John Oliver Dismantles The Biggest Myth About Comedy In The Trump Era

John Oliver is sick of an assumption many have made about late-night comedy under former President Donald Trump: the notion that the comics want or even need him as fodder for their jokes.

“It’s a complete myth and it’s kind of genuinely insulting,” Oliver told The Washington Post ahead of Sunday’s return of his HBO show, “Last Week Tonight.”

“Wow, how little do you think of me? Because partly it comes from ‘Oh, it must’ve written itself.’ Really? You [expletive] think that? You try injecting poison into your body every week and get a joke out the other side that Twitter hasn’t already come up with. The happiest I was at the end of last year was we finished our final show and started working on our new list of shows. And it was just great to be able to think about wonky stories.”

Oliver also said the end of the Trump presidency was not the end of what has bubbled to the surface in recent years.

″[T[he systemic problems underneath were there before him and will remain after him,” Oliver said, adding that the coronavirus pandemic had shined a light on many long-ignored issues in society, some of which will become topics on the upcoming season of his show.