When CBS tapped Stephen Colbert to take over “The Late Show” in 2015, it seemed like the perfect fit. Who better to take on the ridiculousness of election season than a man who built his career on a character that parodied conservative politics with such finesse?
But over the course of its first year, “The Late Show” faltered where its sister series “The Late Late Show with James Corden” thrived. Colbert’s nightly broadcast failed to produce viral moments like Corden’s juggernaut recurring segment “Carpool Karaoke,” instead maintaining the status quo of late-night hosts before him. Corden’s dark horse-like ascension left many to wonder whether the Brit would take over Colbert’s prime-time slot, shuffling the comedian into the background.
Corden, of course, has heard these rumors and previously stated that no such thing will occur under his watch. And Colbert is listening. In a recent profile with The Hollywood Reporter, Colbert addressed how the time-slot buzz has affected him personally.
“The implication of that question is that the show isn’t good enough in its present position,” he responded to an inquiry about the Corden rumors. “So of course that makes you feel bad. But it doesn’t jibe with what I know about our show, so you recover.”
The 52-year-old comedian went on to liken his transition from Comedy Central to CBS as “going from a go-kart to NASCAR in terms of the speed at which everything had to happen.” The profile also notes that Colbert refused to hire a showrunner in the beginning months, sending him to the brink of exhaustion by micromanaging details and decisions other hosts have little time for.
But eventually Colbert began to adapt to his new environment, hiring showrunner Chris Licht in the spring and listening to criticism when it was constructive.
“I’m a human being. Yeah, I care,” Colbert admitted. “If there’s something informative, if there’s some criticism that would be helpful, I’m happy to listen to it. But you know, you are the show, and so you can’t not take it personally. And the only difficult thing really is I like what we do, and so I don’t entirely know how to feel about negative criticism.”
“Hopefully you are having fun while you’re creating the show, and then your job that night is to share with the audience,” he added. “But sometimes, as Reagan said, it’s like crap in a pineapple, and you have to go out there and find the fun in the moment.”
And on that note, let’s hope the future of “The Late Show” is more “pineapple” than “crap.”
Head over to The Hollywood Reporter to read the rest of Colbert’s interview.
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