Jon Stewart & the Daily Show Writers Pack the House

By Maryann Yin 

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart Mon – Thurs 11p / 10c
Rally to Restore Sanity
www.thedailyshow.com
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Jon Stewart and the Daily Show writers held a book signing at Union Square Barnes & Noble last night to promote Earth (The Book): A Visitor’s Guide to the Human Race. The event required a large bottle of water and comfortable shoes because standing was the only option after 4 o’clock.

The event manager predicted that Stewart’s signing would dwarf the crowd for Jonathan Franzen’s 1,000 attendees. The prediction come true; some fans had been waiting since 2 p.m. anticipating Stewart’s appearance. As Stewart readied himself to introduce his writers, he thanked the crowd for their presence. Then, he promised everybody’s books would get signed. Suddenly, Stewart stopped short, looked at the crowd and shared this thought: ” F*** … I really thought I was gonna see my family tonight. As it turns out, I will not.”

After some remarks, Stewart read from the chapter entitled Religions. He explained the premise of the book: “This is the entirety of the human experience. How we got here, what we did while we were here, and obviously, how we’re leaving. We’ll tell you, it’s really quite funny.”


During the 30+ minute Q&A, Stewart alternated between the front and back areas while taking questions. He also spoke extensively about the Rally to Restore Sanity to take place on October 30th in Washington D.C.’s National Mall. The embedded video shows Stewart making the rally’s official announcement.

A majority of the writers come from a comedy-writing background. One writer, Josh Lieb also plugged his young-adult satire novel I Am a Genius of Unspeakable Evil and I Want to Be Your Class President. He told the crowd, “I wrote a really great book … Buy a copy tonight, I’ll sign it for sure. In fact, buy it instead of this book [Earth]. We’ve already sold enough of these.”

When asked for his recommendation on a novel to read, Stewart mentioned Lieb’s book calling it “a tremendous book.” One audience member asked about his relationship with Stephen Colbert. He replied, “It’s homoerotic at times. I think we feel like brothers. Sometimes, when we get to talk to each other it’s just a nice way to exhale because we don’t get to see each other enough.”

The session also revealed that Stewart personally wrote 79 out of 256 pages of the book. He also thinks that in the end, humans “will be fine.”