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Trevor Noah’s Moment of Zen

The ‘Daily Show’ star had nearly two years left on his contract, but it wasn’t a secret that Noah struggled to balance a nightly talk show with other ambitions, and MTV’s Chris McCarthy had few options but to let him leave. The franchise will continue, but the economics may never be the same.

trevor noah
It wasn’t a secret that Noah struggled to balance his other endeavors with shooting a talk show in New York four nights a week. Photo: Kevin Winter/Getty Images
Matthew Belloni
October 3, 2022

Trevor Noah surprised Paramount Global C.E.O. Bob Bakish, Noah’s key producers, his staff, and even some of his own representatives by announcing his exit from The Daily Show at the end of Thursday’s taping. What’s more surprising, I learned this weekend, is that Noah actually had lunch with Chris McCarthy, president and C.E.O. of MTV Entertainment Group—who, with oversight of Comedy Central, is Noah’s boss—the day before the announcement, and Noah didn’t even suggest he might be quitting.