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The Problem with Jon Stewart: Former Daily Show host returns to television with a deep dive show

The show will take ‘tangible steps that can lead to a solutionary path forward,’ Apple said in a statement

Peony Hirwani
Tuesday 31 August 2021 06:54 BST
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Stephen Colbert and Jon Stewart team up to bash Mitch McConnell

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Jon Stewart is returning to TV in September with a new late-night current affairs series titled The Problem With Jon Stewart on AppleTV+.

Each episode of the forthcoming series will focus on a single issue and will feature discussions with people affected by a particular topic.

Apple said in a statement that the show will take “tangible steps that can lead to a solutionary path forward”.

It added that new episodes will premier every other week, accompanied by a weekly podcast of the same name that will feature “lots of jokes”.

Stewart quit The Daily Show in 2015, explaining that the presidential election at the time pushed his decision to leave the satirical series he had helmed since 1999.

“I’d covered an election four times, and it didn’t appear that there was going to be anything wildly different about this one,” he told The Guardian at the time.

He added: “These things are cyclical. You have moments of dissatisfaction, and then you come out of it and it’s OK. But the cycles become longer and maybe more entrenched, and that’s when you realise, ‘OK, I’m on the back side of it now.’”

In 2018, Trevor Noah, who is the current host of The Daily Show, opened up about what Stewart told him when it was announced that he would be leaving after more than 15 years on the series.

“I walked into his office and I said, ‘Hey, what’s going on? Are you being pushed out? What’s happening? You need my help, let me know, man. We’ll fight,’” Trevor said at a panel discussion.

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“He said ‘I’m leaving because I’m tired.’ And he said, ‘I’m tired of being angry.’ And he said, ’I’m angry all the time. I don’t find any of this funny. I do not know how to make it funny right now, and I don’t think the host of the show, I don’t think the show deserves a host who does not feel that it is funny,” he added.

The Problem With Jon Stewart is scheduled to premiere on 30 September 2021.

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