| The Late Show | |
|---|---|
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| Created by | David Letterman |
| Presented by |
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| Country of origin | United States |
| No. of episodes | 4,263 (under Letterman) 1,724 (under Colbert) |
| Production | |
| Production locations | Ed Sullivan Theater New York, New York |
| Camera setup | Multi-camera |
| Running time | 62 min. (with commercials) |
| Production companies | Worldwide Pants Incorporated (1993–2015) Spartina Productions (2015–present) CBS Productions (1993–2006) CBS Paramount Television (2006–2009) CBS Television Studios (2009–2020) CBS Studios (2020–present) |
| Original release | |
| Network | CBS |
| Release | August 30, 1993 (1993-08-30) – present |
| Related | |
TheLate Show is an Americanlate-night talk show franchise onCBS. It first aired on August 30, 1993, with hostDavid Letterman, who previously hostedLate Night with David Letterman onNBC from 1982 to 1993. Letterman's iteration of the program ran until his retirement in May 2015. ComedianStephen Colbert, best known for his roles onComedy Central programsThe Daily Show andThe Colbert Report, assumed hosting duties that September.[1] The show originates from theEd Sullivan Theater in theTheater District ofManhattan, New York, and airslive to tape in most American markets at 11:35 p.m.Eastern andPacific, 10:35 in theCentral andMountain time zones.
CBS has announced that it has canceledThe Late Show franchise, with the final episode due to air in May 2026, at the conclusion of Colbert's eleventh season.
CBS had previously attempted late-night talk shows withThe Merv Griffin Show (1969–1972) andThe Pat Sajak Show (1989–1990) but neither were able to compete with NBC'sThe Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson and were cancelled; Griffin's for editorial disputes with the network (he would go on to continue the show in syndication for 14 more years), and Sajak's for low ratings. For most of the 20 years precedingLate Show, CBS's late night fare consisted of movies, re-runs, imported Canadian dramas and specialty programming packaged under the titlesCBS Late Night andCrimetime After Primetime and broadcast to middling ratings, competing againstThe Tonight Show and, in its last years, the upstart success of a syndicated series,The Arsenio Hall Show, which began airing in January 1989. Before Letterman's arrival, CBS' New York flagship,WCBS-TV, specifically used the Late Show name for its late-night movie programming.
When David Letterman became available after beingpassed over by NBC forThe Tonight Show, CBS was eager to lure him and offered him a three-year, $14 million per year contract,[2] doubling hisLate Night salary. According to their agreement, the show would spend a month in Hollywood at least once a year.[3]
CBS purchased theEd Sullivan Theater for four million dollars, spending "several million more" for renovation.[3] The renovation was supervised by architectJames Polshek.[3] CBS' total cost for acquiring the show—including renovations, negotiation right paid to NBC, signing Letterman, announcerBill Wendell, band leaderPaul Shaffer, and the rest of the band—was over $140 million.[4]
When Letterman moved to CBS and began theLate Show, several ofLate Night's long-running comedy bits made the move with him. Letterman renamed a few of his regular bits to avoid legal problems overtrademark infringement (NBC cited that what he did onLate Night was "intellectual property" of the network, a contention he disputed). "Viewer Mail" on NBC became the "CBS Mailbag", and Larry "Bud" Melman began to use his real name,Calvert DeForest. Shaffer's "World's Most Dangerous Band" became "The CBS Orchestra", a jab at NBC regarding the show's new home, and a play on theNBC Orchestra of the long runningThe Tonight Show. Letterman's signature bit, theTop Ten List, was perfunctorily renamed the "Late Show Top Ten List" (over time it reverted to its original name).
In ratings, Letterman'sLate Show topped Leno'sTonight Show for its first two years. Leno pulled ahead on July 10, 1995, starting with aHugh Grant interview, after Grant's much-publicized arrest for picking up anLA prostitute.[5] Leno also benefited from the lead-in provided by NBC's popularMust See TV prime time programs of the mid-to-late 1990s. Likewise the CBS network was hurt byaffiliation switches in late 1994 relating toFox picking up CBS'sNational Football League rights (although CBS would reacquire those rights in 1998), stunting theLate Show just as it was beginning to gain traction. Despite CBS rising back to first place in prime time in the 2000s, Letterman never fully recovered from the damage, and he remained behind Leno and successorJimmy Fallon for the rest of his tenure, only briefly rising back to first place duringConan O'Brien's run as host ofThe Tonight Show.
AnnouncerBill Wendell left in 1995,[6] withAlan Kalter taking his place for the remainder of Letterman's run as host.
On April 3, 2014, Letterman announced his retirement. His last telecast aired on May 20, 2015.
Instead of airing a transitional version ofLate Show with guest hosts (as happened withThe Late Late Show fromJanuary to March 2015 between the end ofCraig Ferguson's show and the premiere ofJames Corden's) or reruns from Letterman's time as host (asNBC did during its interregnums onThe Tonight Show andLate Night), CBS placed theLate Show on hiatus and instead aired reruns of scripted dramas in the 11:35 pm time slot over the summer with the brandingCBS Summer Showcase.[7] The network dismissed concerns that this may hurt the ratings ofThe Late Late Show with James Corden.[8]
The plan was similar to CBS's pre-Letterman use of the slot forCrimetime After Primetime whenpolice procedurals and mysteries aired in the slot in the early-1990s, and the late 1980sCBS Late Night which featured a mixture of scripted programming. CBS inaugurated the summer format with reruns of the final season ofThe Mentalist, a cancelled prime time police procedural, airing nightly from May 21 until June 5, 2015.[9]Hawaii Five-0 (June 8–12, July 27–31),CSI: Cyber (June 15–19, August 17–21),Elementary (June 22–26),Blue Bloods (June 29-July 5),The Good Wife (July 6–10, August 24–28),NCIS: Los Angeles (July 13–17),NCIS (July 20–24; September 7)Scorpion (August 3–7),NCIS: New Orleans (August 10–14) andMadam Secretary (August 31-September 4) also aired during the summer in the 11:35 pm time slot between the Letterman and Colbert transition.[10][11][12][8]
The Late Late Show poked fun at the initial choice for its summer lead-in during several June episodes with acold open sketch titled "Talking Mentalist", a parody ofTalking Dead in which Corden, his bandleaderReggie Watts, and one of the show's scheduled guests discussed the episode that had just ended.[13] Colbert would follow suit with a running gag on his firstLate Show episode, showingCBS Corporation CEOLeslie Moonves with a giant switch which he could use to switch the network back to reruns ofThe Mentalist if he was dissatisfied with Colbert's performance (which he did, briefly, twice during the show).[14]
Stephen Colbert succeeded Letterman as host on September 8, 2015,[15] having been signed to a five-year contract.[1] In contrast with Colbert's previous program,The Colbert Report, in which he played afictional character also named Stephen Colbert, Colbert hosts the show as himself.[16] Colbert's version retains theLate Show name under license from Letterman'sWorldwide Pants, which holds the registered trademark.[17]
Several cities sought to acquire theLate Show, among them New York City,Los Angeles,New Orleans, andConnecticut.[18] A report in theDaily News indicated thatCBS Corporation had paid over $40,000 in campaign contributions to incumbent GovernorAndrew Cuomo in an effort to lobby the governor for certain tax breaks to keep the show in New York City.[19] A deal to keep the show at the Ed Sullivan Theater, which includes $16,000,000 in state tax incentives over a five-year period, was made official on July 23, 2014.[20]Jon Batiste was the initial bandleader on Colbert's iteration of the program.[21]
On July 17, 2025, CBS announced that it would be endingThe Late Show with Stephen Colbert at the conclusion of its eleventh season, and retiringThe Late Show franchise altogether, in May 2026 after 33 years. While CBS called the decision "financial", others believe it done in part to help obtain U.S. government approval for the Skydance/Paramount merger.[22] In an interview withCNBC FCC ChairBrendan Carr said that Paramount subsidiaryCBS cancelling itsThe Late Show franchise helped the company comply with regulations.[23] Two weeks earlier, Paramount Global had also settled a lawsuit with Donald Trump alleging deceptive editing of a60 Minutes broadcast featuring then-Democratic presidential nomineeKamala Harris,[24][25] despite the widespread belief that the company would prevail in court.[26]
