‘The Interview’: John Oliver Is Still Working Through the Rage

Nobody is doing late-night comedy quite like John Oliver. Oliver first became known to U.S. audiences as the senior British correspondent for “The Daily Show,” bringing a keen outsider’s eye and observational humor to American political dysfunction. But since 2014, he has been hosting his own show, “Last Week Tonight,” on HBO, winning 30 Emmys and the respect of a devoted audience for his very funny, meticulously researched deep dives into subjects that few would consider obvious comedic fodder.

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The show opens with a short riff on the news of the week, but the main event is that detailed spelunk into a single, often pretty nerdy topic. This season alone, Oliver has talked about state medical boards, corn and deep-sea mining and has made the case for universal free lunch in American schools. This is comedy married with moral outrage, and the show’s work has even led to real-world change (called the John Oliver effect).

In this tumultuous moment, when we’re all inundated with low-quality viral takes and misinformation posing as news, Oliver’s fact-based-for-laughs approach (“It’s only funny if it’s true,” he told me) has blurred the line between entertainment and journalism. All of which made me curious about how Oliver sees himself and his work 10 years in, during another bitterly fought election. We first spoke the day after the debate between Kamala Harris and Donald Trump.

This is your first time in the New York Times building, right? It is my first time in this building, yes. I saw the red staircase, and that really is the main thing you think of when you walk through. It’s empty right now, though. We’re here quite early. So it’s less bustling than you would want a cartoon newsroom to be.

We are busy here normally. This is not an accusation that there’s basically nothing happening here at The New York Times. Just as it happens, if you were looking for people throwing balled up pieces of paper at each other and yelling about deadlines, that was not my experience.