+ 'here's something that happened today', craig ferguson shares with us, ''what was it craig?' i'll tell ya! a swedish company today was fined when one of their assembly line robots attacked a human worker. and so it begins... it's bizaar, here in california when a robot goes crazy, we elect it governor!'
wow! its hard to believe that i have been keeping this blog for 18 months already! this blog now features 300 episode summaries of 'the late late show with craig ferguson'. i have enjoyed watching and writing about the show for the past year and a half, and i hope you have enjoyed reading about it to.
recently the 'television critic's association' convention was held. this is a time when all the networks show off their new fall line up of shows and try and convince the television critics that their new shows are going to be great! they also pump up the old shows that are returning.
for several weeks now, craig ferguson has been having a little contest on 'the late late show'. often on the show he will start off before the opening song with puppets. he has a vast collection of puppets and uses them with very funny results! now he is having a 'puppet popularity contest' to see which puppet the audience likes the best. each night (or so) he shares the results from his website. though there were many in the running, craig narrowed it down to the top five or six. when the audience voted for ones he didn't like, he would have the puppet bow out of the race. leading us the the final contest winner: the shark! strange how criag's favorite puppet seemed to win without the most votes... me thinks that there might have been some hanging chads to blame...
+ 'its a big day today.' craig ferguson announces, 'that's right, its peruvian independence day! on this day in 1821 peru declared independence from the spanish. now, they had been dominated by the spanish conquistadors for a long time. i know how they feel- call me antonio banderas!'
another riff on micheal caine, in this bit craig ferguson does his hilarious micheal caine impression with the backdrop being the great outdoors. caine never makes much mention of it, its merely a setting for craig to display his humorous take on the micheal caine of the 60's filled with sexual innuendo and double entendres.
+ 'a big celebrity birthday today' craig ferguson shares, 'bugs bunny was born this day in 1940, he's 69. he looks great, but i think he's had some work done.... talking animals are always popular, not just bugs bunny, that guinea pig movie was number one this weekend. my favorite talking animal movie was 'babe'. that was the reason i stopped acting. you know babe, the talking pig movie. the acting by the pig and the sheep dog in that movie was amazing! and i was like 'i cant do as well as these, why go on?' did you know, though, they used 15 different pigs to play babe? cuase pigs grow very fast, and they are delicious. so after i saw the 'babe' movie, i stopped acting completely. then i did eight years on 'the drew carey show'. and, by the way, did you know they used 15 different drew careys, cause they grow so fast. and they're delicious.'
+ 'now, if you are anything like me, and of course you're not, you've got a life and everything...' craig ferguson begins, 'you've been waiting a long time for today because today you get to see a movie about guinea pigs who fight crime! finally- hollywood made a movie for people with a brain! the movie, 'g force', came out today. its about guinea pigs who work as spies for the government. makes ya proud to be in show business doesn't it? rodents are making a big comeback in the movies, you got ratattoi with rats, 'desperoux' with mice, 'g force' with guinea pigs. i'm guessing gerbils are coming close behind...' the crowd begins to slowly catch on to the joke craig is hinting at here, 'i mean, what do you think? you think? i'm like 'come on'... i mean its so random...'
during the episode of 'the late late show with craig ferguson' on july 23 it was apparent that craig didn't care much for the audience. they kept 'ooh'ing and 'boo'ing at all the wrong times and it obviously got on his nerves, causing him to get up out of his desk and shake his fist at them!
+ 'today in san diego was the first day of comic con', craig ferguson informs us, 'its the worlds big comic book convention. it's not just comic books though, all the hollywood studios go there to preview next year's movies. for the convention they are expecting 135,000 people each day, and not just geeks! there will be nerds, and dorks, and dweebs... being a geek has gone completely mainstream, it's actually cool to be a geek. you wont see me making jokes about comics, and science fiction, and unwanted virginity, or any of that stuff... thanks to geeks technology increases, and life gets easier. without geeks we'd still be playing pong on our computers, we'd still be using magazines for our porn!' one thing that was especially funny tonight was the obvious disliking craig had for the studio audience. they would ooh and ahh at the exact wrong times, and it totally ticked him off- at one point he got out of his chair to shake his fist at the audience!
+ today's a big day if you are a gangster', shares craig ferguson, 'and i dont mean a 16 year old with his hat on backwards driving your mom's pimped out camery. i mean real gangsters. 75 years ago today the gangster john dillanger was shot by g-men. now when i say g-men i don't mean goreous men, or gay men. government angents, thats how they talked in the 1930's, 'say mack, a couple of g-men are on our tail' 'g-men? do you mean goreous men?' 'oh, i wish!' 'goreous men are on our tail? why are you driving so fast?!?' there's a movie out now, 'public enemies' with jonny depp and christian bale. in the 30's john dillanger was known as public enemy number one. and you know who i feal sorry for? public enemy number two. its very hard to get respenct when you're like 'dont mess with me, i'm number two! why are you laughing at me, mack? number two! on one will ever touch number two. number two will make a big splash!'
+ 'i figured it out.' craig ferguson begins his rant, 'i figured it out! 'what?' i'll tell ya: everything!!! why everything sucks. here's why: in the 1950's a bunch of advertising guys, madison avenue guys got together and decided what they were trying to do is sell products to younger people. they said 'we should try to sell products to younger people because then they will buy more products their whole lives'. so they tried to sell them soft drinks, or bread, or cigars, or whatever the hell they were trying to sell them. they decided they would try to advertise to younger people. it was jus an advertising thing, they didn't mean any harm by it, its just a bit of market research. so they did that and told the tv companies, the movie companies, the radio companies, so everybody started targeting they youth because the youth were where you were going to be able to sell things. what happened was, in a strange sort of quirk of fate, youth began to be celebrated by society in a way that had never been done in the whole human history of society, because what used to be celebrated was experience and cleverness. what happened though, was what became valuable was youth. the quality of youth is what made you a consumer. what happened was they started concentrating on these people. i know what yuor thinking: 'but craig, in ancient greece they deified the youth'. no, they didnt, they deified beauty. ah, different, right? so what happened is youth became more important and more important and more important, and society began to turn on its head because with the deification of youth, and youth has a byproduct, the byproduct of inexperience. by the very nature of youth you dont have experience, you're too young to have it, its not your fault. but you're young and kind of stupid, so they sell you stuff, right. so the deification of youth began, but the deification of youth didn't stop there. the deification of youth evolved and became the deification of imbecility. so it became desirable and fashionable to be young and stupid. it started to be in fashion and that grew and that grew and that grew, and now that's all that kids want to be: 'i just want to be young and stupid'. but you know what? that's not what you want to be, you don't want to be that. and then what happened is people became frightened to not be young, they didnt want to be older, so they started to dye their hair, they started to mutilate their face and their bodies to look young. you cant be young forever. thats against the laws of the universe! and all of this horrible querk and terrible movement, nobody meant it, nobody meant any harm, but now we're in this terrible place where we have the fucking jonas brothers!!!'
+ during email time craig ferguson shares this: 'oh, this is awesome, this is an email from carolie in altoin bay in new hampsire. she says 'dear craig, did you know you are the highest rated late night show in the lesbian demographic? does that turn you on?' you bet it does! you know whats so awesome about it as well, it opens up a whole new range of advertisers. i think we can get into plaid shirts, ladies golf accessories... i love that lesbians watch the show. you know why? you're not judged here, no one is judged here. lesbians, not lesbians- what do you call not lesbians? unlesbians i suppose. gay, straight, fat, thin, black, white, tall short. you're all welcome here. you know why? cause its only me, and i got no problem with you, so you're good. 'yes craig, but what about us people who don't like other people?' you're welcome here too. 'but if we're welcome...' dont worry, you don't all have to watch it in the same house. hats my point. 'but craig, i'm a committed racist homophobe, i cant enjoy a show that lesbians also enjoy', well, yes you can! 'how is this possible?' well, you don't have to live in the same house. 'ooh'. its only tv, it's not important. well, its important to me, its how i pay the bills. that and the stripping.'
+ the new harry potter movie comes out today, and craig ferguson has a few things to say about it. 'now, the harry potter books were written, of course, by j.k. rowling who was the most famous woman in scotland, until susan boyle took over. actually, i think her 15 minutes of fame are over by now, which is good- hollywood only has room for one middle aged scottish virgin, and that's me! thats right, step aside, boyle! now, the harry potter books i like cause they made magic seem cool again, this is after the years of damage caused by david blaine. jk should right more harry potter books cause kids get very excited about them, and i think thats great. kids getting excited about them instead of what i did when i was a kid, you know, watching tv, robbing houses, stabbing people. maybe that was just my childhood... i grew up in the village of the damned. 'you were thinking about hurting us, weren't you?' there's only two harry potter movies left to get made, but we'll get more after that, they're not going to stop. they'll make harry potter cartoons with harry potter's little cousin scrappy potter, harry potter meets the harlem globetrotters, a tv show where harry potter is a middle aged dude who's living in a boat in the marina, he's divorced and he solves crimes and hangs out in swingers clubs and everything i'm looking forward to that one, actually...'
+ 'its a great day for the show', craig ferguson shares, 'we're very excited, the emmy awards were announced today, the nominations, and i'm proud to say we've been nominated for outstanding achievement in fart jokes, we're very excited. no we didn't get nominated. you know why? because the academy of television arts hates america. somebody has to say it, and the price that you pay is not getting an emmy nomination. i understand. its a price i'm willing to pay for my country, thank you. yes it is.'
+ 'paul mccartney was on dave tonight,' craig ferguson reminds us, 'i thought paul was fantastic! do we have a picture of paul mccartney?' craig asks, and they show a photo of angela lansbury. 'we've been doing that for years. you know, the only reason we keep doing that, by the way, in the first year of the show, the show got a terrible review from the los angeles times newspaper. a newspaper is a thing that they had before blogs. they gave the show a terrible review and the reviewer said, and i remember the quote, it said 'and without any apparent irony he shows a picture of angela lansbury and says it's paul mccartney, and he's done it three or four times.' so for the next four years i showed it once a week. some weeks it was every night. i'm still here, where are you los angeles times?!?'
+ 'its not only a great day for america, but also for our good friends the french', craig ferguson informs us, 'it's bastille day! now, bastille day, of course, is when the french celebrate the storming of the prison near paris in 1789, the bastille prison. this day was the beginning of the french revolution. it was an era of turmoil for france, lots of things happened: the french fighting, then napoleon, he turned up and ruled for a while, he was kicked out, then they decided they wanted him back, so they put him on at 10:00pm on NBC. i'm hazy on the details...'