Stephen Colbert called the mix of frightening and dull politics “borrifying” during a Late Show monologue tied to the third night of the 2024 Republican National Convention. His antidote, as described in a July 18, 2024 account, was “very large doses of whimsy”—including a handheld bubble machine and jaunty music from Louis Cato and The Late Show Band.
What Colbert meant by “borrifying”
“Borrifying” was Colbert’s word for politicians seeming horrifying and boring at the same time. The term framed the monologue as a comic response to watching three consecutive nights of convention coverage, rather than a standalone political announcement.
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Social Schmuck’s July 18, 2024 article reports Colbert opening the Wednesday-evening show with the line: “I’ve been watching for 3 straight nights and I’ve found that politicians might be each horrifying and boring on the identical time. It is referred to as ‘borrifying’ and the one factor that helps is very large doses of caprice,” Colbert began the present on Wednesday evening.
How the whimsy played out
The account describes Colbert bringing out a handheld bubble machine while Louis Cato and The Late Show Band played jaunty music. The bubbles supplied the visual gag for his proposed cure: a deliberately silly contrast to the political mood he had just described.
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Social Schmuck also attributes this line to Colbert: “Every one in all these tiny bursting bubbles represents a tiny piece of my soul.” The joke turned the bubbles into a playful image of the toll of watching the convention.
What is confirmed about the segment
The available account is a secondary entertainment-news report, not an official transcript. The original broadcast clip or transcript was not independently confirmed, so the wording and staging here should be understood as details reported by that article.
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