One Night Stand: Will Durst

Will Durst built a career out of reading eight newspapers a day and pointing out that the people in charge are completely out of their minds. A self-described “bipartisan smartass” who unsuccessfully ran for mayor of San Francisco three years prior, Durst brought his politically charged material to HBO’s One Night Stand in the spring of 1990. At a time when much of the comedy boom was focused on domestic minutiae, Durst was taking aim at the federal government and the post office, operating under the enduring premise that “you can’t make stuff up like this”. The half-hour captures his crusty, populist delivery during the George H.W. Bush administration, anchored by the observation that politicians lie to the press and then believe what they read.