{"id":685950,"date":"2026-05-22T08:06:08","date_gmt":"2026-05-22T08:06:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/685950\/"},"modified":"2026-05-22T08:06:08","modified_gmt":"2026-05-22T08:06:08","slug":"stephen-colbert-delivers-his-late-show-final-monologue-watch","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/685950\/","title":{"rendered":"Stephen Colbert Delivers His ‘Late Show’ Final Monologue: Watch"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n\tOn Thursday, Stephen Colbert<\/a>, dressed up in a sharp blue suit and tie, stepped before The Late Show audience to deliver his final show.<\/p>\n

\n\tHe started the show speaking directly to the audience, both those who were in the audience at the Ed Sullivan Theater and those watching at home. He said he and the crew called the show \u201cThe Joy Machine,\u201d because a show of that size must be a machine \u2014 but every night, they chose to make it with joy. \u201cOn night one of the Colbert Report,\u201d he said, referring to his long-running Comedy Central talk show, \u201cI said, \u2018Anyone can read the news to you. I promise to feel the news at you.\u2019 And I realized pretty soon that our job over here was different. We were here to feel the news with you, and I don\u2019t know about you, but I sure have felt it.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

\n\tAfter a clip that stitched together moments of historic talk shows<\/a> that together bid farewell to the host, Colbert launched into his monologue, but was interrupted by several A-list guests \u2014\u00a0Bryan Cranston, Paul Rudd, and Tim Meadows \u2014\u00a0who each stormed out when Colbert admitted they weren\u2019t going to be his final guests.<\/p>\n

\n\tThroughout the monologue itself, Colbert played it straight, like a normal episode of the Late Show \u2014\u00a0doing a First Draft bit where he joked about starting an OnlyFans account, while taking shots at Dr. Brian Christine, a penile implant specialist who\u2019s in charge of the Hantavirus (\u201c[He] hosted a YouTube series on erectile dysfunction called Erection Connection, also the name of a very popular category on Craigslist\u201d); a scandal over the Catholic Church\u2019s \u201csexy priest\u201d calendar (\u201cI\u2019m getting word that this is the worst scandal to ever hit the Catholic Church\u201d); and how he\u2019s grateful that he won\u2019t have to cover \u201cthe inevitable rise of our machine overlords.\u201d <\/p>\n

\n\tThe show marks a sad end to an institution. Last year, in a decision that reverberated across the entertainment world, CBS\u00a0announced plans to end its late-night talk show<\/a>, which Colbert\u00a0had hosted over the past decade. While the network cited financial issues, there was much speculation about political pressure as CBS\u2019 parent company, Paramount, was seeking to complete a merger with Skydance Media that needed government approval at the time.<\/p>\n

\t\tEditor\u2019s picks<\/p>\n

\n\tColbert, of course, spent years roasting Trump on\u00a0The Late Show\u00a0and, just days before news of his cancellation,\u00a0called out<\/a>\u00a0CBS\u2019s parent company Paramount for its $16 million settlement with Trump, a deal that Colbert dubbed \u201ca big, fat bribe.\u201d\u00a0The next day, Skydance CEO David Ellison met with the FCC to discuss the company\u2019s proposed merger with Paramount. Following the cancellation, the FCC approved the merger.<\/p>\n

\t\tTrending Stories<\/p>\n

\n\tLast week, Colbert, Jimmy Kimmel<\/a>,\u00a0Jimmy Fallon<\/a>,\u00a0Seth Meyers<\/a>, and\u00a0John Oliver<\/a> released the first episode of their podcast, Strike Force Five since 2023, which came out two days after the late-night hosts reunited<\/a> on The Late Show. When asked by Fallon if the end of his show had sunk in yet, Colbert replied, \u201cWhat I\u2019ve said is the rising tide of emotion has reached my chin, and now, the only thing to do is take a deep breath and swim like hell to May 21.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tColbert began hosting\u00a0The Late Show\u00a0in 2015,\u00a0taking the baton<\/a>\u00a0from David Letterman, after hosting the news satire show\u00a0The Colbert Report\u00a0on Comedy Central. As of May 21, Colbert had hosted the show for 11 seasons on CBS, filming at the Ed Sullivan Theater in New York City.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"On Thursday, Stephen Colbert, dressed up in a sharp blue suit and tie, stepped before The Late Show…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":685951,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[49,48,75,3668,6713],"class_list":["post-685950","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-entertainment","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-entertainment","tag-stephen-colbert","tag-the-late-show-with-stephen-colbert"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/685950","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=685950"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/685950\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/685951"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=685950"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=685950"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=685950"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}