By Favio Snimp on March 27, 2007
Shocking. Stephen Colbert is quick-witted and scary-smart. So is John Perry Barlow. This match made in heaven might have worked with a calmer 20-minute interview. Alas, within its allotted six minutes and a torrent of verbiage, zilch happened.
This is typical of the Colbert Report, really. Promising intellects — Tim Robbins, Steve Wozniak and, last night, Barlow — tend to flame out as Colbert becomes too amped, killing the give-and-take.
Colbert’s style works best on the self-absorbed who forget the nature of the Colbert beast. For example, Colbert baited America-hating conservative Dinesh D’Souza with,”What are the other cultural editing notes we should take from the terrorists?” Colbert badgered D’Souza into admitting that jihadists basically have a good point.
Barlow, hep to Colbert’s game, arrived ready for some fun. Now and then he tossed Colbert a few pre-ripened straight lines. Alas, Colbert was determined to stick to one rather boring (and poorly introduced) subject, Viacom’s lawsuit against MoveOn.org. (It’s a valid suit about using Colbert’s image, and Colbert-style irony, to raise money. Watch the clip in question here.)
Barlow barely got a word in edgewise. In TV annals, a great opportunity has been lost. Rematch!
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