Kimmel Goes Dark for Colbert’s Final Late Show

Jimmy Kimmel is stepping aside for Stephen Colbert. On May 21 — the night of Colbert’s final episode of The Late Show on CBS — Jimmy Kimmel Live! will air a rerun, a quiet but meaningful gesture of respect from one late-night host to another. ABC confirmed the decision, with LateNighter first reporting that Kimmel personally confirmed he’d go dark that night out of deference to Colbert’s sendoff.

It’s not the first time Kimmel has done this. In May 2015, he made the same call for David Letterman’s farewell, urging his own audience to change the channel. “Please do not watch it,” Kimmel said at the time. “Especially if you’re a young person who doesn’t understand what all the fuss is about. Dave is the best and you should see him.” Eleven years later, the same spirit applies — just a different legend walking out the door.

What makes it sting a little more this time is the reason Colbert is leaving in the first place. CBS announced the cancellation in July 2025, framing it as a purely financial decision — the network cited an alleged $40 million annual loss. But the timing raised eyebrows immediately: the ax fell shortly after Colbert publicly criticized CBS’s parent company Paramount for settling a lawsuit brought by President Donald Trump over a 60 Minutes interview with Kamala Harris. The FCC approved the $8 billion Skydance-Paramount merger roughly a week after the cancellation was announced. Trump, for his part, has repeatedly celebrated the show’s end.

Kimmel, who has called the $40 million loss figure “beyond nonsensical,” is no stranger to the current political climate himself. Trump urged ABC last month to fire Kimmel over a joke about Melania Trump, and FCC chairman Brendan Carr previously threatened ABC over a Kimmel joke following Charlie Kirk’s assassination attempt — a threat serious enough that Disney temporarily suspended Kimmel hours after it was made.

Notably, NBC’s The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon is currently still scheduled to air a new episode on May 21, meaning Colbert will have at least one 11:35 competitor that night — though Fallon will be front and center at Colbert’s table days earlier.

A Final Week That Looks Like a Greatest Hits Album

The send-off Colbert is getting is something else entirely. The final week of The Late Show is shaping up to be one of the most stacked stretches of late-night television in years.

It kicks off Monday, May 11, with a full Strike Force Five reunion. Kimmel, Fallon, Seth Meyers, and John Oliver will all join Colbert on the same couch — a callback to the podcast the five hosts launched together during the concurrent Writers Guild and SAG-AFTRA strikes in 2023, with proceeds going to their crew members who went without pay during the work stoppage. TV Guide critic Matt Roush called it a genuine moment: “He’s gonna make a little bit of Late Night history on Monday night.” Monday’s episode will also feature a Broadway performance from Annaleigh Ashford, Christopher Jackson, Bernadette Peters, Ben Platt, and Patrick Wilson.

Tuesday brings Julia Louis-Dreyfus and Pedro Pascal. Wednesday is Tom Hanks — and, in what might be the week’s most talked-about segment, former President Barack Obama will sit down for The Colbert Questionert, the recurring bit where famous guests answer personal questions about things like their favorite sandwich and first concert.

Then Thursday. Letterman comes home.

David Letterman — who launched The Late Show in 1993, hosted it for 22 years, and handed the keys to Colbert in 2015 — will return to the Ed Sullivan Theater for what will almost certainly be an emotional night. The Strokes are the musical guest. And Kimmel’s screen will be dark.

Letterman hasn’t been quiet about how he feels about all of this. In a recent interview with the New York Times, he went after CBS with characteristic bluntness: “He was dumped because the people selling the network to Skydance said, ‘Oh no, there’s not going to be any trouble with that guy. We’re going to take care of the show. We’re just going to throw that into the deal. When will the ink on the check dry?’ I’m just going to go on record as saying: They’re lying. Let me just add one other thing, Jason. They’re lying weasels.”

Colbert himself has been more measured, but no less candid. In a recent Hollywood Reporter exit interview, he recalled the phone call with CBS entertainment head George Cheeks after the cancellation — noting that Cheeks told his manager first, and didn’t speak with Colbert directly until later in the summer. When they did talk, Colbert made one thing clear: he was going to address the widespread belief that the cancellation was politically motivated, and he wasn’t going to pretend otherwise.

He’s also been characteristically funny about what comes next. Colbert mentioned a Lord of the Rings script in the pipeline, some “much more important” family events on the calendar, and admitted he’s genuinely relieved at the idea of stepping away from the daily news cycle. He’s even got one dream booking he’s still chasing: Pope Leo XIV, whom he called his “white whale.” “I wrote him,” Colbert told THR. “I said, ‘Your Holiness, I hope this letter finds you well or, at the very least, infallible. Would you please come on my show?’” And with a very Colbert twist: “Now, if the pope goes on Kimmel instead, I’m going to think hard about the Presbyterian church. That’s all I’m saying.”

https://youtube.com/watch?v=RIUIBuPCS9Y%3Frel%3D0

After May 21, the 11:35 p.m. slot on CBS will go to Byron Allen and his Allen Media Group, with back-to-back episodes of Comics Unleashed moving in starting May 22. The Ed Sullivan Theater — where Letterman reigned for over two decades and Colbert for eleven more years — will face its own uncertain future.

“I don’t know,” Roush said of the iconic venue. “It’s such a historic venue. I can’t imagine they won’t use it for something.”

For now, the only thing that matters is May 21. And on that night, at least one of Colbert’s rivals will make sure you don’t have to choose.