Well, there have been bits here and there over the last month or so, but last night we got to watch as Stephen discussed heaven and the afterlife with Anglican Bishop N.T. Wright. As usual, Stephen tried his best to get the bishop off track, but never quite succeeded. Likewise, the bishop seemed to be trying to out-funny Stephen, which almost never works. I thought the central premise was interesting. I might have to check out the book, Surprised by Hope: Rethinking Heaven, the Resurrection and the Mission of the Church.
RL deadlines kept me from blogging last week, so I’m going to pull everything together today, beginning with friend-of-the-show Fr. Jim Martin’s visit last night. He does have a knack for breaking Stephen out of character!
Here’s the clip from last Wednesday. At least when Stephen crosses the line of decency, it seems he has the grace to realize it:
And finally, from Thursday’s show, the six degrees of Barack Obama:
To put it all in perspective, here’s a little tidbit of an interview with Stephen in the Philadelphia Inquirer the weekend before the show’s run there.
The youngest of 11 children in Charleston, S.C., was raised in a devout Catholic family. Last year, O’Reilly - whom Colbert calls “Papa Bear” - was a guest on the Report, and called Colbert a “secular progressive.” Colbert, only partly in jest, replied that he’s “a deeply religious man who will do anything you say.”
Colbert’s love of role-playing grew, in part, out of tragedy. When he was 10, his father, James, and brothers Peter and Paul, who were closest to him in age, were killed in a plane crash…. Later, he had a crisis of faith. “I got pretty upset that Dad and the boys died, and didn’t have anything to do with my church for years. . . . But then I did, and the moments of reconnection and epiphany are too inexpressible to capture in this kind of an interview.” He’s not teaching Sunday school now because of his election-year schedule. “But I did go to Mass yesterday,” he says. “Does that count, Padre? I find it very calming.”
Now I’m going to go finish watching last night’s show to find out what happened to stage manager Bobby!
Looks like Stephen is all set for the Pope’s visit to New York. He’s got quite a welcome package prepared, right down to a baby to be baptized (son of Colbert Report writer Peter Gwinn). Whether the pope accepts or declines the invitation, it could make for some great comedy bits in the days to come.
Happy Easter everyone! For your holiday viewing pleasure, here’s the clip of last year’s Easter Under Attack. The Gospel According to Cadbury. My favorite Easter clip, “The Wørd: Marketing” seems to be having some technical difficulties on the new Colbert Report website, but we’ve got 50 days of Easter so I’ll keep trying to retrieve it.
In which the humble custodian of this blog submits to photography and reveals her day job.
My local paper interviewed me about the blog and there’s a very nice article here. I even bought a hard copy of the paper, which I haven’t done in ages.
Happy Holy Week, everyone! Here’s hoping that someone out there is attacking Easter and catching Stephen’s attention.
Stephen brought in Bill Donohue, head of the Catholic League, to rage at Rev. Hagee’s endorsement of John McCain. Sort of like a professional mourner?
Also, a housekeeping note on the site. The Motherload videos are no longer working, so I’m in the process of upgrading the links to the new Colbert Report website. The site looks like it’s going to be fabulous once they get the full archive up. I’m hoping that older episodes featured here that expired will be available again.
Philip Zimbardo was on the show to talk about his book The Lucifer Effect and the Stanford Prison Experiment. He was on the Daily Show a while back and the discussion of social pressure and power over others was quite interesting. With Stephen, however, the conversation somehow got sidetracked into a discussion of the Garden of Eden and Stephen had to remind the good professor that Milton’s Lucifer isn’t the basis for Christian belief in hell. I found it especially interesting since Sunday’s first reading was the Garden of Eden story. It also reminded me of a discussion of hell and God’s love that Stephen had on NPR awhile back.
No one goes from the sublime to the ridiculous quite as quickly or gleefully as Stephen Colbert, and last night we saw a great example of that. After last week’s moving tribute to his writers, this week he’s accusing them of murder and telling the world what he claims Catholics have always known but just didn’t tell.
So, without further ado, parts one and two of yet another case of “Muuuurrrrderrr.”
Wow! Last night’s Report was simply amazing. I may yet post all of it, but for now, here’s the closing piece. Ambassador Andrew Young was Stephen’s guest, and the middle segment was extended footage of the 1969 nurses’ strike in Charleston, SC. He pulled together so many things past and present and gave us such an incredibly intimate look at the way the WGA strike is never out of sight while the show is back on the air. If you saw the episode, you know what I’m saying. If you didn’t, find a way to see the rerun today. Go to the Comedy Central site if you have to. And maybe some of today’s Pharaohs need to be reminded of the real flesh-and-blood people who are at the heart of this strike, people who deserve respect for the work that they do.
The old spiritual reminds me that the words of Scripture and the exodus experience provide an archetype that can be applied in many different situations of varying degrees of seriousness. And that’s the beauty of the kind of satire that Stephen does. He can shift back and forth between silliness and seriousness and make a lot of subtle points that would sound ridiculous if pushed to extremes.
Edited to add:I decided I might as well put up the other two videos. You really have to see the whole thing to appreciate the effect.
You have to know your audience when you’re setting up a metaphor. On Monday’s show, Stephen was talking to the governor of South Carolina about the confederate flag that flies outside the statehouse and whether it represents slavery.
The governor said, “It’s like the crucifix. It doesn’t have Jesus on it, but for alot of folks….” and Stephen jumped in with, “Mine does.” And the governor said, “It does?!!” Stephen laughed and said, “I’m a Catholic. Biggest difference. Except for the pope. And that Protestants are heretics.”
(Now technically the governor’s metaphor was off on the wrong foot anyway, because without the corpus it’s a cross, not a crucifix.)
Because of the ongoing WGA strike, I’m not going to link to the clip, but I believe it’s up at Comedy Central. This was the first bit in the new shows that tempted me. And judging by the site stats from earlier today, other people caught it as well.
