Late Night Last Week: Taylor Tomlinson Celebrates Strega Nona Fall

Late Night Last Week is a column highlighting some of the more notable segments from the previous week of late night television. Today’s installment features Strega Nona Fall, Jon Stewart on Israel’s widening war, and Andy Samberg as a well-endowed Olympian.

Before we Italian-Americans come of age and learn about our culture through tales like The Sopranos and Goodfellas, we are introduced to the stories of Tomie dePaola, whose best known work as a writer and illustrator is the 1975 book, Strega Nona.

Winner of the Caldecott Medal, widely-considered the highest honor for a children’s picture book, Strega Nona is set in the south of Italy. The eponymous character is a witch of sorts, whose penchant for coziness is no clearer than when looking at her superb clothing style, and the supernaturally delicious pasta she cooks up with a spell in her cauldron. In the tale, Strega Nona enlists the help of Big Anthony, who, after tasting the pasta, tries to cook it himself to disastrous results for the surrounding town. But luckily, Strega Nona saves the day. A hero for all ages.

So you can imagine my delight at Taylor Tomlinson kicking off her Tuesday monologue, on September 24, with the news that while brat summer may be over, we have now entered Strega Nona Fall. Yes, that is right, the youths on the internet are crazy over Italy’s favorite witch, turning to her for inspiration as they seek to make this fall a cozy one.

Jon Stewart Breaks Down Israel’s Widening War

And now for something completely different. On the Monday, September 23 episode of The Daily Show, Jon Stewart analyzed Israel’s decision to heighten violence in the Middle East by dropping bombs in Lebanon as part of a war against Hezbollah.

Stewart began his monologue by playing a montage of Joe Biden promising that a ceasefire in Gaza was coming soon. One clip even included the president saying so with an ice cream cone in hand. Stewart then, naturally, got one of his own from behind the desk. “I’m going to take a big bite of my ice cream cone as I find out how our ceasefire efforts are paying off,” he said, promptly spitting out the tasty treat after playing a news clip of Israeli bombs falling over Lebanon.

Stewart then played a snippet of Biden reacting to the bombing of Lebanon in which the president promised to prevent a “wider war from breaking out.” “How fucking wide does this war have to be,” Stewart proclaimed, before switching to a more mocking tone: “Without Turkey it’s still technically in the margins.” He added, “As far as I’m concerned, it’s not a wider war until it includes Mongolian archers.”

Stewart’s monologue was a masterful and devastating critique of not merely American foreign policy, but also the shameless ways that people in power refuse even to speak in plain language about what is so clearly going on. Or, as Stewart labeled it in a way that only he can, “the full cognitive dissonance and language calisthenics that have to be deployed to describe the Middle East.” Stewart then played what he called “the Golden Soundbite” to demonstrate the phenomenon. Just watch.

Andy Samberg Revives Summer Olympics Jokes

One of the things I love most about Late Night with Seth Meyers is how comfortable the show is with being both extremely smart and … beautifully stupid. While some late night shows may have said it was way too late to be making jokes about a viral moment from the summer olympics, the Late Night team said, nah, let’s go for it. Enter: the great Andy Samberg.

On the Wednesday, September 25 broadcast, Meyers welcomed his old pal Samberg on to the program. Samberg came out with bits and, as always, committed to them. “Did you see that story this summer during the Olympics about the French pole vaulter who knocked the bar down with his giant dong,” he asked Meyers. From there, they were off to the races.

Samberg left the stage and returned with a red beret, black-and-white lined shirt, and began speaking in a horrible French accent, role-playing as the pole vaulter. To quote Samberg’s jokes, like when he said he used to be a “windshield wiper for trucks,” would be to miss the point. That such a bit has been dug out from the ashbin of viral internet history is so absurd as to make every moment of this dumb bit simply hilarious.

“Why, if I may ask, are you talking about this now? It happened so long ago,” Meyers inquired. “You know what else is so long,” his guest replied. Never change, Mr. Samberg. Never change.

Nick Griffin Breaks Down the CVS Experience

Finally, a bit of stand-up to end our recap of the week in late night.

In his September 26 stand-up appearance on The Tonight Show, Nick Griffin began his monologue by talking about people who are just too bubbly, the kind who, he said, seem like they “swallowed a clown.” “I swallowed a CVS employee,” Griffin said of his own disposition. He was clear: working at CVS must be a hard job. Yet sometimes when you walk in, the vibes are just off, right?

Griffin then deconstructed the absurd ritual that we all must go through to get the attention of an employee. You know the drill: find a thing you want to buy, notice for some reason it is locked up like the Declaration of Independence, and then search for an employee to unlock it for you. As Griffin pointed out, making eye contact is often the hardest part. It’s often returned with a “don’t do it man” look.

“CVS doesn’t have a motto,” Griffin said, “But if they did, it would be [an exasperated head shake], no.”

Will DiGravio is a Brooklyn-based critic and researcher, who first contributed to Paste in 2022. He is an assistant editor at Cineaste, a GALECA member, and since 2019 has hosted The Video Essay Podcast. You can follow and/or unfollow him on Twitter and learn more about him via his website.