Stephen Colbert Starred In One Of The Worst-Rated Movies On IMDb

Stephen Colbert has a long and prolific career in comedy and on television, stretching back to his TV debut in 1993 on the mystery series "Missing Persons." One of his notable TV breakouts was the short-lived 1995 sketch comedy series "Exit 57," which he co-created. This led to a longtime gig on "The Daily Show" beginning in 1997, a gig that lasted for eight years and 1,316 episodes. He was also a writer on the show. In 1999, he co-created, starred in, and wrote the cult comedy series "Strangers With Candy," all while taking various acting gigs and voice roles. In 2005, he created "The Colbert Report," which was a spoof of right-wing media punditry, and served to skewer the foolish actions of the George W. Bush administration. 

Beginning in 2015, Colbert began hosting "The Late Show With Stephen Colbert," one of the sharpest shows on late-night TV. He has nine Emmys. On the show, Colbert regularly and intelligently lambasted President Trump and his many foolish actions, crimes, mistakes, evils, and other antisocial habits. It was recently announced that CBS would be canceling "The Late Show," citing "financial problems." With Trump back in office, and with CBS having paid the president $16 million in an erroneous defamation lawsuit, it's very difficult not to see the decision to cancel Colbert as purely political. 

Colbert's film career is actually a lot less plentiful than one might imagine, however. Colbert has only appeared in nine films wherein he didn't play himself, and that includes a non-speaking cameo he had in "The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug" (Colbert is a professed Tolkien fan). Naturally, he appeared in the "Strangers with Candy" movie, and he has lent his voice to characters in "Monsters vs. Aliens," "Mr. Peabody & Sherman," and "Despicable Me 4." 

He also played a hockey announcer in Marco Schnabel's 2008 ultra-dud "The Love Guru," one of the lowest-rated films on IMDb. And that's saying something. 

Even if you haven't seen it, you likely recall the phenomenon of "The Love Guru." Written by and starring Mike Myers, "The Love Guru" was clearly an attempt to create a new, broad, marketable character that Myers could carry into multiple sequels, the same way he did with Austin Powers and, uh, the Cat in the Hat. Myers' new character was Guru Pitka, a peaceful sage and self-help guru to the stars, second only to Deepak Chopra. The film surrounds his attempts to reconcile the relationship between star hockey player Darren Roanoke (Romany Malco) and his wife Prudence (Meagan Good). This will be difficult, as Pridence is already dating another star hockey player, Jacques "Le Coq" Grandé (Justin Timberlake), notorious for his outsize penis. 

"The Love Guru" is jejune to the extreme, making the lowest, dumbest jokes imaginable. Not a scene passes without an immature penis double entendre, a booger joke, or a bout of insufferable mugging. There is a scene where Pitka's own teacher, a very, very, very, VERY game Ben Kingsley, encourages his students to slather each other with urine-soaked mops. It's quite bad. It was also deeply hated. "The Love Guru" won the Razzie for Worst Picture, and only earned a 13% approval rating on Rotten Tomatoes (based on 177 reviews). In IMDb, it has a rating of 3.8 out of 10, making it one of the 100 lowest-rated films on the site (it's still better than "Piranha 3DD," but worse than "Spice World"). It also bombed terribly, earning just under $41 million on a $62 million budget. 

A lot of the film's budget likely went to its parade of cameos, Colbert among them. Colbert and Jim Gaffigan play two hockey announcers, with Colbert's character named Jay Kell. He jokes about being a drug addict. Rob Huebel and Samantha Bee also have small parts, while celebrities like Jessica Simpson, Mariska Hargitay, Val Kilmer, and Kaye West (!) play themselves. 

Although what happened to Colbert at "The Late Show" is unjust, it's only slightly worse than "The Love Guru."