If your esteem for Colbert isn't already through the roof, read this piece in GQ. There are all kinds of interesting things in it: his take on people calling him influential, his take on moralism, his analogy that late-night TV shows are just like Chopped. ("Who are your guests tonight? Your guests tonight are veal tongue, coffee grounds, and gummy bears. There, make a show.… Make an appetizer that appeals to millions of people.")

But the sense of him that comes through strongest is someone brilliant at both the micro and the macro. The way you get something done, but also the reason to ever set out to get it done. He really, really cares about the nuts* and bolts of building a show, at least in front of reporters:

The micro level at which he is involved in every aspect of preparations is bewildering. He moved so quickly throughout the theater, followed by a small phalanx of architects and designers and contractors. He climbed small hidden ladders in the wings to stand on exposed beams and demonstrate how he needed sneak doors to swing. He headed down below stage level, into what will be either a writers' room or a greenroom, to propose how an air-conditioning duct be rerouted. In every moment of every conversation, his focus on the person in front of him and the logistical conundrum at hand was complete. He never showed frustration, never seemed overwhelmed by the sheer volume of stuff coming at him. If you didn't know he was the talent and came upon that scene with a van full of HVAC parts, you'd definitely be like, Oh, that's the guy I need to ask where to install these.

But he's not just running around caring about ladders and ducts. He's also perfectly willing to synthesize his experiences of tragedy and sadness and aloneness and his mother. As the reporter Joel Lovell writes, "Two of his brothers, Peter and Paul, the two closest to him in age, were killed in a plane crash when he was 10. His elder siblings were all off to school or on with their lives by then, and so it was just him and his mother at home together for years." Colbert's synthesis of that tragedy, and how it connects to a comedian bombing, and what bombing is, is brilliant and humble and worthwhile.

* Speaking of nuts, the article reveals that now that he's doing network TV: "Colbert has declared a moratorium on ball jokes." That sucks.