Stephen Colbert’s been bouncing around town. Throwing treats to Wrigley Field ball hawks along Waveland Avenue. Hanging out at the Old Town Ale House and Second City. Grabbing a hot dog (straight up, with a traditional squirt of abuse) at The Wieners Circle. Last week, while still in New York City, on “The Late Show With Stephen Colbert,” he brought on Sean Hayes (a native of Glen Ellyn), sat on a makeshift public-access set, shot the segment in a soft VHS-esque murky sheen and read a “community calendar” of Chicagoland must-dos, including a read-to-service-dogs day at Yorkville Public Library.
Hours before the Democratic National Convention began, he roamed a near-empty United Center, disguised with long brown hair, a goatee and a Bulls jersey, giving away hot dogs (and hot dog water) to A-list political stars such as Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez.
The reason for this Chi-crawl, of course, was a week of live DNC episodes of “Late Show” at the Auditorium Theatre, starting Monday with guests Hillary Rodham Clinton and Julia Louis-Dreyfus. Tickets for all four shows (free, in keeping with TV tapings) went in a blink. It wasn’t the first time a coastal talk staple vacationed in Chicago. Conan O’Brien did it; Letterman did it years ago; Leno sort of did it (at the Rosemont Theatre). “The Daily Show” is also shooting all week from the Atheneum in Chicago, with Colbert BFF Jon Stewart on Thursday.
But this one felt different.
Near the end of Monday’s show, during a commercial break, Colbert looked over from his desk, smiled broadly, locked eyes with producer Tom Purcell (a 1985 graduate of Loyola University) and mouthed: “Wow …” Then: “Just… WOW!” He punctuated it with kind of jazz hands, spreading them wide beside his face. Purcell, red pen in his mouth, hoodie trailing, feeling good, bopped his head to the house band and, in affirmative, to Colbert.
Now that’s a homecoming.
The Ed Sullivan Theater in New York, the show’s usual headquarters, seats 400, but the cavernous, dizzyingly tall Auditorium Theatre seats almost 4,000. And despite the scheduled 10:30 p.m. start being bumped to midnight because of DNC speeches — this is network TV, subject to preemption by CBS News — despite the audience having to be seated two hours before the show began, that audience was deafeningly engaged, welcoming in a way that Chicagoans only show for people named Murray and Jordan.
Clinton (herself a Park Ridge native), during her segment, surveying the audience, mentioned maybe Colbert should think about shooting the show here more regularly.
He answered quietly, sincerely, his voice full of nostalgia and maybe regret: “I think, why did I ever leave?”
Colbert, graduate of Northwestern University, graduate of Second City, native son of South Carolina, is becoming that rarest Chicago royalty — the man’s not really from Illinois but his formative roots run deep enough, and the love feels true enough, to be adopted. His large face, after all, looks across North Avenue daily, an old headshot staring down from the windows beside other Second City greats. Not to mention, Colbert’s that even rarer breed of residential New Yorker: As he explained before the show went live, he’s drawn to defend deep dish pizza. “It’s a completely different game!”
Talking to Jordan Klepper of ‘The Daily Show’ about prepping for a DNC week in Chicago
The special Chicago-inspired stage set alone was a thoughtful nod to the city, its gold proscenium arch a loving imitation of “L” track girders, flowing seamless into the original ornate stage fronts by the Auditorium architects Dankmar Adler and Louis Sullivan.
Colbert ran out onstage unannounced with a few minutes to spare before the broadcast. He said, “I haven’t spent this much in the Windy City in 30 years — and I couldn’t be happier.” He sounded horse in the way that you do after talking too much, working too long. He took a few questions just before air, including one from a man wearing sunglasses in the theater — Da’ Bears cosplay, seemingly — who wanted to know what Second City taught him. Colbert said that through Mick Napier, longtime Second City director, “I learned to love the bomb.” Meaning, embracing failure. You never do forget where you failed worst. Colbert said to love bombing meant “nothing can kill you.” He said: “Sometimes when a scene was going south, we would stretch it out even longer.”
He stepped aside, lights lowered and the show began with an actual love letter to the city, pre-taped, clever, sweet, performed to the tune of the National Anthem (though identified as “The Chicago National Anthem”). Just 90 seconds long, it played like an instant local classic, starting with Colbert on a hot dog kazoo. The host sang: “Oh say we eat, hot Italian dipped beef … Lower Waaaacker, Hancock … no, that’s not dirty talk …” Hayes was back, joined by Jason Sudeikis (Second City alum), Jennifer Hudson (Chicago native) and, superimposed on the Bean, Nick Offerman (Minooka native). They namechecked Weiners Circle, Anthony Rizzo, the CTA, Michelle Obama, Da’ Bears.
A man in the second row actually wiped his eyes when it was over then smiled sheepishly.
Or maybe he was just tired.
Before the show went to air, the audience sat rapt, watching CBS’s convention feed, groaning when anchor Norah O’Donnell noted three speakers left before President Joe Biden; they also hooted when Biden himself said: “Let me close with …” (That said, much of the audience cheered the feed, even offering standing ovations for United Center speeches.) Some audience members sat with DNC credentials still around their necks. Secret Service members (for Clinton) were spotted in the theater edges, even standing for hours between a forest of cameras on stage, watching without expression. Then just before Monday became Tuesday in Chicago, the CBS news people said it was already Tuesday, presumably because it was Tuesday on the East Coast, though not in the theater. Audience members hissed the costal bias. “Oh god, I hate that,” a woman said.
Then the local love poured forth.
Nods to Frango mints, Portillo’s, Roosevelt Road. There were jokes about the ‘68 DNC. The band played Curtis Mayfield. Louis-Dreyfus noted she also went to Northwestern. And Second City. Colbert looked elated, and exhausted, but he stayed real. “It’s been an amazing week,” he said, then corrected: “Oh, wait. It’s only been… What? One day?”
cborrelli@chicagotribune.coms
