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CBS Ends The Late Show with Stephen Colbert After Nearly 11 Years
CBS will air the final episode of The Late Show with Stephen Colbert on Thursday. The network cited annual financial losses of $40 million as the reason for the cancellation.
May 21, 5:00 AM·1m read2 sources
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CBS will broadcast the final episode of The Late Show with Stephen Colbert on Thursday at 11:35 p.m. ET/PT. The network said the decision followed annual losses of $40 million. The show cost $100 million to produce each year and employed 200 people.
Background on the Program The Late Show with Stephen Colbert premiered on September 8, 2015. Its first guests were George Clooney and Jeb Bush. Colbert had previously hosted The Colbert Report on Comedy Central from 2005 to 2014. That program satirized conservative political commentators.
The last episode was pre-taped and will stream on Paramount+ after its CBS broadcast. Guests during the final week included Jon Stewart, Steven Spielberg, Robert De Niro, and Bruce Springsteen. Fellow late-night hosts Jimmy Fallon, Jimmy Kimmel, Seth Meyers, and John Oliver appeared together on Monday’s episode. David Letterman also appeared as a guest on May 14.
“The move to end Colbert’s Late Show was purely a financial decision against a challenging backdrop in late night." — CBS News, May 21, 2026 Colbert will next write a screenplay for the upcoming Lord of the Rings film Shadow of the Past. CBS will replace the program with Comics Unleashed with Byron Allen.”
