John Oliver has made a name for himself by putting together quirky segments for HBO's Last Week Tonight. The late night host had another memorable bit this weekend, when he revealed he purchased plenty of Russell Crowe memorabilia from Cinderella Man and some of his other movie projects and wants to use the memorabilia to be a "fun, movie-themed way to draw people in" to one of the last remaining Blockbuster Video stores in Alaska. Yes, you read that correctly. And you know what? The Blockbuster store is all for it.
During the segment, John Oliver revealed that he had purchased $80,000 items from "Russell Crowe: The Art of Divorce," including a leather jockstrap that Russell Crowe wore during the making of Cinderella Man and items from Robin Hood and Les Miserables. In fact, Last Week Tonight actually paid $7,000 for the item in question all so they could make a joke on the late night TV show about movie memorabilia and Blockbuster. The rest of the segment was devoted to joking about how the show "didn't buy anything else" from the auction. (It did.)
He ended the spot directly addressing the manager at the Blockbuster at 5600 Debarr Rd. in Anchorage, Alaska -- assumedly just in case one of the other remaining Blockbusters tried to claim the prize -- and letting him know "all this shit" actually belongs to him. If you want to catch the hilarity in all of its full glory, please do so, below.
Last Week Tonight later continued to run with the joke on social media, it got some traction, and then the Blockbuster store in Alaska heard about it. In fact, the general manager at that Blockbuster, Kevin Daymude, actually told THR that the segment has already created a lot of buzz for himself and the store around the town, noting:
I had no idea whatsoever he was going to do that. We would be very honored to showcase that collection. People have been calling and coming in, wanting to know when it will all be here. If we do get it is, it could be very big for business.
Kevin Daymude's store is actually one of several stores still open in Alaska, and he also mentioned to the outlet that he doesn't actually know why the Debarr Rd. store was the one that got the shoutout on Last Week Tonight. (Probably because Debarr Rd. sounds way cooler than "College Rd." brah.) Regardless, his store may very well be the fine proprietors of some weird Russell Crowe memorabilia in the future. Because this story has several steps to go before it is likely to be finished, do stay tuned to CinemaBlend, as we will be sure to let you know if Blockbuster actually gets the movie memorabilia at some point, proof that sometimes being a part of a dwindling chain of stores does actually pay off.
