Conan O’Brien joked that former President Donald Trump’s biggest crime had nothing to do with January 6th and everything to do with the state of comedy.
O’Brien spoke with podcaster Kara Swisher about his long career and why political comedy isn’t his forte during the Monday edition of On with Kara Swisher.
“You don’t do political humor. Is that something that’s eroded?” Swisher asked.
“For me, it was always what serves the comedy and what’s funny to me,” O’Brien said.
“The truest, most visceral comedy to me is always going to be Warner Brothers cartoons that were made in the 1940s and 50’s. That’s the stuff I grew up on that was shown in reruns. So I liked that kind of comedy. I was never as comfortable with comedy where I needed to make a point about something,” O’Brien added.
Swisher noted that Trump gave people the opportunity to do just that.
“It didn’t serve comedy well. I actually think Trump has been — people say all kinds of, you know, he’s committed all these different horrible acts. But I think one of the worst is I think he’s bad for comedy,” O’Brien noted.
The comedian explained that Trump was already a parody of a politician and it’s hard to
“You can’t parody something that already has that crazy irregular shape. It’s not possible. So I always thought that when Trump came along, what a lot of people have to revert to is, ‘Doesn’t he suck? I hate that guy. He’s an asshole.’ And those aren’t jokes,” O’Brien said.
“I’m really going out on a limb here saying — that’s his greatest crime. I think he’s hurt political comedy by being so outlandish himself. I think the January 6th thing is a blip compared to how much he’s hurt comedy,” O’Brien joked.
Listen above via On with Kara Swisher.