A little over two months after Jon Stewart announced he’s leaving The Daily Show this year, The Guardian has a new interview out with Stewart that reveals why he decided to leave his 16-year late night post and his thoughts on the show’s future. Here’s what Stewart said when asked why he ultimately chose to leave:
“It’s not like I thought the show wasn’t working any more, or that I didn’t know how to do it. It was more, ‘Yup, it’s working. But I’m not getting the same satisfaction’ … 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.’”
Understandably, Stewart says he lives “in a constant state of depression” watching Fox News and the rest of the 24-hour news cycle for his job: “I think of us [the Daily Show staff] as turd miners. I put on my helmet, I go and mine turds, hopefully I don’t get turd lung disease.” When asked if there’s any circumstance where he’ll watch Fox News again after The Daily Show, he gave the perfect answer:
“Umm… All right, let’s say that it’s a nuclear winter, and I have been wandering, and there appears to be a flickering light through what appears to be a radioactive cloud and I think that light might be a food source that could help my family. I might glance at it for a moment until I realise, that’s Fox News, and then I shut it off. That’s the circumstance.”
He’s also not worried about what the world will do without a Jon Stewart-hosted Daily Show, arguing that “if Oprah can leave and the world still spins, I honestly think it will survive me.” Read the rest of the interview over at The Guardian.
