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Media, Ratings, and More: The Blogs Continue To Be Crazy!


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Baratunde Thurston (formerly of The Onion) has been hired as TDS' producer for digital content.

As conversations around news events expand far beyond television, it is the responsibility of “The Daily Show,” Mr. Thurston said, “to make things that land on Instagram and Snapchat and FlipFlamf.”
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I don't know why I enjoy that promo so much but I totally do.  (Although it is a little odd to see the host actually be a contemporary of the correspondents -- obviously, that's how it used to be with Colbert, Helms, Carrell and so forth.  How funny, I hadn't noticed that the dynamic had become so strongly journeyman/apprentice!!)

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So here's an interesting question (soon to be answered). Do we think the Noah version keeps the theme song?

Before anyone leads off with "but that was Jon's theme!"... it actually wasn't. Kilborn used it too. For Noah to use it, it simply needs to be re-orchestrated (as Jon's version of the show did when he took over). The song is actually called "Dog On Fire", and it's by that little known group "They Might Be Giants".

Edited by Kromm
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"Dog On Fire" was written by the great Bob Mould, one of my all-time favorites. His version of the theme (the guitar-heavier rendition) was used during the Kilborn years. TMBG rerecorded it when Jon took over.

 

I've also wondered about the theme, and my guess is that they'll do a new recording of it, since they seem to want to keep some continuity with the old TDS (the ads are certainly seeking to reassure people that "it's still TDS").

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That's actually just a small bit of the article (the headline is that first line, I call foul on EW for focusing on that!); it touches much on Noah's upbringing in South Africa, as well as some of his plans going forward with TDS. The closing question and answer;

 

That’s interesting, because I think there’s an overemphasis on positivity in late-night right now. Jimmy Fallon is so likable, but he doesn’t ask tough questions. When late-night hosts come from overseas, their tone often changes. James Corden was very sarcastic when he was in the U.K., and now he’s very upbeat.

It depends on your personality. Fallon — he’s just doing Fallon. Leno is the same. I would argue that they got those jobs because they’re extremely likable. The U.K. is a very dark, sarcastic place. Corden might just know that’s not welcome here. In South Africa, we’re not dark. We’re just open. I’m not trying to offend people, but there’s a funny side of everything. Nelson Mandela laughed a lot. If you can laugh when you think you’re going to be in jail for the rest of your life, I don’t think anyone has an excuse to say there’s nothing to laugh about. There’s always something to laugh about.

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"Dog On Fire" was written by the great Bob Mould, one of my all-time favorites. His version of the theme (the guitar-heavier rendition) was used during the Kilborn years. TMBG rerecorded it when Jon took over.

 

I often still sing along with the lyrics Bill Murray came up with: "I'm gonna be ONNN the Dai-ly-ee Show-oh." I'll be sad if they replace it. But probably only briefly, truth be told.

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As some of you know or may not know, Jon Stewart and Marc Maron are enemies. Or just not friendly. Maron constantly belittled Stewart in his act in the '90s. And in recent years, when Maron tried to get Stewart to come on his successful podcast, Stewart said no way.

 

Well, now that Stewart's gone, it was funny to hear that the sponsor of Monday's WTF Podcast with Marc Maron was The Daily Show with Trevor Noah.

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As some of you know or may not know, Jon Stewart and Marc Maron are enemies. Or just not friendly. Maron constantly belittled Stewart in his act in the '90s. And in recent years, when Maron tried to get Stewart to come on his successful podcast, Stewart said no way.

 

Well, now that Stewart's gone, it was funny to hear that the sponsor of Monday's WTF Podcast with Marc Maron was The Daily Show with Trevor Noah.

 

That's is ... peculiar.  That must be Comedy Central, though, right?  That decision wouldn't have come from the show itself?

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The more I read about what his idea of TDS should be, the less I want to watch. Not because it's not Jon hosting, but because it doesn't actually sound like he will put the comedy first.

 

The Washington Post's TV critic mentioned in his chat a few months ago that he didn't think Noah would last long in the job. He didn't seem that into it.

 

Regardless if it succeeds or not, we still have the Jon Stewart-produced Nightly Show with Larry Wilmore, which has a lot of Daily Show elements in it.

 

And we have the Jon Stewart-produced Late Show with Stephen Colbert, which has a lot of Colbert Report elements in it and a little bit of Daily Show.

 

So the Jon Stewart mockery lives on, whether Noah is the one to carry it on or not.

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So yeah, Viacom's doing this. I just only have one question for that company: Are they trying to make Trevor nervous under the multi-simulcast pressure?!?!? http://variety.com/2015/tv/news/trevor-noah-daily-show-viacom-1201602529/

To me it actually seems like a somewhat desperate attempt to get him attention/counteract the big feeling of "meh" that's surrounding him taking over. They're hoping to gain some accidental viewers too, who stay.
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I don't know how to do the cool linking within text, but interesting negative take from Salon on the impact/non-impact of Trevor Noah's version of the show: http://www.salon.com/2015/09/28/trevor_noah_gives_fox_news_a_free_pass_the_new_daily_show_could_be_great_for_ailes_and_hannity_bad_for_america/

That piece was written before his first episode even aired. I find the entire premise of the article flawed (political satire does not have to be limited to critiquing Fox News) and the comparisons specious (Jon Stewart may be "the most important political satirist in US history" but he sure wasn't the day he got the job -- every single one of their examples was at least five years after he took over TDS). Her conclusions ("there is clear evidence that there is plenty of change to come" and "All signs suggest, though, that Noah may well be more like a combination of Kilborn and Fallon") are fundamentally baseless.

Edited by dusang
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(edited)

This is AMAZING. TDS made a ton of unlisted YouTube videos that only come up when you Google "Trevor Noah" +something (try Trevor Noah Crocs for an example). Splitsider found lots of them, but there are probably more.

 

Edited to add: besides "Crocs," I found two more that aren't mentioned in Splitsider: Google Trevor Noah Knit & Trevor Noah Juice. 

Edited by trow125
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My favorite thus far is this bit from the Crocs video:  "Why don't you keep that ten cents a day you've been sending our kids and buy yourselves some shoes you can't strain pasta with."

 

Or maybe Jessica's "What, no - blasphemy!" in the religion video (when he points out she's trying to recruit him to clean her apartment).

Edited by Bastet
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I love how several of the videos give you clues to other Google search terms (e.g. Crocs, star sign, knitting) that will turn up one of these gems.

One of them had a brief shot that looked like Trevor being hypnotized by a watch being swung like a pendulum, but I haven't been able to find a video that matches that description. (I found the "juice" one because there was a quick shot of a juice bottle in one of the other videos.)

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One of them had a brief shot that looked like Trevor being hypnotized by a watch being swung like a pendulum, but I haven't been able to find a video that matches that description. (I found the "juice" one because there was a quick shot of a juice bottle in one of the other videos.)

         Try searching Trevor Noah Hypnosis. :)

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Gee, a black guy who has moved to America does jokes about racism in various parts of the country.  But wait, he can't do that because some other black guy did jokes about geographical racism? Hey, did you hear about that guy who walked into a bar? Oops, sorry, I can't tell that joke because someone already did it. o_0

 

I think there's a little bitterness out there in parts of the comic world because Trevor scored the coveted gig as Jon's replacement.

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It's unfortunate that ripping off comedy is so accepted in this Twitter age.  This is obvious but comedians do make a living on their comedy and writing.  This is not telling jokes about people walking into a bar at the watercooler.  This is their livelihood.

 

Chappelle's joke was written, and then told in a special that aired to many people, and then Trevor wrote it in a very similar way.  There is no accident here.  He should come out and publicly admit he was subconsciously or unwittingly DIRECTLY inspired by another comedian.  Why are we hand-waving this behaviour?  Even if the intent is not there, the facts are obvious on their face.

 

I don't think there's any bitterness here.  Chappelle for one would not be bitter about Noah getting that job.  He turned down 50 million dollars or something to do Season 3 of the Chappelle Show, do you think he cares about the TDS gig?  A bunch of famous black male comedians hung out last night including Chappelle, Noah, Rock, Murphy, Morgan, Pharoah, etc.  Not sure how an accusation of joke stealing by the Hollywood Reporter world equals bitterness on the part of legitimate comedians.  The logic doesn't follow and I'm not see how one thing could possibly lead to the other.    Fact = he stole the joke whether he intended to or not.

Edited by Ms Blue Jay
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The ratings are not very good. I looked at the ratings for TDS and TCR from exactly a year ago, and TDS had an average of 1.287 million viewers (vs. 770,000 in 2015) and TCR had 1.031 million (vs. 480,000 in 2015). I realize that you can't capture lightning in a bottle the way Comedy Central did with Stewart & Colbert, but if things don't improve during the run-up to the 2016 election (I imagine CC's not going to mess with the Noah/Wilmore combination until that's over), I wonder if they'll reevaluate that time slot.

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The ratings are not very good. I looked at the ratings for TDS and TCR from exactly a year ago, and TDS had an average of 1.287 million viewers (vs. 770,000 in 2015) and TCR had 1.031 million (vs. 480,000 in 2015). I realize that you can't capture lightning in a bottle the way Comedy Central did with Stewart & Colbert, but if things don't improve during the run-up to the 2016 election (I imagine CC's not going to mess with the Noah/Wilmore combination until that's over), I wonder if they'll reevaluate that time slot.

 

They'll certainly be hoping for a bump during the elections.  If they don't get it?  I don't think they would can TDS as a whole unless ratings really bottomed out, since it's an inexpensive show to produce, but if the numbers continue to decline I could certainly see them looking to replace him (which I assume would be a process of trying to steal Oliver from HBO, begging Stewart to come back, offering the job to Jessica Williams, Aasif Mandvi, and the 47 other people they tried before, and finally being stuck going with Klepper or some other random head-scratcher.

 

I was about to add my thoughts on Wilmore, but I'll take them to the Wilmore forum as I see you're over there as well.

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The ratings are not very good. I looked at the ratings for TDS and TCR from exactly a year ago, and TDS had an average of 1.287 million viewers (vs. 770,000 in 2015) and TCR had 1.031 million (vs. 480,000 in 2015). I realize that you can't capture lightning in a bottle the way Comedy Central did with Stewart & Colbert, but if things don't improve during the run-up to the 2016 election (I imagine CC's not going to mess with the Noah/Wilmore combination until that's over), I wonder if they'll reevaluate that time slot.

Not to mention @Midnight has been doing more political news since J Stew stepped down. I have a feeling CC is using that to give Chris some prep there in case they need to make a change as Lennon, Funches, Wheaton, or Tompkins can easily replace Hardwick on @Midnight.

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The ratings are not very good. I looked at the ratings for TDS and TCR from exactly a year ago, and TDS had an average of 1.287 million viewers (vs. 770,000 in 2015) and TCR had 1.031 million (vs. 480,000 in 2015). I realize that you can't capture lightning in a bottle the way Comedy Central did with Stewart & Colbert, but if things don't improve during the run-up to the 2016 election (I imagine CC's not going to mess with the Noah/Wilmore combination until that's over), I wonder if they'll reevaluate that time slot.

 

I'll take bets now that by the time Obama leaves the White House Comedy Central's late night line-up is back to be an white male affair. It's actually a bet I wouldn't mind losing, but I don't think I'm wrong. 

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(edited)

I can't imagine Hardwick taking over "The Daily Show" -- I know @M has been doing some more political humor lately, but I just don't think jokes about the news are "on brand" for him. He's way more into geek/internet culture.

 

I wonder if moving @M to 11 for two weeks in September was something of a trial run; as it turns out, the ratings weren't very good, so there's probably no chance they'll have to worry about changing the name of the show.

 

Trevor Noah doing shows in Dubai this weekend. Guy's an international star; I suspect he'll do just fine if CC decides to let him go. I wish somebody would do a Bill Carter-style inside-baseball, anonymously-sourced story about whether or not CC is panicking yet over the low ratings.

 

Edited to add: Trevor will be appearing on both "Jimmy Kimmel Live" and the Ellen DeGeneres show Wednesday of this coming week.

Edited by trow125
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I can he's a more known face and has experience in pretty much everything else. He can add a nerd/geek spin to the politics (there is a LOT of source material he can reference in jokes) and wouldn't have watchers bitching about him "talking too much."

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