{"id":25887,"date":"2025-07-26T16:33:08","date_gmt":"2025-07-26T16:33:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/25887\/"},"modified":"2025-07-26T16:33:08","modified_gmt":"2025-07-26T16:33:08","slug":"david-letterman-tears-apart-gutless-cbs-over-colbert-cancellation","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/25887\/","title":{"rendered":"David Letterman Tears Apart ‘Gutless’ CBS Over Colbert Cancellation"},"content":{"rendered":"

Former \u201cLate Show<\/a>\u201d host David Letterman<\/a> scorched CBS<\/a> on Friday and took aim at his old network\u2019s leadership over the decision to cancel the\u00a0Stephen Colbert<\/a>-led franchise, one Letterman began over three decades ago.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think one day, if not today, the people at CBS who have manipulated and handled this are going to be embarrassed because this is gutless,\u201d he told former \u201cLate Show\u201d producers Barbara Gaines and Mary Barclay in a Zoom chat uploaded to his YouTube page<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Letterman \u2014 in his first public comments since the network\u2019s shock announcement \u2014 called the move \u201cpure cowardice\u201d before alluding to its parent company Paramount Global<\/a>\u2019s $16 million settlement with President Donald Trump<\/a>\u00a0over his widely criticized \u201c60 Minutes\u201d lawsuit.<\/p>\n

The settlement raised questions as it arrived weeks before the Trump-favoring Federal Communications Commission chair approved a multibillion-dollar deal Thursday that sees Paramount merging with Skydance Media<\/a>, which is headed by multibillionaire Oracle co-founder Larry Ellison\u2019s son David Ellison<\/a>.<\/p>\n

CBS has claimed that the move to cancel \u201cThe Late Show\u201d \u2014 hosted by frequent Trump critic Colbert \u2014 was \u201cpurely a financial decision against a challenging backdrop in late night.\u201d<\/p>\n

While reports have indicated that the program faced financial<\/a>challenges<\/a> in recent years, Letterman argued that \u201cgoons\u201d like David Ellison know all too well that the TV business isn\u2019t the same as it once was.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s no fairness to these goons. You\u2019re telling me they don\u2019t know that? These guys are bottom feeders. That\u2019s exactly what this is. Of course they know that broadcast television is withering,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cSo now they just want to make sure \u2014 on top of buying something that doesn\u2019t have the same value as it had 30 years ago \u2014 they don\u2019t want to be hassled by the United States government. So they want CBS to take care of all of that mess!\u201d<\/p>\n

Letterman further questioned whether the network was \u201closing so much money\u201d with \u201cThe Late Show.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThey did not do the correct thing, they did not handle Stephen Colbert \u2014 the face of that network \u2014 in the way he deserves to have been handled,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Earlier this week, Letterman uploaded a 20-minute video compilation to his YouTube page full of criticism directed at CBS<\/a> during his \u201cLate Show\u201d run.<\/p>\n

While he acknowledged that the news was both shocking and a \u201cbummer,\u201d Letterman told his former producers that he loves the move for Colbert, nonetheless.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe\u2019s a martyr, good for him,\u201d Letterman said. \u201cIf you listen carefully, you can hear them unfolding chairs at the [Television] Hall of Fame for his induction.\u201d<\/p>\n

Related…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Former \u201cLate Show\u201d host David Letterman scorched CBS on Friday and took aim at his old network\u2019s leadership…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":25888,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[29],"tags":[20521,49,48,15450,18027,12997,1376,75,12998,20896,348,4718],"class_list":["post-25887","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tv","tag-barbara-gaines","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-colbert","tag-david-ellison","tag-david-letterman","tag-donald-trump","tag-entertainment","tag-late-show","tag-mary-barclay","tag-tv","tag-youtube"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25887","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=25887"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25887\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/25888"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=25887"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=25887"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=25887"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}