Anecdotes

According to Jon Stewart, his least favorite guest to ever appear on the show was Hugh Grant. According to Stewart, Grant was rude to the staff.

In an interview hosted by Stephen Colbert, Jon Stewart stated that he almost quit the show shortly after he began hosting it. Stewart wanted to change the direction of the show and was met with strong resistance from the writers and producers. According to Stewart, it took two and a half years for those staff members to gradually leave the show so that Stewart could have his own fully supportive staff.

The show had won the Emmy for "Outstanding Variety, Music, or Comedy Series" every year from 2003-2012, the longest winning streak for a television show in Emmy history. The streak was broken by The Colbert Report (2005), which was a spin-off from this show, and of which Jon Stewart was executive producer.

At the beginning of every episode, the announcer listed the full date (month, day, and year). On the first show of the year 2000, the year was listed as 1900, as a joke about the "Y2K bug".

Jon Stewart's interview with CNBC personality Jim Cramer was considered to be a journalistic triumph for Stewart. A few months later, a time.com poll posed the question, "Now that Walter Cronkite has passed on, who is America's most trusted newscaster?" Stewart won with forty-four percent in a four-way race with Brian Williams, Katie Couric, and Charles Gibson.