“Meet The Press with Jon Stewart.”
It seemed like a crazy idea when the news broke, something almost unbelievable – a comedian hosting the flagship Sunday morning news show – but it was all too real, even for Stewart.
In an interview with Rolling Stone, The Daily Show host confirmed he was offered the vaunted “Russert chair” by NBC.
“My guess is they were casting as wide and as weird a net as they could,” Stewart told the magazine. “I’m sure part of them was thinking, ‘Why don’t we just make it a variety show?’”
But he passed, saying he never took the offer seriously. “I felt like that was one of those situations where someone says, ‘We really like what you do. Why don’t you come over here and do something different, maybe something you don’t do as well, for us?’” Stewart says. “I can understand notionally where it comes from. News and entertainment have melded in a way. But they would be overcompensating on the entertainment side. That’s certainly not an outlandish decision, although I don’t necessarily think that’s the best direction for it.”
Stewart’s reluctance to make the leap to real journalism is in keeping with his “I’m just a comedian” mantra. But polls show, particularly among young people, he is considered a legitimate and trusted news source.