Stephen Colbert has spent decades making his fans laugh, but beneath the talk show host's
signature deadpan and his encyclopedic knowledge of all things Tolkien is a man who has faced
incredible tragedy in his personal life.
Tragedy strikes his family
When Stephen was just 10 years old, his family faced the unthinkable.
His father, James, and teenage brothers Paul and Peter were killed when their plane crashed
in 1974.
Colbert opened up about the devastating loss, telling Oprah,
"For years, I sort of thought that was my secret name.
That that loss was my name."
He explained,
“That's a name that no one can ever really pronounce because that's who you are."
He then added,
"There's a magic to your secret name.
And that was my secret name, the loss of my father and my brothers."
Finding the humor
Colbert admitted in an interview with Howard Stern, that lightening up his mother's spirits
after such a dark time was what first drew him to comedy.
He explained,
"I think there's no doubt that I do what I do because I wanted to make her happy."
He went on to reveal that their relationship was closer than most kids are with their parents.
He remembered,
"I was there with my mom, she was there for me, and I sort of kept her going.
Mom and I used to joke that I raised my mom, because at a certain point it had changed
her completely and it changed me completely."
Reality sinks in
Although he was just 10 when his father and brothers were killed, Colbert was almost twice
that age before the profundity of their deaths would really hit him.
He admitted to Oprah,
"I didn't really feel the loss until I was in college.
Then, ugh, then I was in bad shape."
He went on to reveal,
"I went into college at about 185 pounds.
By the end of my freshman year, I was 135."
Colbert theorized that his sudden deep sadness may have had something to do with the fact
that he was no longer living at home, and that he finally found himself alone with his
grief.
He said of the lapse in his reaction,
"It seemed like a long time at the time, but now at age 48."
"It seems like the blink of an eye."
A crisis of faith
These days, Colbert is a devout Catholic, but there was a time when he almost gave up
on his faith for good.
In a discussion with Faith in Focus, he revealed that shortly after graduating college, he'd
given up on the idea of God.
Then, he had a chance encounter with a stranger.
He remembered that he,
"Had lost my faith in God, and to my own great grief that I was sort of convinced that I
had been wrong all this time."
He continued,
"I was walking down the street and someone handed me […] a little green New Testament
Proverbs and Psalms."
When he opened it, he found an index of verses to turn to during challenging times, and,
when he looked to the suggestions for anxiety, he found exactly what he needed.
"I was absolutely immediately lightened."
He said that he finally understood what people mean when they say something speaks to them,
adding,
"I stood on that street corner in the cold and read the sermon.
And my life has never been the same."
Grieving his mother's death
In 2013, Colbert's mother, Lorna, died at 92.
"My mother Lorna Tuck Colbert died.
And I wanna thank everybody who offered their thoughts and prayers"
Stephen had taken time off from shooting The Colbert Report to be with her in her final
days.
And when he returned, he delivered a funny and touching monologue in tribute to her.
"When you watch this show, if you also like me, that's because of my mom."
He went on to share a little about his mother, remembering,
"She had trained to be an actress when she was younger, and she would teach us how to
do stage falls by pretending to faint on the kitchen floor."
He then added,
"We were the light of her life, and she let us know it 'til the end.
And that's it.
Thank you for listening."
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