EL SEGUNDO, Calif. — For over 20 years,The Daily Show has drawn laughs from current events, especially politics. This year, the late-night progam earned two Emmy nominations, including Outstanding Variety Talk Series.
With the Democratic National Convention kicking off Monday and the Republican Convention beginning just a week later, there is no better time than the present for the satirical show's contributers to gear up for a plethora of juicy material.
"I think the problem this year versus 2016, it's not, 'How do we reach the people?'" said Daily Show correspondent Roy Wood Jr. "It's, 'Which story to follow?' Because you know, at the RNC, there's gonna be 50 different stories."
In the meantime, here are five things you need to know about The Daily Show and two of its longtime correspondents:
- Comedian Desi Lydic has been on The Daily Show for the last five years. "We’re trying to plot out what we can and we definitely have some ideas for some field pieces to prep ahead of time," Lydic said. "And then we’re just going to have to roll with it, be flexible, see what happens and come up on the fly. We’re The Daily Show, that’s what we do."
- Wood Jr., who has also been on the show for the last five years, performs stand-up comedy, deejays, acts, produces, and writes. "Pence and Trump is like watching The Hangover Part 4," he said. "You know what’s going to happen, they’ll lose a friend, there’ll be some crazy stuff, Mike Tyson is going to be a tiger and then the movie is going to go off. At least with Biden and Kamala, there’s new places to find comedy and there might be policies passed that won’t leave the country in shambles, people in pain and in cages, possibly."
- The Daily Show premiered on July 21, 1996 and was hosted by Craig Kilborn until December 17, 1998. Jon Stewart then took over as the host from January 11, 1999 until August 6, 2015. Stewart was succeeded by Trevor Noah, whose tenure began on September 28, 2015.
- Past correspondents include Steve Carell, Stephen Colbert, Ed Helms, John Oliver and Samantha Bee. In June 2010, actress-comedian Olivia Munn began a tryout period on the show as a correspondent.
- The Daily Show has inspired numerous other talk shows, such as The Colbert Report, The Nightly Show with Larry Wilmore, Full Frontal with Samantha Bee, Last Week Tonight with John Oliver and The Opposition with Jordan Klepper.
The Daily Show with Trevor Noah airs weeknights at 11p.m. ET/PT on Comedy Central.