'The Hustler' Season 2: Why Craig Ferguson stopped hosting 'The Late Late Show'
Craig Ferguson is back to host the next season of ABC's mind-bending and enigmatic game show 'The Hustler', which breaks the game show mold by featuring one player who secretly already knows the answers. The second season of the show premieres on June 17 at 10 pm on ABC. Fans of the Emmy Award winning Scottish actor and comedian will be happy to see him back on screen, especially considering Ferguson now calls Glasgow home. The actor seems to have some hustling on his hands as well, as he has reportedly slashed the price on his Hollywood mansion for the fourth time in a row, in a bid to find a seller after moving back to Scotland. While the house was initially put on the market for $6.7 million, the asking price has now been slashed to $4.7 million. Ferguson’s stateside main residence was sold in an off-market deal for $3.9 million. The new owners are fellow Hollywood veterans, actor Chris Diamantopoulos (Brian on “The Office”) and his longtime wife, actress Becki Newton ("How I Met Your Mother”).
Despite basing his career in the US for 25 years, where he presented CBS’s 'The Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson' which earned him a Primetime Emmy nomination and the 2009 Peabody Award for Excellence in Broadcasting for his interview with Archbishop Desmond Tutu, Ferguson who became an American citizen in 2008, made the decision to move back to Scotland in 2019. The actor and host was clearly getting rather bored with his hosting position on 'The Late Late Show', which James Corden took over in 2014 saying, "Ten years is a very long time in one job -- for me. I wanted to leave the show before I stopped enjoying it. That was my goal. I didn’t want it to be a chore". But boredom perhaps isn't the only reason, Ferguson has continued to stay away from the late night comedy landscape.
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In an interview to 'The Guardian' in 2019, the actor said that the Trump Era radically changed the landscape of late night comedy in the US, a landscape he wasn't sure he would fit into. In the interview he said, “I don’t know how I would be now, because to be non-political would be seen as political. If I’m honest, what really happened with me and Late Night was that I was having a great time but I got bored and I was ready to go.” While obviously there have been significant political developments post this, it seems that Ferguson for the moment at least seems to be keen to continue keeping Glasgow as a base. Ferguson's younger son goes to school in Glasgow and the actor has said that he likes the fact that he is hardly recognized in his home country. As for his sprawling Hollywood mansion, it seems like anyone who is in the mood to hustle for a bargain on Ferguson's mansion could stand a chance, provided they have around.
Catch the trailer of Season 2 of 'The Hustler' below.