Stephen Colbert’s exit leaves late night darker, more uncertain

John Vennavally-Rao reports on the reignited concerns about censorship as Stephen Colbert prepares to host his final 'The Late Show' on Thursday night.

TORONTO – “The Late Show” is signing off after 33 years on CBS, closing a chapter that some critics say ended not because of financial pressures, but because of corporate self-interest and presidential thin skin.

For Canadian viewers, the loss hits close to home. Over the course of his nearly 11-year tenure, Stephen Colbert welcomed a parade of iconic Canadian guests from Sandra Oh and Eugene Levy to Catherine O’Hara — and made Canada a recurring presence in ways that felt less like a courtesy and more like genuine affection. One of the show’s co-executive producers, Barry Julian, is a comedian and writer from Montreal.

“That might be the source of a lot of the Canadian jokes and Canadianisms that snuck onto that show,” said film critic Richard Crouse.

Those moments were plentiful. Colbert joked that Canada gave U.S. President Donald Trump its lowest letter grade — a “zed” — and responded to Trump’s tariffs with a video of a Mountie, a bear and a lumberjack singing about maple syrup and timber.

Memorably, he and Michael Bublé performed “Barrett’s Privateers,” the classic Stan Rogers folk song, on air together.

The show’s cancellation was announced last year, shortly after CBS’s parent company Paramount settled a $16-million lawsuit with Trump.

On air, Colbert called the payment a “big fat bribe.” Three days later, his show was axed.

CBS insisted the decision was purely a financial one. But Canadian TV critic and podcaster Bill Brioux questioned that during an interview with CTV Your Morning.

“This was a 33-year franchise,” said Brioux. “CBS has tossed it away without cutting the band first, or going to three nights a week, or doing what other late-night talk shows have had to do. So it does seem political.”

Trump celebrated the cancellation on social media. Months later, ABC briefly suspended its late-night host Jimmy Kimmel over remarks he made after the death of conservative commentator Charlie Kirk. It all raised questions about how much power the Trump administration has over the parent companies of the networks that decide who is on the air.

“Paramount is run by (Larry and David Ellison), who are friends of Trump, and they wanted to have this US$111-billion merger with Warner Brothers Discovery, and they need FCC approval and regulation, so they need to keep the White House happy,” Brioux said of the decision to spike The Late Show.

Colbert frequently lampooned Trump on air.

Brioux believes Disney, which owns ABC, is “showing more spine.”

“They’re backing Kimmel, and that’s the only reason he’s still on the air,” he said. “This is all about money and corporate ownership, for sure.”

Brioux warned the threat extends further. When Paramount completes the Warner Bros. Discovery acquisition, it will also own HBO, which is home to Bill Maher and John Oliver.

“They’re all in the crosshairs,” he said.

Film and TV critic Richard Crouse says the late-night landscape has been meaningfully diminished. He says the three 11:30 p.m. shows had fit together like puzzle pieces.

“And now one of them is gone,” he said. “Colbert brought a sense of improv comedy, which Jimmy Kimmel doesn’t particularly do. He brought a sense of intellectualism that I don’t think Jimmy Fallon brings to his show.”

On the question of why “The Late Show” was cancelled, Crouse declined to point to a single cause.

“Was it that the show lost $40 million a year? Was it that Donald Trump doesn’t like being poked fun at? Was it a pawn in a larger corporate merger?” he asked rhetorically. “It could have been any of those things. I have a feeling that it’s a combination of all three.”

Crouse said the industry will now have to grapple with whether late-night television is worth the investment.

“I imagine there is scrutiny now in a way that there probably hasn’t been before. Big companies looking at their bottom line, thinking, ‘do we really actually need to have late night television shows?’”

He believes NBC’s “The Tonight Show” is relatively secure.

“I can’t imagine that NBC will retire it anytime soon. It’s just too valuable a property for them,” he said. “It’s a legacy show — one of the shows, like ‘Saturday Night Live,’ like ‘The Today Show,’ that when you think of NBC, that’s what you think of."

Crouse believes Kimmel, despite his difficult year, also draws a broad enough audience to survive.

In Crouse’s view, the future of late night may hinge on what happens next in the 11:35 p.m. time slot, after Byron Allen’s “Comics Unleashed” takes over from Colbert.

“Byron Allen has a syndicated show where he has comics on just to talk about whatever topics they want to talk about,” said Crouse. “It’s a loosely structured talk show, but it’s kind of inoffensive. It’s kind of not edgy in any way. If that show takes off, which it very may well do, then late night might change.”

As for Colbert, he has said he’s co-writing a new “Lord of the Rings” film with his son, and Crouse expects him to resurface on television — perhaps with a talk show on Netflix or another streamer, or possibly programming focused on faith.

Whatever comes next, Crouse says Colbert’s legacy from his years on the “The Late Show” is clear.

“He was using his platform to create discourse, and I think that’s what we’ll remember about this show five years from now.”