Jon Stewart's Final 'Daily Show': A Funny Long Goodbye
Jon Stewart closed out his run on The Daily Show on Thursday night with an expanded farewell capacious enough to include everyone from Stephen Colbert to Bruce Springsteen.
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The show began with the gradual introduction of just about every “correspondent” the Daily Show ever had, including Steve Carell, Samantha Bee, and John Oliver, culminating with a superb speech from Colbert that was both hilarious and moving enough to bring a tear to Stewart’s eye.
There was a Goodfellas-style camera-swoop through the Daily Show offices and studio that lasted too long only because the host seemed incapable of leaving anyone unacknowledged.
Stewart reserved a segment for a final address to us, the troops he’s trained to be suspicious of anyone in power — or as he termed them repeatedly, “bulls–tters.” He gave us a final lesson in how to detect “bulls–tters,” noting that the good news is, “bulls–tters have gotten pretty lazy, and their work is easily spotted.” (I could quibble and say that’s bad news, because it might also mean the bulls–tters have grown complacent due to widespread success, but let’s give Stewart his pleasure one last time.) “If you smell something, say something,” he said, closing out his final secular sermon.
In his final moments, Stewart introduced Springsteen and the E Street Band by referring to them as “my moment of Zen.” They bore down on a driving version of “Land of Hope and Dreams” — a personal request from Stewart, said Bruce. And then Springsteen slipped into “Born to Run,” and everyone, including Stewart’s wife and children, came onto the set and danced, and Max Weinberg gave Stewart his drumsticks.
Related: The Legacy of Jon Stewart: Making ‘Fake News’ Real
It was a fine, emotional way to conclude what Colbert called Jon Stewart’s “basic-cable fellowship of funny.”
