{"id":77365,"date":"2025-07-20T06:46:10","date_gmt":"2025-07-20T06:46:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/77365\/"},"modified":"2025-07-20T06:46:10","modified_gmt":"2025-07-20T06:46:10","slug":"while-trump-celebrates-the-demise-of-stephen-colberts-show-the-economics-of-late-night-tv-are-crumbling","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/77365\/","title":{"rendered":"While Trump celebrates the demise of Stephen Colbert’s show, the economics of late-night TV are crumbling"},"content":{"rendered":"

CBS says its\u00a0decision to end Stephen Colbert\u2019s late-night comedy show<\/a>\u00a0is financial, not political. Yet even with the ample skepticism about that explanation, there\u2019s no denying the economics were not working in Colbert\u2019s favor.<\/p>\n

The network\u2019s bombshell announcement late Thursday that the \u201cLate Show\u201d will end next May takes away President Donald Trump\u2019s most prominent TV critic and the most popular entertainment program in its genre.<\/p>\n

The television industry\u2019s declining economic health means similar hard calls are already being made with personalities and programming, with others to be faced in the future. For the late-night genre, there are unique factors to consider.<\/p>\n

As recently as 2018, broadcast networks took in an estimated $439 million in advertising revenue for its late-night programs, according to the advertising firm Guidelines. Last year, that number dwindled to $220 million.<\/p>\n

Once a draw for young men, now they\u2019ve turned away<\/p>\n

Late-night TV was a particular draw for young men, considered the hardest-to-get and most valuable demographic for advertisers. Increasingly, these viewers are turning to streaming services, either to watch something else entirely or catch highlights of the late-night shows, which are more difficult for the networks to monetize.<\/p>\n

More broadly, the much-predicted takeover of viewers by streaming services is coming to pass. The Nielsen company reported that\u00a0during the last two months<\/a>, for the first time ever, more people consumed programming on services like YouTube<\/a> and Netflix<\/a> than on ABC, CBS and NBC or any cable network.<\/p>\n

Networks and streamers spent roughly $70 billion on entertainment shows and $30 billion for sports rights last year, said Brian Wieser, CEO of Madison & Wall, an advertising consultant and data services firm. Live sports is the most dependable magnet for viewers and costs for its rights are expected to increase 8% a year over the next decade. With television viewership declining in general, it\u2019s clear where savings will have to come from.<\/p>\n

Wieser said he does not know whether Colbert\u2019s show is profitable or not for CBS and parent company Paramount Global<\/a>, but he knows the direction in which it is headed. \u201cThe economics of television are weak,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

In a statement announcing the cancellation, George Cheeks, Paramount Global\u2019s president and chief executive officer, said that \u201cThis is purely a financial decision against a challenging backdrop in late night. It is not related in any way to the show\u2019s performance, content or other matters happening at Paramount.\u201d<\/p>\n

Cheeks\u2019 problem is that not everyone believes him.<\/p>\n

Colbert is a relentless critic of Trump, and earlier this week\u00a0pointedly criticized<\/a>\u00a0Paramount\u2019s\u00a0decision to settle<\/a>\u00a0Trump\u2019s lawsuit against CBS over a \u201c60 Minutes\u201d interview with Kamala Harris. He called Paramount\u2019s $16 million payment to Trump a \u201cbig fat bribe,\u201d since the company is seeking the administration\u2019s approval of its merger with Skydance Media.<\/p>\n

On Friday, the Writers Guild<\/a> of America called for an investigation by New York\u2019s attorney general into whether Colbert\u2019s cancellation is itself a bribe, \u201csacrificing free speech to curry favor with the Trump administration as the company looks for merger approval.\u201d<\/p>\n

CBS\u2019 decision made this a pivotal week for the future of television and radio programming. Congress\u00a0stripped federal funding<\/a>\u00a0for PBS and NPR, threatening the future of shows on those outlets.<\/p>\n

Journey Gunderson, executive director of the National Comedy Center, called the decision to end Colbert\u2019s show the end of an era.<\/p>\n

\u201cLate-night television has historically been one of comedy\u2019s most audience-accessible platforms \u2014 a place where commentary meets community, night after night,\u201d Gunderson said. \u201cThis isn\u2019t just the end of a show. It\u2019s the quiet removal of one of the few remaining platforms for daily comedic commentary.<\/p>\n

Trump celebrates Colbert\u2019s demise<\/p>\n

Trump, who has called in the past for CBS to terminate Colbert\u2019s contract, celebrated the show\u2019s upcoming demise. \u201cI absolutely love that Colbert got fired,\u201d the president wrote on Truth Social. \u201cHis talent was even less than his ratings.\u201d<\/p>\n

Some experts questioned whether CBS could have explored other ways to save money on Colbert. NBC, for example, has cut costs by eliminating the band on Seth Meyers\u2019 late-night show and curtailing Jimmy Fallon\u2019s \u201cTonight\u201d show to four nights a week.<\/p>\n

Could CBS have saved more money by cutting off the show immediately, instead of letting it run until next May, which sets up an awkward \u201clame duck\u201d period? Then again, Colbert will keep working until his contract runs out; CBS would have had to keep paying him anyway.<\/p>\n

CBS recently cancelled the \u201cAfter Midnight\u201d show that ran after Colbert. But the network had signaled earlier this year that it was prepared to continue that show until host Taylor Tomlinson decided that she wanted to leave, noted Bill Carter, author of \u201cThe Late Shift.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIt is a very sad day for CBS that they are getting out of the late-night race,\u201d Andy Cohen, host of Bravo\u2019s \u201cWatch What Happens Live,\u201d told The Associated Press. \u201cI mean, they are turning off the lights after the news.\u201d<\/p>\n

Colbert, if he wanted to continue past next May, would likely be able to find a streaming service willing to pay him, Wieser said. But the future of late-night comedy on the entertainment networks is genuinely at risk. Trump, in fact, may outlast his fiercest comic critics. Jon Stewart, once a weeknight fixture, works one night a week at \u201cThe Daily Show\u201d for Paramount\u2019s Comedy Central, a network that seldom produces much original programming any more.<\/p>\n

ABC\u2019s Jimmy Kimmel, who was chided on social media by Trump on Friday \u2014 \u201cI hear Jimmy Kimmel is next\u201d \u2014 has a contract that also runs out next year. Kimmel, 57, openly wondered in a Variety interview before signing his latest three-year contract extension how long he wanted to do it. He\u2019s hosted his show since 2003.<\/p>\n

\u201cI have moments where I go, I cannot do this anymore,\u201d Kimmel told Variety in 2022. \u201cAnd I have moments where I go, what am I gonna do with my life if I\u2019m not doing this anymore?\u2019 It\u2019s a very complicated thing \u2026 I\u2019m not going to do this forever.\u201d<\/p>\n

Colbert, Kimmel and Stewart were all nominated for Emmy awards this week.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"CBS says its\u00a0decision to end Stephen Colbert\u2019s late-night comedy show\u00a0is financial, not political. Yet even with the ample…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":77366,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[171,398,6584,173,67,132,68],"class_list":{"0":"post-77365","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-entertainment","8":"tag-entertainment","9":"tag-media","10":"tag-streaming","11":"tag-tv","12":"tag-united-states","13":"tag-unitedstates","14":"tag-us"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/114884220281734037","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/77365","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=77365"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/77365\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/77366"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=77365"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=77365"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=77365"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}