Conan O’Brien had some enjoyable throughout a cease by “The Late Show With Stephen Colbert” on Monday.
“Stephen, how’s late night? What’s going on?” the previous late night time discuss present host mentioned, feigning ignorance about Colbert’s looming cancellation and Jimmy Kimmel getting pulled off the air final month.
“I’ve been out of it for a little bit,” he quipped, asking Colbert to “Catch me up on what’s happening!”
CBS Photograph Archive through Getty Photos
Colbert, whose present is ready to finish in Could, retorted again, “I’ll send you the obituary.”
O’Brien stored up his bit, recounting a particular reminiscence with the entire different hosts.
“I remember just as I was leaving my late night show, I took you and all the other late night hosts out,” he mentioned. “Do you remember this? I took you to a wonderful Sizzler restaurant, and we all had our trays and I told you guys — remember what I told you? I said, ‘Take care of late night. If you take care of late night, late night will take care of you.’ Remember?”
“I said, ‘Don’t do anything to ruffle any feathers.’ Remember? I said that,” O’Brien defined. “And I said, ‘Whatever you do, don’t speak truth to power.’ I said, ‘Cowardice is the way.’”
“In 28 years of my show, I never read the news,” he continued.
The brand new model of the late night time wars began in July, when CBS unceremoniously introduced that it was ending Colbert’s “Late Show” ― for good ― in Could 2026.
The community insisted the transfer was “purely a financial decision” however many suspected it was politically motivated as a result of the announcement got here days after Colbert made a joke ripping CBS dad or mum firm Paramount’s $16 million settlement with President Donald Trump because it sought permission to merge with Skydance.
O’Brien responded to Colbert’s cancellation on the time with an ominous warning about the way forward for late night time TV.
“Late night television, as we have known it since around 1950, is going to disappear,” the previous “Saturday Night Live” author mentioned throughout his induction speech on the Tv Academy Corridor of Fame ceremony in August.
“But those voices are not going anywhere. People like Stephen Colbert are too talented ― and too essential ― to go away. It’s not going to happen,” he added.
Two months later, Jimmy Kimmel was pulled from the air for six days for feedback he made associated to the suspect in Charlie Kirk’s killing.
When Kimmel’s present returned final week, he referred to as out the scary efforts to curb free speech.
“Our freedom to speak is what they admire most about this country,” the late night time present host mentioned in his first present again. “And that’s something I’m embarrassed to say I took for granted until they pulled my friend Stephen off the air and tried to coerce the affiliates who run our show in the cities that you live in to take my show off the air.
“That’s not legal, that’s not American,” he said. “That is un-American. And it’s so dangerous.”
