James Corden’s Late Late Show was losing millions, proving the ongoing suicide of divisive, toxic left-wing late-night television is inevitable.
For nine years, Corden was a midnight staple on CBS … a staple almost no one watched. Last month the 44-year-old signed off for his last show, and multiple reports now say CBS is leaning towards not replacing him as he returns to his English homeland.
With a low-rating epidemic sweeping all of late night, the format is no longer financially sustainable.
Other than the Fox News Channel’s Greg Gutfeld (the King of Late Night), all of late night’s left-wing hacks are paying the price for more than a half-decade of poisonous, joyless, left-wing hectoring and smug moralizing.
CBS’ late-night funnyman James Corden acknowledged that a joke about Elon Musk taking over Twitter he told on his “Late Late Show,” came from comedian Ricky Gervais. https://t.co/UMbtfy7bOt
— Breitbart News (@BreitbartNews) November 5, 2022
This report by LA Magazine’s Brian Stelter (who knows a whole lot about failing TV shows) offers even more insight into the collapse of late night.
“Well-placed sources tell me The Late Late Show was costing $60 million to $65 million a year to produce but was netting less than $45 million,” reports LA Mag, adding that an executive said, “It was simply not sustainable. CBS could not afford him anymore.”
Here are the cold, hard facts:
[Johnny] Carson could draw 10 million viewers a night. As competition mounted, Letterman averaged 3 million to 5 million. Now, all three 11:30 p.m. stars—Stephen Colbert, Jimmy Fallon, and Jimmy Kimmel—reach 5 million, combined. That shrinkage has hurt the 12:30 a.m. shows, too. When Corden debuted, in 2015, he was averaging around 1.6 million viewers. Lately, he’s down to 700,000 to 800,000 a night and fewer than 200,000 viewers in the 25- to 54-year-old demographic that advertisers (and publicists) most covet.
Surprisingly, although the article mostly blames the collapse of late night on social media, streaming, and the like, it sometimes touches on the real reason.
Craig Kilborn, who hosted the Late Late Show prior to Corden, said:
“Let me be tactful and somewhat gentle because I know and admire the guys currently working in late-night,” Kilborn said, “but when I left late-night, it was an easy decision and an exhilarating one. And now it’s even a stronger feeling.” He said he felt, even back then, that late-night formats had become redundant, and the increasingly strident political commentaries on shows were rankling to him. “It seems late-night is becoming more and more obsolete,” Kilborn says. “I’ve talked about it with my comedy-writer friends, and we simply don’t watch late-night anymore. Haven’t watched them for years.”
That’s exactly right. Unless you’re a smug leftist looking for your nightly affirmation, late night no longer matters. Carson, Letterman, and Arsenio had earned America’s goodwill, which gave them the power to make or break singers, celebrities, and comedians. They could sell books and movie tickets. Those days are long over.
A former Daily Show producer said, “The landscape got overly saturated with political-leaning late-night comedy. Not that any of it was bad. It was all good! But the market just got oversaturated.”
One television writer hit the nail on the head: “They keep giving us the same thing, the same desk, the same Trump jokes, the same guests. It needs to evolve.”
One of the greatest sitcoms of all time, The Larry Sanders Show (1992-1998), takes you behind the scenes of a fictional late-night host. Obviously, in those days, the late-night landscape was very different. Johnny Carson had just retired, and Jay Leno and David Letterman were vying to take the crown (Leno won). But above all, late night was still what it had always been: about easing America to sleep with a smile. An hour to wind down, relax and enjoy a laugh with your favorite celebrities who epitomize class.
Anyway, near the end of Larry Sander’s fictional late-night show, Garry Shandling’s title character is retiring. Playing himself, Jerry Seinfeld appears and reassures Sanders about all the money he will make in syndication reruns. Then Seinfeld does that Seinfeld thing and goes in for the kill (paraphrasing): Oh, that’s right, talk shows aren’t rerun. They’re forgotten forever.
At the time, that was true. When NBC attempted to syndicate Late Night with David Letterman, it went nowhere.
The Last Last Late Late Show with James Corden aired April 27, 2023, with guests Harry Styles and Will Ferrell. (Terence Patrick/CBS via Getty)
Today, though, you can watch full episodes of The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson via streaming. Outlets like Pluto and Tubi have 24/7 channels devoted to the show, so you can sit there and watch one episode after another. And guess what? Those shows are still entertaining, relaxing, hilarious, and filled with superstars. Sure, there’s the nostalgia factor. Seeing a Dyan Cannon in her gorgeous, flirty prime and Burt Reynolds at the top of his game is a real treat.
Outside of that, though, the show is still a grand piece of entertainment, a reminder of what entertainment used to be.
Above, I used the word “suicide” to describe what’s happening to late night, and that’s what it is. Those blaming social media and 5,000 competing channels on late night’s financial collapse are trying to gaslight us into believing there was no social media or 5,000 channels prior to 2016.
Reality check: prior to 2016, America still had countless alternatives to late night. It wasn’t the landscape that changed. It was the jerk-off hosts.
WATCH: James Corden Says Trump Jokes Are About ‘Good Versus Evil’
These late-night guys have become anti-entertainment. Unlike Carson and early Letterman, today’s crop is smug, mean-spirited, divisive, dishonest, and priggish.
Some 70 million people voted against Trump, and still, Colbert and the insufferable Jimmies can’t—as is revealed above—“reach 5 million, combined.”
Within the next decade, most of these late-night shows will be replaced with Seinfeld and Friends reruns.
Follow John Nolte on Twitter @NolteNC. Follow his Facebook Page here.