Stephen Colbert turns off the lights of the CBS Late Show after 33 years on the air: "He's finally gone," he celebrated Donald Trump's farewell, going on to threaten the other late-night comedians, "overpaid, talentless, and low-rated. They'll end up like him."
Trump has always denied having any influence on Colbert's dismissal, which came amid his friends Larry and David Ellison's $8.4 billion takeover of CBS parent company Paramount Global. Starring in an increasingly political show, the comedian was fired in July, just days after criticizing the network for settling a $16 million lawsuit with the tycoon.
Having kept the final guest of his TV show a secret until the very end, the staunchly Catholic Colbert had kept the audience on edge amid rumors that he'd secured a stellar turnout: none other than Pope Leo, whom he repeatedly called his "white whale." It was obviously a joke, and Paul McCartney's arrival didn't disappoint: "We've come full circle. You're perfect as our final guest," the host told him, recalling that it was at the Ed Sullivan Theater in 1964 that the Fab Four made their US debut, a momentous occasion not only for music but also for television. At that point, balancing irony and gravity as Colbert has always been a trademark, the final Late Show really got going: "Back then, we imagined America as the place where all the music we loved came from. "America was the land of the free, the greatest democracy," 'Macca' said, and then, in conversation with the comedian, launched into his only dig at Trump: "We were used to wearing very little makeup, but here the makeup artists covered our faces in orange foundation," said the former Beatle. "It's popular in certain circles these days," Colbert picked up the baton: "Thanks, Paul McCartney."
Reaching an audience twice that of Jimmy Fallon and Jimmy Kimmel combined—the two had stepped aside so as not to detract from their friend and colleague—for his final week on the air, Colbert left the open controversies against the tycoon to his high-profile guests—from Jon Stewart to Robert De Niro, from Steven Spielberg to Bruce Springsteen. "One of these vortices opened up on my show last year, but it disappeared after three days," said Kimmel, who was briefly suspended from ABC under pressure from Trump for a misunderstood joke about the assassination of conservative activist Charlie Kirk.
