Jon Stewart to Perform Stand-Up Special on HBO<br />Plus, I can finally use up the last of the Saddam Hussein jokes left over from my first special.”<br />Mr. Stewart, the former host of “The Daily Show” on Comedy Central, will also host an HBO special<br />this fall, “Night of Too Many Stars.” He has over two years left on his production deal with HBO.<br />The announcement came two months after HBO and Mr. Stewart abandoned a highly anticipated animation project<br />that Mr. Stewart had worked on for the network for 18 months.<br />In the past year, the streaming service has signed up a large number of top comedians for specials — including Chris Rock, Dave Chappelle<br />and Amy Schumer — essentially taking over a genre that HBO once dominated.<br />The project was plagued by delays — the animation specials were initially supposed to be unveiled during last year’s presidential election —<br />and HBO ultimately blamed its cancellation on technical issues.<br />HBO announced on Wednesday that Jon Stewart would do a stand-up comedy special, his first since 1996, for the network.<br />Casey Bloys, HBO’s president of programming, said at a Television Critics Association event on Wednesday<br />that the economics of the specials did not make sense for the network.
