[theme music]
ANNOUNCER: From New York City, the only city in America,
it's the show that invented news.
This is The Daily Show with your host, Wanda Sykes.
[cheering]
Hey, what's going on, everybody?
Welcome to The Daily Show.
I'm Wanda Sykes, and I'm back.
[cheering]
Yeah, I'm back.
But, honestly, I never left.
No one told me how to get out this damn building.
You should see them after the show.
They just leave.
But we've got a great show for you tonight.
My girl Nia Long is joining us.
[cheering]
Yes.
So let's get right into it.
[cheering]
Let's start with the war in Ukraine.
We're coming up on 11 months since the Kremlin
gremlin invaded.
And now the Ukrainian military is getting
some major reinforcements.
[dramatic music]
Well, the announcement came this morning.
The United States and Germany will both be
sending tanks to Ukraine.
Ukraine has been desperate to get tanks
as Russia prepares for a spring offensive.
And this morning it looks like more than a dozen German tanks
will be on their way soon, with as many as 100 to follow,
with the US expected to send more than 30 Abrams tanks.
Ukraine wants the advanced German tanks
as soon as possible.
As for those Abrams tanks, the only issue
is they will not likely arrive for at least a year.
WANDA SYKES: A year?
Oh, come on, US.
Ukraine is fighting for its life,
and America is like, all right, the delivery window
is from June to December.
Make sure you're home.
[laughter]
I'll tell you, that damn Louis DeJoy has really
messed up the post office.
He's got to go.
[applause]
Now the reason it took so long to send these tanks
is that Germany didn't want to send tanks alone.
They wanted another country to send tanks with them.
Because, you know, it's not a great look
just when it's German tanks rolling across Europe.
[laughter]
Kind of makes people nervous.
I think it should have been Sweden.
Yeah, and they send tanks to Ukraine and Russia.
OK, hear me out.
Hear me out.
And then, Sweden, do that thing you
do where you send the tanks in parts with a diagram
for assembling them.
[laughter]
Yeah.
See-- see, that would bring the countries
together because no one can assemble
that shit on their own.
Ukraine would be like, hey, Russia
do you have an extra one of those wooden peggy thingies?
Moving on, the FDA has some good news for babies.
And if there are any babies out there watching,
what you doing?
Go to bed.
[laughter]
And, also, your food is about to taste
a lot less like pennies.
In tonight's Health Watch, we have important information
for parents about baby food.
The FDA today proposed new levels for lead in baby food,
cutting the allowable level by about 25%
to 20 parts per billion or less.
Now that would apply to baby foods made with fruits,
vegetables, and dry cereals, but not cereal puff
and teething biscuits, which have been found to have some
of the highest lead levels.
The author of a 2019 report that found dangerous levels
of lead in nearly 95% of manufactured baby foods
says the FDA's proposals don't go far
enough to protect children.
But at least now you know.
But at least now you know?
Is that a thing?
Is this how you break bad news to people now?
Hey, remember that bump I thought was a spider bite?
Well, it's herpes, but at least now you know.
[applause]
For more on this news from the FDA,
we sent our correspondents out in the field.
So let's go live to Desi Lydic and Dulcé Sloan.
[cheering]
Hey, Desi, let's start with you.
I mean, this story is crazy.
How does baby food even get lead in it?
No one knows, Wanda.
It could be from the soil.
It could be from an old paint in the processing plant.
It could be the guy at the end of the assembly line
who sprinkles lead into all the jars.
You telling me they got lead bay down there?
[laughter]
That's probably where the lead is coming from.
It's impossible to say.
But this regulation is necessary, Wanda.
Lead is harmful to babies, and they
shouldn't eat it unless they keep screaming for it.
And then it's like, fine, who gives a shit?
Have it, whatever makes this tantrum stop.
Parenting is complicated.
OK, let's turn to Dulcé.
I guess it's a good thing the FDA is taking
action on this for babies.
Man, [bleep] babies.
[laughter]
[applause]
I'm in a supermarket in Jackson, Mississippi,
trying to buy bottled water because look at the water
they got down here.
The government needs to fix this problem.
Why do babies get priority?
[cheering]
Why is babies getting priority?
I'm the one paying American taxes.
I mean, well-- well, people love babies.
Come on.
They're cute.
I'm cute.
[laughter]
Babies, hit or miss.
I mean, you've seen them.
You-- you tried to be nice, but that baby was a gremlin.
Listen, besides, how is this helping babies, OK?
They're not getting rid of the lead.
They're just lowering the amount.
How about we don't eat any harmful chemicals?
That's-- that's a good idea, right?
[cheering]
Dulcé, I wish.
It's just not possible.
You know, lead is in the soil.
Mercury's in the ocean.
Animals are full of plastic.
It's called the ecosystem.
[laughter]
Desi's got a point, Dulcé.
I mean, chemicals are everywhere.
Especially everywhere Black people live.
[applause]
I mean, my first boyfriend was exposed to so many chemicals--
he glowed in the dark.
[laughter]
Wait a minute.
I'd never heard of that before.
Are you sure that was the chemicals?
I mean, it's hard to say.
He had a lot going on.
[laughter]
I see.
So, Desi, is this the best the FDA can do-- just
try to make sure babies aren't eating too much lead?
Wanda, it's not a bad strategy.
If babies are going to spend their lives eating chemicals,
then we may as well get them started
early to build up an immunity.
You know?
I mean, that's why I've decided to eat more lead.
Personally, I'm just starting now.
OK, I don't think you should--
Here's how I see it.
If I start now, then by this time next year,
I should be able to eat a whole car battery and be fine.
Huh.
That's not a bad idea.
I mean, you know, I guess I can try.
Dulcé-- Dulcé, don't do that.
[groaning]
Mm, that's a good year--
tire. Oh, my god.
Oh.
I saw Jesus.
I gotta say, this lead is not bad.
Mm, really good.
I'll tell you what, Wanda.
I'll tell you what else.
[laughter]
Desi.
Huh?
Yeah.
What were you going to say?
Oh, just that if babies and humans can come a together,
it's fervor America great.
[laughter]
[laughs]
Oh, lord, she done lost her damn mind.
Oh.
[laughter]
I'm just glad that nothing happened to me.
You know what I mean?
Ooh, just out here being healthy.
This water wasn't that bad. Y'all want some?
It's good.
Dulcé, you're-- you're glowing.
Mm.
Thank you, sis.
I got a new skin care routine.
[applause]
Lord, I hope the insurance here is good.
Desi Lydic and Dulcé Sloan, everyone.
[cheering]
All right, when we come back, Roy Wood, Jr. visits Cop City.
You don't want to miss it.
[cheering]
Welcome back to The Daily Show.
Atlanta is in turmoil right now.
And if you're wondering why, it's because the police
shot a protester in Cop City.
And if that has you even more confused,
we sent Roy Wood, Jr. down there to help explain.
Tonight we take a look at Atlanta,
where shit's getting crazy.
I'm talking Waffle House crazy.
REPORTER 1: Atlanta's busy downtown descended
into chaos over the weekend.
Hundreds of protesters marched in the streets
in the wake of the death of a 26-year-old
environmental activist.
The activist was killed on Wednesday
as officers cleared protesters from the site of a planned
police training center.
ROY WOOD, JR. (VOICEOVER): Police training center?
But these guys are trained, right?
This isn't an armed militia of interns.
Back before things got this bad, I went to Atlanta
and met with local activist Jasmine Burnett.
The Atlanta Police Foundation is building
a massive urban warfare training
facility with bomb testings, tear gas
explosions, a shooting range.
Didn't people march to defund the police?
It look like they refunded the police?
Yes, they did.
ROY WOOD, JR. (VOICEOVER): Activists
have dubbed this development Cop City,
an 85-acre, $90 million complex,
including a shooting range, burn buildings,
and a mock city that includes apartments,
a school, even a bar.
ROY WOOD, JR.: So this is basically
like Six Flags for the police.
Yes, it's a playground.
You can't call it a playground.
- Mm-hmm. - Oh, wait.
You right. This is literally a playground.
ROY WOOD, JR. (VOICEOVER): But I
had a dream about how they could make this project
more appealing to activists.
We name it after Martin Luther King.
Doesn't matter.
Tyler Perry presents the training facility.
The name doesn't change the impact.
I can tell you don't watch no Tyler Perry.
ROY WOOD, JR. (VOICEOVER): Activists
like Jasmine have been campaigning against Cop
City using legal avenues.
But others have been like, screw it.
I'm going full Mad Max.
REPORTER 2: Protesters threw at least one Molotov cocktail.
REPORTER 3: Protesters set fire to a construction
worker's truck.
ROY WOOD, JR. (VOICEOVER): Activists calling themselves
Forest Defenders have been occupying
the woods around the Cop City building site for over a year.
It's an effort to protect the surrounding Black community
from increased flooding and other environmental impacts
of this development.
So against my better judgment, I headed it
to one of their encampments.
Barricades, burnt-out, truck pretty normal place.
OK.
ROY WOOD, JR. (VOICEOVER): I met with Sabo and Green Grass,
two Forest Defenders who were going to give
me a tour of the-- wait. Wait, wait.
Who the hell is this?
[siren]
Oh, I think that's the police rolling up.
Yeah, because we're trying to obstruct their project.
Green Grass. Just took off.
Green Grass don't [bleep] with the police.
I understand. It's a Black thing.
Yeah, let's go this way.
ROY WOOD, JR. (VOICEOVER): I'd rather
take my chance with the Georgia Ewoks than the cops.
So I followed Green Grass and Sabo into the woods.
So I just got here, and the police
just ran us into the forest.
Is that normal?
Yes.
Yeah.
They come Monday through Friday just to terrorize us
like police do.
ROY WOOD, JR. (VOICEOVER): Some of the Forest
Defenders have a $25,000 bounty on their head.
So they mask up to disguise their identity.
And some are even taking a cue from old-school T-Pain.
(SINGING) This is a plantation, historically,
and an ex-prison farm.
I gotta be honest.
I wish I had an Auto-Tune I could speak in
because you just made prison farm industrial complex
sounds so melodic.
ROY WOOD, JR. (VOICEOVER): They led me to the living room,
one of their encampments with kind
of a A24 horror film vibe.
Press in the living room!
Yeah, don't-- don't just say press.
You got to say Roy Wood, Jr., who
you know from Def Comedy Jam.
HBO.
And he's one of the best--
Def Comedy Jam.
--comedians to do it.
Oh, no, no.
This living room is used as our community function.
Hey, bingo.
Y'all got bingo night?
Yeah.
Where's the Molotov cocktail station?
Where's the gun training station?
The majority of us just want to live
in peace with each other.
We work here on ourselves, and we do yoga.
And we meditate, get massages here.
ROY WOOD, JR.: Wait.
Y'all get massages?
You do yoga, meditate, stretch, and deal with your inner--
like therapy.
Yeah.
Has that had any type of effect
on stopping Cop City from coming?
Yeah, their construction only gotten like two
days in the past year.
And one of the primary construction firms
dropped out.
ROY WOOD, JR. (VOICEOVER): According to leaked documents,
the Cop City building plan is months behind schedule.
This crunchy granola shit seems to be working.
But Forest Defenders say law enforcement has stepped
up raids on their camps.
So they built barricades, and they avoid police
by living in treehouses, like some sort of Antifa
Swiss Family Robinson.
ROY WOOD, JR.: OK, so that's about 50 feet in the air.
Yeah.
ROY WOOD, JR. (VOICEOVER): Tree sitters may drop things.
Mardi Gras beads?
You just said that they drop paper bags of shit.
Well, if the cops are in here,
and you can't come down from the tree--
It's a lot of different ways to protest.
Why is your way live in the tree house 80 feet up
and drop shit in paper bag?
We have to stop Cop City because they're
practicing to murder us.
They are practicing the bomb us.
They're practicing how to come into our homes
more effectively while we're asleep.
The alternative is staying here, shitting in a bag
sometimes, or lay down and watch the world burn.
Anyone up there?
Please, don't drop shit on us.
This is my only suit.
ROY WOOD, JR. (VOICEOVER): Since my visit to the Atlanta
forest, police raids and arrests
have only been more frequent, culminating
in last week's shooting.
Police don't usually target protesters
like this in America.
What if they go after celebrity journalists next?
Good thing I got rid of my phone in the woods
so the police can't track me.
Oh, shit.
How am I supposed to get an Uber out of here?
[cheering]
Thank you, Roy.
All right, stay tuned because when we come back,
my friend Nia Long will be joining me on the show.
So don't go away.
[cheering]
[applause]
Welcome back to the Daily Show.
My guest tonight is a friend and an actor who
is starring in two new films--
"Missing," which is in theaters now,
and "You People," which will be streaming on Netflix,
January 27th.
This is your white granddaddy come back to haunt me.
What?
It started off by him putting them
strong-ass genes in you that lighten
up the coffee in my babies.
Abar, you sound ridiculous.
And then he planted a poison pill in my little baby girl,
and it has grown into this white boy that had invited
us to lunch at Roscoe's.
Those children got beautiful, cultural experiences
from those moments with my granddaddy.
So please stop.
What they got was confused, clearly.
They are not confused.
They are confused.
You don't think this is confusion?
All I'm going to tell you is, we don't need to be arguing
in front of the white boy.
Please welcome my girl, Nia Long!
[music playing]
OK!
Well, these are nice, tall chairs!
How are you?
- I'm doing really well. - Good.
It's so good to see you. - It's nice to see you.
I was just going to say the same thing.
I know!
So, you have two movies out.
It's crazy.
What the hell?
Won't he do it?
He will do it all the time.
And I just said to myself, I was like, boy, I better
hurry up and get another job, because I'm
going to have a whole year where nothing comes out.
You know how this goes.
It's feast or famine. - Right, right.
So how did you do that?
You shot one movie Monday, Wednesday, Friday,
another on Tuesday, Thursday?
Yeah, Sunday, too.
They had me working on a Sunday!
No, I actually-- it just-- the timing of the release dates
worked out this way. Yeah.
That's great.
And-- so, in "You People," you got Eddie Murphy, Julia
Louis-Dreyfus, Jonah Hill--
I've worked with all of them.
And Kenya, too.
But see, what-- you got to actually
work with Eddie Murphy.
When I worked with Eddie, it was "Nutty Professor 2,"
and I pretty much worked with a tennis ball.
Because he was-- some days I'll get one Eddie Murphy,
but he was all in the make-up as Granny, so.
And then, it's exhausting.
So sometimes the off-camera stuff--
I know the tennis ball thing.
I did that with Martin Lawrence.
I mean, you kind of-- with "Big Mama's House," right?
Same kind of concept.
He was there!
He was there for every single shot.
Wow.
Yeah, no prosthetic makeup in this one.
So he was there, and he was wonderful.
And I was so excited to finally be
old enough to play his wife.
Because for years, it was like, oh, no, you're too young.
You know?
And now, the men always get the younger women, so here we are.
There you go.
So-- and then, your other movie--
"Missing."
Yes.
That's kind of like a--
you're like the Black woman Liam Neeson in "Taken," right?
That would be Storm Reid, because she's
on a mission to find me.
And, you know what's great about the film,
is everything is shot through some sort of technical device.
So it's either an iPhone, a Ring
Cam, a secret phone that's like planted on set somewhere.
So every rule that I've learned about film and television,
I had to throw out the window.
Because there were no overs, there
were no cuts-- it was just shoot and don't ask questions.
Because if you ask questions, you will be more confused.
So I just had to trust the process.
It was good.
I would have been, like, with the cameras--
hey, get that from under my chin!
What you doing?
Bring that up there!
I had mines on ladders.
Oh, yeah, shoot me from up there!
Can I tell you--
there's a moment in the film that actually applies
to exactly what you're saying, where I had to like
shoot my own coverage in--
on the cell phone.
And I'm like, going like this.
I'm like, no, don't roll it yet.
No, no, no, no.
OK, there we go, stop!
And there's-- a woman knows her light and her angles after
a certain amount of time.
Yes.
Well, this is the--
I think it's great to see a Black woman
in this type of role.
It's like, taking over, like, a drama thing.
So like, maybe you can, like, take over,
like, the John Wick movies.
You know? Yeah!
It could be-- Yeah!
It could be like, John Wick is like, they killed her edges.
And now she wants revenge.
Yes!
No more lace front!
That's right.
As long as I can wear this coat,
I'll play whatever character.
It is fancy.
You are fancy.
You are very fancy, Nia Long.
Well, you know what happened is--
I went to Dubai right before I came here to see Beyonce.
And she was incredible.
I was like, literally crying.
I was crying in the audience.
I'm like, a true fan.
And that was my first Beyonce concert.
So to see it in Dubai was like, one of those moments
that I will remember for the rest of my life.
So everything in Dubai is blingy.
And I'm kind of not-blingy.
But everything I packed--
[laughter]
- Kind of. - OK, there we go.
There we go.
But everything I packed was blingy, so.
I'm sorry, Wanda, this is just blingy.
You blingy.
OK, I got to ask you something real quick.
I have to ask you something, because I know how it goes.
So recently-- I'm going to read it-- there was a headline,
right, where you said, I quote, "Black movies and Black famous
only hold us back."
Yes.
You want to clear that shit up?
Because you know--
That's not written correctly.
You know how goes.
Because they take one headline and turn it into something.
Read that again?
Let me see that again?
How much time you got?
"Terms like Black movies and Black famous
only hold us back."
OK, so, what I mean by-- you know what I mean.
I know, but go ahead.
But-- but, so--
For them.
For the white people in the audience--
what I mean by that is, if we continue
to practice this idea of separatism,
we continue to divide.
And I will always and forever hold my fist up, because I
understand the experience.
But I also believe that the more we understand about one
another, and the more accepting we are of one another,
this thing called art should be representative of all of us.
Thank you.
OK, we're going to take a quick break.
We'll be right back after this.
[applause]
[music playing]
[cheering]
That's our show for tonight.
But before we go, please, consider
supporting The Bail Project.
They're a nonprofit that provides free bail assistance
and pretrial services.
If you want to help their mission,
please, donate at the link below.
Now here it is, your Moment of Zen.
[laughs]
What are you laughing at?
Is it me?
Did I do something?
What is so funny?
[laughter] I'm serious.
I have no idea.
It's global belly laugh day.
So we were just doing a little experiment.
We're testing a theory-- wanted to see if it would,
like-- - How contagious it would be.
- --how contagious laughter is. - It was not.
ANNOUNCER: MTV.