Overview
- David Letterman’s guest spot on The Late Show Thursday ended with him and Stephen Colbert tossing set furniture, watermelons and a cake from the Ed Sullivan Theater roof onto a giant CBS logo.
- CBS says retiring the franchise is a financial move, citing reported losses near $40 million a year, while Letterman and other critics link the timing to the Skydance–Paramount deal and note that President Trump publicly cheered Colbert’s ouster.
- Colbert’s final episode airs May 21, capping 11 years as host, after a farewell week that reunited fellow late-night hosts and featured high-profile guests including Tom Hanks, Julia Louis-Dreyfus and Barack Obama.
- Byron Allen’s Allen Media Group takes over CBS’s 11:35 p.m. slot on May 22 with Comics Unleashed, followed by Funny You Should Ask at 12:35 a.m., reflecting a lower-cost, syndicated model.
- The sendoff highlights late night’s broader reset as TV audiences splinter to streaming, ad dollars fall, and networks opt for cheaper time-buy programming that reshapes jobs and shrinks daily platforms for political satire.