Late Night Last Week: Kamasi Washington Electrifies the Tonight Show Stage
Every Monday, Late Night Last Week highlights some of the best late night TV from the previous week. This week, Kamasi Washington plays The Tonight Show, Grace Kuhlenschmidt talks pardons in the streets of New York, Saul Trujillo crushes on Colbert, and Seth Meyers inspects his writers.
The Tonight Show stage played host to one of the greatest living jazz musicians last Thursday, December 12, as Kamasi Washington, along with members of the West Coast Get Down, performed “Lesanu,” the opening track from his May album, Fearless Movement. The jazz collective and an Ethiopian dance group electrified the Rockefeller Center studios, crowding into the narrow, minimalistic set and overfilling it with the sounds of the album, which foregrounds movement.
“When I was younger, I had this connection between highly improvisational and expressive music and dance, and, for whatever reason, generally, those things are split apart like they’re two different things,” Washington told Paste earlier this year. “I’ve always wanted to explore that more: the idea of making music that I’m intentionally wanting people to move and to express [themselves] with.”
The Tonight Show performance foregrounded the dancers, as the camera remained focused on their movements, while the musicians, including Washginton, played from a short riser just behind them. The music seemed to flow down to the dancers, fueling their movements, which in turn, seemed to inspire similar movements from the musicians themselves. A masterful display of the symbiotic nature of dance and song.
Over at the Ed Sullivan Theater, home to The Late Show with Stephen Colbert, stand-up Saul Trujillo delivered a superb set on Tuesday, December 10. Trujillo began by addressing his mullet. The cliched description of the hair style usually goes, “business in the front, party in the back.” But he does not fit that description, Trujillo said: “With this face, it’s very much ‘missing child’s poster’ in the front, and ‘the guy who kidnapped that kid’ in the back.”
Trujillo discussed his Mexican heritage as a set-up to admitting his love for Taco Bell. He had plenty of Mexican home cooking growing up, but sometimes he and his dad would just need to jump in the car and head out for a crunchwrap supreme. “It’s just like the Beastie Boys,” he mused. “It’s not authentic, but you can’t deny talent.”
I’m a big “man on the street” fan. Well, I’m a fan when it’s done right. And of those who consistently crush the genre today, The Daily Show’s Grace Kuhlenschmidt is at the top of the list. On Thursday, Kuhlenschmidt took to the streets of New York to talk about pardons, following President Biden’s decision to pardon two turkeys for Thanksgiving and then his son, Hunter.
Kuhlenschmidt is at her best when she deviates from the bit. For example, she asks people to play “Marry, Fuck, Pardon,” listening as the options Donald Trump, NYC Mayor Eric Adams, and the Q-Anon Shaman. It’s funny enough, but the best moments come following more subtle questions. “If you could get pardoned for one crime, what would it be?” she asked one New Yorker. “Arson,” he replies. “That was really quick,” she says, without missing a beat. “I like fire,” he replies with a look in his eye.
Subsequent exchanges yield lines like, “All Limewire users should be pardoned.” Then, “To me, part of self-checkout is, ‘Maybe I am gonna shoplift.’” And finally, “Biden, I need a pardon. I outed someone on national television.” Just watch.
Finally, we end with one of this column’s favorite late night segments. On December 11, Seth Meyers held a surprise inspection of his monologue writers. For the uninitiated, the segment features Meyers reading rejected jokes submitted by his writers, many of which are either a) inappropriate, or b) so bad they become funny in this recycled format.
We also love a pun. Which is why we were tickled by this one failed political joke. “Senate Republicans elected Senator John Thune to be their majority leader,” Meyers read from the prompter. “And Thune, there won’t be any more elections at all!” The joke was written by staff member Matt Goldich. “I’m very disappointed in you,” Meyers said to the audience, who similarly loved the joke. “That was way more than Matt deserved.”
Alright fine, one more piece of bonus content. If you’re not following The Daily Show on YouTube, you’re missing out on some fantastic compilation videos the team there has been putting together, ranging from the “Best of Samantha Bee” to round-ups of Jon Stewart’s interviews with comedy icons.
As the year comes to an end and we all enter a reflective mode, take a moment to watch the beautifully entitled compilation, “Everything That Pissed off Lewis Black in 2024.”
Will DiGravio is a Brooklyn-based critic, researcher, and late night comedy columnist, 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.