Free Republic

CBS canceled The Late Show with Stephen Colbert because it was losing $40 million a year, it was claimed. Puck journalist Matthew Belloni revealed Colbert's astonishing lack of profitability Friday, hours after CNN first broke the news that the show was canceled because it was in the red. Belloni outlined how The Late Show - whose cancelation was announced Thursday - costs $100m a year to produce, with Colbert, 61, getting paid between $15 million and $20 million a year to host.

Back in June 2022, I joined the ranks of the many conservatives who looked at late-night network television, with its tired “clap-ter” and heavy-handed cheerleading for Democratic politicians, and asked just how many people actually enjoyed watching it. Never mind the now-regular softball interviews with Democratic elected officials or the exhausted “aren’t Republicans so dumb and evil” monologue jokes, the whole thing felt stale, rote, and joyless. Viewership has plummeted across the board for network television in the streaming era, and you figure the market for the likes of Stephen Colbert offering variations of the same jokes night after night...

CBS announced the cancellation of the Late Show with Stephen Colbert - just days after the host blasted the network's $16 million settlement with President Trump as a 'big fat bribe.' Colbert's show, which began in 2015, will now come to an end in May 2026, executives with the network and Paramount, its new parent company, announced on Thursday. 'The Late Show with Stephen Colbert will end its historic run in May 2026 at the end of the broadcast season,' they said in a statement. 'We consider Stephen Colbert irreplaceable and will retire the Late Show franchise at that time,'...