 "Photo: Courtesy of Comedy Central")
The Lantern and several other local media participated in an interview with The Daily Show's Jon Stewart on Friday. Stewart and his cast will tape their show on campus from Oct. 30 to Nov. 2.
He will also host "An Evening with Jon Stewart" at the Schottenstein Center on Oct. 28.
The Lantern: How do you plan on spending your time on Ohio State's campus and in central Ohio, and how do you feel about taping the show on campus?
Jon Stewart: I am going to go from bonfire to bonfire and pep rally to pep rally. That is all I will be doing, is literally lighting fires and shouting "Go Buckeyes." In fact, we might not even tape a show.
I'm excited to be on the campus, we've done a couple of the shows from campuses before; we did something from University of Pennsylvania during the 2000 convention for the Republicans, which was in Philadelphia.
Then we also did one at Boston University during the Democratic Convention in 2004. The energy is always great and there is no lack of people who will work for free, and that's really the key. Student labor I believe will be the key to our program. We are actually using a lot of student interns to work on the show and also to build... I would like a giant tribute pyramid built behind the studio.
TL: Are (you) going to have the theatre department do that?
JS: I'm hoping to.
TL: I was wondering what the layout of the show was going to be (Stewart will appear at the Schottenstein Center on Oct. 28)?
JS: I believe it will be a moderated sort of discussion. What we are going to do is get a bunch of questions from students. I actually don't know what the Schottenstein Center looks like, but it will be a moderated discussion. We will probably show some clips and take questions from the audience, just a long discussion. Should I have said kegger? I should have said kegger.
The Cincinnati Enquirer: What's so funny about Ohio? Do you have some favorite stories about your Ohio visits back from your standup days?
JS: I don't. I don't believe there is anything particularly inherently humorous, but we're going to Ohio because it was the prettiest girl at the ball in the 2004 election. The debutante that everyone wanted to seduce and we would like to see if the boy ever called again. So, we're going out there to find out what happened to this swing state that was visited so many times and to the people who were massaged by democrats and republicans alike and how that went.
CE: Will there be a produced piece from Ohio in each of the four shows?
JS: I don't know about in each of the four shows, but we are going to have a produced piece, a sort of a "Hello Columbus piece," and some other pieces from Ohio. We have three on the board, right now.
CE: What the hell is a buckeye?
JS: It is an acorn. Actually it is half-man, half-acorn, judging from the mascot that I've seen. It is a thinking acorn.
The Other Paper: When you took over the show from Craig Kilborn it was a very different show than it is now. I think it sort of evolved into almost a Fox News for the left - with Steven as Bill O'Reilly. Talk about how you kind of saw the show from when you took it over and how you wanted to change it to something that is still funny, but also a lot more serious and deals with a lot more serious issues.
JS: Well, I don't think it was even a question of whether we're going to do more serious issues. It's just that when you are spending this much time on something, you want it to be material about something you are interested in. So it's more about personal interest then it was about seeking a defined relevance. I am not as interested in pop culture than I am the other things. Of course my true interest is folk music, but that really wouldn't be a good show.
OP: Did you watch it when Kilborn did it?
JS: I don't believe that I watched it a whole lot. If it's not Sports Center, I probably don't catch it a whole lot, although now I'm into the kid shows.
DW: What did you whisper into the ear of John Ashcroft the other night after the show?
JS: Get your hand off my knee.
Columbus Alive: So where do you get your news, and about how much of it do you absorb in a day?
JS: I get a lot of it from the tickers on the top of cabs. So it comes kind of late and it usually is just sports scores. We try to absorb as much as we can. Our process is similar to digestion, I would imagine, and we're taking in a lot of material and trying to synthesize it and sort of structure it in a way that makes sense. Not just inherently as a story (or) as a narrative, but in a humor way. So much of our day is spent whittling, but we probably get most of it from newspaper and the 24 hours. We've got those on TiVoing and rolling, and always kind of parsing what's going on and what's being discussed.
CA: On the other hand there is a recent study by Indiana University ... it's supposed to come about early next year, and it is basically saying that "The Daily Show" is as substantive as network news. I was wondering how you feel about that?
JS: I really hope it got a B or at least a B+ on the study. Is this like some sort of dissertation?
CA: Actually I believe it is a professor, Julia Fox, assistant professor.
JS: I think it will have a huge cultural impact because I don't think there is anything in society more impactful than academic studies. I think there will definitely be five people in Berkley who change their lives because of it.
CA: In the last gubernatorial debate, between Kenneth Blackwell and Ted Strickland, the two people in Ohio, Blackwell actually made a NAMBLA comment and it made me wonder if you have been following the races in Ohio?
JS: Well yeah, I get all the NAMBLA updates. I saw Blackwell did that, and that in no way smacks of desperation, to suggest your opponent is for pedophilia and is applauded by NAMBLA. I think it shows a real dignified approach to an election and someone I would certainly trust my state government to. Shouldn't that be a push poll thing? Doesn't he realize that is not supposed to come from him. Isn't that supposed to come from unnamed packs that make calls to people at two in the morning? He's not supposed to say it out loud. He's supposed to orchestrate it. What's happening to Ohio? I am surprised there has been no Bob Ney talk. How about a little Bob Ney talk.
CA: I want to talk about Bob Ney. Are you going to go back to that well again?
JS: It is a bottomless well. Here's the thing, here's what I love about Ohio. You had a scandal with rare coins. Now that so doesn't happen. That may be the nerdiest scandal I've ever seen. I could imagine a state government being brought down by a stamp collecting scandal. But seriously, I mean to come from Teapot Dome to rare coins in only a hundred years, that's saying something.
Be the first to comment on this article!