>> tonight the, the latest from sochi, due to warm weather the bobsled is now the log flume. and surprising news from iraq, in that i'm surprised that anyone is reporting news from iraq. and my guest alexander payne directed the film "nebraska" which was shot in black and white though because it was nebraska i'm guessing mostly white. georgia is offering a licence plate with the confederate flag. i certainly hope state troopers don't use it to racially profile white people. this is the colbert report.

(cheers and applause) >> stephen: welcome to the show, everybody. >> stephen, stephen, stephen! stephen, stephen, stephen! stephen, stephen, stephen! stephen, stephen, stephen! stephen, stephen, stephen! >> stephen: welcome to the report. good to have you with us. nation, if you will excuse me if i seem a bit more radiant tonight. or if my movements are more poetic than normalling if i'm unusually in sync with myself, i'm just still floating on air from this weekend's gold medal performance by the u.s. ice dancing team. (cheers and applause) these guys their passion

could have melted the ice and even if it had, they would have just won the gold for sin crom-- synchronized swimming am you know themming they're american's darling. the bouncing and behaving charlie white and meryl davis who i believe comes from the island where they grow disney princesses. now of course this network does not have the right to rebroadcast any of nbc's coverage. if i corporation i would show you footage of bob costas and the horrible lovecraftian eye nightmare that forced him off the air last week. but i can't so instead i will just show a photo of an actual snowman my kids paid last we can where they used black berries for the eyes and one of the blackberries burst. it's uncanny. (applause) get well, bob. get well. but folks there is a dark cloud hanging over these

olympics. the sochi games have been under constant threat from a group of radicals who put the men in fundamentalists, the gays. now i have to give a lot of credit to my friend va lat mir putin, v-putz did his best to keep games safe from homosexuals by passing anti-gay propaganda laws. but are those laws enough to keep homosexuality out of the olympics? well, until they make a bobsled out of glass there is no way to tell. (laughter) and, anything could be happening, anything, madness. and russia is ready to bring down the hammer and sickle on any pro gay agitators. just today they went after feminist art collective and russia's answer to the wiggles pussy riot. friends of the show, friends of the show. now clearly there is a massive gay conspiracy to bring down these olympic games. that's why i enlisted my old

frat buddy and colbert report producer buddy cole to investigate the gay threat to sochi. last week buddy sat down with the u.s. speed skating team to teach them how to appear just as straight as he is. and now buddy's in the belly of the beast, please welcome live from sochi buddy cole. buddy, my friend. (cheers and applause) buddy, i got to say it is good to see you. >> bonjour from russia, stephen. now you're joining us live from the heart of the olympics. >> that's right, stephen, i stayed here in sochi. i wanted to be sure i was still in russia when these segments about their anti-gay laws aired. >> stephen: that's very brave of you. >> yes, aren't i. >> stephen: now buddy the mayor of sochi says there are no gays in the city. can you confirm that? >> i can confirm there is at least one.

>> that's my bloodhound, smoke them out, my friend. now you have met with any olympic-- olympians. >> actually last night at a cafe i met with one of those guise, you know the ones that ski and shoot. >> stephen: a biathlete. >> he is now. >> stephen: okay, good, all right. let's get right to it i sent you to investigate the rampant gay prop gandizing, what you have uncovered. >> why tell when i can show. >> stephen: okay, great, let's see the report. >> can i say jim tonight? >> stephen: you certainly earned it, jim? >> "the colbert report" presents a spor report exclusive, from russia with love. >> no gay stuff. >> double o 14. >> with me, buddy cole. >> i finally arrived in sochi russia for the winter limb picks. i just had to find the olympics, or for that matter

winter. hello? where's winter? i'm looking for the winter limb picks. do you know where the winter limb picks are? upstairs? good enough. now while i believe every occasion calls for short shorts, i decided this assignment required going native. the hunt was on. >> i'm looking for the winter olympics. where are they? >> olympic not here, olympic in -- >> okay. i didn't catch all of that. or that. >> or that. >> luckily these olympic elves showed me the way. >> finally i found something, and got as up close and personal as nbc would allow. welcome to the olympic games.

i can't search olympic village for gay propaganda so instead i searched the official souvenir shop and found olympic fashions refreshingly free of homosexual taste. >> oh, excuse me. >> well done, vladimir putin, that's a gay suicide vest. you put this on, you want to kill yourself. oh, a bear to the wearing pants, nothing gay about that. >> satisfied that no gay people had ever touched this clothing, i took my crusade to the streets. >> the mayor of sochi says there are no gays in sochi. where am i going to find the gays? is that true? >> next question please. >> they're gay. >> buddy cole, nice to meet you. >> nice to meet you too. >> it's funny because my grinder said you were 300 yards away. oh well, we're trying to seek out the gay propaganda threat here in russia. have you seen it anywhere? the gay propaganda.

so there's no gay propaganda threat in sochi. >> no, no. >> so no gays on main street. i thinkinged they must all be at putin's free speech protest. >> have you heard about these protest zones, where would i find these protest zones. >> protest, what is protest. >> protests where people go no, no, i don't like that, down with something i don't understand. >> which way to the gay protest zone? >>. >> apparently the official free speech protest zone was conveniently located just outside of sochi. just down the highway. past this, through this tunnel, and through the

mountains. 9 bottles of beer on the wall, 99 bottles of beer. it's around here somewhere. the viaduct and then to this kind of place where you would dump a body and just the brisk half mile walk. past the police station under the freeway. through the construction site. past the barbed wire. and hi arrived just a hop skip and 17 kilometers from sochi. this was the protest zone where no one was protesting. so i thought i might as well. >> i want a drink, i want a drink. i want a drink. >> it was all>> it was all going swimmingly until i ran out

of vodka. and the police showed up. >> can i sit on the bench, this is a protest zone. >> go silt on the bench. >> this is the protest zone. >> please. >> i protest. >> stop yelling, okay, no more yelling. >> no yelling. why, it is a protest zone, people don't whisper in a protest zone. >> so i finished my cocktail and said hello to the police. he was a very nice man in leather jackets. seen here on this exclusive nervous producer cam. they had come to take use way. but my producer explained, please don't. while shooting this footage with a go-pro apparently strapped to his croc, turns out prot test the russian government you need a written permission of the russian government, oh no. the journalists and man of principles, i took a courageous stand and got the hell out of there. >> stephen: great work, buddy. buddy cole, everybody. we'll be right back. we'll be right back. aflac!

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>> stephen: hey! (cheers and applause) >> stephen: welcome back, everybody thanks so much. you know, folks, i don't know about you but it seems that every time i turn on the news channels all i hear is doom and gloom. they're too focused on the negative, yes, 700 cruise ship passengers spent a week squirting liquides at high

pressure from every hole in their body. but what about the upside? a cruise where you lose ten pounds? sign me up. that's why every once in a while those negative nellies need to take their head out of the oven and stick it into stephen colbert's smile file. tonight on the smile file al qaeda. folks, people say you never hear any good news from iraq, not true. sumerians gave the world cuneiform script in the 4th millennium b.c., nice work, guys, or should i say wedge hedge dog, slanty diamond. but the latest news out of iraq is sure to turn that crescent moon upside down. >> a group of potential suicide bombers in iraq won't get to carry out their plans because they were accidentally killed during a training exercise.

21 members of a car bomb training class were blown up when their al qaeda instructor unwittingly set off the explosive charge. >> z hey, those who can do those cho who can't teach, and those who can't teach accidentally blow themselves up. (laughter) it is that sort of hands on-- (applause) >> big explosion fans here tonight. folks, it's that kind of hands-on teacher reminds me of dead poet society, only without the poets, or the society. say what you will about al qaeda, they value education. it's like they say, gave a man a suicide bomb he belows up once, teach a man to suicide bomb, he also blows up once. (laughter) still working out the kink os on that one. but folks the violent death of 22 people isn't the only ray of sunshine here.

because there were also 15 other terrorists wounded. okay, just wounded means they're not quite martyrs, they're just partish, and instead of 72 virgins they get one 72-year-old virgin, even better, even better, folks, security forces were drawn to the area by the sound of the explosion and arrested 22 survivors, including the mastermind of the group wile e al coyote. and it's no surprise-- (cheers and applause) it comes as no surprise that i'm not the only one la, la, la, la, loving this story. one local iraqi reacted by saying this is so funny t shows how stupid they are, those dogs and sons of dogs. it is hilarious. it's like jackass only with more redealing social value. folks, it's stories like this that make you not ask

the question, why do bad things happen to bad people? god often works in mysterious ways. but sometimes he makes them really obvious choices. and that's the smile file. remember, if you are's feeling blue, just be glad feeling blue, just be glad you're not feeling what does an apron have to do with car insurance? an apron is hard work. an apron is pride in what you do. an apron is not quitting until you've made something a little better. what does an apron have to do with car insurance?

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>> stephen: welcome back, everybody. my guest tonight, director of "nebraska" please welcome alexander payne. (cheers and applause) hey, mr. payne. thank you for coming on. good to have you on. >> nice to be on, thanks for having me. >> for those people out there who may not know you are a two time oscar winning writer, director, producer, past film, the descendantsing sideways b schmitz and your latest film "nebraska" is currently nominated for six oscars. >> yes, sir. >> stephen: are you nominated for best director. >> i am. >> stephen: congratulations within thank you, sir. >> stephen: are you one of those, because your movies are a little arty, you know, they're crowd pleasers but a

little artie. fins this one is in black and white. >> yes t is. >> stephen: and you yourself are sore of in black and white. >> yes, i am, thanks for noticing. >> stephen: your first film was at the time set in nebraska, so was your next film election. >> yes. >> stephen: and this one nebraska also set in nebraska. >> and about schmidt. >> stephen: and about schmidt. >> also in only aha!. >> stephen: you're from nebraska, right. >> right, still live there. >> stephen: you are allowed to leave nebraska. >> yes. >> stephen: you don't have one of those tracking ang lets on or anything, you're not a wanted man. >> no. >> stephen: why dow keep shooting in, you know, what hollywood and the east coast elite was call a fly over state, you know? >> yeah, i am from there so i just like being there. i mean we don't-- we don't really ask woody allen or martin scorsese why they like to shoot in new york, for example. we just kind of think that that is okay. but because i'm from a more far-flung unusual place, i'm asked-- . >> stephen: it's exotic. >> it is. >> stephen: i'm all for it i'm all for it.

that's the heartland, okay that is the real america. like not the west coast, not the east coast, south of chicago, north of miami, everywhere in there it's 1983 reagan is just taking, you know-- reagan is peaking, reagan is still peaking in there. >> yeah, it's a pretty republican state, that's true. but fairly free thinking as well. i mean we've had many democratic senators. we've had two women run against each other in the gubernatorial race. nbc is one of two nonwinner take all states for the electoral college and in '08 only aha! gave one electoral vote to barack obama, for example. so there's more going on. >> stephen: all right, probably voter fraud on that one. okay, let's show a little clip from "nbc" >> there's woody's little sister. she was only 19 when she was killed in a car wreck near washington. what a whore. >> mom. >> nobody, i liked rose but

my god she was a shut. now i'm just tell ug the truth. >> where's your family. >> they're in the catholic sell father. -- cemetery. >> catholics wouldn't be caught dead around all these damn lutherans. here's dell mer, woody's cousin. he was a drunk. one time we were wrestling and he felt me up. grabbed a handful of boob and woody was right there and didn't have a clue, did you wody? (applause) >> stephen: is everyone in nebraska that honest? >> one. reasons i like living there is that people are fairly plain spoken. >> stephen: uh-huh, uh-huh r there reasons you would live there because i have been there. >> yeah. >> stephen: this time of year. >> grim. >> stephen: it is grim.

it is in black and white, all the time. >> yup. >> stephen: with just the corn stubl, laid low like a sailor's beard on a shore leave. and the bleakness, the snow actually somehow makes it seem dirtier. >> yeah, well, now you know why i chose to shoot in black and white it captures that feeling. >> stephen: uh-huh. that might have actually been color film you were using. >> yeah, right. (laughter) >> stephen: the road trip this is a road trip in this movie. >> yup. >> stephen: father anson on a road trip. you've done several road trips, do you like driving, dow actually like driving. >> i do, i do indeed. >> stephen: you are a big hollywood guy, why not get on the jet. that's exciting, people want to see that, people want to see that. >> i don't think that it's the proper way to think of this country as a five or six hour fly over. i think if you drive it or take the train, i take amtrak whenever i can, it's

fun to see things. >> stephen: uh-huh, okay, okay, but, you know, that takes a long time and we're all going to die at some point. >> yup. >> stephen: and it's not about the journey, it's about the destination. >> yes, yes. >> stephen: okay, all that crap about it's the journally is for people who haven't got to the destination. >> yes. >> stephen: because where i have arrived, fantastic. >> fair enough, fair enough, okay. >> stephen: are you happy-- (laughter) because a lot of people in your films, they're not happy. they're not happy. but you don't seem like a sad guy, are you happy? >> yeah, i think so i think i'm basically a happy, positive person. >> stephen: you know, i mean you think that there is a certain unhappiness in the films but i'm making comedies. >> stephen: no, no you can be sad and funny. >> yeah, yeah. >> stephen: are you one of those sad clowns?

because i heard-- i heard some comedians are actually sad inside. >> really? >> yeah, i heard that i read that about them. >> hamm. >> stephen: well, alexander, thank you so much for joining me. alexander payne, the film is "nebraska" the man is nebraska, we'll be right back can you feel that? [ male announcer ] in two days... "pompeii" will blow your mind. [ milo ] we must flee the city. ♪ [ male announcer ] "pompeii." rated pg-13. ♪ transferred money from his before larry instantly bank of america savings

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what is it? is it what she wears? how he speaks? is it her timing? this guy's idea of a good time? or that one time he did...that. is it because she's a woman? c'mon now. how bout those moves? those looks. his style. is it because they scare us? surprise us? make us uncomfortable? like, really uncomfortable? whatever it is, you know it when you see it. here's to being one of a kind. >> stephen: that's it for the report, everybody, good night

>> it's 11:59 and 59 seconds. this happened on youtube today. the internet went nuts over this photo shoot of kate upton on a parabolic flight experiencing 0 gravity, while men's pants across america pushed at least. 2 gs. >> apollo ono. >> matt walsh, the right must have. ian roberts. >> the challenger, because i just exploded in my