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And Finally Artist News Media
Colbert discusses Daft Punk no-show
By Andy Malt | Published on Wednesday 14 August 2013
Stephen Colbert has discussed the non-appearance of Daft Punk on ‘The Colbert Report’ earlier this month.
As previously reported, the duo were apparently booked to perform on the US talk show, but cancelled two hours prior to air time because they had also been secured to make a ‘surprise’ appearance at the MTV Video Music Awards later this month (presumably with some sort of exclusivity). Though some questioned if Daft Punk had ever really been set to appear on Colbert’s show, suggesting the whole thing may have been an elaborate prank to promote the VMAs.
But in an interview on dancer and choreographer Paul Mercurio’s podcast, Colbert said that the duo had definitely been booked to appear on his show, but that he had been told from the off that they would not talk or perform (which explains how Robin Thicke was able to reference this in his pre-recorded performance shown in the same episode).
Colbert said that he’d planned to deliver a monologue in place of an interview, eventually getting the duo’s manager Paul Hahn to speak for them, explaining: “They said, ‘Do you want to cancel?’ I said, ‘No, this is an interesting challenge’. I wish we could have done this joke. It was: ‘Paul, can I ask you – how do I even know it’s them in the robot outfits, how do I even know it’s them?’ And he goes, ‘Stephen, if it wasn’t really them, they’d be doing the song'”.
The video of Colbert dancing with various celebrities to ‘Get Lucky’ aired after Colbert announced the duo’s cancellation was also intended as a joke as part of the original plans, aimed at goading Daft Punk into performing live. Though Colbert admitted that they had not initially liked this idea, worried that it might be “playing too much on the idea that they’re not performing as opposed to the joy of them being there”.
Listen to the full interview here: