Trevor Noah took a big dig at everyone during the White House Correspondents’ DinnerWhite House Correspondents’ Dinner. He took a swipe at Will Smith for slapping Chris Rock at the Oscars, name-checked Joe Rogan, resurrected Fox News’ Roger Ailes, and mocked Paramount+. Deadline reports that Trevor Noah didn’t spare everyone, not even “the people who pay him the big bucks.” Everyone got his or her share of the dig!
“I actually get why CBS hired Mick Mulvaney,” Comedy Central-based Noah noted of the controversial contract handed out to one of Donald Trump’s former chiefs of staff. “He’s more than just a guy who assured everyone that Donald Trump would concede gracefully, he can also get you access to other people who assured you that Donald Trump would concede, it’s very important,” he added.
“So shout out to CBS, my corporate cousin,” Noah then went on to say at the so-called Nerd Prom with various CBS and Showtime brass in the Washington Hilton ballroom audience in front of him and a constantly laughing President Joe Biden. “You can actually find us on Paramount+ right between SpongeBob SquarePants and a bunch of movies even Delta’s in-flight entertainment system turned down,” the comedian said to hearty laughter from the crowd.
Making the expected swipes at the assembled politicians, especially Florida’s governor and 2024 hopeful Ron DeSantis, the short shelf life of CNN+, the resignation of Jeff Zucker, fired Chris Cuomo’s grab for big bucks, and more, NYC-set Noah wasted little time dragging up the biggest entertainment story of the year from out of Los Angeles.
“It is risky making jokes these days,” the Daily Show frontman told the packed and maskless crowd of around 2,500 of the media, Hollywood and DC’s power players, plus President Biden and First Lady Dr. Jill Biden, who was seated on the dais next to CBS Entertainment Group boss George Cheeks. “I mean, we all saw what happened at the Oscars,” he said of Will Smith’s widely condemned and globally televised slap of Chris Rock on March 27 for making fun of Jada Pinkett-Smith’s haircut.
Then Noah leaned into what was arguably his best quip of the night.
“I’ve actually been a little worried about tonight. What if I make a really mean joke about Kellyanne Conway, and then her husband rushes up on the stage and thanks me?”
A hit with at least one target market, Biden himself, Noah initially praised “the kings of cable, Fox News.” Citing the outlet, which POTUS wrapped repeatedly in his own earlier WHCD remarks, Noah compared the quality of fact-based news on FNC to a Waffle House. “It’s relatively normal in the afternoon, but as soon as the sun goes down there is a drunk lady named Jeanine threatening to fight every Mexican who comes in,” the South African-born comic jabbed.
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