Late night TV host Stephen Colbert and comedian Nick Kroll have raised $1 million for hurricane relief in Puerto Rico through a campaign that called on celebrities to share embarrassing photos of themselves during puberty.
Colbert and Kroll announced the initiative, called #PuberMe, last week, and Colbert vowed to donate $1,000 from The Stephen Colbert Americone Dream Fund to the One America Appeal campaign for each celebrity who tweeted a photo of themselves during adolescence.
Celebrities including Seth Rogan, Henry Winkler, and Kristen Bell, and politicians like Sen. Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska., former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg, and former President Bill Clinton all pitched in, posting to Twitter photos from their teenage years.
During Thursday night’s show, Colbert announced there were more than 75,000 tweets using #PuberMe, as thousands of Americans participated in the campaign.
In total, Colbert said the Americone Dream Fund would donate $233,000 based on #PuberMe tweets. Kroll and the cast and crew of his new Netflix show “Big Mouth” chipped in $100,000, and CBS said it would match their donations, bringing the total to $666,000.
But Colbert said the Americone Dream Fund would donate an extra $266,000, and Kroll announced an additional $67,000 donation on behalf of his Netflix show, raising the total donated to Puerto Rico hurricane relief to $999,000.
That prompted an appearance from Lin-Manuel Miranda, the creator of “Hamilton,” who shared a video of himself singing a song about Puerto Rico from his teenage years. The $1,000 for the actor’s video brought the campaign to the $1 million mark.
