-Welcome back, everybody. I am here with John Oliver,
the host of "Last Week Tonight with
John Oliver." I always love having you
on the show. And thank you for doing
"Hey Robot." -Of course. I was going to say "a pleasure,"
but it wasn't. It wasn't. I really hope, Jimmy, you didn't
cut out my question about what union busting is. I presume you left that in. -I was just on -- I was just
going to take your joke again. I was just on grumpycat.com. I kind of remember Grumpy Cat
was like a -- It was a cat, right?
It looked sad? -Yeah. Do you know what?
We tried to get Grumpy Cat. In the first year, I think,
of our show, we had an idea for a joke
and we said -- We got in touch with
Grumpy Cat's people, saying,
"Could we have Grumpy Cat?" They sent back the --
the first-class plane tickets they would need
and what Grumpy Cat cost, and we thought,
"[Bleep] Grumpy Cat. We don't need that
for this joke." I'll tell you what we can get.
Another cat. -We did something -- We had a
dog that was a famous dog that didn't --
It just looked cute. It didn't do anything. It just sat on a dog bed
and looked cute. And it was --
Oh, no, I'm so sorry. It was backstage at
a Kevin Hart concert. -Wow!
-I swear to God. -You are fully conflating
two memories there. "Was it on the show? "It was backstage at
a Kevin Hart concert. You know what? I dreamt it.
Let's move on." Wait. No, I --
We have to go back. You saw a famous dog lying
on a bed backstage at a Kevin Hart concert? -Yes.
I went to a Kevin Hart concert. I went backstage,
and in a room, they go, "Do you want to meet..."
something dog or something. And I go,
"I have no idea what that is. I'm just here -- I'm gonna
say hi to Kevin, and then..." They go,
"Well, the owners would like you to say hello to"
whatever it was. And so I went in, and there was like a line of
people waiting to meet this dog. The dog was in
one of the rooms backstage, like had his own dressing room. -I mean, every anecdote from
before the pandemic seems dislocating now. To me, that's one of
the weirdest anecdotes I've ever heard. I feel like you've thrown
that out, Jimmy, like that's
a normal thing to say. "I met this famous dog backstage
of a Kevin Hart concert" is a sequence of words in
the English language I don't think have ever
been said before. -Oh, my gosh. -"I met this
famous dog backstage at a Kevin Hart concert,
and it looked disappointed. And I kind of got it." -I want to talk about
some topical things, if you don't mind. Something everyone has been
talking about this past week is Prince Harry and Meghan's
interview with Oprah. -Right.
-Did you watch this? -I did. I did watch it.
-The whole thing? -Yeah, my wife was -- She --
I watched it soup to nuts, the whole thing. And, yeah, it was --
It was amazing? I mean, I will say, I didn't
find any of it surprising. That was kind of what
I felt like, sadly, her experience was
going to be going in, because, you know, I grew up -- I know the royal family
from a distance, and they seemed like
flawed people. That's literally the kindest way
I could possibly put it. -Nothing shocked you at all
about the interview? -The only thing that shocked me
afterwards was that Oprah, the next day,
saying, "Oh, Prince Harry wants to make it clear
that it wasn't Prince Philip being racist,"
which made me think, "Really? Okay, that -- that is
actually surprising." I think was assumed, And I guess people
just didn't hear him. -Do you think any change
will come from this interview? -I don't -- I mean,
it's hard to say, isn't it? Because the royal family -- its whole selling point
is that it doesn't change. That was kind of the point of it
over centuries, that, you know,
times come and go, governments rise and fall,
but the royal family will always be there,
unyielding, the stiff upper lip that
doesn't wobble. So that's their selling point. As years go by,
you realize that not changing is not entirely a good thing,
because that means the times might be
changing around you, and you are refusing to evolve. So I don't think
they will change, because I don't think they
have the capacity to, but they obviously should. The one person who I think
has been really happy about all of this is
Prince Andrew. I'm guessing that
he has been nudging the royal family like, "Can you
believe what Meghan did, huh? Can you believe it? Dragging this family's name
into disrepute, shaming us, right?" -"Everyone is talking about this
and only this." -"She's ruined our reputation.
She has, right, guys?" Wow.
-Wow. The other week on your show,
you briefly talked about Ted Cruz going to Cancun. And I got the feeling that there
was more you wanted to say but didn't have the time. We have the time now.
Is there -- -Oh, I mean, the thing that
was most tantalizing to me about that regretful episode was Heidi Cruz's
group chat leaking, Because I think it just
really drilled home to me that nothing good
comes from a group chat. I don't mess with
group chats, Jimmy. -I wonder if she found out
which friend it was. -Oh, she definitely found out
which friend it was. I think she knew going in. You know what the weak link
in a group chat is. She knows --
She didn't need to find out. She knew. -Do you think there's
another group chat that's talking about Heidi Cruz? -Oh, 100%. There is absolutely. The group chat with
Heidi Cruz on it, and then there's the same group
chat without Heidi Cruz on it. And that is the group chat
that I want to see. I want to see the
"Can you believe this [bleep]" from the rest of the neighbors. That's the group chat
with the good stuff in. That is the one group chat
I will join. -Yeah. Oh, really? Okay. -Heidi Cruz's neighbors's
group chat that she's not on. That. Invite me. I'm there. -This past year has been
tough for a lot of people. And I just want to say one thing
I love about your show is that you're continuously
finding ways to give and donate. And you donate in
interesting ways to food banks. -I think what we were really
doing is kind of money-laundering
HBO's production budget to food banks
over the last year. So it felt like
we were just -- each week, we were trying to come up
with different ways to kind of force a donation
to a food bank. "No, sell us this painting. We'll give you --
Name your sewage plant after me. Give it to a food bank."
-That was the best. The sewage plant was the best. So, wait.
So, you just go like this. "We're just making a show. We needed a budget for that, and the money will go
to the food bank." -Yeah, that's right. "You've given us this money,
HBO, for a reason. We're gonna use it
for something else now." Is that the definition of fraud? Seems to be, but let's
just assume that charity has happened
and not an actual crime. -That's a better way to put it. John, we love everything
you're doing. We always -- I personally,
I love every single time you come on, and thank you
for being so funny and for doing those shows
and just getting us through the trickiest political times
and making us all laugh. Really, it doesn't fall on
deaf ears. -I appreciate it, mate. Thanks.
-John Oliver, everybody. "Last Week Tonight with
John Oliver" airs Sundays at 11:00 p.m.
on HBO.
