In under a week, we've had two famously awkward talk show confrontations - Paris Hilton on "The Late Show with David Letterman" Friday and "Hardball" host Chris Matthews on "The Daily Show" Tuesday. Like 99% of America, I thought the Paris Hilton interview was pretty funny - I mean, really, who was expecting probing (no pun intended) questions about her perfume? But the "TDS" bit was a little harder to take for me. It seemed more like Jon Stewart was taking issue with Darrell Hammond's Chris Matthews impression than the actual guy himself, who seems like a pretty cool dude. Sure, "Life's A Campaign" sounds like a pretty dumb book, but Stewart never explained - or gave Matthews a chance to explain - beyond what's in the title. It'd be like having the author of the "The Neverending Story" on and complaining about the fact that it did, indeed, end. I've preferred "The Colbert Report" to "TDS" for a while now, and this further illustrates why - in having Matthews on for seemingly no reason to take him to task and not give him much of a chance to respond, he sort of becomes what he satires.
So, much like celebrity deaths, it stands to reason that awkward talk show encounters come in threes. So what's next? Looking at upcoming lineups, I'm gonna guess Josh Duhamel on "The Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson" on Friday. That is just an explosive controversy waiting to happen.
In case you missed them (the "TDS" one will probably be yanked by Viacom sooner rather than later):
2 comments:
Dear Albert... With all due respect, I believe you missed the beauty of the interview. Even better than Jon's criticism of the book is the fact that Stewart essentially prevented Matthews from achieving his own shallow concept of success! Stewart stood in the way of Matthews' tactics to take strategic control of the situation and shill his morally bankrupt book. Touché, Jon!
Dear Anonymous,
I guess I could see that - but Jon Stewart's inescapable smugness overshadowed it for me. I mean, I'm in no way advocating "Life's a Campaign," but it seemed like Stewart was determined to not have any sort of intelligent discourse about it but instead dismiss it without giving Matthews much of a chance, which seems to go against what he's been advocating for years. I don't know - I still like Jon Stewart, this just seemed a little unnecessary, I guess.
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