The comic Louis CK may have phoned a New York City radio show on Tuesday in defense of Mayor Bill de Blasio. Or maybe he didn’t (but we’re pretty sure he did).
Identifying himself only as “Louis in the Village”, a caller who sounded an awful lot like the comedian who just spent a day shadowing the mayor, phoned the Brian Lehrer Show, a daily call-in program that often focuses on local New York City news.
The topic of Tuesday’s show was a recent New York Times article on De Blasio’s declining poll numbers, which were quickly overshadowed by online speculation that “Louis” was in fact Louis CK, including by the show’s host station, WNYC.
Hold the press, we're pretty sure Louis C.K. just called into the @BrianLehrer show...anyone else hear that? Can someone text him and ask?
— WNYC (@WNYC) August 18, 2015
The caller blamed the mayor’s woes on the “click-bait” culture of modern media, something that a world-famous comic would certainly have some familiarity with.
“I don’t want a mayor who spends all his time bragging and taking victory laps,” Louis said. “You want a guy, or a woman, that just does good, and moves on to the next thing.
“But the press today, they don’t make any money on articles about ‘Look, his job number’s up’. They make money on articles about ‘Look at this little pointless gaffe that the mayor did. Shouldn’t he have sent someone to this rally?’”
Lehrer thanked “Louis” for calling and returned to the discussion with New York Times city hall bureau chief Michael Grynbaum.
“By the way,” Lehrer broke in moments later. “The consensus in the control room is that ‘Louie from the Village’ who just called to defend the mayor and knock the media might be a certain Louie from the Village who people have heard of. We will just leave it at that.
“By the way, our Twitter followers,” Lehrer continued. “Many of them are absolutely sure that ‘Louie from the Village’ was a certain Louis from the Village who walks out of the West 4th Street subway station at the beginning of a certain TV show,” a reference to the opening credits from Louie on FX.
Was it him? You decide. “Louis” calls in around the 19-minute mark:
