Bill O'Reilly's Interview with Stephen Colbert Last Night Was Like Nothing They've Done Before
Stephen Colbert's interviews at The Late Show have had little of the dogged confrontation-bordering-on-belligerence of his Comedy Central days, but he has continued asking the right questions. That was true last night with Bill O'Reilly, with whom he managed to get into a reasoned argument about the legacy of conservative idol Ronald Reagan. He asked the right question about why, for conservatives, huge deficit spending can only be justified when it goes towards the military. He asked the right question about why Reagan's legacy of raising taxes goes almost completely ignored in conservative circles. Things stayed calm and polite, but it hasn't always been that way.
It's been more than nine years since Colbert first appeared on The O'Reilly Factor. Plenty has changed in the interim, but few things have evolved more than Colbert. In 2007, he was fully channeling O'Reilly for his faux right-wing cable news character, and just beginning to secure his place in liberal hearts as a satirist to rival his mentor, Jon Stewart. His appearance on O'Reilly back then was masterful: He did not just perfectly mimic Bill O's demeanor, he managed to rile him up and use comedic judo moves to make O'Reilly's gripes-and O'Reilly himself-look petty and small.
It all came to a head when O'Reilly tried to trap him by telling viewers that a younger Colbert went by "little Stevie ColberT," and that he had, deep breaths here, embraced Frenchness. Colbert dodged him again and again, however, and it all became too much for O'Reilly.
"Who are you?" he screamed. "Are you ColberT, or Colbeerrrr?"
"Bill," Colbert said, smirking just a bit, "I'm whoever you want me to be."
Last night's interview couldn't have been more different. In the years that followed that appearance, Colbert's character softened a bit. He laughed more on set, and not every segment and joke was completely filtered through the arch-conservative persona. And then there was the clean break: the new gig succeeding David Letterman at CBS, and the chance to be himself again for the first time in a decade.
The difference these days is that when Colbert asks the guest a question, he's really asking. There's no underlying motive to set up the next judo chop, a staple of cable news interviews and the round table next to the fireplace on the Colbert Report. In contrast to some others, Colbert's move to network late night has made him treat things as less of a game.
