Stephen Colbert wasted no time cracking jokes about Donald Trump at the 2017 Tony Awards on Sunday, June 11. On stage at NYC’s Radio City Music Hall to present the award for Best Revival of a Musical, the Late Show host immediately began taking jabs at the president.
“It’s been a great year for revivals in general, especially that one they revived down in Washington,D.C.” he said. “It started off-Broadway in the ’80s. Way off Broadway, over on 5th Avenue, huge production values.”
After receiving laughs and cheers from the crowd, Colbert continued to mock the president. “A couple of problems: the main character is totally unbelievable, and the hair and makeup: yeesh,” he said. “This D.C. production is supposed to have a four-year run, but reviews have not been kind. Could close early. We don’t know, we don’t know. Best of luck to everyone involved.”
The camera panned to Olivia Wilde, who was cheering as she clapped with her hands above her head, but not all of Colbert’s jokes about Trump were well received. After introducing the category’s three nominees – Hello,Dolly!, Falsettos and Miss Saigon – the late-night host cracked that Miss Saigon was “the only pageant whose locker room our president hasn’t walked in on.” After receiving a mixed reaction – including audible boos – from the crowd, Colbert quipped, “a lot of Trump fans here tonight, evidently.”
Colbert recently came under fire in May for making a crude oral-sex joke about the president and Vladimir Putin while taping the Late Show. Viewers who found the comment to be inappropriate called for the comedian to be dropped from his CBS show, tweeting the hashtag #FireColbert. The host responded to the backlash two days later on May 3 saying that while he would “do it again,” he would “change a few words that were cruder than they needed to be.”
