Emmy Winner John Oliver Calls Stephen Colbert’s Victory ‘Highlight of the Night’ (Exclusive)

On Sunday, TV personality John Oliver went home with two Emmys!

“Extra’s” Terri Seymour spoke with John backstage, where he reacted to Stephen Colbert’s win for Outstanding Talk Series.

John called it a “huge relief” that Stephen won, saying, “We were all rooting for him so much... That’ll be the highlight of the night.” 

“Last Week Tonight with John Oliver” won for Outstanding Scripted Variety Series and Outstanding Writing for a Variety Series.

John opened up on his plans to celebrate tonight, saying, “I’ll go see my staff now. We’ll go to the HBO party and then I’ll go to bed.” 

“I got in this morning, so I’m quite tired,” he shared after flying in from New York.

John joked, “I haven’t factored the time difference, and I am about to pass out — and that has more than a little to do with the fact that Guillermo just gave me tequila.”

As for how he juggles humor with the politics in the show, Oliver admitted, “I don’t know if it’s juggling — I think, hopefully, the humor helps the politics go down a little easier. We just try and show people things they haven’t seen before.” 

“So, that’s the distinction with the difference for us,” he emphasized. “So often, you all are seeing the same stuff on social media because everything gets cut up and just thrown around — and so jokes can happen incredibly fast that way.” 

According to John, they “try to do a slightly more-slow cooking version and show you material that you might not have seen yet.” 

Even with the news that “The Late Show with Stephen Colbert” is ending in June 2026, John said it will be business as usual for his show.

“I think it’s very, very different for us,” he answered. “We’re not on commercial television, so we’re in a very, very different spot.” 

“So, it’s slightly apples and oranges, and I’m happy to be an orange,” he said.