Photo: Charles Sykes/Bravo via Getty Images
The big news in late night this week was covered succinctly by Jimmy Kimmel on Thursday night. Brendan Carr’s FCC is still twisting its panties over the existence of talk shows (don’t worry, Netflix wants to make them all video-only “podcasts”). This time, Carr’s freak-out was an attempt to stretch the FCC’s equal-time rules to apply to talk shows — both late night and daytime. Will we see Trump in the Spirit Tunnel in 2028? Only time will tell. “I want to just point it out because it is another example of this administration trying to squash anyone who doesn’t support them by following the rules,” Kimmel said. “And we know how much respect these people have for the rules.” Kimmel then cut to a Truth Social post where Trump floated a fourth term in office; never mind that a third would be illegal. Cool, cool.
These shows really do give voice to people who feel pretty voiceless at the moment. The catharsis provided for the audience of The Late Show when Bernie Sanders is the guest can’t be overstated. The gleeful “YEEEAAH!” scream of the woman who was big-upping Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s canvassing team was unreal. Or when Tommy Brennan played the clip of the ICE agent eating it on Minnesota ice over and over again on “Weekend Update.” People screamed in glee every time — to the point you couldn’t hear the people in the video doing the exact same. Here’s where we found group catharsis or escape this week.
It has been so gratifying to watch the wider world learn what Bravo fans (and anti-Zionists) have known for a while now: Michael Rapaport sucks. Johnny Weir threw great shade on Watch What Happens Live Tuesday night, perfectly warping a “say three nice things” challenge to all be low-key insults. When the nicest thing you can say about someone is “He’s recently learned what commiserate means,” it’s over. Also, crazy Bumpit on Weir; looking forward to some more interesting hairpieces this Olympics season.
The best moment from last year’s SAG Awards (we don’t have to call them the Actor Awards yet, do we?) was Harrison Ford pulling focus during Jessica Williams’s “I am an actor” speech. And whoever was selling Ford kooky socks at Paul Smith agreed, apparently. Williams recounted the time Ford called her post-SAGs on The Late Show, and she and Colbert swapped Ford anecdotes. In private, he does a lot of hand talking — who knew?
Full disclosure: I grew up in Indiana, and this football win means a lot to people I know on Instagram. But we’re not here to discuss college football, per se. We’re hear to see, essentially, a stupid human trick. Hoosiers QB Fernando Mendoza smashed vinyl records with a football, and it rocked. It’s just cool to see a physical feat that neither you nor anyone you’ve ever met can do. It’s what’s motivating that guy to climb that building today on Netflix. Humans are weird and they do weird shit with their weird bodies, and it’s neat to behold.
It’s the way Cue Card Wally runs over to taste-test the two sandwiches from Molly Baz and Seth Meyers. Wally Feresten was the impartial judge of a sandwich draft Baz devised between her and Meyers. The two sandwiches did both look tasty, and the competition was spirited and playful. But the heart of the piece was a guy stoked to eat two sandwiches. Peacock should green-light Somebody Feed Wally posthaste.
Imagine a legend in your field approaching you with the salutation of “Wassup, Choppy?” What do you do? Mary J. Blige was faced with that predicament when recording with Aretha Franklin. Apparently, it was a compliment, like she has the chops? It’s unclear. Blige shared her memory of recording “Don’t Waste Your Time” with the Queen of Soul, who came in hot before Blige’s mother showed up, “and shit cooled off real quick,” Blige said. “My mother said, ‘You know that’s my baby?’ And so the rest is history. She and my mother became cool. But it didn’t stop Aretha from being mean.” This is the kind of legendary tea we go to WWHL for. It’s the raison d’être of the show, and it fulfilled its purpose Monday night.