Current and former writers reflect on trying to wring humor from the Trump administration.
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Heres what else they had to say.
We didnt take Trump seriously enough at first.
My colleagues and I had a lingering, nagging sense of culpability.
We became part of this nightmare recursive loop of Trump content being pumped into peoples houses.
Occasionally, you had to break news.
There was always this breathless pace of trying to keep up with the news.
The shows goals were sometimes unclear.
Our host has explicitly told us, This show is not a force for change.
Were just a comedy show.
And I think he means that when he says it he is a genuinely good guy.
But then you look at some of the heartfelt sentiments hes expressed, and its like,Hmmm.
Seems a little serious for the show not being a force for change.
Everyone had the same joke.
Back in the days ofThe Daily Show,Jon Stewart was doing something different.
Playing those things off each other and pointing out that kind of hypocrisy, that felt fresh to me.
And then, honestly, I think Twitter is the worst invention of modern times.
That ruined it because everyone was doing it, and it was all the same thing.
Its not effective anymore everybody sees the same clip and the same quote and misinterprets the same headlines.
Thats what I wanted to avoid.
Vulture did a roundup of late-nighthosts who all told the same joke.
I was like,I never want to tell one of these jokes.
It was hard to find the line.
He made multiple appearances on the show as Cage Kid.
The staff were watching rehearsal, and they were like,Oh my God, we cant.
We cant do this.
And we did it, and it was funny and one of the more memorable segments from the show.
There wasnt much beyond it other thanOh my God, I cant believe they did that.
It often felt like a liberal circle jerk.
Jimmy Kimmel and Stephen Colbert are probably the worst offenders here.
The latter is sometimes crying on TV about things nobody else is even that upset about.
Colbert wore all black in mourning and stood up todeliver the monologuefor the first time since March.
Its not that I dont think his tears were sincere.
Its that they were wasted on something so stupid, and theyre the only ones he chose to broadcast.
Where were those tears for the quarter million Americans who have died of COVID?
And above all, why would anyone want tears from a comedy show in the first place?
Have all of our brains collectively broken this badly?
Much of late night devolved into this Aaron Sorkinified liberal circle jerk.
Its not productive, its not impressive, and its definitely not comedy.
Just wait for the next fascist to take office and continue this masturbatory rage ouroboros.
Theres clearly good money in it.
The competition was fierce.
Id go,Oh my God, we have the greatest monologue today,and it was.
Then Id go home and watch Colbert, and I was like,What do we have to do?
Theyre really well crafted.
The same thing with Seth Meyers.
The audience could be overly sincere.
Personally, I never thought I would write for this show.
I feel like whatever Im doing now, it doesnt really feel like comedy.
I feel like everybody is trying to have fun with this thing, but its just an awful thing.
I just feel like were very hamstrung by the audience and what the audience wants.
We cant really be ironic.
You dont want to lose the audience youve built up.
I think theres just going to be some light ribbing of the Biden administration.
Were going to set our sights on Fox News and the machine against Biden and Harris.
I actually think the audience is the problem.
Like I said, they want their biases confirmed.
We played with it; we didnt play against it.
So its hard to break out of the echo chamber.
Hes out of touch.
Sometimes, Im like,Are we a propaganda machine?I dont know.
Theres a weird double standard.
Trump was too easy a target.
For the first time in four years, writers rooms are going to have a political divide within them.
I dont know how that will reflect on TV.
Trump was certainly a convenient target for subjects it might be difficult for hosts to talk about otherwise.
Police brutality and Black Lives Matter marches arent gonna stop.
The wealth gap will increase.
Immigration policy will almost certainly not get better.
Very few late-night hosts are equipped to deal with those things, so well see how it goes.
One thing that stood out to me was this years DNC.
You know, the banality of evil.
And mocking him felt pointless.
I dont remember the last time I laughed at a Trump joke on any show, including my own.
And it was useless.
It doesnt hurt him, it doesnt do anything.
It doesnt change anyones mind.
But live audiences only responded to Trump jokes.
We tried to do silly non-Trump jokes.
It was just clear that, for whatever reason, other stuff was just not going to fly.
So most of the monologue ended up being 90 percent Trump jokes.
Its like an addiction: Thats all people wanted.
That infected other jokes too.
It felt like a lot of the time Trump was steering the ship.
Then it becomes like,Oh my God, this is just, like, The Trump Show.
Late night gave Trump what he wanted.
We rewarded his abuse by giving him exactly what he wanted.
It stopped being fun.
But after a while, you get tired of drinking poison every day.
I dont have the gene for that, unfortunately.
I just always wanted to do late-night stuff.
I still dont really want to do anything else.
But joking about Trump sometimes prevented you from crying.
Approaching it as a joke writer was a way to stay anesthetized to what was happening.
Not every host found the right way to tackle Trump.
It was kind of a self-deprecating joke, but it was also true.
The problem is when you need a little levityandyoure talking about Trump.
The problems went beyond the writing.
There should also be a total overhaul when it comes to considering which guests to book.
Why is fucking Rahm Emanuel making the circuit,straight up lying about Bernie Sanderss gun record?
Why was Chris Christie aregular guest onThe Late Show?
How is that any better than Rick Santorum getting a CNN gig?
Theyre not those kind of shows so stop booking people who famously always lie.
Complacency during Bidens presidency is a concern.
The end of Trumps presidency is probably a relief to a lot of the more traditional late-night hosts.
Not only can they stop focusing on Trump, but so can their audiences.
And its unclear if audiences will stick around.
Is that gonna be a tough pill to swallow for some of our audience?
Our boss tells us, We just want good jokes.
Fortunately, that persons not me.
This story has been edited and condensed for clarity.
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