Stephen Colbert On Why Stephen Colbert is Awesome

As one of Entertainment Weekly's Entertainers of the Year, Stephen Colbert has a lot to say.

Mostly about himself.

Let's listen in to an interview he recently gave the magazine. It's one that shows how this patriot would make Donald Trump proud if he were ever named Mr. USA.

EW: Congrats on being named one of EW's Entertainers of the Year.
SC: I'm honored. Not surprised. I don't want anyone to think that this comes as a shock to me.

EW: What did you hope to accomplish in 2006?
SC: I set out to change the world â€" not a lot, just by tiny degrees â€" and grab the wheel of this nation and turn the great ship of our national destiny.

EW: There's so much going on in the world right now â€"
SC: For the first time ever, there's a lot going on in the world. I'm so lucky that this year was the year something happened in the world. Years before, this show wouldn't have worked. The world was just phoning it in.

EW: It's obviously fun to see you in full-on Colbert mode, but it's also entertaining to see you struggle not to break character, as if the absurdity of what you're doing is suddenly washing over you.
SC: I try to wear it very lightly. The show was an extension and an amplification of the stuff I had done for Jon [Stewart on The Daily Show], and the character's attitude over there, while self-important, was variable in terms of the way I expressed it, because I had to be paint on Jon's brush.

But as we started to make this more consistent, my refrain was, ''I can't be an a--hole.'' And Jon kept saying, ''You're not an a--hole, you're an idiot. And second of all, if you just enjoy yourself, the audience will know. Don't wear it so heavily.'' And that has been a really wonderful note from him. While I want to be consistent in the character, I'm having such a good time doing it...

[Sometimes] I break. And I don't think there's anything wrong with it, because if the audience has occasionally sensed that I'm also perceiving the absurdity of what I'm doing, I don't come off as such a jerk.

To read the rest of the interview, click here.

To see sex-crazed, almost nude Katie Rees pictures, click here.