The L.A. Times provides a sneak peek into the joke writing process for the upcoming Oscars telecast which will be hosted by Jon Stewart of The Daily Show.
[I]f you're in the late-night comedy business, you have to go after Cheney this week, however much you're craving to do bits on North Korea or the secretary of Agriculture — and if you're writing the opening extravaganza and monologue for the Oscar broadcast, you've got to come up with "Brokeback Mountain" stuff and George Clooney stuff, no matter how many others are doing it. The trick is simply to do it smarter and funnier, and that's the challenge for Stewart and his partners in both endeavors, Ben Karlin, executive producer of "The Daily Show," and David Javerbaum, its chief writer.
"I'm not doing this for posterity," he says of hosting Oscar night. Stewart leans back behind his desk and explains how these awards are a 78-year-old entity and a pretty sweet franchise and he'll be borrowing interest from it, not the other way around. Can he bring a slightly different atmosphere? "That may be," he says.
"My impulse is always to start with absurdity, either the absurdity of me doing it, or whatever the absurdity may be of this year's films ... I'll do that or I will come up with a song parody that somehow figures out a way to rhyme 'Syriana' and 'Capote,' which is not going to be easy," though that quip comes out a little stale, the line perhaps past its expiration date, just as Cheney bits may be by Oscar night.
"But I'm hoping that the vice president shoots someone [else], probably around March 3, March 4," Stewart says.
Bruce Vilanch is busy writing the inane banter that goes on between presenters, but Stewart has two writers who used to work for The Onion and who helped him write America: The Book to help him with the monologue. We'll definitely be tuning in.
