• A few additions to the Big List, including Rodale tonight at Django. (Will Dave Zinczenko permit beer? So many carbs!) Full, updated list is after the jump.
We got cranky last night when we discovered The Daily Show was a rerun. Now we feel bad about that.
As it turns out, before Daily Show host and fake news darling Jon Stewart was funny, he was a soccer jock. Too gentle for lacrosse and too petite for football, Stewart played kickball at William & Mary from 1981-1983 — until he realized that no Jew should have quadriceps like that.
The Thurber Prize for American Humor was presented last night in a ceremony at — where else? — the Algonquin. The three finalists were America (The Book), by Jon Stewart, Ben Karlin, and David Javerbaum; The Borowitz Report: The Big Book of Shockers, by Andy Borowitz; and Funny in Farsi: A Memoir of Growing Up Iranian in America, by Firoozeh Dumas. Adam Gopnik, one of the three judges, hosted the proceedings. A bookishly humorous (or perhaps humorously bookish?) spy reports:
The Times today looks at Comedy Central's forthcoming Colbert Report, which debuts Monday, and considers the tough terrain faced by television spinoffs:
We attended last night's profoundly weird Magazine Publishers of America panel, "Laughing Matters: Magazines Celebrate Humor," at which Jon Stewart interviewed four top editors — Vanity Fair's Graydon Carter, Time's Jim Kelly, Cosmo's Kate White, and Men's Health's Dave Zinczenko — about, theoretically, the role of humor in magazines. It was really more of a free-for-all rant.
• You can't even win in magazine publishing by appealing to the lowest common denominator, as tabloid king David Pecker is learning the hard way. [BusinessWeek]
• You can win, though, by appealing to the just-better-than-lowest denominator, as Jann Wenner — and his Us staff of the cool girls — has learned the fun way. [WP]
• OK! America has the Britney baby pix, allegedly. It's amazing what a little scratch can get you. [Access Hollywood via MSNBC]
• Oprah re-opens book club to works by contemporary authors. Jonathan Franzen is appalled. Then pleased. Then appalled again. [NYT]
• Economist gives free subscriptions to influential bloggers. We didn't get one, so take a guess who doesn't get a comments invitation. [Folio:]
• New weekend WSJ is a "spectacular bellyflop," says William Powers. Come on, tell us what you really think. [National Journal]
• "I'm a chiropodist," The Daily Show's Stephen Colbert tells his kids, according to the Times Mag. [E&P]
From Page Six today:
We love Jon Stewart, and we love The Daily Show. We really do. But one thing has been bothering us since about 11:02 last night:
• MPA finally decides which editors will get the privilege of bantering with Jon Stewart: VF's Graydon Carter, Time's Jim Kelly, Cosmo's Kate White, and Men's Health's Dave Zinczenko. "Here's hoping he's a Men's Health fan," says Zinczenko. Oh yeah, we're sure he is. [WWD, second item]
• The special prosecutor might try to keep Judy Miller in jail for even longer. Which means only one thing: More Mediterranean cruises for husband Jason Epstein! [E&P]
• Now Roger Ailes is in charge of Fox's TV stations, too. They'll be even fairer and balanceder. [NYT]
• Effective yesterday, it's World News Tonight, not World News Tonight With Peter Jennings. [USAT]
• In the all-Target New Yorker, the discount chain comes off as like Kim Jong Il. Or something like that. [Design Observer]
• Back from imaginary Thanksgiving with the Murdochs, Simon Dumenco is drafting imaginary decency memos at the FCC. [Ad Age]
• Hey guess what? The kids like the cable networks' late-night fare, like Jon Stewart and Family Guy. And advertisers like to go where the viewers are. [LAT]
• The Bancroft family controls Dow Jones & Co., which publishes The Wall Street Journal. But the way they've been selling their stock, the family might not for much longer. [NYP]
• The newest New Yorker writer: Former WP managing editor Steve Coll. [NYT]
• Thanks to the new Wallpaper*, you can peek inside Rupert Murdoch's fridge. [WWD]
• David Carr remakes that Observer classic, "When Rupert met Hillary..." [NYT]
• Dan Rather liked Peter Jennings, too. [NY Mag]
• For foreign-policy types, sexy pictures in the new Playboy. [Media Mob/NYO]
• At Advertising Week in September, the headline event will be Jon Stewart interviewing four yet-unnamed prominent magazine editors. We really hope it's Newsweek chief Mark Whitaker. We hear he's a laugh riot. [AdFreak]
• "[B]logs are often just a way of making oneself appear on the Internet," observes NYT editorial. No word on whether newspapers are a way for making oneself appear in print, of if TV is a way for making oneself appear on TV. [NYT]
• More on the Murdoch Family Feud: It wasn't that Rupe couldn't let go, it was that Lach just didn't care enough. And dad was very disappointed in him, young man. [Economist]
• Top flack Peter Costiglio to leave Time Inc. at end of summer. Also, EIC Norm Pearlstine could hand over the top chair to editorial director John Huey around then, too. Ah, they grow up so fast these days. [NYP]
• Army Archerd to end column, but not leave Variety. [NYT]
• Will Fairchild honestly name a new editor to take over Jane within the next week? And does this new editor actually exist as of yet? [Folio]
• NYT Arts & Leisure czarina Jodi Kantor gives up the big job for a reporting slot at The Way We Live. "After a couple of years in the building," she says in the memo, "I'm dying to get out and actually report some stories myself." Sure. And Willy Loman was dying to drive from city to city and make no sales. [Romenesko Memos]
• The removal of the couch shows that Jon Stewart is trying to take on Ted Koppel. Or something like that. [LAT]
• Fairchild interns think Fairchild's new dress guidelines make no sense, reports Fairchild's WWD. [WWD, fourth item]
• Like the Catholic church and sinners vs. sins, Seventeen chief Atoosa Rubenstein doesn't hate blogs. Just the no-longer-anonymous bloggers she nearly hires to work for her. [Jossip]
• More fun with maybe/once-anonymous bloggers: Hot on the trail of Imaginary Socialite, Daily Transom builds us to a great climax. Then, natch, it doesn't finish. Sigh. [Daily Transom]
"Daily Show" host/comedian Jon Stewart engages his in-house "media analyst," Stephen Colbert on media coverage of the war in Iraq:
Jon Stewart: What should the media's role be in covering the war?
Stephen Colbert: Very simply, the media's role should be the accurate and objective description of the hellacious ass-whomping we're handing the Iraqis.
Jon Stewart: Hellacious ass-whomping? Now to me, that sounds pretty subjective.
Stephen Colbert: Are you saying it's not an ass-whomping, Jon? I suppose you could call it an ass-kicking or an ass-handing-to. Unless, of course, you love Hitler.
TV's boldest news show [Salon]
