Thanks to the wonders of modern technology, we now know what “Late Show” host Stephen Colbert would have asked Ryan Lochte if he had been the one to score an exclusive interview with the swimmer, instead of Matt Lauer.
When Lochte sat down with “Today” host Lauer on Saturday evening to address his “over-exaggeration” regarding a fabricated robbery in Rio, two things were immediately apparent. First, Lauer wasn’t wearing socks. Second, it was the sort of interview that would spawn many, many memes and be useful fodder for late night hosts.
So it didn’t take long for “Late Show” producers to digitally replace Lauer with Colbert, whose brand of Stern Dad hewed closer to Red Forman from “That ’70s Show,” creating the interview we were really looking for.
In the clip from Monday’s show, Colbert got to ask the questions we all wanted to ask of Lochte, like “Do you know what a gun is?” and “Without a gun cocked at your forehead, it’s really just a story about some guys urinating on a gas station. How could you get that so wrong?”
Conducting every interview by splicing in questions asked by a different interviewer may violate journalistic ethics, but it does make for a more satisfying experience.
While the Lauer-Lochte interview didn’t air in full until Monday, NBC showed excerpts during its Olympics coverage on Saturday, possibly in an effort to goose flagging ratings.
Watch the video below.