Comedian and HBO host John Oliver quietly visited a town in Connecticut last week to celebrate that it named a sewage plant in his honor.
Danbury mayor Mark Boughton made the announcement on social media early Monday morning, posting a photo of him and Oliver standing in front of the new sewer plant sign.
“It was glorious,” Boughton said on Twitter. “Congratulations to Mr. John Oliver.”
The Danbury Sewer Plant was renamed the John Oliver Memorial Sewer Plant after the town’s city council voted earlier this month in favor of the change, Boughton said in a Facebook post earlier this month.
The decision follows a monthslong, playful feud with the mayor after the host of HBO’s “Last Week Tonight with John Oliver” criticized the town while discussing racial discrimination in jury selection.
During his segment on the show from August 16, the comedian ranted about how Connecticut mistakenly excluded residents from Hartford or New Britain — which accounts for a predominantly Black and Hispanic population in the district — for nearly three years. He joked that if you were going to forget a town in Connecticut, why not Danbury?
“F--- Danbury!” Oliver said. “From its charming railway museum to its historic Hearthstone Castle, Danbury, Connecticut, can eat my whole a--.”
He added that he only knew three things about the town: “USA Today ranked it the second-best city to live in in 2015, it was once the center of the American hat industry and if you’re from there, you have a standing invite to come get a thrashing from John Oliver, children included, f--- you.”
In response, Boughton posted a Facebook video on Aug. 22 addressing the comedian’s comments.
While standing in front of the formerly named Danbury Sewer Plant, Boughton said he was going to rename it after the comedian. “Why?” Boughton said. “Because it’s full of crap just like you, John.”
Oliver then offered to donate $55,000 to local charities if the town followed through on his initial proposal, which the mayor accepted in a video posted a week later.
In a photo posted on the "Last Week Tonight" show’s Twitter on Monday, Oliver can be seen wearing a homemade protective suit, which appears to be made from a white plastic trash bag with rubber gloves and a see-through plastic helmet.
“This place takes the worst that humanity can produce, and transforms it into something that we can live with,” Oliver said on his show Sunday. “And now more than ever, there’s something inspirational in that, because at the end of this awful, awful year, what could be more important than evidence that, if we want to, we can come together, overcome our differences and sort our s--- out.”
