Following Comedy Central's Night of Too Many Stars live autism benefit last night, Hollywood swells convened at an after-party, where the backslapping continued in earnest and the jokes were apparently left at the door.
Over by the bar, actor Matthew Broderick was on the lookout for the foul-mouthed puppet Triumph The Insult Comic Dog, who early on in the telecast jabbed at Broderick by quipping, "We only know you because of your wife ... Nathan Lane!" "If I see that dog tonight," Broderick told reporters, in unconvincing mock anger, "I'm going to ... I don't even know." When a reporter pointed out that Robert Smigel, the voice of Triumph, was in the corner, Broderick countered, "Is that who does the voice? I didn't know that. But I did know about the line in advance. I really do think that anything that Triumph says is hilarious." Getting clearance from Broderick, Smigel? For shame.
Following his emcee duties, Jon Stewart made note that his former Daily Show reporter Steve Carell is among the finest in the business: "[Carell] kills me.... You can't believe he's actually going to physically go through with his routines," Stewart said. "A lot of guys would just pull back on the bit, but he forces himself through. I remember one time on the show him eating Crisco. We could've put anything in there. We said, 'Steve, we can make this vanilla icing,' but he wanted the Crisco," Stewart laughed.
Steven Wright even turned up, skully hat and all. Earlier, Wright and Chris Rock performed each other's material—to surprisingly funny results. "It was Chris's idea," Wright said. Rock prefaced the routine saying he was contractually not allowed to perform his own set, due to an impending HBO special. "I was immediately on board," Wright monotoned. "He's a brilliant comedian. He picked some of the jokes, I suggested a few, the writers picked some." The clip's above.