The Daily Show: Ears Edition - Roy’s Experience Hosting the White House Correspondents’ Dinner | Beyond the Scenes

Episode Date: May 5, 2023

From Tucker Carlson to Dominion to Biden’s age, Roy Wood Jr. didn’t hold back at the White House Correspondents’ Dinner. In this episode, he sits down with some of his writers for the correspondents’ dinner – Christiana Mbakwe-Medina, Felonious Munk, and David Angelo – to reflect on the writing process leading up to the dinner, why the Property Brothers threw a wrench in Roy’s speech, the Kanye joke that didn’t make it in, and which conservative is now a big fan of Roy. Recorded on 5/1/23.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

You're listening to Comedy Central. You're listening to Comedy Central. Welcome to Beyond the Scenes. The Podcasts that goes deeper to topics and segments that normally air on the daily show. This is what you got to think about this podcast is. All right, so like, we like eggs, everybody love an egg. This is an omelette. You got the eggs, that's the Daily Show. But then we come in and we give you a little,

we sprinkling some crumbled up sausage. We put in some green peppers. We put in onion, cheese, all types of stuff, to make something even better for you. Today is kind of a different type of episode. This is a topic we don't, we haven't had a chance to get into on the Daily Show just yet, but we want to talk about the White House Correspondence Dinner that I had the pleasure of hosting not too long ago, and I want to get into it with some of the writers so we can go into, I guess showing you all the process of what it's like creating that type of script. What it's like creating that type of show.

And you know what? I think it would be a joy if we first heard a couple of clips from the correspondence dinner before we get into everything. Roll the clip. You all look good. You dress nice. You got the nice threads on. You got the jewelry, glistening.

Look like everybody got a little piece of that settlement money from Fox News. And that's all I have to say about that, because I'm not going to have dominion on my ass. I love to me. Matter of fact, let me just say right now, my favorite voting machine is dominion voting machines. When I go to the polls, I make sure it is a dominion machine that I use. If your election need the truth, put dominion in your booth. That's, you should be inspired by the events in France. They rioted when the retirement age went up two years to 64. They rioted because they didn't want to work till 64.

Meanwhile in America, we have an 80-year-old man begging us for four more years of work. Begging. Begging. Begging. Okay, so those are some of the highlights. We might even get into a few more a little later on than the show. Before I get the writers in here and add them to the program, let me just say that politics is crazy in this world and things changed so, so fast. Like as a performer, you cannot do this without writers.

Last week, Don Lemon got fired fired, Tucker Carlson got fired. There was all the stuff with the Fox Dominion vote settlement. And then this week, smartly CNN, well played, announced after the correspondence dinner that they are going to have Donald Trump on their network doing a town hall. So, yo, man, if the correspondence dinner was a couple days away, yo, it would have been a whole different situation. So when you're in a media landscape where things are changing so, so, so, so, so fast, it's hard to always find a joke that

hits what is basically a constantly moving target of the American zeitge. So, it's my pleasure to talk a little bit about this today. We're gonna answer a couple questions. I know some people have some stuff in my social media comments about the correspondence dinner, so maybe we'll get to some of that. But first, let's beat the writers, with me in the studio. I'm joined by a daily show writer, Hello David. Hey Roy, it's great to be here today. Thank you so much for having me. Thank you.

I'm joined by another writer that wrote with me on the correspondence dinner. He was formerly a writer for the Knightley Show on this beautiful, beautiful Paramount Plus network. It was a wonderful work and stand-up comedian as well. Felonia's Muck. How you doing? I'm here. I'm here. Yes. That is the blackest answer I've ever heard. Like, how are you doing? I'm trying to get like you, Ron. I'm here. I woke up and I didn't get shot yet.

You know, you know, I'm gonna go. I got to my back hurt a little bit, but you know, I'm making it. I'm making it out here. And also joining us. I don't know if she's still an investigative reporter for me, investigative reporter, former writer for the Daily Show. Christiana, who was our hit writer. How you doing, Christiana. Hi, Roy, I'm great. How are you? So let's unpack this, because I've been tweeted a bunch of quite, actually I've been tweeated

a lot of shit I can't read on the air, but I have been sent a couple of questions that I think people had about the actual writing process in the assembly of the Correspondence Center, because I've never been on the inside of this at all. I can't speak to the three of you, Angela, I don't know if you've written on any of them in the past or anything. I did it with Hassan and with Trevor. What was that like, what was, what would you say is the difference then between the three processes? Because I don't know how to approach this, like to me the thing that was weird was that I don't, I've never used writers for stand-up. Right.

Like, I use writers in the show, so there's some degree of trust, but when I got the call about this, Christiana was literally the first person I called because I'm like, all right, I know we can find funny people, but you usually had arguments within the daily show that I agreed with, that were fair, like building the actual structure and the North Star of it. So for me I wanted to build from what am I trying to say and now how can I make that funny which is how I build my stand-up but like with Hassan and Trevor like was the construction process the same or was it like I mean there everyone was a little different

this one was like probably the least number of people working on it so I think I the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. t. te. te. te. te. te. te. te. te. te. te. te. te. te. te. te. te. try. try on it. So I think it went tighter. I think everything was a little more like organized and sink like that. The other, like Trevor's, there were so many people involved that it was kind of like, I didn't really even know what was happening sometimes. It's like I was sort of on the periphery. And then Hassan it was kind of just like, I mean I barely remember, but he had kind of like a head writer. Sort of like how Christiani, like he had this guy. Yeah, Prashant. Yeah, Pee v.

And he sort of just kind of would ask for jokes and then we'd get the joke. It wasn't that different from this one actually. It was kind of the same sort of thing. Yeah, I had no idea what I don't even, you want them comedians, man, well I don't even remember where the fuck we met. Like, it's like it was before you were at Knightley Show. I feel like we were parlaying on Twitter some, but then it's possible that we just bumped shoulders at some points around the Chicago comedy scene, where you started out, but you always had takes and angles on the nightly show that were like very black.

Like, y'all gotta dig in the crates and find some of monk shit. And I'm like, okay, I know I'm gonna need some of that in the script at some point as well. And also the way you look at politics from the perspective of a black man, which I am, it was, I don't know, I just felt like it was essential, but like in terms of like writing for Larry Wilmore, who ultimately did the correspondence dinner as well, around there was some overlap in the time that you were at the nightly show, that Wilmore talk at all about this process? Not really, but I will say one of the segments that I was able to do for with Larry, we made light light the light th. to to to to to to to -word? Oh, yeah. I ain't know if I could say n-nigger. He called him n-nigger. And so we had a play off of that in a segment that I did where I said, you know, you're my brother of sub-Saharan content. And he was like, wait, did you just call me? I was like, yeah, I called you my nigger. The idea for me is, you know, we make fun of all of these spaces being extremely, you know, you know, centered on white men. But we have, we have people of color in the room. The issue is always that we're writing for a specific. the the th. T, that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that th. that th. th. th. th. the the the the idea, the idea, the idea, the idea, thi. the idea, the idea, the idea, the idea, the idea, the idea, the idea, the idea, the idea, the idea, the idea, the idea, the idea, the idea, the idea, the idea, the idea, the idea, the idea, the idea, the idea, the idea, the idea, the idea, the idea, the idea, th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. thi is, thi is, thi is, thi is, the the the the thi. the the the the idea is, the idea is, the idea is, the idea is, the idea is, the idea is, the idea is, the idea is, the idea is, the idea is, that we're writing for a specific voice and you can't make I can't

make Jimmy Kimmel say nigger you know what I mean you couldn't get John Stewart to say nigger so when you're pushing jokes you have to think about the person who's saying the joke so this was fun for me because I was talking to a guy over 40 who had experiences in the South and in the north who knew you know what it was like to do this room full of people who may not look like you but still want to sound like yourself. So that part, that part to me was, you know, was reminiscent of the nightly show because that's, I think, what Larry Wilmore did. He presented the same format that everyone else had presented. He just tried to do it with a little bit of color. So Christianiana, Ch, th, th, to to to to to th, to th, th, to the th, to the to they, they. to they. th, they. th, th, thi, thi, thi, they, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, they, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, th, th, th, th, th, th, to to to to to to to th, to th, th. th, th. th. th. th. the the the the the the the the the the they, they, they, they, they, they, they, they, they, to to they, to to they, to they, thi. to thi. thi. thi, thi, thi, thi, having taken everybody's jokes, and let me just give the viewers an understanding of me and Christiana's relationship over the last two weeks,

because really if we're being real about this, we wrote this on a three-week runway. It was quick. This was the quickest turnaround of the three out of that. I, I feel like we had some loose suggestions a month out, but the problem was that my guest hosting week for Daily Show ran three weeks before this and I was so focused on getting ready for content and stuff and segments for my guest week. I couldn't split my mind in the two partitions. I just go, fuck it, the day after Friday morning after guest hosting. We're gonna really dig in. And I, and I, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, the the the the th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th,. I just go, fuck it, the day after Friday morning after guest hosting, we're gonna really dig in. And I started, the process was essentially,

I would take whatever we had written in a big Google Doc that we were all sharing with the other writers, and I would take that and boil that down to a little bit of verbiage, take that out into that down to a little bit of verbiage, take that out into the comedy clubs at night, whatever didn't work, that's what I would change in the script, send that to Christiana, she would look at it in the morning, get it back to the writer, so we do punch up and by the time I looked at the script again at eight o'clock at night, I could rejigger everything and then then the the the the the the theygigigigigig, th, th, th, th, th, th, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, that's, that's, that's, that's, that's, that's, that's, that's, that's, that's, that's, that's, that's, that's, that's, that's, th, th, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thin, thin, thi's thi's, togu., togu. togu. thi, togu. tha's what's what's tha's, tha's, thi, thi, th one in the morning. So I was essentially sleeping, I don't know, probably three, four hours a night and then Angelo was kind enough to come out on one of those nights

and kind of give tweets and move stuff around. But it was a lot of just Christiana and you send in the audio to Christiana of every single show that I did and just agreeing, like what joke worked, what didn't work, what the crowd didn't respond to, and then just going from there. But what are your, from what we constructed, Christiana, what are some of your takeaways from the correspondence dinner? You know it's so interesting when like our initial conversation a couple months back was it February? I kind of like time means nothing to me right now. It was, we had all of these people we wanted to hit. We were like, oh, Marjorie Taylor Green.

And we should do some T.J. Holmes and Amy. And we should, like, they, because they were in the zeitgeist, they were in the news so prominently. And it was kind of like the gift and the cursed. We just kept getting the gift of doing news. That meant we would just have to just rip up what we had or you know what we were trying to say. And then obviously, you know, the Trump arrangement happened and that changed a lot, I think. And then, you know, Elon must joke got pissed real.

Yeah, Elon, Elon, just seemed irrelevant what was happening at Elon and Twitter. Even though when you got the gig, it was a pretty big story is what everyone was talking about. And then Bloody Monday where Tucker and Don lost their jobs, it was just like, there's no way we can't open with Fox Dominion and into these massive firings. So I'm happy with how it went, but the reshuffling and the resinking and listening to the audio and then it's funny because I was listening to all of it so religiously, what would get a hard laugh like the week before in light of everything that happened the next week, kind of like, oh, we don't really care about that. You know, you could just feel the temperature changing as the news cycle went. So it was like a real gift, but it just meant

that we were messaging you on WhatsApp, literally why you were sitting. Yeah, we'll get to that in a little bit. We'll get to that in a little bit. Let's watch a clip real quick from the correspondent dinner. Oh, this joke. Oh, shit. I'm happy to be here.

Oh, real quick, Mr. President, I think you left some of your classified documents up here. You can get to the way. Yeah, no, don't get him to him. I'll put him in a safe place. He don't know where to keep him. We never ran that joke. Yeah, I'm Brandon. The document joke. No, no, yeah, the document joke, never ran it. No, I saw, I remember watching that and thinking, I don't recall that in the document. He's freestyling. No. No, no, like that was. He pictured in the day, right? Roy, you were like, yeah.

Yeah, because both the property brothers showed up. That's what happened. So for the people don't. the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the document. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, the the the the document. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the document. the document. the document. the document. the document. the document. the document. the document. Because both the property brothers showed up with our whole thing. So for the people don't know, the White House Correspondence Association gives us a list of the confirmed guest, but you don't know who's going to show up or not. And we were told from the jump there would only be one property brother, only one property brother. So the initial opening line was, Greetings, distinguished members of the media, our greatest leaders, and a property brother. And then I go down to COVID testing that morning,

I fucking see the other property brother. And I'm like, you gotta be shit in me. What the fuck are we gonna, how do we, like? Yeah, through a wrenching. Yeah, so we started trying to figure out a new open, and that's what we ended up coming up with. And that ended up being way funnier than the property brother line. Then I find out from one of our other writers Matt Nagrin that Dr. Fauci was there.

Because you all are at the table or whatever, just checking Twitter and looking at stuff. And they're sending me jokes in real time at the table. They go, Fouchy's here and I go, oh perfect. We'll sneak him in behind the property brother joke and just fucking go from there. It's a pleasure to be here amongst our country's greatest leaders, distinguished media organizations, both property brothers and Dr. Fauci. If you see Fauci take a picture with him, that's your new booster shot.

All right, after the break, I guess we should talk more about the actual night and the jokes and the people, and I guess I should tell y'all, oh, I'll tell you who loves me now. I'll tell you who loves, that's a tease. I'm saying it for after the break. And you will not guess this person. Fucking loves me. You don't even fucking understand. It's beyond the scenes. We'll be right back. Beyond the scenes, we are back. We're talking about the White House Correspondence dinner, which I had the honor of being a part of, and we're here with some of the writers and headwriters from that evening. Before we do anything else, let's just go into a quick clip of some of the best jokes from that evening, and then I want to come back and get y'all's opinion. I want to go around the horn and find out which joke that you all think was going bomb. One of them did. One's the tham. tham. tham. tham. tham. tham. tham. tham. tham. tham. I tham. I tham. I thin' thin' thin' thin' thin' the thin' thi' the the the tho' thi' their their thi' their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their thi. thi. thi. thi. thi. thi. thi. thi. thi. thi. thi. thi. thi. thi. tooooooooooooooooooo' toooooo' toooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo ain't hating on another right. First, the clip.

The untouchable Tucker Carlson is out of a job. Yeah. Okay. Some people celebrate it. But to Tucker's staff, I want you to know that I know what you're feeling. I work at the Daily Show. So I too have been blindsided by the sudden departure of the host of a fake news program. But can we just all acknowledge, can we just all be honest and just say that the trump arrest didn't hit like we thought it was going to hit. We're so desensitized the scandals now, that trump arrest, it didn't do what I thought it was going to do. The truck arrest was like like like brown and you ate four hours ago. And you're like, hmm, do

I feel justice? This don't feel like justice. Hmm. Let me try one of them Georgia arraignment brownies. Maybe that are hit. Okay, that one's got some kick to it. I think Republicans, you'd be surprised. that they'd thheheheheheheed, that, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, tho, tho, tho, tho, tho, tho, tho, tho, tho, tho, tho, tho, tho, tho, tho, tho, tho, tho, tho, tho, tho, do like, do like, do like, do like, do like, do like, do, do, do, do, do, do, do, do, do, do, do, do, tho, tho, tho, tho, do, do, th, do, do, do, do like, do th, tho, tho, tho, tho, tho, tho, tho, tho, tho, tho, tho, tho, tho, tho, thooooo, thooooo, thoooooooo, thoooooooooooooo, thooo, tho, tho, 'all would be surprised, man, if y'all would just be real about what CRT is, you can be surprised. Some black folks might meet you halfway. But you've got to tell the truth. You can't lie to black people. Call it what it is. Anti-Cart policies are an attack on black history and an attempt to erase the contributions of black people from the history books. That's what it is.

You are trying to erase black people, and a lot of black people wouldn't mind some of that erasure, as long as that black person is Clarence Thomas. Okay, all right, so a lot of good jokes in there. Thank you all for the assistants. Oh, and also, shout out to Matt Negrre and Lily Blumkin. We're talking Kalea. What's Kalea's last name? My writer's assistant? Tyson. And Ambria Allen. Ambria Allen. Yeah. So of all of the jokes that we did, the joke that I thought would get a laugh or a clap and it got neither was the joke about this is America. We don't make a promise to pass a law then th th th th th th th th th th th th th th th the law. th the law. th the law. th th the law. the law. the law. the law. the law. the law. their their their their their their their their their their their of of their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their tho. tho. the. the. the. to to to thooooo. to to to their their their their their their their their their their their about this is America we don't make laws we make a

promise to pass a law then we don't do anything but I thought that would get something it got something in the club I won Roy Roy I did if there's one person that could use a scandal it's Ron DeSantis. That boy is just running around, just passing every controversial law he can think of, thinking that's going to activate voters. That's not how you activate voters in this country, Ron. Everybody know how you do politics. This is a miracle. We don't pass laws.

You make a promise to voters, and then you don't do it. That's what the great leaders in this room understand. You know how to make things not happen. I want to say, I was like, run! Then the line was, that's what you all understand. Y'all are the best at not making things happen. Yeah. And do you remember the original line, Christiana?

Because that was the softer version. The original line was, that's why you're all in this room. You're the best liars. Because you're the best of lying. And I was like, really, you can't say that. Well, I can't say that the best love. But saying you the best that not making it happen. That was, I. It got nothing. It got nothing.

And like in my head, as soon as it came out my mouth, I was like, fuck her, she was right. But you know what I realized as a comic you thought, because when I read it, I was like, thrown is hilarious. Because my brain can only see me performing that joke in a clip and making it work. It didn't cross my mind that this wasn't a room that you were going to be able to be able to make it work because they were focused on what you were saying more than how you were saying it, which I'm not used to that. They're're like a Hilton, they're like five drinks in, right? So like those type of like really nuanced jokes, like, I think by the time it landed, they were like, oh we can't be bothered to laugh, let me have some more whiskey. Right, that was it. That's what I felt it would be. And by, and at that point in the night, they were already getting their orders from the CIA for the tomorrow's broadcast you know what they needed to say. So they were distracted. Although you did it you did that joke in the club. I think it worked in the club.

When I called them the best liars in the club it was great because it wasn't about them. Yeah, that audience. Right. Yeah. Yeah, so constituents. It's a constituents. the the the joke. the joke. the their. their. their. their. their. their. their. their. their. their. their. their. their their their their their their their their their their their their their joke. their their their their their their their their they were. they were. they were. they were. they were. they were. they were. they were. they were. they were. they they they were. they they they they they were. they they they they were. they they were. they were. they were. their. their. their. their. their. their. their. their joke. their joke. their their their trio. trio. their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their th. the, that you said it to them about them and they were like, Isn't that part of the balance though? You're playing to the room, but you're also keenly aware that the constituents are watching this, right? You're trying to make the room feel. But the clips that are going viral aren't necessarily the ones that killed in the room. It's the ones that the constituents connected with the most. the most the most the most the most the most the most the most the most the most the most the most the most the most the most the most the most. the most. the ones the ones the ones the ones the ones the ones the ones the ones the ones the ones the ones connected. that that the constituents const constituents connected. that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that that the ones. the ones. the constituents. the constituents. the constituents constituents. the constituents. the constituents constituents. the constituents constituents. the constituents. the constituents. the constituents. the constituents. the constituents. the constituents con. the constituents con. the constituents con. the most constituents con. the most con. the most con. they. they. they. they. they. they constituents con. they constituents connected. the ones. the constituents connected. the ones. the ones. the ones. the ones. the ones. they. they. they. the ones. they. the constituents. the ones. the ones are the ones that they're repeated. Mm-hmm. Right. Yeah, that's true. I want to hear what jokes y'all were like, ugh. I don't know how that one's gonna— I'm glad you said that.

I think it's funny. I don't even know. That was one of the one that you just mentioned. that I was heavily in that the BMF and the power lines were very specific to a particular demographic and I didn't think that was a roomful of that demographic but I also thought the people who watch BMF and power are very dedicated but it is not that but I also but but that was my my thinking was the same way that room won't get the BMF reference the people who watch BMF won't get the succession reference and that's the the issue the issue the issue the issue the issue the issue the issue the issue the issue the issue the issue the issue the issue the issue the issue the issue the issue the issue the issue the issue the issue the issue the issue the issue is the issue is the issue is the issue is the issue is the issue is the issue is the issue is the issue is the issue is the issue is the issue is the issue is the issue is the issue. i i i the the the the the th i i i i th is. is. is. is. is. is. is. is. is. is. is. is. is. is. is. is. is. is. is. is. is. is. is. is. is. is. Is. Is. Is. Is. Is. Is. Is. Is. Is. Is. Is. Is. Is. Is. Is. Is. Is. Is. Is. th. th. th. th. th.s.s.s.s.s.s.s.s.s....................... the. the. the. th. the. the get the BMF reference, the people who watch BMF won't get the succession reference,

and that's the issue there, but I knew that somebody who, there would be one, one power viewer, one BMF watcher who will go, hey man, they mentioned Big Meach, and that was all I wanted. I felt like you reached out to me specifically for that joke. He was like, put something real specifically blackness only going to be for them 17 people. And that's what we did. Right after a Vanderpump. Right after 17. 17 people and 50 cents. Which turned it into 1.7 million people.

17. He was one of the 17. So yeah, that's what we need. But here's the thing. The thing with that though was that even with 50 cent, right, 50 cent reposted that part of the joke, because he's an executive producer and co-creator on those two series, the line after about Biden, we got to replace Chuck Crock and millions Americans don't know why they hate you. And then they cut to Biden's face. I never saw that. Yeah, remember I'm going to say, I don't see the cutaway shots. I don't see any of that. So Biden's reaction to the joke was almost like a punch-up tag to the joke, like in and of itself. Because I didn't know he had this surprise look on his face like, what the fuck did you just say? Tucker got caught up. Got caught up like that dude from Vanderpump Rules. Text message stuff.

I don't know what Vanderpump Rules is about. I'm just watching a couple times. My friends told me it's like BMF but for white people. Or is that secession? No, Scession is power for white people. No, Tucker Clawson is power for white people. No, that's white power. You know, never mind, don't worry about that.

We got to get Tucker back on the air, Mr. President, because right now there's millions of Americans that don't even know why they hate you. That was an Angela joke, if I'm not mistaken. He didn't move for like two seconds. And I knew Biden would be bewildered when you said his name, so I kind of worked it in. That was part of the architecture. All right, what about you, Angela? Give me one.

I was trying to look because I forget, but the, the, I thought everything was, I expected kind of everything to work because we went through it. I think the school shooting one was the most like, the biggest question mark about how they'd respond. Who gave me the Kanye joke that I didn't do? Because I just didn't want that here. I didn't give it to you. That was a blend of me. That was a blend of myself and Lily.

He was Jewish. All right? No one was about to get me. And then Lily was like, maybe you shouldn't do that. It worked in the clubs. It worked in the clubs. It was coming off of the B.E.T. joke, Mark, I'm not sure if you were on board yet by the time we dropped the Kanye joke, which is

probably for the best because you would have tagged it. It made it worse. What you got it said. or maybe even more camera. But the joke was about, it was come off of BT. But the joke was about, it was come off of BT, BET, Tyler Perry is thinking about buying BT, and that's how broke these companies are. They're thinking about giving BT back to black people. And then the tag was, Roy, don't say the joke?

Don't say the joke. Please save the joke. Why not? Don't say the joke. Just say hi. I can see it. Okay, right, right. Please say the joke. Let me navigate. As a white ally, let me navigate this. Okay. The joke.

Oh my gosh. Generally speaking, it was, you know, it was a joke about Kanye in his anti-Semitism, which was in the news, and how like he says, you know, you all are familiar, the Jews run the media, that was the Kanye thing. And so the joke was about how they were selling it to a black person, and that didn't fit with Cany's theories. theories were wrong. See, thank you.

See, Christiana we we got through that just fine. We all still got our job. For now. But you didn't say it. Angelo did. So I was right. Again, I was right. But yet we felt like we ended up putting that for length and then also because the audience does not know me as a comedian. That's the other hurdle I was dealing with is that even if you only know me from the Daily Show, I know you don't know my stand up because my first two specials

was on the Comedy Central app and you know this is before Paramount Plus saved us and gave us, you know, I'm just being real. So I can't assume that you know my heart as a comedian. Yeah, and when you're doing all this weird political stuff, you don't have the time to make them trust you and what you're saying. Or even before you get to the punchline, they're going to get tense because, you know, how people have like... You set the buzzword. Yeah, and then they are already like, oh, we heard this word. You know, so they just start doing their Pavlovian thing thing thing thing thing thing thing thing thing things, and things, and it, and it, and it, and it, and it, and it, and it, and it, and it, and it, and it, and it, and it, and it, th, thian, th, th, th, thi, thi, thi, or thi, or their, or their, or, or, or, or, or, or, or, or, or, or, or, or, or, or, or, or, or, or, or, or, or, or, or, or, or, or, or, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, the, their, the, the, their, their, their, their, they, they, they, they, they, they, they, they, they, they, they, they, they, they, even they, even, even, even a point that is good with Kanye and this and that, it's just more like, I think in Christiani, you agree, it was just like,

it was just like, it was just too much like math for the room for not to pay off. Come see me live. I do that. But you know what, I will say watching that watching that process though was interesting for me as a stand-up because I don't think about that while I'm doing stand-up. I think about whether or not the joke will work. Is the joke funny? Is the joke funny? And do I stand by the joke? And so to kind of see you guys have this insight to what will lose the room before you do the joke is different for me. But I think you're right, like hearing the joke is tame that will will will will will will will will will will will will will will will will will will will will will will will will will will will will will will will will kill kill kill kill kill kill kill kill kill kill kill kill kill kill kill kill kill kill kill kill kill kill kill kill that will kill that will kill that will kill that will kill that will kill that will kill that that that that that that that that that th. th. that that that that that that that that's that's that's that's that's that's that's that's that's, the the the joke. the joke. the joke. the joke. the joke. the joke. the joke. the joke. the joke. the joke. the joke. the joke. the joke. the joke. the joke. the joke. the joke. the joke. the joke. the joke. the joke. the joke. the the the today, today, today, today, today, today, today, today, today, is, is, is, is, today, the the the, I'm like, the joke is tame that will kill in a comedy club, but I could see how today was going to be a bunch of, he supports Kanye Wester, he made the Jews, and that would have been, that would have been detrimental to what you accomplished.

Yeah, because it was strategic, like, where will we lose the room? Because we're going to do that a couple times. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. to, to, to, to, to, to, the to, to, to, to, they. Yeah, to, to, they. Yeah, to, to, they. Yeah, to, they. Yeah, they. Yeah, they. Yeah, they. Yeah, they. Yeah, they. Yeah, they. Yeah, they. Yeah, they. Yeah, they. Yeah, they. Yeah, they. Yeah, they. Yeah, they. Yeah, they. Yeah, they. Yeah, to, to, they. Yeah, they. Yeah, to, they. Yeah, to, to, to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to they. they. they.'re gonna do that a couple times? So you don't want to do it too many times you have to pick which one. If you're gonna do what you want to do it for something better than that particular. That's a good joke but that's not the one you want to lose. Yeah then going to bat for Kanye. Yeah the school shooting joke was a joke where you're like the joke where you you was a joke where you were you was a joke where you're like where you're like where you're like where you're like you you you you you were to you were to to to to to to to you were like to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to you. you to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to you want you want you want you want you want you want you want you want you want you want you want you want you want you were like you were like you were like where you were like where you were. to you. you. you. you. you. you. you. you. you. you. the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the to to to to to the to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to the the you., so that's the thing. And it's that thought that we like, we knew there were certain moments where the room would not be behind us. But we felt that the final 25% when Roy did his kumbaya thing as we started calling it,

would bring them back because then they would be like, see that Roy is rooted in more than just like, kind of comedy and a, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, that, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, that., that Roy is rooted in more than just like kind of like comedy and provocative ideas. He kind of comes from the... I thought that was the most important moment of the entire... And I thought it was funny, I thought it was funny, I thought it was funny, but once I saw, that was the original version I saw in the Google Doc. That was added in the last four or five days. That's it evolved.

That was a back and forth, right, Roy, because initially was too, I felt it was too long. And I sent it back to Roy with a bunch of cuts. Yeah, it was too emotional. I was like, I love the mom's stuff, but we need to figure out the dad stuff, but the way it was compressed, people came away, people th, th, th, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that and then it tied into the broader theme of like these scandals and the fact that you know what's going on with the press that we're not necessarily talking about but I was just concerned especially since that BT joke was so up top it was like one of the opening after like just a greeting I was like yo if he loses them at that point,

then you bomb. Yeah. And I'm aware that we're playing to different constituencies and my feeling was whatever goes viral, if the clip is a room full of people not laughing, then it's just like, it's you bombing. Yeah, you're bombing. Even if the person watching it is like, this BMF joke is hilarious. But if no one's laughing is like, is it's like, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it's like, it's like, it's like, thi. Yeah, thi, thi, thi, thi. Yeah, thi, thom. Yeah, th. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, it's th. Yeah, it's th. Yeah, it's th. Yeah, it's th. Yeah, it's like, it's like, it's like, it's like, it's like, it's like, it's like, it's like, it's like, it's like, it's like, it's like, it's like, it's like, it's like, it's like, it's like, it's like, it's like, it's like, thi. I's like, thi. I's like, thi. I's like, thi. I's like, thi. I's like, thi. Yeah, it's person watching it is like, this BMF joke is hilarious. But if no one's laughing, is it funny? And I just didn't want that. And it was hard because we're constantly doing those calculations of like, okay, we're playing to the room and in the room there's like this big ideological division, you know, there's the politicians and then there's the press and you got someone from Vanderpump rules and the people at home are like I'm a Bravo fanatic so I was trying to get a

housewives or van der Pump rules in there somewhere but like the rest of the room don't know what the hell that is you know so it was just like and we want to the people on the shade room shade room joke in there initially right remember But that we lost that also for time but then shade room picked up the Kamala joke Okay after the break. I will wrap up this conversation with some of my wonderful wonderful writers from the White House Correspondence dinner and the lovely. I don't even know why they call it a speech. It's a performance. We'll be right back As we wrap up here as we wrap up here. I'm gonna tell you the the the the one. I the one. I don't the one. I don't the one. I don't the one. I don't even the one. I don't even even even even even even even even even the one. I don't the one. I don't the one. I don't the one. I don't the the the the the the one. I don't the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the theyyyy. they. theyrea. they. theyrea. their the, because I want to hold you all up, I'm going to tell you the one person who loved the set that I was shocked, but then it could be the bridge we need to bring the correspondence dinner back to being a beautiful bipartisan evening of roasting.

At the CBS Party. Kelly Ann Conway. Oh wow. Oh my gosh. Love it. And I don't know if that's success or failure. She's a new single, Roy. Yeah, I was going to say. Yeah, it might not have anything to do with yourself. Tell I am. What's so? Yeah. She likes a bit of color, so you know. Or should I call you? Should I call you on that? You're gonna rap. Yeah, that's.

See, now y'all are twisted in some freaky. That's enough. Somebody asked me this earlier. Would you do this again? Depends on who the host is. Yeah. Oh, no. If it it it it it it it's it's it's it's it's it's it's it's it's it's it's it's it's it's it's it's it's it's it's it's it's it's it's it's it's it's it's it's it's it's a the the the the the the the the the the the th. So, so th. So, so th. So, so th. So, so th. So, so th. So, so th. So, so to th. So, so to to to to to to to to to to to to to th. So, so th. So, so th. So, so th. So, so th. So, so th. So, so th. So, it's a th. So, it's a th. So, it's a th. So, it's a the the the thi. It's a thi. It's a thi. It's a thi. It's a thi. It's a thi. It's a thi. It's a thi. It's a thi. It's a thi. It's a thi. would you do this again? Depends on who the host is. Yeah. Oh my god. It's on who the host is I would. Oh no, if it's you, yes, but I'm not doing this again. Oh no for you, yes I do it for you. I turned for somebody else. Well that's all the time we have for today. Thank you so much David Angelo Chistiana and thank you, Philonius Muck. Thank you all for going beyond the scenes with you.

See you next time. Listen to the Daily Show Beyond the Scenes on Apple Podcast, the I-Heart Radio App or wherever you get your podcast.