During Barack Obama’s time as President of the United States, eight White House Correspondents’ dinner were held, each featuring famous celebrities both onstage and in the crowd. 
 
 Notably, in 2011, Seth Meyers hosted the event, poking fun at Donald Trump’s role in the birther controversy that falsely accused Obama of not being born in the United States. 
 
 Come 2017’s event and Trump will once again be mocked, but not as an audience member, instead as President himself. An odd turn of events, that’s for sure. 
 
 Whether Trump will go forward with the White House Correspondents’ dinner - which has taken place every year since 1983 - remains unknown, his relationship with the press being strained at best. 
 
 Samantha Bee won’t be waiting around to find out what Trump plans to do, deciding to host her own counter-event in Washington on the 29 April - the same day the dinner is currently booked for. 
 
 'Not the White House Correspondents’ Dinner' will take place at the Willard Hotel and will see Bee roast the current President. 
 
 “We’re not trying to supersede it,” she told the New York Times. “We just want to be there in case something happens - or doesn’t happen - and ensure that we get to properly roast the president.” 
 
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 Bee, who currently hosts topical TBS comedy “Full Frontal with Samantha Bee,” said the show’s producers and herself came up with the idea back in November when the election results were announced. 
 
 “We were talking out loud about whether we thought the White House Correspondents’ dinner would change during a Trump presidency, or if it would even exist,” she said. 
 
 “And then we thought, Why don’t we just do one, just to do it in the way that we would want it done if we were hosting it?” 
 
 She added that there are “binders full of people” who may perform at the event, but was unable to give any specifics. 
 
 While Trump’s dinner may take place, the President may find it difficult finding comedians to take part seeing as many celebrities pulled out of his inauguration ceremony. ||||| The annual custom of the White House Correspondents’ Association dinner suddenly seems uncomfortable if not untenable: Journalists mingling with Trump administration aides who loathe them, celebrities decrying Trump White House policies, and an entertainment headliner grappling with the tone and boldness of jokes about President Trump himself. 
 
 But Samantha Bee is not waiting to see how this year’s soiree unfolds or if those involved decide to hold it at all. 
 
 Instead, Ms. Bee, host of the topical TBS comedy show “Full Frontal With Samantha Bee,” and her colleagues are planning a counter-event that will take place in Washington on April 29, the same night as the Correspondents’ Association dinner. 
 
 This alternative gala, which is being called “Not the White House Correspondents’ Dinner” and was announced on Monday, will be at the Willard Hotel. Ms. Bee said that it was not an attempt to comment on or compete with that other, better-known banquet, but a night to include jokes about Mr. Trump that she and like-minded comedians want to make. ||||| Relations between the White House and the press corps that covers it are arguably at an all-time low under the Trump administration, but Samantha Bee intends to offer a solution. She will host a gala dinner in Washington, D.C. that could serve as an alternative to the annual White House Correspondents’ Association Dinner. 
 
 Bee and producers from her TBS satirical-comedy program, “Full Frontal,” will take over Washington’s Willard Hotel on April 29 at the same time the WHCA dinner is slated to take place, and invite journalists and celebrities to attend. During a conference call with reporters Monday, Bee said she expected the Time Warner-owned cable network to broadcast the event, but indicated details were still being worked out. 
 
 The idea originated after Election Day said Bee and Jo Miller, the show’s executive producer. Bee and others were trying to come up with something they thought would be fun. “We are trying to have some joy, trying to capture something for ourselves,” said Bee. “We never intended for this to take away from the other event,” she said. 
 
 With the Trump administration venting regularly about how the press treats it, there has been rising concern about whether the WHCA dinner might actually take place this year. In past years, the event has been criticized as one that renders the media too chummy with a subject of a good part of its coverage. A representative for the WHCA could not be reached for immediate comment. 
 
 At the same time, the event regularly generates headlines. Comedians including Seth Meyers and Stephen Colbert have held forth in what is usually a very tough room. In 2016, Larry Wilmore, then host of Comedy Central’s “The Nightly Show,” raised eyebrows with a monologue that poked fun at CNN correspondents Wolf Blitzer and Don Lemon and made use of a racial epithet. 
 
 Bee’s move is novel, to be sure, but by making it, the comedienne is joining a number of late-night hosts who are expanding their role with creative outreach. With TV viewers growing ever more fragmented thanks to the rise of streaming video and mobile devices, hosts like Stephen Colbert and Seth Meyers are devising new methods to stay relevant. Others have mounted similar efforts in the past. Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert in 2010 organized “The Rally to Restore Sanity and/or Fear,” a Washington, D.C. event meant to spoof a Glenn Beck rally, that lured fans of both his “Daily Show” and Colbert’s “Colbert Report.” 
 
 The pressure to stand out has only grown since that time. In the last few years, late-night comedy has seen the rise of what might be called Johnny Carson’s grandchildren: a wave of successors to Jay Leno and David Letterman who must contend with smaller audiences and the relentless pressure to cultivate a growing legion of fans who watch the programs not when they are on TV, but through clips passed around on YouTube or other sites. 
 
 These days, the late-night hosts do things Steve Allen could only consider in a fever dream. Stephen Colbert has inserted new introduction segments into repeats, and his staff recently started a new Twitter feed purporting to be written by disaffected members of his program. Seth Meyers’ “Late Night” will make available the show’s signature segment, “A Closer Look,” on social media hours before a new episode that contains it debuts at 12:30 a.m. Jimmy Fallon has given the nod to having an amusement-park ride inspired by his “Tonight Show” launch at NBCUniversal-owned Universal Orlando. 
 
 These business aspects had no role in the decision to try to hold the event, Bee said. But producers will try to use the soiree to call attention to journalism, and may invite what Bee said were “unsung journalists” to take part, as well as “super fans” of the program. All proceeds for the gala, which is being called “Not the White House Correspondents’ Dinner,” will go to the Committee to Protect Journalists. “Obviously, the press is under attack” under the Trump administration, said Bee. 
 
 Bee’s staff has tested several intriguing ideas since TBS launched the show last February. “Full Frontal” occasionally publishes humorous bits on Medium; passes around extra segments that never made it to air via social media; and occasionally offers previews of the pre-show process via Facebook Live. 
 
 The segment seems tailored to Bee, who offers a take-no-prisoners brand of humor and has not been shy about disagreeing with President Trump’s attitudes and policies. TBS recently renewed the program to run for a second season through 2017. 
 
 “We’re really doing this,” said Bee. “This is not a joke.”
– If Donald Trump chooses to roast journalists, celebrities, and politicians at the annual White House Correspondents' Dinner in Washington, DC, this year, it'll be with the knowledge that he's being brutally mocked not too far away. Samantha Bee of TBS' Full Frontal says she'll host celebrities, journalists, and comedians at a Trump roast at the Willard Hotel in Washington on April 29. Bee tells the New York Times that the goal of the event, dubbed "Not the White House Correspondents' Dinner," is not to "supersede" the official dinner scheduled for the same night, but simply to "ensure that we get to properly roast the president." She promises "plenty of surprises," per Variety. "If you're not careful you just might learn something. Specifically, you'll learn how screwed we'd be without a free press," she adds. It's not yet clear when or how the event will be broadcast, or even who will attend, but Bee says proceeds will go to the Committee to Protect Journalists. Whether the official Correspondents' dinner will happen is also unclear given Trump's tumultuous relationship with the press, his history with the dinner, and "his oft-demonstrated thin skin," reports the Times. The Independent notes the dinner has been an annual occurrence since 1983.