{"id":6295,"date":"2025-07-18T20:03:09","date_gmt":"2025-07-18T20:03:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/6295\/"},"modified":"2025-07-18T20:03:09","modified_gmt":"2025-07-18T20:03:09","slug":"with-colbert-exit-canada-will-lose-the-talk-show-host-most-attuned-to-our-whims-and-politics","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/6295\/","title":{"rendered":"With Colbert exit, Canada will lose the talk show host most attuned to our whims and politics"},"content":{"rendered":"

The\u00a0cancellation\u00a0next year of The Late Show with Stephen Colbert, announced by the host on Thursday night’s broadcast<\/a>, is resonating as the most significant news in the television landscape in some time.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The reactions on social media range\u00a0from surprise to dismay:\u00a0Colbert has been in that seat for a decade and\u00a0is the ratings\u00a0leader among late night shows on the original three\u00a0American broadcast networks, but the announcement comes three days after he called a controversial settlement between Paramount, CBS’s parent company, and U.S. President Donald Trump, a “big fat bribe.”<\/p>\n

CBS executives characterized the decision as “purely a financial statement against a challenging backdrop in late night,” and Colbert said he was told he wasn’t being replaced by another host for the show.<\/p>\n

There’s merit to the CBS\u00a0statement in a genera,\u00a0sense:\u00a0NBC executives became alarmed when The Tonight Show dropped to an average\u00a0of 3.3\u00a0million viewers with Conan O’Brien as host in 2009, about two million fewer\u00a0than predecessor Jay Leno. Colbert\u00a0averaged 2.4 million in the most recent quarter<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\"AThen-Prime Minister Justin Trudeau waves while making an appearance at the Ed Sullivan Theater in New York City for the filming of The Late Show with Stephen Colbert on Sept. 23, 2024. (Sean Kilpatrick\/The Canadian Press)<\/p>\n

And late last year, one of the most notable credit agencies\u00a0downgraded the ratings<\/a> of some\u00a0corporations that own several local American television stations, as people flock from cable and over-the-air networks to streamers and the internet. There was even a report last year<\/a>\u00a0suggesting\u00a0that NBC was considering giving the 10 p.m. hour back to affiliates, who are craving as much of their own ad revenue as possible in troubled times, either from local businesses or political campaigns in the U.S.’s perpetual election cycle.<\/p>\n

Whatever the reasons, Colbert always\u00a0seemed to be the leader among the trio of him, Jimmy Fallon and Jimmy Kimmel\u00a0who kept\u00a0Canada, or “cold Mexico,” in view. Befitting and reflecting the times over the years, the coverage evolved from silly and mirthful jabs at our food, culture and penchant for apologizing, to more biting material as the U.S.-Canada relationship turned more antagonistic.<\/p>\n

Rubio, Vancouver’s presidential candidate<\/p>\n

The affinity to Canada stretched back to his previous show, Comedy Central’s The Colbert Report, where a bit resulted in\u00a0Stephen Colbert Day being\u00a0proclaimed in Oshawa, Ont.<\/a>,\u00a0in 2007.<\/p>\n

When Colbert scored the coveted CBS gig to succeed David Letterman, he debuted in 2015, just as the U.S. presidential cycle was kicking into gear.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Republican candidate Marco Rubio came in for a pasting after it was discovered that a campaign ad included\u00a0stock footage of the Vancouver skyline and a tugboat with a Canadian flag.\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

Colbert suggested the next ad for Rubio, in which the words “baseball, apple pie and Mom”\u00a0were matched with images of an NHL hockey scrap, poutine and Queen Elizabeth II. The vow to “fix the education system” was paired with a picture of the original early 1990s\u00a0Degrassi High cast.<\/p>\n

The subsequent election of Republican wild card\u00a0Donald Trump spawned stories of despondent liberals\u00a0considering leaving the U.S., but Colbert was having none of it. He urged Americans to be resilient<\/a>, ride out bumpy times\u00a0and not flock to the country with\u00a0“the language of France and the culture of Minnesota.”<\/p>\n

Trump’s first term saw the president threaten Canada with softwood lumber tariffs. Colbert drew laughs from the studio audience at Ed Sullivan Theatre in New York City for a ribald joke involving Justin Trudeau\u00a0and “wood,” and also when he read out the\u00a0highly officious response to the policy\u00a0written by then-national resources minister Jim Carr.<\/p>\n

Carr’s retort \u2014 he “strongly” disagreed with the tariffs \u2014 was treated by Colbert\u00a0as the equivalent of an expletive from\u00a0polite Canada.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

‘Polite one up’<\/p>\n

The tumultuous first Trump term \u2014 consistent White House turnover, two\u00a0impeachments and roiling American incidents \u2014\u00a0provided Colbert enough fodder, but occasionally Canadian cultural changes were clocked, too.<\/p>\n

When a line in the Canadian national\u00a0anthem was\u00a0changed in 2018 to better reflect modern times, Colbert implored his audience to, “Please rise\u00a0and place your hand over your beaver.”<\/p>\n

A singing Mountie then took the stage<\/a>\u00a0for a rendition of the\u00a0new “anthem,” replete with the usual clich\u00e9s about Canadian weather and moose, but also nods to “sexy Ryans”\u00a0Reynolds and Gosling. The song ended with a show-stopping “Our prime minister is hot” over an image of Justin Trudeau, who on another episode was likened to “the prince from Tangled.”<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

Changes to Canada’s cannabis laws \u2014 “polite one up,” the show advised \u2014 featured on more than one show, with Colbert warbling off-key after the laws went into effect, “Oh cannabis, I’m staring at my hand.”\u00a0<\/p>\n

The host then introduced Canada’s new pot tourism ad, where an oh-so-chill narrator enjoys a mix of Canadian wildlife and mildly hallucinogenic images, ponders “deep” thoughts, hankers for poutine and sings a few bars of One Week by the Barenaked Ladies before getting easily distracted again.\u00a0<\/p>\n

When a years-old brownface photo of Trudeau emerged in the 2019 election campaign, Colbert went with a pithy approach<\/a> that\u00a0included an inference to frequent,\u00a0racially charged U.S. stories:\u00a0“It’s not us this time! Suck it, Canada!”<\/p>\n

With a more friendly Joe Biden administration in power\u00a0and COVID-19 affecting\u00a0production, the Canadian content from 2021 to 2023 tended to involve celebrities\u00a0\u2014 actor Thomas Middleditch took a Canadian citizenship test<\/a> in an interview done remotely, and his fellow B.C. native\u00a0Michael Bubl\u00e9\u00a0was a good sport in a pre-recorded bit on Canadian cuisine<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n

One\u00a0exception was the trucker convoy protests of early 2022, during which Colbert expressed bafflement<\/a> at the presence of Confederate flags:<\/p>\n

“I didn’t know you could secede from a country you were never part of.”<\/p>\n

Trudeau trades barbs, makes his case<\/p>\n

Things changed again in 2024, as Trump completed a remarkable comeback and spoke of Canada at length in hostile\u00a0terms, threatening tariffs and annexation.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Trudeau, facing his own looming election, sat down\u00a0for a conventional, stunt-free\u00a0interview in September.<\/p>\n

While Trudeau was already in town for the UN General Assembly, it seemed clear that\u00a0advisers were pulling out the stops to remind Canadians of his appeal \u2014 The Late Show\u00a0is aired on Global stations \u2014 as he sought a fourth term in office.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

After a few minutes of light banter\u00a0\u2014\u00a0Trudeau extolled the virtues of Canada’s culture and made a pitch for the U.S. to implement Canadian health care\u00a0\u2014 things turned more serious.<\/p>\n

Colbert dutifully reported that Trudeau was trailing badly in the polls, though Opposition Leader Pierre Pollievre\u00a0was referred to as “Canada’s Trump.”\u00a0<\/p>\n

WATCH l Canadian voters may have already heard his pitch on Colbert:\u00a0\"\"<\/p>\n

Every answer Trudeau gave Colbert he\u2019s given before | About That<\/p>\n

A week after the House of Commons resumed, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau made an appearance on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert. Andrew Chang breaks down the interview by looking at how Trudeau answered Colbert’s questions: To an American audience, they may have seemed off-the-cuff \u2014 but almost all the answers were ones Canadians have heard many times over.<\/p>\n

Images supplied by Getty Images and The Canadian Press.<\/p>\n

When asked if he\u00a0deserved a fourth term in office, Trudeau’s\u00a0answer was perhaps less-than-rousing for Canadians facing inflationary pressures.<\/p>\n

“The reality is, um, I deeply believe in continuing to fight climate change, in continuing to invest in people, continuing to be there to support people and I’m going to keep fighting at it,” said Trudeau.<\/p>\n

Ontario\u00a0MP Ryan Williams called Trudeau the “punchline” in a subsequent House of Commons session, and the appearance came during a week when the Conservatives introduced a non-confidence motion.\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

When Trudeau’s successor was named, Colbert took note of the Canadian election win for Mark Carney, saying it spared\u00a0everyone from Trump repeatedly\u00a0mangling the pronunciation of Pollievre.<\/p>\n

Following up on a mild-mannered Carney\u00a0statement of standing up for Canadian businesses and citizens in the face of Trump’s trade threats, Colbert kissed both of his fists:<\/p>\n

“Let me introduce you to my two friends\u00a0\u2014\u00a0Quiet and Reasonable.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The\u00a0cancellation\u00a0next year of The Late Show with Stephen Colbert, announced by the host on Thursday night’s broadcast, is…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":6296,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[32],"tags":[49,48,361,75],"class_list":{"0":"post-6295","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-celebrities","8":"tag-ca","9":"tag-canada","10":"tag-celebrities","11":"tag-entertainment"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6295","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=6295"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6295\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6296"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6295"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6295"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6295"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}