Satirist Stephen Colbert ended the late night show he hosted for nearly 11 years on a whimsical and joyful note.
During his finale, he invited his audience, his crew and famous friends to dance with him onstage as he sang Hello, Goodbye with former Beatle Paul McCartney. Joining them was singer Elvis Costello, and musicians Louis Cato and Jon Batiste, the current and former band leaders for Colbert's show.
And in the end, Colbert and McCartney together switched off the lights at New York's Ed Sullivan Theater, where the Beatles made their American debut in 1964 and where the Late Show franchise was taped in front of audiences for close to 33 years.
Through the magic of visual effects, Colbert's entire show and the theater were sucked into a giant green interdimensional wormhole that at times looked like the CBS logo to this reporter.
Joining Colbert for a bit earlier in the show were his late night host buddies Jon Oliver, Seth Meyers and the two Jimmies – Fallon and Kimmel – aka "Strike Force Five."
"We came to say, we're going to miss you," Kimmel said. "Late night is not going to be the same without you."
Meyers added, "Yeah, without you. Where will Americans turn to see a middle-aged white man make jokes about the news?"
Last July, CBS canceled Colbert's top-rated late night show, saying it was "purely a financial decision against a challenging backdrop in late night." But his fans and friends say it was retribution for his continuous criticism of President Trump and his administration. The cancellation also came as Paramount Global – which owns CBS – sought Federal Communications Commission approval for its $8.4 billion merger with Skydance Media.
The network gave Colbert months to wind down his show, and he never stopped roasting Trump during his monologues…. except for his last one, where he didn't mention politics.
While Colbert never directly blamed the president for the cancellation, many of his friends and fans did.
On the eve of the final Late Show with Stephen Colbert, musical guest Bruce Springsteen told the host, "You're the first guy in America who lost his job because the president can't take a joke."
Colbert's final show continued to feature some of his famous friends, including Bryan Cranston, Paul Rudd, Tim Meadows, and Ryan Reynolds, though he had teased the final guest would be Pope Leo XIV.
Colbert was also visited by his friend and mentor Jon Stewart, host of The Daily Show.
"I didn't think my show would end like this," Colbert said to him. "But still, grateful."
"The only choice you have is how to walk through it," Stewart told him as they faced the pretend wormhole they agreed was a metaphor. "You can go in kicking and screaming. Or you can do what you've done for the past 30 years when faced with something dark: you stare it down and you can laugh."
Earlier in the week, Stewart came on the show to quote something former Late Night host David Letterman once told him: "Don't confuse cancellation with failure."
Letterman was also a guest on one of Colbert's last shows, and expressed his outrage about the cancellation. "As we all understand," Letterman told him, "you can take a man's show, but you can't take a man's voice, so that's the good news."
Letterman and Colbert also went onto the roof of the Ed Sullivan Theater and proceeded to gleefully participate in what Letterman called "wanton destruction of CBS property." They threw chairs from the set, a cake and some watermelons, over the side of the building, onto a target painted with the CBS logo.
Colbert's departure marks the end of The Late Show franchise, which Letterman began in 1993 before handing the baton to Colbert.
This is a pivotal moment for late night television, as audiences increasingly watch online clips of shows rather than tune in to broadcast networks. The cancellation also comes at a time when the FCC is reviewing the broadcast licenses of eight Disney-owned television stations.
Disney, the parent company of ABC, which broadcasts Jimmy Kimmel Live!, has also found itself in the crosshairs of the Trump administration.
Kimmel asked ABC to air a rerun of his show on Thursday so fans could watch Colbert's finale, which aired at the same time. Kimmel also urged viewers to "never watch CBS again," after The Late Show was "pushed out."
"I hope the people who did the pushing feel ashamed of themselves," Kimmel said on his own show Wednesday night, "although I know they probably won't."
Colbert told People magazine he has not thought much about what's next, beyond attending his brother's wedding this weekend. He's been working on a passion project: co-writing a script for an upcoming Lord of the Rings movie with his son Peter McGee. This week, Colbert also started a new TikTok account.
CBS says the set of The Late Show will be donated to the Museum of Broadcast Communications in Chicago, where Colbert started his career with the legendary improv comedy troupe, The Second City.
Starting Friday, CBS will replace The Late Show with Stephen Colbert with Comics Unleashed, the long-running syndicated talk show hosted by the new BuzzFeed owner and CEO, Byron Allen. The media executive is leasing the coveted timeslot from CBS, insisting the comedy on his show will be apolitical.
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