The TV market is used to its fair share of cancellations, but the 2025 TV schedule has been quite an interesting minefield of surprises. The most recent (and certainly the most shocking) was CBS’ abrupt cancellation of The Late Show, which will see Stephen Colbert sunsetting the program for good in May 2026.
The company has stood by its decision on the grounds of it being a “financial decision,” but personalities like Bravo host Andy Cohen aren’t convinced - and think it’s a sign of a greater problem ahead. During a recent episode of Sirius XM’s Andy Cohen Live, the man himself weighed in on the hot button issue that has riled up fans and supporters of Mr. Colbert. Noting the importance of The Late Show’s legacy on its home network, Cohen started dissecting the issue thusly:
I think it is possible that it's losing money and typically what would happen if a show is losing money that is also super important to the network … what they would probably do is say, ‘Listen, Stephen, your show is losing X amount of money a year. There's two things we could do. We could cut the budget in half, maybe move out of the Ed Sullivan Theater, do the show in a small studio that we already own,’ because CBS has a lot of studio space.
Getting further into his discussion on potential cost cutting measures, Andy Cohen went even further by suggesting some other moves to tighten the metaphorical purse strings, such as staffing cuts. Despite The Late Show staff's thoughts on the cancellation, one could presume that some show would have been better than no show at all.
The Watch What Happens Live host even brought up The Tonight Show’s shift to four-episode weeks as another tactic that could have stemmed the bleeding. Showing further frustration with the situation, Andy Cohen moved into this alternate scenario, which to him is the proof that CBS is “cooked”:
Or they would say, ‘Stephen, by the end of the year, we need to make these cuts and we'll give you another year, but we want to give you another year or two with all these cuts and then we're gonna see we're gonna cut our losses and if you wind up, you know, losing X amount, whatever.’ Instead they're turning the lights out completely at 11:30, which says to me, it's like CBS is just cooked. I mean, you got, it's just, it is cooked. They are saying, ‘We are done.’
Between the cancellations of The Late Show with Stephen Colbert as well as After Midnight’s sunsetting this past June, CBS’ late night apparatus is effectively done. Neither show has a substitute, leaving two long time fixtures in the history books. Andy Cohen understands this, and on a larger scale Jimmy Kimmel's comments on late night's future comprehend this shift as well.
That won't stop the laughter, and it certainly won't stop the show...at least for another 10 months. You can see that spirit in this clip from last night's The Late Show, where Mr. Cohen and his chat show brethren took part in a very topical gag on the matter:
While late night hosts continue to react to the news, and CBS’s alleged financial losses continue to raise questions, we’ve reached the beginning of another end of an era. For now, The Late Show with Stephen Colbert will play on, until it ends in May 2026. Which means you can still see the man of the hour do his thing, weeknights at 11:35pm ET on CBS.
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