when did jon stewart leave the daily show

When did jon stewart leave the daily show series#

'For the better part of the last two decades, we have had the incredible honor and privilege of working with Jon Stewart. They did release the following statement, officially announcing that the longtime host will step down later this year. At this time, Comedy Central has not decided who will take over. The daily talk show will continue on in the future with a different host. 'That's how I started and that's… I'm sure that's how I will end,' he said.Jon Stewart has decided to leave his seat at The Daily Show after 16 years on the air. When asked at a recent Daily Show taping if he ever planned to return to standup, he responded with an emphatic yes. for a surprise set at the Comedy Cellar - the New York-based venue that marked one of the key foundations of Stewart's career in comedy, and where his picture now hangs on the wall.įittingly, it's on the subject of standup comedy that Stewart made the most definitive statement about his future plans. With retirement just a day away, Stewart is already showing more range than he has in years.

And if he ever decided to follow in the footsteps of comedians-turned-politicians like Al Franken and run for office himself - well, it would certainly make for an interesting campaign season.īut the diversity of Stewart's interests before The Daily Show - combined with his decision, after 16 years, to leave it - is a reminder that the most influential political commentator of our time has interests that extend beyond politics. There are also side projects he recently bought a farm with the intention of turning it into an animal sanctuary. Then there's the staggering number of Daily Show correspondents who have gone on to bigger careers, which proves Stewart has an eye for talent - and given the work he put into building the careers of Stephen Colbert, Larry Wilmore, and Trevor Noah through Busboy Productions, there's plenty of room for him to keep seeking talent out. Audiences have long been trained to expect a certain tone from Stewart - witty, patrician, occasionally hectoring - and hearing him deliver lines like 'I am the lord of the springs!' never stops feeling incongruous. It's far from the movie's only flaw, but Stewart's voiceover performance as an evil anthropomorphic spring in 2006's singularly awful Doogal is incredibly distracting. On the few times Jon Stewart did branch away from his Daily Show persona during his tenure as anchor, the results were at best bizarre and at worst disastrous. Even his non-Daily Show projects tended to be extensions of his persona as a two-time host for both the Grammy Awards and the Academy Awards, his jokes tended toward the kinds of things you'd hear on the Comedy Central series. Since taking over The Daily Show, Stewart has channeled the vast majority of his creative impulses into Daily Show-related projects, including a couple of books and the 'Rally to Restore Sanity,' an incredibly well-attended live event he co-hosted with Stephen Colbert in 2010.

It was a massive, career-making role, and Stewart threw himself into it at the expense of almost everything else he'd attempted up to that point.

When did jon stewart leave the daily show series#

At the time, neither Stewart nor The Daily Show were the network-defining institutions they've become today, and it took time to hone both the host and the show into the sharp political series it became - and above all, an outlet for liberals frustrated with the Bush administration. Stewart's eventual ascension to the anchor chair on The Daily Show, which was vacated by Craig Kilborn in 1998, came after several similar hosting gigs, including MTV's failed The Jon Stewart Show.