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© Gillian Laub for TIME

Stephen Colbert – Provocateur

Before every show, Stephen visits the green room and tells that evening’s guest the same thing: “My character’s an idiot. Your job is to set him straight.” Easier said than done, especially since the first part’s a lie. Stephen’s character may ask idiotic questions, but they’re so unexpected and diabolically entangling that watching his guests fight their way toward daylight is unalloyed pleasure.

On The Colbert Report, every day is Opposite Day. Because of how his humor works, the audience finds meaning through sustained inference, which is a lot more fun than it sounds. Colbert’s riffs are so ingeniously convoluted and deeply weird that the post-reason wingers have no response to him. They just have to absorb the punishment, night after night.

I’d like to add here that Stephen and I are old friends, but I can’t. I barely know the man. But like millions of others, I revere him as the class clown I never knew — the one without a trace of mean. How he can be so devastating and endearing at the same time I cannot say, but it sure wears well. Look for him to hold down this spot on TIME’s list for years to come.

By Garry Trudea
Trudeau is an American cartoonist and creator of the comic strip Doonesbury.

Source: TIME.com

Categories: Awards, Who’s Honouring Me Now? Tags: TIME 100, TIME Magazine

© Comedy Central

Name: Stephen Colbert
Age: 47
Occupation: Host, The Colbert Report

Is it even fair to continue calling Stephen Colbert a comedian? In recent years he’s stretched the boundaries of his emmy-winning fake punditry to their limits, and beyond. In 2010, he and Jon Stewart held a tongue-mostly-in-cheek Rally to Restore Sanity and/or Fear on the Washington Mall, drawing tens of thousands. Now he’s mulling a presidential bid, backed (but not in cooperation with) his own super PAC. In the process he’s morphed from a mere satirist to a political performance artist.

Vote: TIME.com

Categories: Awards Tags: Stephen Colbert, TIME 100