'Conan' and 'The Daily Show' abuzz over Michelle Obama's new bangs

By Meredith Blake

Jan. 22, 2013 12 AM PT

There were only three topics of conversation on the late-night airwaves Monday: Martin Luther King Jr., the presidential inauguration, and of course, Michelle Obama’s bangs.

On “The Daily Show,” correspondents Jessica Williams and Al Madrigal showed up with new hairstyles inspired by the first lady. Asked her thoughts about President Obama’s speech, Williams replied that “it was fresh, it was new, it was unexpected yet really classy. I thought the speech really helped frame the president’s agenda in a sexy way.”

Full coverage of the 2013 inauguration

When Jon Stewart suggested she was copying Michelle’s look, Williams insisted she’d been sporting “b-b-b-b-bangs” since she was a babe – and offered up the photo to prove it. For his part, Madrigal was upset to learn that Stewart wasn’t fond of his makeover. “So now I’m fat?” he screeched in response. (Jason Jones, covering the conservative side of the news, stuck to a Nancy Reagan red suit and curly blond coiffe.)

Meanwhile, on “Conan,” “Cougar Town” star Busy Philipps praised FLOTUS’ “incredible” new ‘do, and even got Conan O’Brien to try the look himself (let’s just say bangs aren’t for everyone).

But it was Atlantic writer Ta-Nehisi Coates who had the last word on “The Colbert Report.” Host Stephen Colbert said the first lady looked “unbelievably beautiful” with a fringe, but qualified his praise by saying it seemed like she was angling to replace Zooey Deschanel as America’s most beloved wearer of bangs.

Coates politely withheld his opinion and offered up some advice instead: “Don’t talk about a black woman’s hair.”

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Twitter.com/MeredithBlake