Science and Technology Guests on Late Night, Week of November 3

Before I dive into the regular listings, two items of note.  Hydraulic fracturing was the major plot device for the most recent episode (November 2) of The Simpsons, “Opposites A-Frack.”  Arguably the show addressed a very similar phenomenon nearly twenty years ago in it’s “Who Shot Mr. Burns?” cliffhanger, with C. Montgomery Burns drilling at a slant underneath the elementary school in order to steal its oil.

The other item involves Last Week Tonight, which doesn’t often get attention here.  In the episode that aired October 26, the show aired an interview with chimpanzee expert Dr. Jane Goodall

On to this week.  Tomorrow’s mid-term elections in the United States will affect the late night programs.  Some will opt to air repeats Tuesday night, while The Daily Show and The Colbert Report will focus more on political topics (and guests) than usual.  Even so, Stephen will talk with Steven Johnson (of How We Got to Now) on Thursday.  The program ends its U.S. run next week.

Most of this week’s list focuses on new releases.  The cast of Interstellar are out promoting the film which premieres in the U.S. on Friday.  Anne Hathaway is on The Tonight Show on Monday, Live with Kelly and Michael on Wednesday, and the Ellen program on Thursday.  Her co-star Matthew McConaughey visits Kelly and Michael on Tuesday and The Tonight Show on Thursday.  Jessica Chastain is also in the film, and she was on with Kelly and Michael this morning.  Tuesday’s repeat of The Late Show also features Chastain, though the interview ended up a bit stingy on details of the film.

Finally, Carson Daly’s really late program earns not one, but two mentions for this week.  On Tuesday Megan Amram, television comedy writer, will plug her newly released book, Science….For Her!, which takes aim at women’s magazines.  I make that point because should anyone takes the book at face value, there will be a lot of cross people objecting to a sexist trivialization of science.  But that’s (at least part of) what Amram is trying to satirize with the book.  Wednesday night Isabella Rossellini is a guest on Daly’s program.  She is currently touring her one-woman animal behavior show, Green Porno.  It’s based on a series of short films Rossellini developed in 2008.