Willie Geist gets together with John Oliver to chat a little 'football at the pub' ahead of a new season of "Last Week Tonight", fresh off the show's latest annual sweep of the Emmy Awards. (Original broadcast date February 18, 2024)
Sunday Sitdown with Willie Geist
EMMY NOMINEE: John Oliver
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Learn more at honestlygood.org, federally insured by NCUA. Hey guys, Willie Geist here with another episode of the Sunday Sit Down Podcast. My thanks as always for clicking and listening along. Very excited to bring my conversation this week with John Oliver, the host of Last Week Tonight on HBO and HBO Max. Obviously embarking on the new season of his new satire show in the middle of a presidential election year. I'm going to talk about that and all these Emmys he's won, including very recently for Last Week Tonight between himself as host for the writing and for the series itself. They've won 16 Emmys for Last Week Tonight. He also, by the way, won 3 when he was on The Daily Show. He had a memorable stint in 2013 filling in for 8 weeks as host of The Daily Show when John Stewart was away directing a movie, and as you'll hear him talk about, a lot of people watched him do that and said, "Oh, he's not just the correspondent. He could sit alone and host a show," and now we got Last Week Tonight. Came up through comedy, growing up in Birmingham, moved to London, went to Cambridge to this incredible society effectively of comedy that gave birth to Monty Python, among many others, very, very smart, very fast, and very funny. I think you're going to enjoy our conversation. That's really about much more than his show. It's about everything going on in the world and his rise at a great storyteller, I have to say. A little background, John and I got together at a place called McHales in Midtown Manhattan, known to be a Liverpool bar, meaning it's where fans of Liverpool, supporters go to watch the matches in the Premier League. Now, John Oliver, lifelong from birth, Liverpool fan, passed down from his family, and he is an intense fan. I'll just say that as I think you're about to find out. He knows everything about the team, past, current, future, and is very excited because Liverpool right now, as we speak, sits at the top of the table, meaning they're in first place in the Premier League. These are good times to be a Liverpool fan. So, we went to a place where he felt at home for a great conversation right now on the Sunday Sit Down podcast with John Oliver. It's great to see you, man. I'm about to shut down, man. Oh, you're going to get rid of it? Yeah, that's right. The pre-talk was fun. I'm just going to remove any discernible personality and then just shut down. You were so charming there before we started. Yeah, that's not for Canberra, really. Some people come alive when the cameras turn on, I die inside. And notice when the lights came up, you sort of smiled at it. That's right. It diminishes me. Attention diminishes me. I'm better outside this environment. Well, let's do our best. Yeah, for sure. Let's talk about something that might make you feel comfortable, which is football. Yes. We're in McHales Bar, which is the home of Liverpool supporters, right? Yes. And do you come and watch? The home of Liverpool supporters is Liverpool, just pretty clear. Fair. The kind of imperialism that McHales Bar is doing, I don't think, as much as they would love to claim this is the whole of Liverpool, it just isn't. The whole of Liverpool is that way. Fair. That's a fair point. But yes, the New York City. The New York City home of Liverpool, that I will accept. So will you be in here watching games from time to time? No, I'll be at home watching games. Yeah, always. Yes. So, yeah, I'd still have little kids, so I'm trying to force them into liking football and liking Liverpool specifically. Yes. If they don't like Liverpool specifically, they cannot have football as far as I can say. That's it. That was the rule in my house. So yes, I watch it at home. Also, when things don't go well, I don't handle that well. You don't want to be around people saying, "Hey, it's just a game." "Well, don't say that to me. Never say that to me." After England lost once in the World Cup, my wife said, "Before the game, in my defence, I've said, if England lose, we should probably think about other things to do this afternoon because I'm not going to be at my best as a human being. And in the kindest way they lost, and she said, "Well, it is, I love you." No, it's just sport, isn't it? Which is true. Objectively, that's true. And I walked around the entirety of Central Park twice, the whole thing, just to try and walk off that comment. Is it just sports? Let's see. I'm going to walk until this pain goes away. I'll see you when it's dark. And once was it enough? Once did not do it. One loop makes sense, doesn't it? Not even close. Maybe the second one. You basically did like a half marathon to walk off the pain. That's right. Like those Olympics walkers, but we're just focused on the floor. Can I organize thoughts in my head so that this thing that shouldn't hurt me as much as it just did, doesn't? I love that you have to be home where you can be explosive around your children, but not here with strangers. Yeah. And also, I can engage more in the group text I have with your friends as the game goes on, so that we can just check in on each other's welfare. Yeah. Well, you should be doing pretty well this year, right? Top of the table. Yes, right. Salah's injured. Are we worried about that? Is a long call to write about that? Yes, we're worried about that. I'm worried about his mental and physical health constantly. Why do I think you're not joking? I'm not remotely joking. I met him once at the time 100 thing. I kind of had to write an introduction for him. And I turned him early. He was going to be sitting next to me. So he's like his name tag. I was just looking at his name tag thinking he's going to be here in a second. I couldn't fathom how I was going to interact with someone I love that much. And they served food, and then he turned up. And the first thing I said to him was, "Oh, nice to meet you, Mo. I've protected your fish so no one would touch it." And you could see his head thinking, "Well, I'm definitely not eating that fish now." Because that's the thing that someone says after they've just touched my fish. Did you, as those words left your mouth, did you try to grab them? Yes, of course. Oh, that's not a thing. No, no, no, no, no. That's not a thing to say to another human being. Why would his ears want that? No, no, no, no, no. Come back. And you had a lot of time to come up with something. I come up with a lot of things. And then my body decided, "Don't worry, I got this one. Let's make this about the fish protection situation." That's why he wants to hear. He's going to turn up again, "I hope this stranger has addressed the presence of my fish." I'd take it you didn't strike up a friendship from there then. I don't think a friendship was ever going to be appropriate. It can't be a friendship when there's an affection imbalance on that level. Which is not to say that he didn't care about me, though he would absolutely be allowed to do that. It's more that I can't, I cannot interact with footballers because it's too much because I love them too much. I want to be them too much. So there is nothing to say at all. And you were a bit of a footballer growing up. Is that fair to say? I think played. I think physically a bit of a footballer is both harsh and fair. I think my coaches would say, "Yeah, you're a bit of a footballer. Are you a whole footballer?" "No, are you enough of a footballer? Not even for this team." "Are you a bit of a footballer?" "Yes, and that bit is mainly in your mind." "Not the rest of your body." "Yeah, I loved it more than anything else." Yeah. And so you grew up, you were born in Birmingham, grew up just north of London. But a Liverpool fan. Yes. As of your parents. Yeah, my whole family, both sides are all for Liverpool. So yeah, my granddad had a season ticket and so it was not a choice. Can you speak to an American audience who is maybe more obsessed with American football to the passion that you feel as a family, as a fan, as a supporter of Liverpool and what it's like over there? I mean, it's just – it is so important to the city. I don't know that that's not true of certain NFL teams. It does feel like owners of NFL teams have, even to the anger of the cities those teams have been in, decided to move them. That's not something you could do in England without people being murdered. That's not – I know people were angry when the Browns moved to Baltimore, but the people that did it are still alive, right? I'm not saying they should have been killed. I'm saying if you cared enough, you would have done it. Yeah, it is – English football teams are – well, European football teams are intrinsically linked to the cities they're in and so the feelings I have for Liverpool now are that it's especially as someone who lives thousands of miles away is it really is a connection to home, right? You're watching games at the same time as your friends are, so it's like your days – it's a way to synchronize your days in a way. And we're happy with the Fenway Sports Group, the guys who've run it for the last 13, 14 years? I – that's a complicated question, Willie. I think if you ask Liverpool fans, they would never be happy. They – Liverpool was a mess before they came in, so I'm very happy with what they've become. I think it's very important to remember not to get too Drake related, but we started from the bottom. Now we're here. Now we're here. And we didn't start from the bottom. We started from like sixth, but it felt like the boss was taken. So no, they have done a lot – the tricky thing in football European style is that there is an influx of Saudi oil money, Russian oligarchs, and Fenway Sports Group are going to struggle to compete with that money. Now should you try and compete with that money? I think arguably you shouldn't because it makes football non-financially sustainable. And it makes it at best morally gray. You had a great moment at the Emmys where you just won two more. Congratulations. Thanks. Where you were trying to sort of run out the clock for Anthony Anderson's mother. Yes. And you did what? Well, yeah, I guess – I just – I love it when they play people off at the Emmys. I love it. And so that's the most exciting thing is to get to be played off. I couldn't – the first time ever happened was amazing, because I'm talking until that music starts, because as a kid, all I've wanted was not to win something is to be played off. So I knew I was going to do that. You're sick. So I just thought – I'll talk until Anthony Anderson's mom starts yelling at me, and so I started naming the football players, and it was nice to see Trent Alexander-Arnold get some – Yeah. It feels like he's been a while since Trent has been mentioned at the Emmys. I don't know if it was the first time, it shouldn't have been, but it's an inverted full-back role now, Willy. I think that Hollywood needs to understand the right-back role that's changing now. Right. Right. And you will not be silenced on that. No. No. Very brave. Very brave. It says so much about you that you take more glee and being played off probably than holding the awards. Oh, way more. Because holding an award isn't funny. Being played off is funny. And when things are funny, those are my favorite logos. No, it is 19 Emmys for you for this show, 28 for the show altogether. The math on that through 10 seasons is like 2.8 a year. I don't even know how that works, how there are that many Emmys to give a show. It's forgetting into fractions. So few people would round up or down. No. I appreciate, I respect. It's around 2.8. Yeah. Knowing quietly, it's 2.8. A rate of 2.8 per year. Does that ever get old for you to be recognized that way or is it just – No. No, it was observed the first time and it's been observed most recently and I'm massively grateful for multiple reasons. One, it's objectively nice. And two, it does feel like building a slight suit of armour around us as a show so that we can continue to exist. Right. But I'm very grateful for any Academy voter. Please understand that you are personally stopping HBO from doing this. Please keep doing it. As long as you're up there. As long as you're up there, it is. It's a suit of armour in pointy goals form. Another season. There it is. It would look so bad if you were to cancel this. Now if it's just me and two fists, you've got a clean head shot. What was amazing too is they created a new category this year to sort of boot you out of the late talk show group. I think that category already exists. We just got pumped into it. You got shifted around to it. You got pumped into it. Right. You got to punt into it. Yeah. And then you still win a couple. Do you hear from your buddies? Do you hear from Seth and Kimball and all those guys? Like, give us a break. How about one year? No. They've had a break. They had a break this year and they lost to Trevor Noah. Look what happened. They all thought they were second, then Trevor pointed out they weren't. I think they're all gradually understanding it was better when we were there. Then you can be, "Oh, I was just one voter wait." Sure. Tell yourself that, right. Tell yourself that. A little farther down the table than they thought they were. So season 11, as we sit here right now, a few weeks off, I think the day this airs will be the premiere, February the 18th. Oh, good. Tell me about how you're feeling about doing the show you do, which is a heavy lift every week. Yes. During this election year. Is there a relationship between the content you'll be putting out in this election? I mean, we do. Yeah. We used to do a heavy lift each week. Now it takes about six weeks to write and research each story. So now it's like a heavy six week cycle. The stories just move like that. I mean, previously we have felt like we've had to respond in the main body of the show to the election. I'm not sure. That's going to be as true this year because I don't know if there's anything unknown about these two men. That's the kindest thing I can say about this choice of two candidates. I think we're all aware of what we've got here, right. I don't know if they've been able to truffle out anything fascinating about the unexpressed thought of either guy. Yes. So I'm hoping that US elections, as you know, really tend to take up a lot of the air in the room. I mean, and they can be complicit in doing that. This election cycle feels like I don't know what the argument is going to be to just focus on a horse race between two well-known horses. Is that a relief to you in some way? Oh, it's great. We enjoy doing the other stuff with more. Yes. I think we will hopefully we'll be able to protect the main body of our show from whatever has happened on the campaign trial that week. And then we'll just deal with that right at the start of the show as quickly as we can. And so you've already set in motion what you're going to be doing for these first couple of episodes. Thank you for the top for this new season. Yeah. We have a pretty good idea. I don't know what we'll do exactly for the first episode. We have a good idea of some of the more complicated stories that we'll be doing as the year goes on. Hopefully, the election will not ruin that. I think people who love you and love the show would love to hear just the process of how these pieces of comedy journalism, I don't know how do you describe it? Comedy. Comedy. Yeah, yeah, yeah. There is a journalistic quality. There's no revealing truth. There's certainly Joe's underneath it. Yeah. You can't build your jokes on Sandra. Right. Right. It all falls away. So the process begins when for a show. I'm thinking, let's say you're Elon Musk, your last episode. Oh, okay. So I think a different one. I thought you just said, let's say you're Elon Musk. No, no, no. Okay. Great. I have some things to say to the camera. They're going to be really problematic. I've got some views. And this is the forum. So what's the... Welcome to welfare holds back production. What do people find hard to deal about that? I'm still angry about that guy in the cave in Thailand. There we go. We've got the PR clip. John Oliver. We're good to go. The process. How you think about it. How you work through to show. So we'll have like, we'll have everyone picture stories at the show, everyone. And then if there's something that intrigues us, we'll give it a researcher. They'll take that story for a week to check that it's been reported accurately, that were the things of change that affect the story right now. Then if it kind of clears that early test, we'll give it to a footage producer to find out if there's any footage through which we can tell the story, then at that point we'll add writers to the process. By that point, the footage department, the research department will have packets, hundreds of pages of material that the writers can distill, and they will write an outline of the story. Then Tim Carverne and I, who I run the show with, will put the outlines together into one outline. Then they will go and write away, write a draft based on that combined outline. Then we will combine those drafts, and then we're at the final week of production. I mean, I think people who watch 30 minutes, they go, "Oh, he's got it, he's just kind of." He's out there. Off the cuff? Off the cuff? I mean, oh no. Not off the cuff. Oh, but like, I don't think anyone would fully appreciate what goes in to put one of those together. Yeah, I hope that that illustrative and not disappointing, that when you hear they go, "Wow, that much work goes into that end product." It feels like there are some shortcuts that would be advisable there. It just became less impressive somehow. But six weeks to get to that, it's not a bit of a chef says, "Oh, this is a four day process." I mean, a sandwich is quicker and that's good. Yeah. I mean, just thinking about how you put these things together, and I know you've made jokes and you did in that Emmy speech to about once you've crafted it, letting some lawyers read through it. What's the push and pull like there? I mean, there is both push and pull for sure, and then I think we're trying to get ourselves on to the same page. And I appreciate it. I appreciate it. What eventually the lawyers are enabling us to stand on rock solid ground, which means that you can take aggressive swings with jokes and with points that you're making in the story knowing that you are right. I think the only tension comes in degrees of caution. I think that is sometimes where there is whether lawyers want you to say something a certain way or whether you must say something a certain way, and the second part of that is really important, whether lawyers want something to happen, that is of no concern to anybody. Whether it's absolutely imperative that you make sure that a certain amount of pushback is put in, that makes the story better. And we're always reaching out to the companies and the individuals we talk about anyway, because you want to build in their pushback to the body of the show. You expect some kind of response from these. People have talked about the John Oliver effect and all that stuff. I know you've been kind of dismissive of that, but the fact that these do impact, had real world impacts. That's not the goal I know. No. But it's not. And in terms of response from the company that we're talking about, again, those responses should be in the piece. We should have pushback from them or from their lawyers, so that we're already a few steps ahead there. In terms of what happens to the show after we've done it, that point honestly, we're out. We've already moved on. Again, we're doing six shows at a time. So as soon as we have finished taping the show, we will go across the road to our offices and read the drafts that have just come in for the next week's show. Oh, wow. I'm immediately worried about next week. Turn the corner. I've moved on. Wow. Yes. I didn't realize the process moved that fast. Yes. Yes. It's a bit of a meat grinder. Yes. Is it exhausting in some ways? Yeah. It's definitely exhausting. But a good kind of exhausting. Yeah. It's fun. It's fun to be constantly challenged and to constantly see what the staff can come up with because we've changed the process a lot over the years. And so it is exciting to see what they can do when you give them the time and the resources to attack a really complicated story and try and make it fit for human consumption. Hey, guys. Thanks for listening to the Sunday Sit Down podcast. Stick around to hear more from John Oliver right after the break. At KeyBank, we know a small moment like, "Whoa, my kid's got a serious backhand." Can lead to an even bigger question like, "Tennis campus, how much?" And that's the type of moment where we'll meet you. To help you build a savings plan for expenses big and small so your money can make money. Mike, how's that sound? Sounds like Matchpoint. Sounds like love. We could serve up tennis puns all day. 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It's such a ridiculous thing to try and do for your second show and we did it for 12 minutes and that felt like a long time. Now, we wouldn't talk about anything for 12 minutes. You couldn't get into any kind of detail in any subject. We talked about Chuck E. Cheese for 32. So now we go much narrower and much deeper on stories and the fact that people respond to it is like a constant source of pleasant surprise to me. I feel that way, actually, myself, I was not great, there's a big audience for that. Yeah, I think you hypothetically think it's people would be interested in how our organ donation system works if it was explained to them and I think there is incredible journalism done that doesn't necessarily get the attention that it deserves. I think at times we can be a useful aggregator of excellent reporting and put it into a form that people can actually ingest when they might not feel as inclined to read a long data heavy ProPublica article, then we might be able to add some bells and whistles that makes that easier to watch. And I feel like the comic timing is so important, which is to say, sort of journalism, journalism, reporting, and then you just add a left field, you make some absurd reference to bring us back a little bit. That's why, just to give you a little bit of a break, right? Carrot, carrot, carrot, M&M, carrot, finish your carrots. So when you got this job, you left the Daily Show in 2013, I believe, right? Just over 10 years ago. A lot of it, I think, and the people at HBO would say they watched you fill in for John and then he said, "Oh, he can carry a show." Was it terrifying in some ways for you to leave that safe family of the Daily Show and step out on your own? Massively, terribly, because I've been protected for eight years by John Stewart. I've been in his womb of revolting images that is, but it felt like a very safe place to be, completely protected from Comedy Central. I felt that he had faith in me, that made me feel confident, and yes, it was incredibly intimidating and unsettling, to be honest, to leave and strike out on my own without him kind of feeling his presence over my shoulder. Did you hesitate at first? Oh, yeah. Yeah. I hesitate because it seemed crazy, and he said before he left to go and direct his film for the summer, he said, "When I come back, we need to talk about what you're going to do." And that was horrible to hear because all I wanted to do was stay. It was my dream job. All I wanted to do was stay there forever for nothing to ever change. So to have someone say, "Yeah, this is about to finish," was a bit of a gut punch. But his point was, once you kind of have the precious, you're not going to want to give that precious up. And I really vehemently disagreed with him before that precious. My hand and your old s***, yeah, this is kind of shy, it's nice to have. And so he was right, and so, yeah, we started those conversations when he got back. And something else entirely, is it not to step out on your own? For me, that ensemble was lean on other people. Yes. Just even comedically, I would think. Yeah, because there was such joy at the day to show in being part of the kind of engineering team that put that show together, right? But there is definitely a different kind of feeling to get inside that car and drive it. It was really fun to work for the driver, but when you put the pedal down and it moves, it is a kind of exhilarating feeling. That's hard to give up. Yeah. You said The Daily Show was your dream job. Yeah, it's true. And it's something you've thought about for a long time. So when you got that call that they wanted you to come audition and be on the show that you'd dream of being on, were you surprised, number one, and thrilled and terrified and all of those things? Yeah, because it wasn't even come audition, they were just asking people to put things on tape. Right. I was in London, put something on tape, sent it, and then thought, I never need to think about this again. It was kind of fun to do that tape. And then they said, come to New York, and I'd never been to New York before. So I got on a plane, turned up here, stayed just up the road, thought, where shall I go for my first New York experience? Went to Applebee's, not realizing there's more than one Applebee's. Then I am thinking like, Robert did a taxi driver, I'm having some pancakes. Was that your first meal in New York? Fantastic. It's a true American experience. Right here in Midtown? Yes. It's perfect. Yeah, it's a good one. Midtown Applebee's. If you want the quintessential New York experience as a tourist, the Midtown Applebee's is a must. So then, yeah, then I turned up, did an audition with John, and then they said, would you like to live here? What is that? Me? In general? In New York, one day, sure. And they said, well, how soon could you move? And so I went home, put my stuff in storage. It's still there, and South London's still in the storage container in South London. And then I haven't really, I've barely been back. Isn't that amazing? Yes, crazy. And was there any doubt in your mind that you had to come and do this? No, that was it. There was no doubt in my mind that I had to come and do this because what John was doing in the day was the gold standard of comedy about news at that time. There was nothing better. So, and my manager said to me, go, they will fire you after three months, that's what happens in America. It's a great pet talk from someone who's literally your representative, right? You won't have to stay there long because you'll be fired after three months. And so I thought, okay, so that's why I just came with two bags, like a little British fiverr. And I thought, oh, I'll be back in England by September. I think it's a semester abroad. Yeah, that's how I thought I would try and like a sponge, collect as much of this experience as I can, and then maybe try and do something like this back in England. And then I never left. As soon as I got here, I felt totally at home in a way that I hadn't felt at home. So, yes, it was an incredible experience. And I never wanted to leave, which is why it was so hard to do that. And you were kind of a hit right away, listening to John talk about it now, and you know... Again, kind of a hit, I think is fair. No, I'm like a bit of a fiverr. I'm kind of a hit. Like a lowercase watch. Lowercase watch, everything. Just to protect myself. But you listen to John talk about it, and others who, you know, produce it to the show, they're like, he kind of had it right away. Did you feel that way at the beginning? Like, I fit here, this works. I think... Yeah, probably, to be totally honest, it felt like, yeah, it felt like I fit in in a way that again, I hadn't fit in to other places. And it was, I think, the gold standard. So, I felt very, very comfortable kind of committing to it full throttle. And all I wanted to do was that, it was around the time that so many other station corresponders were going and doing... Yeah. I think you would see other correspondents kind of doing sitcoms or bits in movies. All I wanted to do was the station. That's all I wanted to do. I didn't want to do anything else. And when I was hired to do community as a little bit parts on that, I wanted to make it very clear, I can't do this full time, because I have my dream job. So I'll do this whenever I'm free, but whenever the station is on, I want to be in that building, helping make the show, because it's the happiest I've ever been. I love your first field piece, Civil War Re-enactments on the Union side, I should say. You're welcome. You were on the Union side. And it didn't go quite as planned, although then it turned into something historically funny. Yes. So it was... I was fighting for the North, although very good people on both sides. And I had a musket with a knife on the end. And I was... The joke, the only joke really that we had in mind was I would run at the opposing army before they said go, which is how I believe the Civil War began. And so I ran as fast as I could in dress shoes, slipped, fell, smashed my face into the ground, broke my nose instantly. And I knew I was at the right place when my field producer called back saying, "Hey, all of us just been hurt." And their first response was, "Was it on camera?" And he said, "Yeah." He said, "Is it funny?" And he said, "Very." They went, "Okay, great. Send the tape home, take him to hospital." So the tape got back before we did. When I got back into the office, it was just laughter echoing around the walls as people were just playing it back, "Giggly-liggly-ling, wham!" and that complete lack of care for the physical body and total commitment to what is funny really made me think, "I think this is home." Yeah. If your first response is not "Is he okay with it? How funny was it?" Then I'm in the right place. These are my people. Yeah. Absolutely my people. I don't care if I live or die. No. No. If you're going to die, do it funny. Commit to the bit. Do it funny and do it while cameras are rolling. I think for a lot of people, John, they met you on The Daily Show. So they don't really fully understand your appreciation for comedy that you grew up a comedy fan. Yeah, of course. Of all those… There's my favorite. You know, not just Monty Python, but you were in Cambridge. But it's all those things that sort of brought you to where you are. Was that a family thing? Was it a funny family? And they all appreciated the comedy. I think it was when my granddad in Liverpool was really funny, and he always said he had a very funny war, which was not a way to describe the second world war because they were huge laughs around. He had… He was a very funny looking man. He had gigantic ears. He looked like the BFG, and he… It was very clear from him that he valued being able to make people laugh quite highly. He taught me to behave badly as a kid. He would like bang his cupboard on the table and demand food, and as a kid, that's the dream. When you've got an adult who's a bad influence, you're like, "Oh, this guy's incredible." He plays his fiddle to a different tune. So he was very clear that laughter is him was very important. In fact, the last time I saw him, he was in like in a city living facility, it was clear that he wasn't going to have long, and my dad, it was just me and my dad with him, and my dad left to get the car. And I thought he was on the ground floor, so I thought, "I'll just say goodbye, and I'll climb out the window," because that's a stupid thing to do. So I'm the window, climbed out of it, and I've got to try to get through a hedge to the car park, and the last thing I heard him say was, "You're an idiot." There are much worse last things to have a grandparent say to you than you're an idiot chuckling to himself, and he wasn't wrong. Would you give him a laugh? He did that bit. I guess the thing, as death is, you can either have a sincere conversation, or you can climb out of a window to avoid one. You gave him a laugh of. That's amazing. So you've got a funny household, you've got funny relatives, but when does the idea strike you that this is a way a person can have a life and a career? Oh, it hasn't been reached. Yes, I guess it was always in school, it was clear it was a good way to connect with people or to diffuse tense situations. I think it was probably when I got to college that myself and my friend back then, Richard Iwadi, we started writing shows together, and the first one that we did together on stage, I remember walking off, we'd written like an hour show of sketches, walking off stage and feeling different, kind of feeling, "Oh, this is my life now, I don't know if that's good or bad news, but nothing has ever made me feel like this." So from that point on, I think I decided that that's what I was going to do, whatever came from it. And so after leaving college, I immediately just started doing stand up, trying to get any writing job as however bad that I could, and very slowly forging a career in comedy. And so it felt like I had a career as soon as I could sustain myself without having to do other jobs. As soon as I could buy orange juice, that was always, that felt like, because that's a luxury item for orange juice, right? You don't need orange juice, you need water. So if you can upgrade yourself from water to orange juice, you're playing with a house this Monday for that. You made it. Yep. What was that feeling in your hands, the response from the audience? Yeah, I think that definitely, the response from the audience and the feeling of having communicated something that they understood and agreed to be funny. It was a full expression of yourself, yeah, the electrical feeling of people laughing at it, and then your body having this response of, "Well, I need more of that. I'm literally describing heroin." As I've talked about, oh, this is great, but it had that kind of addictive quality of, this is a high that I've not experienced before. I must have more of this. And you still get it. We were just talking about, I saw you on stage and an event a couple of months ago. You and Seth are out doing a stand-up comedy tour. Do you still get that feeling up there? Yeah. I love it. That keeps you coming back. It's my favorite thing to do. It's the only thing that actually calms me down. Really? Right? Yeah. I know it is absurd to say that about something which is many people's literal nightmare, but stand-up is, if I don't do it for a long amount of time, I get angsty. So it is the one place I can really relax and calm down. And comedy is that place for me. It's why during the early days of the pandemic, as everything was shut down with suddenly having to do the show from home, the problem was not having an audience. The problem was the idea that I would not be able to write comedy with people, for people. I didn't mind not having an audience, because as long as I had our staff working together to try and produce funny material from the abyss of human panic, the idea of that being taken away was truly panic-inducing to me. So I didn't mind being stuck in a room. It was not ideal, but stuck in a room delivering jokes to nobody, because at least I was getting to deliver jokes. At least we were getting to work together, even though we weren't together. Stick around for more of my conversation with John Oliver right after a quick break. Capella University is rethinking higher education. With their game-changing flex-path format, you can earn your degree on your schedule, so you can fit education seamlessly into your life. Ima heenato futuro de ultramanera, and Capella.edu. There are some football feelings you can only get with Bet MGM Sportsbook. 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I guess the thing is, once you've bombed 100 times, the audience loses its capacity to hurt you anymore. You can't hurt me any more than they did above a pub in Mosley in 1999. You can't do that. There's nothing left. So yeah, I think lots of comedians find it appealing to see, to either experience a tense situation or to witness their friends doing it. I love seeing Seth moments on a show where jokes struggle and you see like it. There's just like a little soup song of excitement around and you think, look, he's never felt more alive. Where is whenever jokes bomb on our show, they will like pause the screen and say, look at your face. And like, when I've just delivered a joke, I'm really excited about the silence. You'll just see like a spark in my eyes, pure happiness and it goes, there's something about it's so, it's so ridiculous. I guess it's why I love being played off of the enemy's focus. You get so excited to tell a joke, if your whole body is like, you're going to love this and then they don't. I mean, if that's not funny, I don't know what is. See, to a normal, reasonable human being, they would start sweating and say, this is going terribly, I have to run off the stage. All I would say is do that 99 more times and then it'll pick up fun. You've just got to push through 100 nightmares to get to a dream state. And it's worth it on the other side. I really, it's absolutely for you. Can I ask you, John, would you host any of these award shows? Because people say you would be perfect for that because of your lack of fear. Think I would. I don't think I would be perfect. I think I'd actually be very bad for it. So I think I would probably not do that because I know those rooms are a nightmare. And I think it doesn't seem fair to just go to ruin everyone's evening. Would it be fun? Yes. It would be really fun, Willy. It's fun to ruin an entire Oscars, oh my god, my granddad would be so proud. But I think, I don't know if I have the skill to do it both ways in the way that Kimmel and Seth are particularly good, right, of being able to show contempt, enough contempt for a ridiculous, over-the-top occasion while also allowing people to have a good time. I don't think, I think I have too self-destructive a streak to be able to make that a functional evening for everybody. That's why, Kimmel is the perfect Oscar, because he's, my view is that everyone can enjoy it, right? If you like that show, you can enjoy what he's doing. And if you think it's absurd, as I do, you can see that in his face. There's a certain amount of flattery that goes into the job that I don't think you'd be willing to do. No, I think, it's really hard. Before John left for the summer, the thing that I was most worried about was interviewing people, interviewing actors, who's movies, I thought were terrible. And I don't think John was, that is not a part of the job that he was good at. He was good at everything, that was, he was not good at sitting opposite someone and going, tell me about Garfield the movie. There'll be just tiny flickers in his voice where people start laughing, he didn't say anything, he just said, tell me about Garfield, but you can tell his heart's not in it. And yes, those were the white luffel moments that summer were looking opposite someone and saying, thinking, well, four minutes is going to be a really long time. Right. Yeah. You've been four minutes. So, I mean, absolute awe of, I remember talking to one actor who will not, and thinking I'm getting to the end of this interview now, turning to the stage manager, Spindy. And to kind of get a sense of how long have I done, he said, two minutes. This is two minutes. They said, 120 seconds is all that was, because I'm out. I've had that moment, by the way. Two? No. Two minutes left. Two minutes in. Oh. Oh, then I need to mentally pace myself for this, because I'm out of curiosity. You must have sat on this table and thought, ah, I know there's five more questions. Not so much on this show, but on other, sometimes, when you do volume sales, when you do a lot of TV, inevitably you're going to have those moments. I said to Seth, the moments that fill with him mostly are watching him really work. I always loved, let them, because he felt like he was grandfathered in to have enough, he had enough standing that he could just completely disengage from interviews that he's not interested in. The first time I ever did his show, I can't remember who was on, there was some actor who had some, I think it was like a black and white Shakespeare movie, and they played a clip, it came back to the studio and we just looked up and said, "Good luck with that." Wow. I think you have to have been on TV for 40 years to be able to do that and for it to be John. Right. Right. There's a year, if you come after that, you're not allowed to do it. Yes. John, this has been my Garfield interview. Garfield is in theaters and streaming on Fubu. Fubu. Oh my god, that was perfect. Thank you, man. That was so much fun. So we've just got some news that John Stewart is going to return to the Daily Show to do Mondays through the elections. So we're repeating that what was just handed to us on the phone. I presume variety is accurate. It's been passed aboard today. Yes. Yes, apparently so. What do you think? I mean, that is a surprise. Yeah, that is a show that needs a host. He certainly is a very, very good one. So yeah, it'll be exciting to see what he does. I do think after 2025 they should appoint a permanent host. It feels that way, doesn't it? Yes. Yeah. I would, if I had Roy Wood or Amber Ruffin is very good. Yes. But that's going to be very exciting to see John at the end of the election year as well. Yeah. That is, that is watchable. Back in for another bite of the apple. That's right. Yeah. Wow. Yeah, Jordan's back in one more time. So being that we were sitting at McHales, a Liverpool bar, we had to go downstairs to the bar itself and watch some football. So John and I, me with a pint, he with a cup of tea, sat and watched some football as he explained what it means to be a Liverpool fan, what it means to live and breathe. Football, as I told him what it means to live and breathe. American football is a Giants fan. He, by the way, you'll hear is a Jets fan, his adopted team since moving to the United States. So a little football chatter at the bar right now with John Oliver. Okay. So John, who are we watching? So this is Alexis McAllister. He's moved this year. Got a corner here? Yes. He's an audience who won the World Cup, played with Messi. Thank you very much. He's playing, having to play at a position this year? Oh. Yeah. He's had to play at a position this year because he's ideally not a defensive bit of field but he's having to play that way. He's very, very smart football. And I think actually we're, if I remember, we're all right, I think we're about to score. We're down here. One mil. Yeah, I think. Well, you don't know because this is live. Oh, that's right. Yeah, you. Oh, that's right. Unless you had a premonition. This is Joe Gomez, who's a kid. This is, so this is Jürgen Klopp. There he is. Yep. Spectacular manager. Not just in terms of football, but also, there are, I think it might be the same case in Reggulable. They're generally not deep thinkers, coaches. Klopp really is. Yeah. Oh, yeah. That is Joe's local lads. You saw that coming? Yeah. Ow. Yes. Yeah, he's enjoying the pandemic when Liverpool want you on the pandemic. Absolutely incredible. He was about pointing out, trying to defend the existence of football at that time. I didn't feel like it made any sense. And he said football is the most important of the least important things, which feels like a... That's so wise. It's a truly profound thing to say, absolutely true. It felt also, at that moment, when it was a way to still forge a connection when people are so fractured. Yeah. Yeah. He's an amazing guy. We're very lucky to have him. And they've had... He's part of Liverpool's... Oh, right. ...city. Deflected. Oh, yeah. It's not quite as good as it looked. It took, I believe, like, just comes, spins up off his leg. Ah, yes, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Liverpool's a city, a very independent place. It's always felt not really one with England. That's why they don't play the match either, ever, because it gets booed. So there's been a long history of very, very charismatic managers going back to this guy, Bill Shankley, back in the '60s. And he is really part of that. He's really taken to the... He really loves him. Yeah, yeah. Adores him. Yeah. I mean, I think there'll be statues of him. Mm-hmm. Who to use? In football. In America. I'm a giant fan. We've had past success. I picked when I moved here, you know, genuinely could pick. Sure. Couldn't pick a baseball team because he can't can't pick the NBA, he's right. So I got to pick the Jets and the Giants won the Super Bowl right now. Oh, great. You're like, "Can I draft again?" No, no, no. He really felt like, "No, this is about right." Okay. Jets it is. So you ride with the Jets? Through it all. Yeah, through it all. Through the Zack Wilson and the Aaron Rodgers of it all. Well, this is... Mark Sanchez, Bob Fumble. Oh. Through the joy of wishing for Woody Johnson to be happy about something. Through the electrifying, whatever it was, six and a half minutes of... It was her. It was her. What was it? What was it? Oh, it looked like... There we go. What's the last thing that happened? How? And that was the most Jets thing ever. Did they just score again? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Oh, my gosh. Would you rather have Liverpool win a big match, I'd say? Yes. Or win yet another Emmy for the show? I mean, there's a heart on the head talking there, right? It's Emmy's very important as a protective mechanism against being cancelled. The heart is saying, "I don't know what this guy's talking about." It's... Liverpool. Which do you have a physical response to when it's... Right. This is it. This is the... Yeah. When Liverpool won the league during COVID, it was incredibly meaningful to me in a way I can't justify because it, you know, football sport in general doesn't matter as much as you kind of feel it does. You know, it's just a game. And when the death count is spiking, you know, it's even less important. And yet, it meant a huge amount to me to see Liverpool win. Well, it means less intellectually, but here, there's no diminishing match. No, there's no... Because it's childlike joy. Yes. It lifts you out of yourself. Yes. I can still remember going on my first ever game and Liverpool scoring and my dad hugging me. I can remember the smell, I can remember the sound his coat made as he hugged me and it's just because they scored. Right. So those are the... It's those moments. Yes. That's what it is for me. It connects me back. Yeah, exactly. Exactly. It gives you childhood father, grandfather... Yeah, it gives you... Yeah, it gives you deeper as you get older. Yes. Well, it's kind of just an elemental, like, binary joy and pain when you're a kid. Now, especially, I will say, living in a different country, that's what it really does tether you to the same emotions that you know people are feeling and the emotions that, yeah, that it can stir up from how you felt 30 years ago. And then, for me to watch my children take up the cause, too, and feel that same joy and pain with the team. Do your kids watch with you? They do. Yeah. They do. They don't like it when I yell. I understand that. But I've tried to explain to them this is not something in the control of. Sure. So, you don't like the sound of my extreme excitement and joy? What about that sound repels you so much? This is me happy. You'd like me to mute that? Oh, okay. You're scaring us, Dad. But, yeah, no, there was to see them, yeah, to see them sing most of our's name, or there was a guy who'd played for us for years. He left, they called Bobby Firmino, and there was a great song that fans used to sing about him. So, if I was in one room and I just shouted out, "See, senor." I know that whatever they were doing, they would look up and say, "Pastor Bo to Bobby and he will score the big break." You've done it. I've done it. Yeah. So, you agree this is your team? We're done. Yeah. You'll have so many choices in your life. This is not going to be one of them. Exactly. Yeah. But it sounds like that's set in stone now. They're on board. Yeah. If they wanted to really hurt me, they would say, "I'd like to be a man united for him." Ooh. And I'd say, "Well." And I'd encourage you to find a household in which that's appropriate. And are they jet fans too? Have you ever thought of that upon you? No, no. If they can choose, they can choose anything else but this. Sure. Anything. Right. Honestly, they can be Yankees fan, if they want. They just can't choose this. Okay. That's it. It seems fair. Yeah. This guy's crazy. Oh, this is worse. Not very much. Oh, I doubt that we are any. Great minutes. Do you follow this at all? I bet. I do. I do. I think it's going to be quite big here in a couple of years. It's getting there. It's definitely getting there. And I think it will change because for the first time America is going to have an actually a good team. I think America's thought it's had a good team in the past. Yes. It's been wrong about that. Yes. Mine was on always. He's the greatest thing. It's C minus football player. He's fine, but he's not even here. And we've been hearing it for... Yes. 30 years. It's had a new pellet. And the rest of what it's like. He is not the new pellet, unless there's a different pellet that you're talking about. We do run the pellet very well. Yes. Better than we do in the football. But there are some... For the first time, there are some legitimately very good American players studying out. Okay. Which is very good. Yeah, he's good. But, yes. They're everywhere. You've got a cosplay for Barcelona now. Yep. I went two years ago in Buenos Aires. I went to the... Wow. That was the name of the match. The two big teams down there. The two big teams. Oh, genius. Yeah, both the two. Holy shit. My sister was living down there. And it just happened to be... Was Maradona there? No, it was later than that. But it was... I was like... You know, the fireworks in the stadium. Oh my God. And I was like... Oh my God. I was like... I get it. Have you seen that Maradona documentary? Yes. Phenomenal. Incredible. Phenomenal. Yes. But that was the moment where I got football, because I grew up here and played as a kid but then started playing football and I was like, okay, I see. Got it. You know? Yeah. Yeah. 100%. My big thanks to John for a great conversation and to McHales in Midtown Manhattan for hosting us. Last week tonight on HBO or streaming on Max. And my thanks, as always, to all of you for listening again this week. If you want to hear more of our conversations every week, be sure to click follow so you never miss an episode. And don't forget to tune in to Sunday Today, every weekend on NBC. I'm Willie Geist. We'll see you right back here next week with Sunday Sit Down Pie. Capella University is rethinking higher education. With their game-changing flex path format, you can earn your degree on your schedule. So you can fit education seamlessly into your life. Ima heenato futuro de ultramanera and capella.edu. [BLANK_AUDIO]