Michelle Wolf's WHCD roast has already set a C-SPAN record
President Trump seems to be a firm subscriber to the adage that no publicity is bad publicity, so he might be pleased that his three tweets criticizing "filthy" comedian Michelle Wolf's jokes at Saturday's White House Correspondents' Dinner have helped propel her roast to the most-viewed WHCD performance in C-SPAN's history. In just three days, Wolf's comedy set has been viewed more than 4.4 million times, The Hill reports, edging out Seth Meyers' 2011 performance, which has 4.3 million views. In that set, which Trump also criticized on Twitter this week, Meyers famously called a visibly irritated Trump a "joke."
In further evidence that controversy sells — or maybe that Trump sells, as Wolf noted pointedly in her monologue — the least watched WHCD set, with 280,000 views, is Jay Leno's performance from 2010. The White House Correspondents' Association is contemplating big changes to its format, including a laugh-off between liberal and conservative comedians and scrapping comedy for song. But it turns out they could also just hire bland comedians, and no one would pay attention.
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Peter has worked as a news and culture writer and editor at The Week since the site's launch in 2008. He covers politics, world affairs, religion and cultural currents. His journalism career began as a copy editor at a financial newswire and has included editorial positions at The New York Times Magazine, Facts on File, and Oregon State University.
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