America's Anchors

STEWART: He got me a guy who did a puzzle for me.

What were some of the clues?

STEWART: One of them was "1969 Miracle Met baseball player Art." We had a dog named Shamsky. We had a cat named Stanley, so "tool company." There were little things in there that related to her. She got the puzzle wrong. We never got married.

Stephen, how did you propose?

COLBERT: I asked my wife to marry me by having it spelled out in nuclear bombs. You have a very broad range of interests -- you like "A Man for All Seasons" and "Jackass," hip-hop and T.S. Eliot.

COLBERT: Yeah, I'm an omnivore. I like everything. I was pretty much left to myself as a kid, with a lot of books.

How could you be left to yourself with all those kids in your family?

COLBERT: Because Peter and Paul died. And Dad died. And all the others went to college. And it was just me and Mom.

Was your name always pronounced Col-bear?

COLBERT: No. My father always wanted to be Col-bear. He lived in the same town as his father, and his father didn't like the idea of the name with the French pronunciation. So my father said to us, "Do what you want. You're not going to offend anybody." And he was dead long before I made my decision. I was flying up to theater school at Northwestern, and I sat next to an astronaut, actually. And I told him I was going off to a new school. I was transferring to Northwestern and I didn't know anyone in Chicago. He said, "Oh, wow, you could really reinvent yourself out there." When the plane took off I was Col-bert, and when the plane landed I was Col-bear.

Jon, I have to ask you about changing your name from Leibowitz to a variation on your middle name, Stuart. You've said it was because New York comedy-club hosts didn't know how to pronounce it, but wouldn't they know how to pronounce a Jewish name?

STEWART: It just felt like a mouthful. I'm sure there's some sort of Oedipal, psychosomatic something in there I could find, if I wanted to delve into my psyche, which I don't, because repression suits me. I'm sure it's familial, but I just used my middle name that night and that was it.

What were your political influences?

COLBERT: I was from this big Irish- Catholic family, and my dad was president of Physicians for Kennedy. So we had a picture of the president and my dad. I was sure my parents were Democrats but then later realized they only voted for one Democrat. The Kennedy pictures were more like religious icons.

STEWART: There was no "I remember hearing Hubert Humphrey speak at the Citadel while I was dating a Radcliffe girl." No moment of shaking hands with Kennedy at Boys Nation. I still don't consider myself political. People confuse political interest with interest in current events. The political industry is devoted to the electing and un-electing of officials, and that can be corrosive. If the Republicans don't lose either house, people will talk about Karl Rove's genius. There's no genius. It will be the triumph of machine and money and strategy over reality. I don't think that's anything to honor or enjoy. OK: Seat of Heat. Jon, if you had to get an erotic instant message?

STEWART: Erotic or neurotic? Or autoerotic?

Well, let's start with erotic. Would you rather get one from Mark Foley, Ann Coulter or Sharon Stone, who you said alarmed you by going topless in your green room?

[Colbert leans over and whispers in Stewart's ear.]

STEWART: I'd go with Coulter.

COLBERT: Hey, you know what? Why don't you have Ann and Sharon fight? Then you stand up and stroke yourself gently.

STEWART: I'll rub my nipples while they go into Thunderdome, and whoever comes out gets to message me. Here's the problem. Coulter, I think, would destroy Sharon in a one-on-one. But Sharon Stone is one of those who won't forget. Like, Ann would be sleeping that night and the limbless Sharon Stone would crawl up the side of her building with a rock and beat her to death in her sleep. I have a feeling she's relentless. It's like The Terminator. Unless every circuit is out, she will regenerate and she will get a rock and she will haunt your fucking dreams.

Stephen, now it's your turn: dungeons or dragons?

COLBERT: Definitely dragons. Because there's nothing worse than an empty dungeon.