TV Review: The Daily Show - Week Ending April 30

Pity the unfortunate ones who have been elected to the United States Congress, also known as "the Big House." Try as they might, the unlucky incumbents in Congress just can't seem to avoid getting re-elected, as Daily Show Correspondent Ed Helms reported during a segment last week. “They are stuck in their jobs. They just can’t get un-elected,” he said. He referred to being in Congress as “sort of a life sentence.”

Daily Show Host Jon Stewart introduced the satirical Dateline-style piece as a "moving story of heartache and hope." The piece was wonderful dark satire, sending up issues about incumbents in the way the show does best - with wit and clever wordplay. It reminded me a bit of that classic piece of satire, A Modest Proposal. You can watch the segment at Comedy Central's Internet site.

The people interviewed didn't seem to know what hit them:
To a congressional watchdog he asked, “Why you gotta be a legislator hater?”
To Rep. Earl Blumenauer of Oregon he said, “You poor bastard” and referred to Congress as a "hellhole.” When Blumenauer protested that characterization of the situation, Helms said, “I guess when you are trapped in this hellhole it’s hard to remember what it’s like in the outside.” When he again protested, Helms said he was just in denial. When he still disagreed, Helms suggested that proves he’s in denial.

Helms even hugged one former congressman, Charlie Stenholm, telling him he has made an amazing recovery since leaving office and becoming a lobbyist. The former congressman Helms hugs really well and then awkwardly suggests the hug has gone on long enough.

That scene captured perfectly the delicate line the show walks regularly between being too serious or even mean and biting humor that is sometimes awkward for the person interviewed. The segment was the best item on The Daily Show last week.

As usual the week had some bombs, most notably a new segment that is, ostensibly, about polls. The feature was called “Poll Smoking.” Yes, someone played a joke on the new correspondent, who is British, and acted like he was unaware of the double entendre. “You show me a poll and I’ll smoke it,” he said, meaning analyzing it. I don’t know about you but jokes about gay sex acts just seem tired and too pat for me.

There were fun, entertaining interviews with actors Tom Selleck and Robin Williams.

Last week I praised The Daily Show for being better than usual - and definitely
better than most comedy shows - with the interviews. Some of my praise stemmed from the host having actually done his homework prior to an interview by reading an author’s new book, seeing the new movie, etc. And when he was ignorant about something, he was quick to admit it.

Article Author: Scott Butki

Scott Butki was a newspaper reporter for more than 10 years before making a career change into education.

He is an in-house media critic, a recovering Tetris addict and a proud uncle.

Visit Scott Butki's author page — Scott Butki's Blog