-John Oliver, it is so great to see you.
-Thanks for having me. -Welcome back to the show.
Did you do anything for the holidays?
Did you get any time off before you start going back to work?
-I got COVID. Does that count? -Wow, no.
-That counts. That's something, right?
First time. I thought I was indestructible.
I wasn't. -Oh, gosh.
-I got that. The kids got RSV.
That counts as something as well.
-Oh, my gosh. This is insane.
-Yeah, the Oliver family's been ill, Jimmy.
-Yeah, they, really -- Yeah. But no celebrating or --
-No, we tried to celebrate as much as we could.
Then I went to Chicago to do some stand-up, so that was nice.
I did that over on New Year's Eve.
[ Scattered cheers ] That's --
It's not clear -- It's not clear whether they're supporting
the city of Chicago or the live arts.
[ Laughter ] -The live arts.
But New Year's Eve, you like working on New Year's Eve?
-I love working on New Year's Eve.
-Really? -Because it means you don't have
to do anything else on New Year's Eve.
So it's partly 'cause I love doing stand-up and it's fun.
And it's partly because it stops me having to go to
any New Year's Eve party, where I will not be value added.
-Yeah. [ Laughter ]
-No party is going up a notch.
-When you're there on New Year's Eve.
-You know, like, when, like, LMFAO walk into a room?
What a dated reference that is.
[ Laughter ] [ Rim shot ]
-That's a fantastic -- -Oh, my God.
-I literally -- I was thinking, "Who, who --"
[ Laughter ]
"Who would really elevate a party?
Those two guys from LMFAO." You know.
-Of course. Yeah.
-"Party rock is in the house, tonight."
-Absolutely, yes! They are a party.
-"Everybody just have a good time."
[ Rhythmic clapping ]
-Yeah, with the glasses. -Yeah.
Picture that. -Yeah.
-Picture the opposite of that, and you're looking at it.
-That's you. Alright, yeah. [ Laughter ]
So, are you on stage at midnight?
-No, I would not do that.
I did it once, actually, the last time I was in Chicago.
The reason I stopped being on stage at midnight
was I had to do the countdown.
And there was a guy there and he was in the front row.
And I was about to do the 10 of the 10 seconds.
And he put this bottle down, and he said, "I've got some Malort."
I didn't know what Malort was. It's like --
[ Audience groans ] Oh, it's not good.
[ Laughter ] -Malort?
-It's like a fizzy wine. -No.
-No? What is it? -It's terrible.
-It's terrible, yeah. [ Laughter ]
-Thank you. That's a nice way of putting it.
"It's not a fizzy wine. It's terrible."
-You're not even willing to describe it more than that.
[ Laughter ] Just "it's terrible."
-It's just terrible. -It's a bad liquid.
You are right. [ Laughter ]
I think it's made -- Yeah, he put it down.
And then he said, "Drink this," like a bully.
And then a guy at the other side of the theater, who,
I can't stress this enough, had not come with him,
ran down the side, and he had, like, one of those, like,
bullet belts with shot glasses in it.
So he'd worn that to a show.
And to my show, not to LMFAO's show...
[ Laughter ] ...where it might be welcome.
-He wore a vest of shot glasses? -Yeah.
And so he said -- So, he put his shot glasses on the front of
the stage, thinking I'm like Jesus at sermon of the mount.
"I will take this one bottle of Malort
and get this room [bleep]-faced."
-Yeah, exactly, yeah. -And yeah.
So, I took one sip. It was so unpleasant,
"terrible," to quote your audience member,
that I failed to count down from 10 to 1 accurately.
I missed New Year's Eve and ruined everybody's night.
[ Laughter ] -Don't do that ever, ever again.
[ Applause ] Please, don't do that.
-Yeah. So, no, I was done. Yeah.
-A few months ago, you hosted this event
for the Clooney Foundation.
-I did. Yeah, the Albie Awards. It was fantastic.
They honored Maria Ressa, Albie Sachs.
It was an incredible night. -When George Clooney calls
and asks to do this, do you go, "Oh, yeah, whatever you need"?
-Yeah. I don't know if I'm really at the point in my life
where you can take an unexpected call from George Clooney
and go, "Yeah, no."
-Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. [ Laughter ]
-Yeah, so it was -- but it was
an amazing, amazing organization they are.
And they were celebrating some incredible people.
And it was -- yeah, it was a magical, spectacular night.
-You had a great table. -I did.
-Yeah. -What do you got?
-Well, I have a picture of -- -Oh, yeah!
-You and Meryl Streep having a blast.
-Yes. Now, I found out about this photo 'cause one of
our writers dropped that photo the next day
in our Slack channel with the message, in all caps,
"What the [bleep] was happening here?"
[ Laughter ]
That felt like a fair question.
And honestly, I don't have the answer to it.
I don't know what Meryl Streep had said.
I will say, that is typically not the dynamic
a comedian is looking for. [ Laughter ]
It's supposed to be the other way round.
I'm supposed to be making Streep laugh.
[ Laughter ]
-Meryl Streep is cracking you up.
-I don't know what she said, but she was destroying.
[ Laughter ] Yeah.
-That's really funny. -Yeah. She's clearly very funny.
That's a photographic evidence artifact.
-I wanted to ask you about another photo.
And I'm gonna show it, not because it's a cute baby photo.
-What is it? -It is a cute baby, but --
-Oh. -It's a cute baby, but it's you,
but you're wearing a sweater that has your full name on it.
[ Laughter ] -Yeah. I don't know.
-I've never seen that in my life.
-I don't know how that got on to the Internet.
But, yeah, that is me, as you can tell.
By the sweater, not the face.
And, yeah, I think what is amazing,
is that I don't remember, either, who knitted that,
but I think it is a bold choice to go --
-Full name. -Full name is a bold choice.
First name, cute. -It's so cute.
-Full name feels like you're about to put
the phone number underneath it.
[ Laughter ]
That feels like, "If lost, please deliver to this address."
[ Laughter ] Yeah.
-Did this kid -- -More people should do that.
-Did this kid think that he was going to host a show
and win awards and be one of the funniest people on Earth?
-I think that kid knew one thing,
and that's that his name was John Oliver.
[ Laughter ]
No, no. That kid was not aware of that fact, at all.
-But were you into comedy originally or in acting?
-Oh, comedy. -Yeah.
-I mean, I acted in school plays, but, you know,
I don't think we need to bring up how good I was
as Fagin in "Oliver." [ Laughter ]
-Hold your applause.
-Oh, they held it. [ Laughter ]
Even this audience, which is supportive,
were going, "That sounds like any child."
[ Laughter ]
Yeah, so I liked it, but no, I'm not an actor.
In fact, I did -- I did a show called "Community" for a while.
[ Cheers and applause ] Yeah.
I think I realized just how little of an actor I was
when I was doing a scene with Gillian Jacobs in a car
and she was crying in this scene,
and I remember just watching her thinking,
"Oh, look, you're crying now. That's a real --"
[ Laughter ]
"It's got a real tear. You look really sad.
And yet we were just talking and you weren't sad,
but now you're being sad, and the tear rolled down."
And I was watching the tear go down her face.
-And you're in the scene with her?
-And it hit me, "Oh, I'm giving this individual
nothing to work with, absolutely nothing."
-Disaster. -Yeah.
-"You're a real actor." -Yeah, she did not need
anyone -- You know when you see like behind the scenes
of movies and there's, like, an actor acting opposite
a tennis ball? -Yes.
-I was that tennis ball. [ Laughter ]
-That's very nice of you. -We did once actually
on the show, we got these wax presidents,
and Laura Linney was acting opposite a wax
Warren G. Harding, and she was acting so well
you realize, "Oh, you've just been carrying
actors your entire career."
[ Laughter ] -She's that good.
-She is that good, yeah. -She's that good.
-Let's talk about "Last Week Tonight."
It's going into season 10. -Sure. Yes.
[ Cheers and applause ] Double figures. Double figures.
Big 10. Big 10, yeah. -Wow, double -- Yeah.
Does it feel like 10 seasons?
-Not really, no, 'cause we haven't --
You know, we haven't really stopped.
So it kind of feels like one long splurge of work.
-Yeah. -Yeah, the only time it really
hit me just how long it's been, is that we were
asking the writers for ideas for our new poster this year.
And one of our writers, Seena, he said, "I got one for you."
And he just said, "Let's just take a photo of you now
and a photo from our original poster.
And then we'll --" Yeah.
So, this is what our poster is for the coming season.
"It's only been nine years." So, that's --
[ Laughter and applause ]
That's me nine years ago. [ Cheers and applause ]
That, Jimmy. -Nine years. That's it.
-I don't think you need to be an official doctor
to know that this is not ideal.
[ Laughter ]
That is not aging at its ideal form.
When you're zero to 9, you're allowed to change.
Baby, child, fine.
9 to 18, you're allowed to change.
I don't think nine years can do that to a human being
unless you are President of the United States.
-No, no. -This guy had his whole life
ahead of him. Look at him. [ Laughter ]
He's thinking, "Obama's the president right now.
Sure, he's a little technocratic,
disappointing in some ways,
but it seems like America's on the right track.
There hasn't been a pandemic since 1918.
What's the worst that could happen?"
This guy [bleep] around and found out.
[ Laughter ] [ Cheers and applause ]
-Unbelievable. Come on, man.
John Oliver, everybody. [ Cheers and applause ]
John and I are playing a new game after the break.
Stick around. Come on back. -Yes.