We Now Know Why Stephen Colbert Delivered His Cancellation Announcement With Googly Eyes on His Hand
After the news broke yesterday afternoon that CBS had cancelled The Late Show With Stephen Colbert — officially for “financial reasons,” though it’s hard not to think politics has something to do with it — the show released a teaser clip of the cold open. In the clip, Colbert maintained his composure (though his cheeks do seem a bit more pink than usual) as he told the audience watching the taping live in the legendary Ed Sullivan Theater that he’d found out the night before that not only the network was firing him, but that it was doing the time-slot equivalent of salting the earth so that nothing would ever grow there again, ending The Late Show just two hosts into its 32-year run.
Colbert concluded his remarks in a manner I would describe as unexpected: He called to a “Dante,” presumably camera operator Dante Pagano, and the camera cut to a close-up of Colbert’s right hand.
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Red lips had been drawn, budget Señor Wences-style, on the side of Colbert’s thumb and the base of his finger, and a pair of googly eyes had been stuck on his forefinger, approximating a face for Colbert to puppeteer. “Let’s do the show!” exclaimed Colbert’s hand puppet. “Jazz cowboy, blapping on the poof!”
I have no idea what any of that means, maybe because I didn’t grow up in this country or maybe because I didn’t go to Northwestern. Despite the presence of googly eyes, Google is no help.
But never mind: What seemed in the cold open to be an utter non sequitur of a joke was merely coming to us out of the sequence in which the live audience saw it, like a Christopher Nolan movie unspooling its plot in reverse. When the show proper began, Colbert dispensed with commentary about the brutally hot weather across the country, then segued to his subject for the rest of the monologue, commenting that the heat may also be affecting the president: “His skin seems to be falling off.”
With copious visual aids, Colbert described Donald Trump’s right hand, which lately has been photographed in public with concealer slapped on it haphazardly. It took until Thursday for White House spokespeople to admit that Trump has “chronic venous insufficiency,” of which both his hand bruising and visibly swollen ankles are symptoms. This explains why Trump has been looking different lately; it doesn’t explain why the person who applied the concealer to Trump’s hand did such a half-assed job, but the sabotage to his public image does seem intentional. Yes, his wife is a professional model who could probably deal with this effortlessly; why she didn’t is a question no one seems to be asking.
Anyway: Colbert generously said that he’s on TV every day and he wears makeup too: “Sometimes, I even wear it on my hand, and there’s nothing weird about that, is there.” Colbert pulled his right hand out of his pocket, and as the camera closed in on his puppet hand, it replied in a high-pitched voice, “No, Mr. Stephen! You’re awesome! I love you! You are so perfect and so handsome, I love you, (smooch noises).”
“Why, thank you, Mr. Hand,” replied Colbert.
“’S’alright,” said Mr. Hand, at a much deeper pitch.
A long way to go for a joke that will appeal most to viewers who watched Señor Wences live on The Ed Sullivan Show? Maybe. But at least it called back to the rich showbiz history of the theater the show is shooting in. When CBS sells The Ed Sullivan Theater to Coinbase or the UFC, this is the sort of gag we’ll miss.
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