Comedy Central isn’t making the same mistake thrice.
After letting former stand-out correspondents such as John Oliver and Samantha Bee leave The Daily Show for their own starring vehicles on HBO and TBS, Comedy Central will hold onto Jordan Klepper, giving him the plum post-Daily Show half-hour, starting weeknights this fall.
“The choice to entrust me with the 11:30 p.m. time slot is both incredibly humbling and deeply disturbing,” Klepper said in the network’s official statement. “Without a doubt, it has utterly destroyed my confidence in Comedy Central’s decision making acumen. Dear God, now I have to work with these fools.”
“Jordan’s talent has become so increasingly obvious it would take a real fool to not offer him this opportunity,” said Comedy Central chief Kent Alterman.
The network had filled the slot by starting @midnight a half-hour earlier since August 2016, when Comedy Central had cancelled The Nightly Show with Larry Wilmore.
No word yet on how this will impact the network’s other current late-night programming, including the newly announced The President Show, a weekly satire starring Anthony Atamanuik as Trump.
More from the press release:
Klepper was hired by Jon Stewart to join The Daily Show in 2014 and continued on to become the senior correspondent under Trevor Noah where he has defined himself with both his studio work and segments in the field, ranging from his multi-part series exploring the reality of being a “Good Guy with a Gun” to his field pieces at Trump rallies which have garnered millions of views.
His new series, which is in the beginning stages of development and will be produced by Klepper, Trevor Noah and Stuart Miller (The Daily Show with Jon Stewart, Ferrell Takes the Field), will look to embrace and define the chaos of our country by channeling Klepper’s steadfast attitude that institutions are to be trusted less than the lies of the mainstream media. He’ll surround himself with a hand-picked team of contributors contractually obligated to reinforce his singularly correct world view. Adds Klepper, “Finally, there’s a show on TV that’s not didactic and is NOT GOING TO TELL YOU WHAT TO DO. Watch – 11:30’s in the fall on Comedy Central. Do it.”
Sarah Babineau and Ari Pearce are the executives in charge of production for Comedy Central. Klepper is represented by Fred Hashagen at UTA and Kirsten Ames at Kirsten Ames Management.