#the-late-show

#the-late-show

Paul McCartney turned up as the surprise, unannounced final guest guest for the final episode ever. Of course, McCartney's appearance marks his return to the very room where the Beatles played The Ed Sullivan Show on February 9th, 1964, performing for a shrieking studio audience and an estimated 73 million Americans at home. That broadcast is widely credited with cementing the British Invasion. Sixty-two years later, Sir McCartney returned to The Ed Sullivan Theatre to help switch off the lights on more than three decades of CBS' late-night franchise.

A mix of television broadcasts and a brief return to live theater occupied the space until 1993, when CBS bought the landmarked structure for their new talk show, The Late Show with David Letterman. Colbert took over the desk in 2015, and in July 2025, CBS announced that The Late Show would end on May 21, 2026, after 33 years.

Colbert introduced the two songs as follows: “Performing a medley of the first song they played on this stage on The Late Show 31 years ago, 'This Is a Call,' and the last one on Letterman in 2015, 'Everlong,' ladies and gentleman, Foo Fighters!”

"What I like about the American thing is it's a lot more bloodthirsty and there's a lot more treachery. It's broken hearts, love doesn't work quite so well."

In the 50s, Chuck Berry wrote things that were so good they could've been part of the Harlem Renaissance, and he taught my whole generation. They're all influenced by Chuck Berry—Bob and the Beatles and everybody—cause he made stories in words that flowed effortlessly. And his stories were great.

Rogers gave 'Alaska' the acoustic treatment, surrounded by a string quartet and slowing the song's tempo to folk-tinged crawl, providing a luxurious, introspective rendition.

I can understand why people would have that reaction because CBS or the parent corporation - I'm not going to say who made that decision, because I don't know; no one's ever going to tell us - decided to cut a check for $16 million to the president of the United States over a lawsuit that their own lawyers, Paramount's own lawyers, said is completely without merit.

I understand the fear that you and your advertisers have with $8 billion at stake, but understand this: Truly, the shows that you now seek to cancel, censor, and control-a not insignificant portion of that $8 billion value came from those fucking shows-that's what made you that money.