John Oliver: Don’t Expect Trevor Noah to ‘Replace’ Jon Stewart

In an interview with Fusion’s Jorge Ramos this week, John Oliver attempted to both shower praise on his former boss Jon Stewart and lower expectations for The Daily Show host’s successor Trevor Noah.

“Jon Stewart taught me how to everything,” Oliver said. “I think it’s pretty much an objective fact, I owe him everything,” he added, saying that on his HBO show Last Week Tonight, “all I’m doing now is trying to use the muscles he gave me.” He stressed that he was talking about “comedic muscles,” not literal ones.

Asked by Ramos about Noah, Oliver said, “You cannot expect him to replace someone who is completely irreplaceable. He will do his own thing, that will be the best thing for that show. You can’t replace the greatest person to ever have done this thing.”

Last month, when Oliver first faced questions about the controversial tweets from Noah’s past, he turned the focus around on himself. “Listen, I’m a standup,” he said at the time. “If you go through the first years of my career, thank fuck there weren’t camera phones.”

Watch video below, via Fusion:

[Photo via screengrab]

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