Stephen Colbert planned to abandon his signature character before he was offered the job of Late Night host, according to a revealing profile in GQ. “I no longer felt that that model served to address the national mood,” he said, adding that he feels the country is less angry now than 10 years ago. “Our response to the horror in South Carolina is to take the flag down," he said. "That is something I didn't think was ever going to happen.” Colbert said he struggled “to have to pull everything through the keyhole of [the persona's] worldview.”
