Colbert and Stewart vs the Writer’s Strike
I'll admit I was a little disappointed to tune in to the Colbert Report and see re-runs the day the writer's strike started.
In case you haven't been paying attention, there's a writer's guild strike going on that's taken Hollywood's writers offline (or "Pencils Down" as they say). This means the behind-the-scenes folks who come up Jay Leno's and David Letterman's monologues are not writing, meaning those guys are hiding behind their desks until this all blows over.
But it's different with The Daily Show and The Colbert Report, because to me it always felt like those guys were a bigger part of what went on than just hosts. Can Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert be funny without his writing staff?
We'll never know, because it's a matter of solidarity for them to not do any writing while the strike is on.
But I think it would have been extra funny to do something just making fun of the strike. Re-runs of a topical news show just aren't interesting, but how about just running a half hour worth of funny YouTube clips or a fish tank? Or a webcam on a room full of cats? Does it take a writer to do that?
(And what would happen if, during a Stephen Colbert presidency, a writer's strike occurred?)