It’s difficult to see Stephen Colbert in a standard late night role. His comedy wouldn’t translate too well to the parade of self-important Hollywood types that make up the majority of late night talk show guests. And he seems to like to interview authors where as most guests on any network talk show give the impression that they either don’t read or do know how to.
While the money would probably be MUCH better, Colbert doesn’t seem like he is in it completely for the money as he hasn’t tried to translate his current fame into movie roles or television appearances. He seems secure with doing his own show on CC his own way.
If he did take the job however,I can’t see him staying very long as his wit would be too much for most guests even without his “Colbert persona.”
Yeah, that’d be my big concern. Regardless of whether or not he continues with his “right-wing asshole” schtick, he’d probably have to water down his brand of comedy. Which would be unfortunate, because nobody else does what he does.
Frankly I’m pretty surprised that he’s a top contender for this. Not because I don’t think talented, of course. But the schtick is really his trademark at this point. He does interviews in character, he’s written books in character, he’s even testified before congress in character. He’s gone such full bore with the schtick that it’s kind of jarring when he appears out of character. So if he did decide to do a talk show as his “real” self, the network would have to devise a major rebranding.
He also does interviews out of character. I heard him on NPR, and he was quite pleasant and funny. He talked about the character as if he was a separate person.
That being said, I think it’s unlikely that I’d enjoy him on a network late night show as a general comedian as much as I enjoy the character he plays on Colbert Report.
Let’s get John Oliver out of HBO and onto network TV.