When the Senate Intelligence Committee released a summary of its report on the CIA's Detention and Interrogation Program last December, it was big news.
How many Americans actually took the time to read all 500 pages? Probably not too many, even though you can pick up a copy on Amazon.
However, you can't really blame people for being reluctant to read it, now, can you? It is all about torture, which isn't the most fun thing to read about, although we do love seeing Mel Gibson get tortured in his movies, and Jack Bauer inflicting pain on other people to get the information he needs on 24. However, that's another story.
Yes, it's important for every American to be informed about what's in the torture report. However, with graphic details about members of the CIA playing Russian Roulette, threatening a detainee with a gun and performing rectal rehydration — forced feeding through the rectum with no medical necessity — the torture report isn't exactly beach reading, now, is it?
You know what would make the torture report much more tolerable to get through? If it was read by someone that had a lovely, sophisticated and soothing voice.
John Oliver knows what's up, and for Sunday night's episode of Last Week Tonight, he enlisted Helen Mirren, who is everyone's favorite classy lady, to read some passages from the torture report and make it a little easier on the ears and mind. Although there might have been a hot second where Mirren actually made the torture report sound a little more dignified, ultimately, even she couldn't make hearing about one detainee having pureed hummus, pasta, sauce, nuts and raisins "rectally-infused" sound any more pleasant ... and that's exactly the point.
Watch the full Last Week Tonight segment below, and then maybe brace yourself before you read the torture report IRL.
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