I’ve been a fan of Last Week Tonight with John Oliver pretty much since it’s inception, as my regular readers may have guessed. Last Week Tonight is funny, insightful, enraging, and understands that sight gags, especially those involving mascots, are comedy gold. Like Jon Stewart and The Daily Show before him, Oliver pushes back at the label of “journalist,” even as he delivers information that might otherwise be called news. (Considering Oliver started as a faux “senior correspondent” of various topics at The Daily Show, it’s familiar ground).
In this interview by Lulu Garcia-Navarro for The New York Times, Oliver takes a closer look on the program itself, how it’s changed over the years, and how he defines the boundaries between his work and true journalism. Personally, I like to call it “investigative comedy,” but whatever you call it, it makes for an interesting discussion: