Sunday Sitdown with Willie Geist - Trevor Noah

Episode Date: June 17, 2018

When Jon Stewart announced he would give up his hosting chair on “The Daily Show” after 16 years, almost no one speculated his replacement would be Trevor Noah. In this week’s “Sunday Sitdown,” Willie Geist chats with the popular comedian about his astounding journey from apartheid South Africa where his biracial background was literally a crime to now sitting in that famous chair. Noah also discusses his unique approach to covering today’s politics and breaking through in a crowded late-night field. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Hey guys, Willie Geist here with another episode of the Sunday Sit Down podcast. Thanks as always for clicking, for subscribing. My guest this week is Trevor Noah, the Emmy Award-winning host of The Daily Show on Comedy Central, a job he inherited from John Stewart a couple of years ago. And as he readily admits, everyone had to Google his name when the news came out. But it was John Stewart who saw something in Trevor Noah after just three or four appearances on the Daily Show as a correspondent and thought he could carry the torch and take the job on to what it is. now and what it always has been. His personal story is absolutely incredible. We get into a big conversation of that, but the Cliff's notes are he was born in apartheid South Africa to an African mother and a white father. That was literally a crime at the time he was born. You could not have a mixed-race child. So essentially, he had to hide throughout his childhood. If he were seen on the streets with his mother who was darker than him, he'd raise suspicion. If he were seen with his father, who obviously had lighter skin than him, that would raise his children. He would raise his suspicion. He could have been arrested. They could have put Trevor into an orphanage. It's an

incredible personal story and then to think that he found humor and a career in comedy getting out of that. We'll talk about all of it. We'll talk about the Daily Show, how it treats President Trump. What he thinks goes too far in comedy. Is there a line in comedy? Has that line changed under President Trump? We talk about his stand-up comedy tour and the Trevor Noah Foundation, among many other things. I think you're going to love this conversation with Daily Show host, Trevor Noah. Thanks for having us in your home. Thank you so much for coming.

So we're just talking about the complexities and the challenge every day, putting a daily show like this on. Let's take today, for example, your process, you come in in the morning, what does it look like? Well, I mean, I feel like the days have started earlier and they end later now.

The new cycle is not what it used to be. You know this better than anybody. We live in a world now where the president speaks at any time. You know, his thoughts are unfiltered and they go straight out into the zeitgeist. And so the day, starts with, you know, reading the news before you get in, the day starts watching the news

before you get in, and then we consume it together at the show. And then it's trying to figure out what you're delving into. Are you speaking about Rudy Giuliani and his comments about Somi Daniels, or are you talking about Malcolm Jenkins and the Philadelphia Eagles, or are you going to speak about the trade policies and the G7 summit that's coming up? All of these are ideas that we're trying to put together whilst also thinking about making the most entertaining show. Because at the end of the day, if the daily show is not funny and entertaining, then I don't think I'm doing my job. One of the things we run up against is we'll have a show plan and we go on at 6 a.m. and a tweet is launched and you just throw out. Right. And complete

night's work and you go in a completely different direction. I think that that can be seen both ways. I choose to see it positively. I think Donald Trump is teaching us the very Buddhist philosophy of not being attached to anything. You know, why attach yourself to a story or an idea or anything that you've planned. Just live, live in the moment and appreciate what's happening to you. Is that a scramble though on some nights? It is. Right before taping, he can change the story. Everything changes and something bigger can come out. We call it the 5.30 curse for us because we've found that it always happens at 5.30 on either end. It's 5.30 in the morning or it's 5.30 p.m. And so sometimes we'll have a show ready to go and then big news will break. And we have to figure

out how we incorporate that into the show whilst not throwing away what we felt was important news of the day, you know, because in many ways I see Trump like a storm, you know, it's like, although there's a storm happening, the weatherman still lets to tell you about the weather and other areas. And so for us, it's always trying to figure out how we still incorporate those other pieces of news. Well, how do you decide then, this is a challenge we have to what's important enough for your first 12 or 14 minutes of the show, because you could probably pick one of eight stories every day and do 12 or 14 minutes. What's the thing? criteria for you? For me it's what is interesting, what do I believe is newsworthy, what is

fresh and gives us an opportunity to have a conversation on, and what do we feel we can make jokes about? There are some topics where I won't deny it. It's so fresh that you don't feel like there's any comedy in it, or you can't use comedy to help you dissect what's happening. But most importantly for me, it's just figuring out, is it real, is there an impact, is they're funny attached to it. So sometimes we'll explicitly say on the show, look, we're just trying to have fun. This is a funny segment. You know, we don't take it that seriously. Like Melania missing. We don't really think there's a conspiracy or anything behind it. We think it's funny. The idea behind it is funny. And so that will cover to just have a little bit of

a light-hearted reprieve on the show. But I guess most of the topics we look at what is newsworthy, what actually affects, you know, let's say the American public first and then by extension the rest of the world. Every late night show in one way or another is engaging Donald Trump, all doing it a little bit differently, but between you and Colbert and Seth and the jimmies and Bill Maher and Sam B and all the way down the line. Everyone is grappling with Donald Trump. How do you set yourself apart in that landscape of late night where everyone's kind of talking about the same guy or the same stories? What's the daily show thing? Well, I think the daily show thing specifically is how we process that information.

So I've said many times, and I say it to my staff, and I have to remind myself all the time, I refuse to exist in a state of outrage. You know, I think at times people allow themselves to get outraged at everything Donald Trump does. But at some point, I'm just going to accept certain ideas and norms of him as a president. It doesn't mean that they're normal, but they're his.

So I don't care that Donald Trump can't spell counsel. If he wants to spell it the way he does, then that's that. That's not going to be a thing for me. Spelling and grammar are out of my world. And, you know, him telling, like, little simple lies about nothing. North Korea gave me a letter. It's a really interesting letter. No, actually, I haven't read it eight minutes later.

That's something I'm not going to stress myself over. You know, I don't think it's good for you emotionally or mentally. So what we try and do on the Daily Show specifically is create a space where we bring you interesting stories, We're not afraid to get into the weeds of the topics of the day, but we're also finding a funny way to frame it. We're finding a space to try and dilute a little bit of that outrage that we may all feel living in this world, experiencing the same things. How do you avoid the element, Trevor, of preaching to the choir?

Because you know you have your audience sitting in here and watching you who's waiting to hear what you're going to say, but by and large, they share your worldview and the worldview of your writers. Right. There are some, I've talked to some late-night hosts and writers who say, they dread the seal clap or the cheer. They want to laugh. Right.

How do you grapple with that? Well, I don't think I shun, nor am I against any different type of applause or joy. I mean, I like a laugh. Sometimes a clap means that you've connected with an audience. Sometimes the cheer is an expression of that. So it's about a balance for me. Obviously, you want the laughs, when you want the laughs. But there are times when I'm trying to elicit a groan.

I want a bit of discomfort in the audience. I think it's good to keep people on their toes. When making the show, though, I think... I always try and focus on how we get the message to our people. And it's funny that you say preaching to the choir because I think of it just like any church would. The church preaches to the choir, you know, the pastor preaches to the choir and the congregation,

but they're always trying to get additional people to come in. And there may be people who say, we don't believe in that religion, so we're never going to come in. But there are people in the middle. There are people who have lost their way in life who go, hey, I'm looking for an answer, and the church goes, we may be able to provide it for you.

And so I don't believe that we live in a binary world where there are people who agree with me and then people who don't agree with me. There's also people in the middle who are just like, I don't know, tell me what you think. And then when I do, they're like, oh, you're funny. I'll stick around for another episode.

So persuasion is in your mind. Yeah, I think comedy is the ultimate persuasion. You know, when you laugh, it's an implicit agreement. whether you like it or not. That's why sometimes people laugh and be like, oh, no, no, no, no, no, I don't agree with you. I shouldn't have laughed.

But the laugh is the true, immediate, visceral agreement, and I think that's what I've always loved about comedy. One of the things I've noticed about you, and I have to watch you online the next day because I go to bed so early because I'm a cranky old man with a morning show, is that you will not always go along with the narrative. I'm thinking about a segment you did last week

when there were reports that the Trump administration had lost 1,500 immigrant children. Right, right. And that wasn't exactly true. But that narrative, by the time you went on the air, had taken off, in the mainstream media, by the way, not just in circles on the left. And you came on the air and said,

that's actually not true. Right. What's the thinking behind that? Well, the thinking behind it is this. I've always said that I believe Donald Trump is going to be the black light on America's democracy. He's going to expose things that have been there all along, and people have never taken the time to look at.

So immigration is one of those. if you look at America's immigration policy, there are many questionable practices that people have chosen to overlook because the face that was attached to it may have been a little bit more appeasing. So how children were treated under the Obama administration, people didn't really pay attention to

because it felt like Obama was trying to do it in the right way because of how he was speaking and what he was saying. And then when people look at it under Trump, then people start questioning, wait, where are these kids? How do people get treated when they cross a border because of his rhetoric? And I think that's a good thing.

I think it forces us to look. It forces us to question. And I don't think as people, we should question an idea or a moral or a value based on who is doing it, but rather on what we believe. So if you believe something is wrong, it should be wrong regardless of who's doing it. It shouldn't change depending on who's in power.

So for myself, what I like is sometimes Donald Trump, because people are so eager to get him, will actually open up a conversation into a problem that I feel has been happening for a long time and we get to speak about it. And because it's Trump, people are more willing to pay attention to it. And so I won't go with the narrative.

I try and share my opinion. We have fact checkers in the building who make sure that I'm not saying something that's not true. An opinion can be disagreed with, but I think we'd like to live in a world where there are facts that exist that ground us. To me, a moment like that last week

makes your criticism much more powerful because it tells me you're not just along for the ride and instantly outrage. by whatever the outrage of the day is, that you're willing to be fair in some ways to Donald Trump, and that he will, you know, if you're just honest and present the facts that, you know, the light will be shed on him as it is

and you don't have to spin it. Right. Well, I believe if you have to distort what Donald Trump is doing to get him, then you are ignoring everything else that's there. So, you know, if you disagree with somebody, you should be able to disagree with them on the real things that they've done. You shouldn't have to invent anything about them.

I make my views crystal clear. I try not to obscure anything that I believe in. And the purpose of the show for me is to be in an honest space. I don't believe that any president was or is a saint. Some presidents are worse than others. And I also don't like to live in a world of false equivalency. I won't be like, well, Trump's just like the rest of them. He's not.

Everyone knows this is a completely unique thing that we're experiencing. Presidents like storms have categories. And right now, this is a category five. And so what I do is acknowledge the world that we live in. I like to live in the realities of what we're experiencing so that we can honestly assess how we feel about something as opposed to letting our outrage take us out of control.

There's been a lot of talk lately about civility and where the line is. In the last couple of weeks, we've had both Roseanne and Samantha B, both of whom apologize for things they said publicly. Do you think about a line? Are there things that are not okay to say? Yeah, all the time. You do?

I think comedy is context for me. Without context, comedy has no foothold. You know, when you go into a comedy club, you know that all the things that are said are jokes because you're in the space. If that comedian just stood up on the subway and started saying these things, you would go, who is this incendiary human being

who is, you know, spouting these hateful or crazy ideas? But the truth is, comedy lives within that space of distorting reality and playing with the ideas that we accept as human beings. So context is everything. So when I'm working on the show, we're always trying to think of with the writers and with the executives, what are we trying to say?

Can it be interpreted differently? And we're always looking at that because your intention may not match how the audience perceives it. Now, you can't always control that. Sometimes people want to make it seem like you said something you didn't. But for the most part,

we can work on being as precise as possible with our message and with what we're trying to say. because I don't want to offend anybody if I'm not trying to offend anybody, you know? I'm not trying to stir up anything. I'm not an offensive comedian in my nature. You know, I understand that people can be offended at any time, but I also know that I can work hard to go,

hey, I'm not trying to do that, so why give people the impression that I was trying to do or say that? So when you hear something like Sam B using the term she used about Ivanka Trump, what do you think? Well, I think she addressed it on her show and she really gave her opinion on it, you know?

She said she was, trying to reclaim a word for women. And I understand that logic. She said, this is how I choose to process this word that has a misogynistic connotation to it. It's got misogynistic roots. And so I understand where Sam B was coming from. And, you know, she chose to deal with it in the way that she did.

And I admire that. I think anyone who chooses to deal with their thing, like deal with it. What I didn't appreciate was people trying to create this equivalence between the two worlds. I think a white woman calling a white woman a word is not the same as a white person comparing a black person to an ape. We have to acknowledge that the power dynamic and the history of that relationship between the groups of people also plays into that.

There is a larger story of oppression. There is a larger story of what we see till this day in terms of racial hatred. So it's not the same thing, but I understand how people can be offended about different things in different ways. And you see in our culturally, tribal times that it gave the other side the ability to say, well, look, you're doing it as well.

The truth is, really, there's, like, lines are things that we create. We have to be honest, you know. I've watched the Republican Party over the past two years slowly blur their lines for Donald Trump. I remember when I first encountered American politics. I always knew that Republicans were the party of God, and they believed in conservatism, and, you know, for them it was about morals, and then along came this man with multiple marriages, and he was saying, and grab them by the pussy, and all of a sudden, these were the same people telling us, oh, what, this is locker room talk.

Who doesn't speak like this? Who doesn't, I was like, wait, so you speak like this? All of a sudden, I saw people on TV bringing up rappers as a defense saying, like, well, I mean, people listen to rap. Rapp says these things all the time. You said rap was, you know, destroying our society. You said that rap was, and that's where you start to realize that lines, yes, they may exist,

but a society, we keep redrawing our lines. And so I acknowledge where my lines are. I'm lucky that I create a show with a group of very talented and thoughtful people. And so using that group, we try to define where we think at least a safer area is in which to play, where we're still saying what we want to say without getting an unintended reaction.

So reading your book, Trevor, and thinking about where we're sitting right now. I love what you said in your first show. You said there were a couple things you thought you'd never had. An indoor toilet and a job host Did you ever get the toilet, by the way? I got the toilet, but I know I have two flushing toilets, my friend. You have two?

I don't mean to brag, but I have two. You've made it. I have. I genuinely have. It's an astounding, astounding story that's going to be made into a movie and there'll be another book. How did you see, as a young boy, going through all the things you detail in this book, a future for yourself? You couldn't have imagined this, obviously. No, not at all.

But how did you have a vision out of the place you were in as a life? place you were in as a little boy? I would be lying if I didn't credit everything I am today to my mother. As a child, I had no vision. I only existed in the now. I was lucky enough to have a mother who appreciated the nuance of the way she could process the world she lived in. So my mother acknowledged that there was a government, namely the apartheid government

in South Africa that was oppressing her, people of color by and large. But she also acknowledged that she could play a role in her own life. in trying to move forward. And I think that's a difficult conversation that people struggle to have sometimes in life is that there are many ways for us to handle a problem or a situation. My mother said, yes, I'm being oppressed.

But while I'm waiting for that oppression to end or while I'm fighting against it, I will also find ways to improve myself beyond the scope of what I've been told I can or cannot do. And so my mother engaged me in a way where she forced me to see worlds that she never knew I may have access to. You know, my mother drove me to areas

that were reserved for white people. She made me look at rich people's houses. I remember the first time I saw a tennis court was over the wall of somebody's house to see a swimming pool. These were all ideas that were foreign to me. But I grew up knowing they existed. And sometimes for me, the knowledge

of a place or an idea is as important as having access to it because you cannot dream or aspire to something if you don't know that it exists. Among the many heartbreaking scenes here, you chasing your father, saying daddy, daddy on a playground, him having to walk away, not being able to walk with your mother down the street at risk of her going to jail for four or five years. And you frankly saying, like, you didn't have friends.

You had cousins, but you had to stay inside so your family didn't get in trouble, go to jail, you didn't end up in an orphanage. So where did the sense of humor, where did the creativity? Was that all born in your own head? Well, even when you're telling it to me now, I'm like, those are hilarious stories in my mind. Oh, those are funny stories. Yeah, because in my head, you must remember as a kid, I was chasing my father and my mother was chasing me.

Now, the real story is my father was running away from me so that the police would not see him with this child and arrest my family. My mother was chasing me to stop me from getting us into trouble. In my head, I was in the park, my dad was running, my mom was running. This is a family. We're having a great time. That's all I could process at that time. And, I mean, you learned the truth afterwards, but I was lucky in that, like, my mother did a really good job

of shielding me from, I guess, an unnecessary pressure at a young age and then giving me the context when I was old enough to handle it. So living at home in the house, I just felt special. You know, in South Africa, specifically in African culture, you're not allowed to stay in the house as a kid. So as soon as, like, you know, it's morning, kids are kicked out of the house,

everyone has to leave. You've got to go play in the streets, and then you come back in the evening. That's what you'll do when there's no school. So I was like, wow, I'm special. I get to stay in the house. Now, the true story is my grandmother was afraid to let me outside because she was afraid the police would take me away

because of my skin color. But in my head, I was like, man, I'm living a sweet life. I get to stay indoors. And all the other kids were like, yeah, Trevor gets to stay indoors. He's living a good life. So, you know, I think maybe that's what shaped how I see the world.

I've realized that, you know, like how you process information is as important sometimes as the information itself. You know, what's happening to you is real. but the way you react to it is a choice that you can make as a human being. And that's something that I think I've tried to apply to my life, and I try and apply to the daily show as well. It's something that has kept me sane, and it's helped me laugh through a lot of my pain.

You know, it's interesting. In the book and on the show and just talking to you, I don't pick up resentment about your childhood. I'm sure there's anger and frustration and things that are still within you. When you look back now on that time, sitting where you are today, what do you think? I think it's an amazing story for a country. I think it's amazing that South Africa can even exist

when you look at the place we've come from. You know, to have a country where the wealth, the power, everything was concentrated with a small group of people and then over 90% of the population was oppressed, to have that country come out of it and be a functioning democracy, to have a functioning economy, a country that does have its problems, you know,

but a country, a place without a bloodless revolution, a place where people have found a way to exist and try and build something. That's what I see, and that's what I choose to see, you know? And I think in life we choose to see it the way we choose to see it. So for myself, when I look at my stories or when I look at my life growing up,

I think of how amazing it is that my mother taught herself English. She taught herself how to type. She taught herself all the things that she needed to. finally get jobs when black people were allowed to get the jobs that they were in South Africa. I think it's amazing that she put me through school, spent all her money on books, teaching me English. Like, I, that's the thing I choose to focus on, and I think I would waste a lot of my mind on the resentment for the moments that I now have no control over, as opposed to appreciating

all of the things that got me to where I am today. Your mom was brave, too. Definitely. Right? I mean, she was doing things that could have gotten her easily in trouble. Definitely, yeah. didn't seem to be hiding from them. No, my mother always believed that although there were rules and laws,

there are certain rules and laws that we agree in society have been created based on a false premise or a ludicrous idea. And that's the conversation I have with people, even until this day. Oftentimes I'll hear people say, oh, but that's the law. And I say, yeah, but laws have always changed. Societies have changed. At one point, slavery was a law in America. Does that mean it was right?

We go, no, it wasn't right. But it was the law. So my mother always taught me to question authority, to question the ideas that we accept as normal in our society. It's a question even what we believe. You know, one of the hardest things to do in life is to shift your perspective. We're all resistant to it,

because then it makes us feel like we were stupid before that point. Nobody wants to admit that maybe I was wrong. Like I remember, I grew up many years of my life believing that women had one less rib than men because I guess someone had told me this in church. And then I was in my 20s and someone says, that's not true. I was like, that's true. And I googled it and I was like,

it wasn't true. And my first instinct was to be like, well, I've seen it. I've seen it somewhere because I was afraid to go, to realize that I believed an incorrect thing for so long was a frightening concept. And I think that's something we struggle with as human beings. But I try to do that. I honestly try and question everything I believe and question every idea that I hold to try and get to a place where I learn from my mistakes as opposed to holding onto ideas that maybe hold me back. For people who are watching this or listening to this on the podcast and don't get what born

a crime means, can you explain the book title? Well, I was born in South Africa during apartheid. Apartite was a system of laws that oppressed people of color in our country. And one of the laws in the country made it illegal for black and white people to interact with one another. They called it carnal intercourse. If you had sex, you would be arrested. And my mother's a black woman, Hossa woman, South African,

my father's Swiss from Switzerland, and they had me. And so I was born a crime. You know, my father's name couldn't be on my birth certificate because then the jig would be up. I couldn't live with my mom legally because according to the laws of the country, my race wasn't one that matched hers, and so I wasn't supposed to be in that designated area.

So that's where the title came from. So you survived. When you were you When did you feel like you began to thrive? When were you inspired to do comedy, to make people laugh? When did that begin for you? I think I've always made people laugh. As a kid, my dad's friends used to say,

your son has a radio in his chest. It's the worst thing ever. I never shut up. I was always entertaining people. At school, I was always telling jokes. And in class, like my teachers always said, look, Trevor, he's really funny and he's really disruptive. I was never disrespectful to teachers,

but I was always like the class clown. You're always causing chaos. And you had to make the bullies laugh really important. Because I realized very early on that bullies generally have a single-track mind, very focused individuals, bullies. So if you can make them think about something other than beating you up, they can't multitask. So if they're laughing, they're not punching. And that's something that I learned to think of very quickly.

So what's the move? They come up to you with a close fist? Yeah, they'll come up with a joke. And be like, Trevor, give me your lunch. You know, and then I think of a joke about my lunch. I'd go like, you know, I'd think of whatever. it is in that moment. I'll think of something or someone will be like, oh, Trevor, punch. You know, someone will be like, I'm going to punch you in the face. And I'll be like,

oh, thank God, someone's going to fix this ugly face of mine. And the guy would be like, what? And it's just a moment. Disarmed him. Just a moment where a person has to think. And then you go like, guy goes like, go, go away. They almost look at you like, you've been pre-bullied. Go away. You're good. So what does your mom think watching you now? And by the way, knowing she's going to be played by Lupita Nyango? Right. Must be pretty cool. But can she believe knowing what you all have been through where you are today? I think she can. My mother's a very religious woman, and so if you asked her, can you believe this? She'd say yes, because it was promised to me. I had faith in the Lord,

and this is how my family got to where it is. My mother's always believed in me. She always wanted better for me. She always believed that each generation should try to make the next better. So she's proud of me, but I'm really lucky in that my mother was a fan before I had done anything and any space of entertainment or celebrity. So I would say the same joy my mother had for me taking over the Daily Show is the same joy that she had when I first learned how to walk.

She just goes like, yeah, look at this kid, doing things, keep it up, you know? In fact, when I called her to tell her about the Daily Show, I said, hey, I'm the host of the Daily Show, it's a big show in America, this is really exciting. And she was like, yes, this is amazing. And your brother's going to be head of the student council. Oh, my boys are doing big things.

And I was like, wait, what? It's like, no, no, I'm doing a big thing. He's in school. And she's like, no, you're both doing big things. Like, no, no, no, one is bigger than the other. And then she said to me, well, were you ever the head of your student council? Oh. And I said, no.

And she's like, well, I guess, I guess then you can't say anything, can you? And it was, that's how she thinks. And I'm really, really, really am lucky because she's never defined her love for me by what I've done, but rather by who I am. So that makes me try and be a better person to live within the space of that love. And your mother has been through so much that you write about in the book, including from her second husband.

How did you get through that moment and that time? I mean, domestic abuse is one of those experiences that can really shape you in a negative or positive way depending on how you deal with it. I was genuinely really lucky that my mother spent a lot of time drilling into my head that I couldn't focus on hating the man who had abused her which didn't make sense to me

because all I wanted to do was hate. She explained to me, she said, if you don't find a way to forgive him, not forget what he's done, not hold him accountable, but to forgive him, to let it go for yourself, you may end up being in the same place that he is, you may carry that hate with you in life, not realizing it. And, you know, you read all these studies of how men or boys

who have been in homes where there's domestic abuse are more likely to abuse their spouse physically, there is something that happens to your brain, you know? There were moments when I blamed my mother for being abused. And only because of her mental strength was I able to process the information and work through a lot of pain, a lot of resentment, a lot of anger, and slowly work through those issues and try and come out on the other side.

And honestly, she led by example. You know, she leaned on her faith. She led by example. And she helped me to get through a lot of those feelings, which I think could have scarred me for life as a human being. There's an amazing scene near the end of the book where you're able to smile about it after she's in the hospital. She said, see, I told you. You didn't believe me all these years. We joked about everything.

I mean, like, so, you know, as I talk about in the book, my mother was shot in the head, and, you know, I thought she was going to die. And in the hospital, the doctor came in. And I remember the pained look on his face. And, you know, I turned to him, I said, Doc, like, what's the prognosis? And he said, I hate using this term, but this was a miracle.

I said, I'm a man of science. I don't use that word, but this was a miracle. The bullet missed every vital organ. It missed her brain. her spine, missed everything, that one millimeter in either direction, and this would be a different story. And so this is a miracle, your mother's fine. We couldn't even perform surgery.

And so I turned to my mom and I said, this is insane. I can't believe it. And she said to me, no, this is Jesus. I told you. I was like, no, but why didn't Jesus stop you from getting shot? And my mom was like, no, no, the Lord works in mysterious ways. Because now you believe, don't you? And that's how she thinks.

She kind of had you on that one. She had me. And that's the relationship we'd always had. We played back and forth. I always had and still respect her as my mother. But I think she encouraged me to challenge her as a free-thinking individual as well, which I think really helped us grow a healthy relationship as human beings. I love how you had the last line, though.

You said, is Jesus going to pick up the bill? The hospital bill? Yeah, because the medical bill was, good Lord. I, yeah. There's one point because my mother decided to cancel her medical insurance because she just never got sick

and then as Murphy's law would have it that's when she gets shot and she had it for years and then this happened and so I had to pay for her medical bills and I remember each bill would come because at the hospital luckily they would come with each individual bill and say you need to sign off and you need to pay

and you to sign off and need to pay and in my head I was like oh my bank account it's gone everything I've worked for is gone and you think you think you love somewhere you think you'd give everything up for them. I told my mom, I was like, yo, there was a number where I was going to be like, she's lived her life.

I told her, I said, you were very lucky because I had a number in my head, and if you hit that number, I would have been like, well, you go say hi to Jesus for me, and we say we've tried. But I, you know, I was blessed enough that at that point, I had been working, I'd been earning money, and I was in a position where I could pay for my mother's life to be saved. So, you know, so I said to her, you know, did Jesus pay for your medical bills? And she said, no, but he gave me a son who could. Oh, man. So she beat me again.

I mean. I guess you got the last word then. Yeah, she always does. She always does. Trevor Noah Foundation. How cool is it to be able to go back and give back? It's exciting, man. It really is.

One of the biggest pillars in my family and in my life has been education. One of the reasons I'm here today is because of the education I got. Fantastic teachers, schools, people who, who pushed a little bit more than they needed to to get a little bit more out of me as an individual and as a student. And I always promised myself if I could, I would go back and find a way to help improve education,

not just in South Africa, but anywhere I could in the world. But the place I would have to start would always be home. And so I was lucky enough that over time, through meeting the right people and, you know, doing the research, I started the Trevor Noma Foundation And what we started doing, the initial phase is just looking at schools that are catering to underprivileged kids, kids who are orphans, kids who don't come from homes where they have anything. You know, these kids oftentimes, they eat their only meal at the school.

Every piece of clothing they have comes from the school, and then they learn at the school. And when you see these kids, really, they have more enthusiasm than I think I ever had in school. And I feel ashamed when I see them. I go like, I used to complain about my math lesson, and these kids are plowing through on an empty stomach. And I realized that this school that I was looking at has done so much with so little. If I could help them get to a better place,

imagine how much more they could do. And then if we could try and find all of these institutions that are doing something with nothing and give them just a little bit more than they've got, how much further could they get these kids? And that's just where we're starting. I mean, the goal is to get to a place where it's a philosophy, it's an ideal, it's something that we're getting the government to join in on, you know, new ways to teach kids in school. But the most important thing for me right now is to just get kids educated, you know.

I think it's the number one tool that just moves us forward in society. It's the fishing rod that helps you get that fish. I have to imagine you see some little Trevor Noah's running around when you go back and, right? kids who were like, I was that kid, right? That kid needs help. There was one kid. Yeah, there was one kid I've met. Whereas I took him under my wing specifically.

He got into trouble because he took a razor blade in class. And during recess, he went around and he cut every other kid's backpack. Just so that, like, when they put the backpacks on, they would all, like, fall. So he didn't completely, which is a fantastic prank. I admired this from a prankster side. But we don't encourage. Right. I don't encourage that at all.

Except it was an excellent prank. Right. It was an excellent prank. And I was just like, if we can just re-reshape, and just aim that focus somewhere else, this kid could be inventing something magical one day. So let's just aim him in the right direction. But really, he was like a little mischievous kid, you know, and he didn't think anything of it.

And I saw a little bit of myself in him. And it's kids like that where I go, you know, it's just, I don't think every kid is the same. I think it's weird that we teach every child exactly the same way in schools. I think that's why we have passes and failures because you're failing because you're all measured on the same thing. But if we're all trying to do what we're all trying to do, we should get to the thing that we're

really good at. And so what I'm trying to create is an environment where we're creating the best individuals possible as opposed to them trying to access what we think is the best way to do something. And so that's really exciting for us as a foundation. We've just started off. I was lucky enough to have Microsoft come on board, which... That helps. Yeah, that completely.

you know, catapulted us into a different stratosphere. Yeah, and then Bill Gates said, hey, if you need any help, let me know. I was like, yeah, a billion, that's what I need. That's going to say, that's the right guy to say, if you need any help, you want Gates doing that. But it's been really wonderful, and it's just the beginning. And then in the midst of all this, and I write that you're going to Copenhagen tomorrow for a show, the world tour for stand-up. You've got your foot on the gas, man.

Well, on the weekends, no, that's how I take a break, actually. I do the daily show during the week, and on the weekends I do stand-up comedy. So this weekend I'll be going to Denmark and to Norway. Norway I'm excited for because, I mean, that's the country that Trump wants all the people to come from. That's right. So I'm going to go see what those people are all about. It's a scouting mission. Yeah, it's going to be amazing, man.

Come back with some of them. And what's great is going to bring them in. They don't need passports or everything. Trump's going to be like, Norway, let them in. Wave them through. So that's going to be fun. But I don't regularly. I mean, sometimes I'll go to other countries on the weekend, you know,

whether it's, you know, the United Arab Emirates or South Africa or somewhere in Europe. It was, I mean, a few weekends ago, it was Amsterdam and London. But most weekends, it's the United States of America. I love it. Coast to coast, every city, every state. I like getting in on the ground and meeting real people and performing comedy to human beings.

So when you got this job, I think you'd been on the Daily Show three times. Is that right? Yeah. Were you as surprised? As so many people in the world were. I was more surprised. I was more surprised. because I had been here.

People were surprised because they were like, who is this guy? I was surprised because I was like, wait, what? It makes no sense. It's just like it's a wild, you know what I mean? I remember talking to John and I was like, wait, explain. What's, what's, like, why?

Why would you suggest me? And it's, I think it's, it was mind-blowing because I didn't believe it would happen. And so I just threw my name in the hat. I didn't expect anything. The fact that I was considered was enough for me. I was like, wow, this is great. You know, the network was like, hey, we like you, and thanks for telling us you'd want to do the job.

And that was enough. And what did John say to you during the handoff? John said to me that although nobody would believe it because of where we come from, our backgrounds and how we look, he said, I see in you what I saw in myself when I started the show. And he said, although I'm a Jew from New Jersey, he said, you remind me of myself. And I was like, I don't know what you mean. And he said, you know, you've done your stand-up? Politics intrigues you.

You question ideas. You don't take yourself too seriously. But you understand that there are serious things that you want to talk about within comedy. And he said, and most importantly, you won't try and be me. And he said, I like that you remind me of me, but you won't try and be me. And I was like, okay, well, I guess that's good enough.

So that's an interesting question, because John and the show were such institutions through the Bush and Obama years. Right. What was your mindset coming in to keep that brand powerful, but to make it your own? Well, that was a difficult thing because I was in a transitionary period where the country itself wasn't in a specific space. You had Obama's era winding down. It was generally a sense of it's going to be more of the same. Is it going to be Hillary? Is it going to be Jeff Bush or Marco Ruby?

It felt like establishment was the order of the day. It didn't really feel like anything new was happening. So on my side, it was difficult because, you know, initially I came on. I remember people in the first few weeks, they were like, where's your outrage? And I was like, but what am I angry about? I don't see anything to be angry about right now. Things seem good.

And I think initially I was trying to figure out, well, where are we going to take the show? What's the vision of the show going to be? I remember initially I thought, like, I want to give the daily show more of a global appeal, you know, more of a global perspective. Because I've always thought, if you look at issues in other countries, sometimes you can get answers to something that's happening here because they've either handled it already or are handling it incorrectly now.

You know, Brexit's a good example. If you really paid attention to Brexit, you would have thought to yourself, geez, this might happen in America if we're not careful. So for myself, I wanted the show to have a good. global perspective. I honestly thought that if Hillary won, the show would have, like, leeway to now go talk about global issues because Hillary was going to just be this, like, down the line president. Conventional. Yeah, conventional. And then Trump came in, and the irony has been, there is no international story he does not touch. If anything, Donald Trump has

made the Daily Show more global, because everyone in the world knows Donald Trump. Everyone the world wants to know what he's saying or doing. And in some way, shape, or form, every single issue comes back to him. Puerto Rico, the response, comes back to Donald Trump. You want to talk about Rodrigo Duterte? You have to talk about his relationship with Donald Trump. You want to talk about what's happening in Japan, Shenzhou Abe, and Donald Trump. You want to go to Korea? You have to talk about what's happening in Africa right now. The armed forces, the troops, where they are, and what they're doing, you have to come back to Donald Trump. You don't talk about the Me Too movement in some way, you have to come back to Donald Trump. So, if anything, I've learned

that he becomes the nexus that provides me the opportunity to go out into all these different areas. Even Canada now. Yeah. Places we would have expected. Yeah. So now time to learn about Canada and their military capabilities.

Who knew South Park was going to come to life? Thank you, man. Thank you so much, man. I appreciate, man. Thank you very much, really. My thanks again to Trevor and to the Daily Show team for welcoming us into their studio. You can catch the Daily Show every weeknight

at 11 p.m. Eastern on Comedy Central. Thanks to all of you for tuning into the Sunday. Sit Down podcast this week to hear more of these uncut, unedited conversations from all of my guests. Be sure to click subscribe so you never miss an episode. And of course, don't forget to tune in on Sunday to Sunday today on NBC. I'm Willie Geist. See you right back here next week on the Sunday Sit Down podcast.