Though you’ve seen and enjoyed comedian/actress Amanda Seales on TV and in movies for years now, Seales’ set from last night’s Late Night with Seth Meyers marks her first stand-up set on a late night talk show.
It sure doesn’t seem like her first time doing stand-up on the late night circuit. See for yourself here.
Fox Might Be Finally Stepping Back Into the Late Night Ring with a New Show from Neal Brennan
Thanks to the Internet, late night is now more of a genre than it is a time slot. As such, the genre that gets dibs on making fun of what’s going on in the world first has become very popular, especially thanks to 12 hours news cycle and a psychopath in the White House.
For many years now, Fox has had no entry in the late night world like Kimmel or The Daily Show. They might joining with the times by developing a potential weekly late night show with Neal Brennan, stand-up, writer, and famed co-creator of Chappelle’s Show.
Preliminary details point towards a sort of Last Week Tonight/Full Frontal sort of format, but, we hope, within that format, Brennan might take a cue from his own Three Mics special to break down the week’s events in one-liners, bits, and truths.
In fact, we’d go so far as to say that you shouldn’t spend too much time thinking about or contextualizing what you see in the thumbnail above.
Just play the set and enjoy the wonder of wildly clever absurdist comedian Jon Dore.
Beth Stelling has a million dollar smile and a warm and inviting personality to match. Additionally, she has jokes and stories that are as sharp as they are charming.
Please watch her set and have your day go a little bit better here.
With a Comedy Central half-hour special having just aired last month and the release of his splendid album Model Minority coming up this week, Joel Kim Booster shows why he’s on such a hot streak with his latest Conan set.
Watch and enjoy it here.
Once again, Nathan Fielder exquisitely “games” the format of the traditional late night talk show panel interview by having Susan Sarandon on deck in case his stories are boring.
Of course, Fielder is simultaneously in on the joke while also playing like he “didn’t know” what might might end up happening as is his trademark style at this point.
Please enjoy the whole interview here.
Despite what Nathan says, he has proven that he is actually a great late night talk show guest, albeit a very untraditional one. Needless to say, Nathan Fielder would probably fare pretty well on Talk Show the Game Show.
Nathan Fielder has actually done a real life, comedy version of Inception on all of us and we’re all laughing the whole way through despite it being a ruse the whole time.
One layer is that Fielder told a great late night story on Kimmel.
Another layer is that he fabricated that story to have an interesting story to tell on a late night talk show.
A layer within that is that he would feel guilty about outright lying about said late night talk show story, so Nathan opted to stage every event in the story to happen to him.
Another layer down from that is Fielder explaining all of that to Seth Meyers and then asking to get more mileage from the story by retelling it, pretty much word-for-word.
Plain and simple, it’s comedic genius at work.
Jesus Trejo made a great impression with his first late night set on last night’s Late Late Show with James Corden with how roles with his parents have been pretty much entirely reversed.
Watch it here.
Last week, Conan O’Brien stopped by The Late Show with Stephen Colbert and told the story of how David Letterman sent a horse to Conan’s soundstage on the Warner Bros. lot and how much of a nightmare that ended up being.
Turns out Conan suspicions of Letterman sending a gift that was more of a joke than anything else was true, but things didn’t work out exactly how Dave would have liked.
On last night’s Jimmy Kimmel Live, Letterman explained how he really wanted the prank gift to work, then bemoaned how it, technically, worked more effectively (in the sense of causing Conan distress) than initially intended.
Ever the prankster himself, Jimmy Kimmel jumped in with a perfect button to this story at 4:58 of this clip of the interview.
HBO Orders Late Night Wyatt Cenac Comedy Docu-Series
So, three very exciting developments with this new addition to late night in 2018:
1) Wyatt Cenac will be back on television again, this time, with his own show on HBO.
2) None of this show will be done from a desk. Wyatt will take on current issues in satirical documentary segments.
3) John Oliver is an EP.
Look for Wyatt’s late night show on HBO in spring 2018.
Well, Ismael Loufti has one of the best jokes about Islamophobia that we’ve heard in awhile.
See for yourself in his charming and cleverly profound late night debut on last night’s Kimmel here.
On this Thursday, October 12th, two more women, Sarah Silverman and Robin Thede will indeed premiere their own topical late night shows.
On Hulu, I Love You, America will have Sarah Silverman take her own heartfelt, yet unapologetically silly take on the world.
BET will enter the foray of late night with The Rundown with Robin Thede, a combo of the head writer of The Nightly Show with Larry Wilmore and Chris Rock producing, with might be a traditional late night format, but focusing a little less on Trump.
Here’s Thede on MSNBC detailing what’s to come on The Rundown.
In any case, that means there are now four late night female hosts between Samantha Bee, Chelsea Handler, Sarah Silverman, and Robin Thede.
The Rundown with Robin Thede, the topical late night show produced by Chris Rock, will kick off Thursday night, October 12th at 10PM.
You might remember Thede from The Nightly Show with Larry Wilmore, which seems like such a distant memory these days, especially when it comes to the world of late night. As to what’s to come on The Rundown, the show itself is shrouded in a bit of mystery as there is only this promo for the time being.
It just so happens that Sarah Silverman’s topical show I Love You, America begins streaming on Hulu on Thursday as well.
Given the pace of the news right now, there seems to be room in late night for attempting to digest and make fun of whatever happened earlier in the day.
If you like jokes extra dry, we’d urge you to take a listen to The Matt Goldich Guarantee, the very album release from one Matt Goldich that has one of the driest deliveries around in the world of stand-up comedy.
Matt combines cleverness and sharp writing together and plates it, if you will, in a minimalist style with the serving of every joke.
Get a taste of of what we’re talking about from Matt’s set on Late Night with Seth Meyers from this week, then go get The Matt Goldich Guarantee here.
Not only will comedian/TED talk speaker/professional prankster James Veitch prank the people he lives with, but he will document it for the world to see.
See for yourself here on Conan as he recounts really testing the mental and emotional limits of his roommate with ducks.
Above smooth cadence and delivery, Caleb Synan highlights an undervalued tool in stand-up comedy these days: facial expressions. He really animates his jokes with fun act outs that hinge on what face Synan puts on for that specific joke.
See for yourself in his latest Conan set here.
There are many facets to the comedy of Moses Storm of which we enjoy. Modern Millennial and Terminally Chill Birthday are just a couple of Moses’ performance art pranks that got us on board for whatever Moses is doing.
He also has honed his skills in storytelling and stand-up that maintains Moses’ truthful, yet silly brand of humor.
See for yourself in this first late night stand-up appearance from last night’s Conan.
Jimmy Kimmel, former co-host of The Man Show, would now seem to be a sort of conscience in the ongoing struggle for healthcare in the United States.
If you consider the gravity of that idea, it’s a curious crossroads that we’ve come to in regards to comedy actually affecting change as opposed to just commenting on it. May it be “gonzo comedy” (i.e. becoming an active part of the joke that you’re making) perhaps?
Only in rare times of tragedy (9/11, Charlie Hebdo attacks Trump getting elected) do late night hosts take a much more sobering tone that leans less on jokes and more on emotional resonance. Also, the idea that comedians can actually affect change directly on a socio-political level with their comedy was a fever dream at best for a very long time.
For instance, comedian Dick Gregory, RIP, actually put action behind his razor sharp wit to make change happen with civil rights by joining in at marches, speaking out at rallies, etc. on top of being a groundbreaking, outspoken comedian.
Yet, in these topsy, turvy, non-sensical, surreal times where everything is getting “turned on its head”, the words of comedians are not only getting more barb-laden, but they’re actually getting much more serious much more often as well.
Years ago, Jon Stewart took on Mad Money’s Jim Cramer on The Daily Show in a planned attack forsaking humor, even satirically, for the intention of clearly pointing out injustice. That wasn’t the norm in late night back then even though Stewart rose to an even more revered status after that interview.
Nowadays, Stephen Colbert takes several direct shots at Trump on a nightly basis, Conan O’Brien is virtually a goodwill ambassador, and John Oliver and Samantha Bee both make their ideologies clear within their roasting of various topics as well issue some sort of call to action. In fact, Colbert has been noted to overtake Fallon in ratings these past several months because of the more overtly political comedy that happens on Late Night with Stephen Colbert versus The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon.
This brings us to Jimmy Kimmel, a late night host so apolitical that he had Donald Trump on and suffered none of the Internet’s scorn like Fallon did for having Trump on The Tonight Show and jostling his hair.
Earlier this year, Kimmel gave one of the most sincere late night monologues in history (try thinking of another monologue where a late night host cried more on camera than Jimmy) by recounting the story of how his newborn son had to undergo heart surgery to live. The ordeal made Jimmy think of all the other babies that might have a similar condition that wouldn’t be afforded the same medical attention under proposed GOP healthcare bills intended to replace Obamacare.
This led to Jimmy chatting with Senator Bill Cassidy about a new GOP healthcare bill that would pass the “Jimmy Kimmel Test” for having no exclusions of pre-existing conditions among other things. That segment was from an episode of Jimmy Kimmel Live taped four months ago.
Just this past week, Kimmel found that the Graham-Cassidy Bill that Senator Cassidy had been working on had not fulfilled the promises that the Senator made to Jimmy on his show. Jimmy has not only taken Cassidy to task almost every night this week, but done so in a way that comes across more as a PSA than a late night monologue.
Tuesday night’s monologue was most definitely a call-to-action almost entirely devoid of any sort of jokes. Wednesday and Thursday made sure to have some of the tension broken by some roast style jokes, but Kimmel is now clearly perceived to actually have a dog in the fight for healthcare reform now, going toe-to-toe with elected officials.
Again, such a notion might seem odd, but it’s most certainly an echo of the zeitgeist and how splintered the public trust in government is.
This is as about a good of a time as any to remember that one of the enduring qualities of the late night talk show format is its ability to comment on the day’s events after they happen. The inherent tension in world events sets up a perfect opportunity for one liner jokes or even deep dive segments to highlight the absurdity of it all as quickly as network television can.
The news cycle moves so wickedly quick in 2017 that it almost burdens late night shows to cleverly make fun of it all. It may just be easier now to use the platform to, as Jon Stewart had done, just point out “what’s going on” as they see it instead of worrying so much about where the laughs come in.
Whether Kimmel will end up actually making a long lasting, significant difference in American health care has yet to be seen. To the point of this piece, it also has yet to be seen whether outright calling U.S. senators out for lying and then, subsequently, cracking jokes about their appearance and behavior will lead to said difference.
Jimmy Kimmel taking on staunch stance and repeatedly not backing down on healthcare does show one important thing: being neutral in late night is becoming less and less of an option.
The latest adaptation of Stephen King’s It is a box office hit, which has many clowns upset for allegedly promoting the idea that clowns are scary.
On last night’s Conan, O’Brien “let” one such clown (that’s some sort of unholy cross between Tim Curry’s Pennywise and John Wayne Gacy’s Pogo The Clown) “speak” to this injustice.
We’ve said it for awhile and we’ll keep saying it, Conan still has the best sketches in late night and this (written by Todd Levin) is just one more piece of proof.
For those wondering, that’s Andrés du Bouchet under all that objectively scary clown make-up.
Jenny Zigrino returned to Conan’s stage for another delightful late night stand-up set last night. From her dangerous posterior to summarizing country songs, Jenny went through a tight five and a half minutes we really enjoyed.
Watch and also enjoy it here.
If you need an unfettered dose of silly (that’s kinda meant for adults), you might want to get on board with Martin Urbano.
Just see for yourself on his very first late night set on Jimmy Kimmel Live from last night.
Late night is back from what seemed like they’re own Summer vacation.
With that, Julian McCullough delivered a fun set on Corden’s first episode back and explained why you might not want to ask old Russians for a joke that they might know.
Watch it here.
Dan St. Germain’s measured execution, quick pacing and timing, etc. translate very well to late night sets. Thus, he does stand-up on television quite frequently and deservingly so.
With that in mind, enjoy his latest set on Conan here where, among other things, explains himself as a dumb liberal.
We’ve been digging Ahamed Weinberg’s very unique off-beat comedic perspective for quite some time, both as a stand-up and a filmmaker.
We’re glad to see that he’s finally getting his due with this debut late night set on Late Night with Seth Meyers.
Watch and see what we’re talking about here.
In case you didn’t know, Nate Bargatze is one of the Tonight Show’s absolute favorite comedians.
This set is a yet another example of why Nate keeps getting asked back. Also, this is the first time that we can remember that Nate, or really anyone in recent memory for that matter, has opened up with a story of murder on a family friendly late night talk show. Of course, it being Nate, it went pretty swell.