Woody Harrelson Lets Stephen Colbert Shave His Head For The Troops

This clip crystallizes one of the reasons why The Colbert Report is so damn good: Anything can happen, and when it does, it will happen for the right reasons.

It will also be kooky, goofy, funny and hilarious — but it will be shot through with decency, charity, tolerance and warmth. You will seriously never find mean humor on the Colbert Report. It’s just not what that show’s about.

This is what I found myself thinking as I watched Stephen Colbert shave Woody Harrelson‘s head just now, catching up on my DVR from Thursday night. Harrelson stars in The Messenger, about two soldiers with the terrible duty of delivering the news to next of kin that their loved ones have died. (He is also in 2012, but only one of these movies is to be taken seriously.) Colbert, as you probably already know, is a huge supporter of the troops and shaved his own head when he took his show to Iraq earlier this year. So when he asked Harrelson if he’d shave his head for the troops, he had standing to do so.

Who knows whether it was planned before — Colbert’s reaction suggests it wasn’t, but he had the shaver there, so he had at least thought some of it through — but what happened next was just a lovely, lovely bit of television: Woody Harrelson let Stephen Colbert shave his head for the troops while together they sang The Star-Spangled Banner. It is a pretty amazing clip.

Watch it below, followed by the full embedded Colbert Report from Thursday night, which contains several other hallmarks of the show’s greatness: The Wørd, a hilarious Canada-baiting bit that will gin up Colbert’s usual audience-participation, and an awesomely meta bit about Miracle Whip mayonnaise that gets the advertiser in on the joke…and paying for ad time (totally meta, totally hilarious). Colbert is the gold standard; wish more people on the boob tube measured up. Huge kudos for Harrelson, too, obviously; both of them get major mensch points for this one.