I think Stephen Colbert's one of the ten-or-so funniest people to grace my Sony Trinitron this century. The Daily Show with Jon Stewart is probably my current favorite show and he's probably the best thing on it apart from Stewart…so you figure a whole half hour of the guy has gotta be great, right? Well, I'm still assuming it will be and that the first outing of The Colbert Report was an okay first step. I mean, someone's going to figure out that Colbert's snotty screen personality needs more "normality" to play against. Out there alone, he's like Costello with no Abbott, and the whole show plays at the same snide attitude without interruption. The correspondents on The Daily Show are funny because they have Mr. Stewart there to play straight and to represent our amazement at the bizarre things they say and do. On last night's first Colbert Report, it was the other way around: Because he's the host, Colbert's odd style becomes the norm and his guest, Stone Phillips, was the guy who was out of sync with the rest of the world. Not as humorous that way.
Based on the promos, I was expecting The Colbert Report to be more of a parody of The O'Reilly Factor and other shows where the host sells a worldview and berates all who challenge it. Perhaps that's what they have in mind. (Bill O'Reilly, by the way, is Jon Stewart's guest tonight.) I wouldn't judge a show of this kind by its first episodes. After all, it took a long time for The Daily Show to become The Daily Show. Still, I have to admit I was a little disappointed by how much of the first Colbert Report was just Colbert arching that eyebrow towards Camera One. I hope this won't be another in the long list of shows that prove some people are just better as Second Bananas.