NEW YORK, NY—The team of writers for a comedic late show had hit a brick wall on Thursday as they were brainstorming ideas in the writers' room.
"It just seems like everything's been done," said one member of the team, who has worked in the industry since 1998.
The team tossed around several possible topics for their punchlines, including air travel, soda commercials, and driverless automobiles, but just couldn't seem to make anything work.
"What could we do that's fresh and edgy?" queried one writer who has worked on 3 sitcoms, and two movie scripts in the last 10 years.
Finally, one member of the team, Sean Wilkerson, 35, had an epiphany. Witnesses described the moment that the idea seemed to strike Wilkerson: "He was sitting there in his chair, staring off into space with a furrowed brow. And then one moment, his entire countenance just changed. I don't want to call it divine inspiration, but I mean, that's sure what it looked like."
With a look of perfect clarity in his eyes, Wilkerson slowly sat forward in his chair and carefully placed both palms down on the table in front of him. He then spoke carefully, as if the words might crumble away and be lost if he was too hasty to speak them, "We could make fun of Trump."
The statement fell upon profound silence. Witnesses explain that time seemed to stand still as the notion sunk into their mortal consciousness. Like a newborn getting accustomed to the light of the sun, they weighed the notion of deriding the President of the United States.
"Could such a thing be possible?" posed one of the team, after what seemed like hours of contemplation.
"Dare we?" came another inquiry.
The team slowly began to seriously toy with the notion of actually looking for something that could be considered humorous about President Trump's behaviors or choice of words in recent days, or even in years past.
"Do you think there's even anything that could lead to a good punchline?" asked the most junior member of the team.
No one was sure, but after several more minutes of deliberations, they thought to perhaps read through the news, searching for any information about the highest ranking member of the U.S. government to see if they could find anything that could possibly be used in a comically derogatory manner, or that could potentially offer a punchline of any sort.
"We were treading new waters here," said Wilkerson of the next several hours. "But something deep inside of me said to keep going. Just keep going and we'll find something."