The King of Late Night isn’t going anywhere: Stephen Colbert will remain at The Late Show through 2026.
While speaking at the Banff TV Festival on Tuesday, CBS CEO George Cheeks revealed that CBS had reached a contract extension with the comedian to continue as host of its top-rated The Late Show with Stephen Colbert for another three years. His current pact was set to expire this year.
“We just extended him for three more years and I was praying for that to happen,” Cheeks said at a Deadline-moderated panel.
Although The Late Show is one of the late-night shows that have been hit by the writers strike – all of late-night is essentially dark, Cheeks said that before the strike, The Late Show was “absolutely crushing it”.
“It’s just a great cohesive group that is firing on all cylinders and Stephen’s really enjoying himself,” he said.
Colbert, who succeeded David Letterman previously extended his deal in September 2019 through August 2023.
After a bumpy start, where the show was losing to NBC’s The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon, Colbert hit his stride in 2016 as Donald Trump entered politics and ultimately ended up as a President. This coincided with Chris Licht, the now ex-boss of CNN, joining as exec producer.
When asked during the keynote panel in the Canadian Rockies if Licht had asked for his old job back, Cheeks laughed and quickly moved on to other subjects
The deal to keep Colbert comes at a transitional time for CBS’ late night lineup. In April, James Corden appeared in his final Late Late Show after eight years in the timeslot after Colbert.
The Late Late Show is being replaced with a reboot of former Comedy Central series @midnight.
The Late Show with Stephen Colbert is exec produced by Colbert, Jon Stewart and Tom Purcell. It is produced by CBS Studios in association with Spartina Productions.
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