For Adam Chodikoff, T'93, the connection between his job as a senior producer at Comedy Central's "The Daily Show with Jon Stewart" and his time at Duke is obvious. His best class as an undergrad was "Contemporary Jewish Thought" and now he works for Stewart, "the seventh most influential Jew in the world, according to the Jerusalem Post."
Even so, speaking to a Duke audience Friday afternoon, Chodikoff showed a short home movie of his desk and work area at Comedy Central, cluttered high with stacks of papers and binders and, despite his vast influence and prestige, "next to the crapper."
Chodikoff was the keynote speaker at the kickoff of DEMAN (Duke Entertainment, Media and the Arts Network) weekend, Nov. 1-2, organized by the university's alumni affairs office.
The story of his rise at "The Daily Show" highlighted a weekend that connects alumni working in media and entertainment to each other and to students, said Sterly Wilder, the associate vice president for alumni affairs.
A native of New Jersey, Chodikoff shared his experience as an investigative humorist and "tattletale for justice" to a crowd of nearly 150 people in Reynolds Theater.
His job entails searching through years of network video footage and transcripts looking for just the right clip to showcase a politician's hypocrisy or a pundit's contradictions. And imagine doing that "in time for the morning meeting without having your brains leak out of your nostrils," he said. "It's more than just research. Sometimes the nugget you need is buried in the 23rd paragraph."
The other part of Chodikoff's job is to prep show commentators and guests such as Rudolph Giuliani and Nancy Pelosi.
"I’m fortunate to work with geniuses," Chodikoff said. "Seventeen and a half years later and I'm still agape at their sheer brilliance."
Chodikoff showed several "The Daily Show" segments that he said best illustrated his work and the precision necessary for Jon Stewart to make razor-sharp arguments.
In one clip, Paul Ryan is caught in a lie about pork in a bill that would benefit victims of Hurricane Sandy. In another, Republicans who praised 9-11's first responders as heroes after the 2001 tragedy, voted against a bill that would help them cover health care costs.
"After this aired, we got credit for helping pass the bill," Chodikoff said.
Chodikoff said he looks at news with an eye towards setting up a joke and his journalism background -- he interned at CNN and ESPN after graduating, and also produced for Conan O’Brien -- has helped.
"I track facts like a journalist does, finding nonpartisan evidence in the mainstream media," he said, "not something random off the Internet."
"The Daily Show" is often criticized for only attacking conservatives, but Chodikoff said they are also critical of President Obama. He said he felt it necessary at times to defend his honor when challenged on the accuracy of his research -- particularly against Fox's Bill O'Reilly. "I call it research jujitsu," he said of the scramble to find the most accurate studies and reports.
"This is what a Duke degree will get you -- supplying the serious between the scatalogical," he said.