Later this year, Comedy Central's Daily Show will be looking for a new host/anchor, who would be the 3rd in the series' 19 year history.
Daily, especially since Jon Stewart took over in 1999, is the sole reason, arguably, for the decline of supermarket tabloids such as the Weekly World News, which specialize in fictional articles. Whereas the series mocked and tweaked pop culture under original host Craig Kilborn, Stewart steered it toward the political arena, becoming just as important to viewers as the nightly newscasts it parodies.
Stewart, who'd previously helmed a pair of self-titled talk shows, including one on MTV, is the 3rd late night MC to step away from his desk within the last year following CBS' Craig Ferguson (who replaced Kilborn on the Late, Late Show) & David Letterman, who will depart in the spring, with Daily Show alumnus Stephen Colbert moving in to The Late Show in the fall. Colbert actually makes 4, but Comedy Central cancelled The Colbert Report outright, replacing it with Larry Wilmore's Nightly Show last month, and, as noted, Colbert will shift over to CBS.
The success of Daily Show under Stewart prompted the host to film the movie, "Rosewater", which came out late last year. Comedy Central hasn't said who will succeed Stewart, but Kilborn, I think, is available, and in today's editions, the New York Post suggested that suspended NBC anchor Brian Williams could fill Stewart's chair, assuming NBC drops the other shoe and cuts Williams altogether in the wake of recent events.
Following is a sample clip from last year.
Rating: A.
2 comments:
It would be all sorts of irony if Brian Williams ended up working as Stewart's replacement.
However, I never gave much interest to The Daily Show. I don't understand why anyone else does - I never found it all that funny. Worse still, there are far too many 20 somethings who look to this show for their daily news round up - good gravy that's insane!
There was a nice write-up in one of the papers today that said that while Stewart still touts the show as a "fake" news show, they still break real stories. Stewart, who couldn't score in syndication with a talk show, has become a more credible journalist. Who knew?
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