It was a night of comedy following a heavy dose of drama at the Kennedy Center, as performers honoring Conan O’Brien at the Mark Twain Prize for American Humor lined up to rebuke President Trump’s overhaul of the performing arts institution.
The prestigious comedy award ceremony on Sunday in Washington, D.C. marked the first major star-studded event at the Kennedy Center following Trump’s unprecedented shakeup.
Last month, Trump announced he would remove multiple members of the Kennedy Center’s board and named himself as its chairman. He later described the Kennedy Center as being too “woke.”
O’Brien had been named the 26th recipient of the Mark Twain Prize in January, weeks before Trump’s upheaval.
On the red carpet ahead of the ceremony — which will stream on Netflix starting May 4 — O’Brien spoke publicly about Trump’s move for the first time.
When ITK asked for his reaction to the news that Trump would serve as chair, the 61-year-old former TV late-night host quipped, “It sounds like it’s a big priority. I think it’s his priority right now, is the Kennedy Center, and only he knows his priorities best.”
“There’s a lot going on in the world but probably taking control of the Kennedy Centers should be at the top of the list,” O’Brien said.
“It’s a personal decision what everybody wants to do, but my decision was that there’s a lot of people that work here at the Kennedy Center who have been here for a very long time,” O’Brien told reporters.
“They work hard to promote the arts, and so I want to be here in that spirit,” he said.
Only a handful of performers appeared on the red carpet for the event, which is typically flooded with entertainers. But plenty of Hollywood stars — and some of Trump’s most vocal critics — touched down in the nation’s capital to celebrate O’Brien and mock the president’s takeover of the Kennedy Center, without mentioning him by name.
“I really miss the days when you were America’s only orange a——,” comedian Sarah Silverman said to the red-haired “Conan O’Brien Needs a Friend” podcast host.
“Late Show” host Stephen Colbert, who skewers Trump regularly on his CBS show, chowed down on chicken wings as he did a sketch spoofing O’Brien’s “Hot Ones” episode that went viral last year.
“In light of the new leadership at the Kennedy Center, all of these are right wings,” Colbert cracked.
When O’Brien originally accepted the Mark Twain Prize, Colbert told the audience, the Kennedy Center was “a very different place.”
“Today, they announced two board members: [former Syrian president] Bashar al-Assad and Skeletor,” he said.
“It’s an honor to be here at the Kennedy Center, or as it will be known next week, the ‘Roy Cohn Pavilion for Big, Strong Men Who Love Cats,’” comedian John Mulaney said, in a reference to Trump’s former attorney and mentor.
In a video message lauding O’Brien, Martin Short jested, “There is no more fitting recipient getting the last-ever Twain Prize here at the Robert F. Kennedy Center,” inserting the name of the Health and Human Services Secretary instead of the 35th president for whom the “living memorial” is named.
As he presented O’Brien with the night’s honor, former “Late Show” host David Letterman said, “I’m not a historian, but I believe that history will show this will be the most entertaining gathering of the resistance ever.”
Some of the biggest applause of the night occurred during O’Brien’s acceptance speech.
“A special thanks to all the beautiful people who have worked here at the Kennedy Center for years and who are worried about what the future might bring,” he said to a standing ovation. Loud applause could also be heard when O’Brien praised former Kennedy Center board chair David Rubenstein and its former president, Deborah Rutter, whose contracts were terminated after Trump’s takeover
O’Brien, who rarely gets political with his comedy, struck a sometimes serious tone as he lauded the Mark Twain Prize’s namesake: “First and foremost, Twain hated bullies… He punched up, not down, and he deeply, deeply empathized with the weak.”
“Twain was suspicious of populism, jingoism, imperialism, the money-obsessed mania of the Gilded Age, and any expression of mindless American might or self-importance,” O’Brien said.
“Above all, Twain was a patriot in the best sense of the word. He loved America, but knew it was deeply flawed. Twain wrote, ‘Patriotism is supporting your country all of the time, and your government when it deserves it.'”
“Some of you might be thinking, what does this have to do with comedy? It has everything to do with comedy. Everything!” O’Brien exclaimed.
“Comedy that I have loved all my life: Comedy that is self-critical, deflating and dedicated to the proposition that we are all flawed, absurd and wallowing in the mud together,” he said.
“When we celebrate Twain, truly seeing him for who he was, we acknowledge our commonality and we move just a little closer together,” O’Brien told the audience.
After the impassioned speech, O’Brien — surrounded by a group of dancing Twain look-alikes — picked up a guitar to play a song alongside Adam Sandler: Neil Young’s 1989 hit, “Rockin’ in the Free World.”
