. On the other hand…
Jon Stewart ‘Crossfire’ Feud Ignites Net Frenzy
This was a significant event because for many people, Jon Stewart became more than just a comedian throwing spitballs from the back of the room. He started to become the Jon we know and love today, who hates to be a player in the media landscape but he really is.
Many people credit Jon with the demise of Crossfire. Of course, it’s back which made Jon a little pissed at the end of this clip.
Six Degrees
TELEVISION; Past Jonathan Swift To Linda Tripp (Yeah. Whatever.)
Linda Tripp? Wow, this one was written a long time ago.
In fact this was written so long ago, I did a double take. As I was looking over this article, I thought it was about The Daily Show, but the tagline had 1998 in it. I thought, “that can’t be right”. Jon started in 1999. Then as I read further I noticed the name Craig Kilborn. Oh yeah, I forgot. The Daily Show did start in 1996 with some other guy and one of those correspondents who was on when this was written, was a young Stephen Colbert.
This was a much different ‘Daily Show’ than it is now. In fact, it was called just “The Daily Show” (as opposed to “The Daily Show with Jon Stewart”) and I remember how Craig would usually open saying, “This is your Daily Show”.
I know how some people feel about Craig Kilborn, but whether you like him or not, he did get TDS off the ground and kept it going and were it not for that, we wouldn’t have The Colbert Report today.
And now, here it is, your moment of zen:
Caught Off Message
The Moment of Zen is something that goes back to the very beginning of The Daily Show. Jon hasn’t continued most of the things that Kilborn did, but the end of the show is still Zen-like.
Here is an article about the Moment of Zen, written by A.O. Scott, for the New York Times in October 2004.
Dog Eat Dog Films Paul Wolfowitz in “Fahrenheit 9/11″
Goodnight!