This week is a big one for the world of late night talk shows. Audiences are sadly just over a week away from the end of Conan O'Brien's talk show run on TBS, but on the brighter side of the spectrum, The Late Show with Stephen Colbert has finally welcomed back its full live studio audience after more than 15 months of remote episodes and mostly empty studio tapings. And who better to celebrate the return to sub-normalcy than Stephen Colbert's former Comedy Central cohort Jon Stewart.
As the former host of The Daily Show, not to mention his own less political talk show on MTV back in the day, Jon Stewart is no stranger to late night TV, though it's been a whole six years since he vacated all hosting gigs. But seeing as how he's an executive producer for CBS' The Late Show, it definitely makes sense for him to be part of the welcome wagon for the studio audience's resurgence. Check it out in the video clip below!
You know who doesn't need a long and overdrawn introduction before being introduced to a Stephen Colbert-adoring crowd? Jon Stewart, boyeee. The politically minded comedian and filmmaker walked out to the highly missed sounds of audience cheers and applause and shared a hug with his former Daily Show colleague, and all seemed right with the world again, even if just for a few moments.
Even though Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert have remained legitimately good friends outside of their respective careers, the Late Show host revealed that the two entertainers hadn't seen each other in person in 15 months. And perhaps expectedly, the interview then fully veered into a heightened and sarcasm-laden conversation about COVID-19 and its origins. You can take the man out of politically hinged convos, but you can't take the politically hinged convos out of the man, apparently.
While it's almost always enjoyable to watch Jon Stewart's signature self-aware fluster, he did face some blowback online after the interview aired for his comments on the theory that COVID-19 was created in a lab in Wuhan, China, and didn't occur naturally. His views came as a surprise to many viewers, and even seemed to take Stephen Colbert aback a few times as the interview was happening.
But for anyone who wasn't looking for such serious conversation topics to populate The Late Show's first episode back with its full audience in the Ed Sullivan Theater, here's the hilarious clip of Stephen Colbert making the effort to finally put pants back on.
The Late Show with Stephen Colbert airs weeknights on CBS at 11:35 p.m. ET. Be sure to keep up with our 2021 Summer TV schedule and more to see when Jon Stewart's return to the small screen will finally arrive.
