Stephen Colbert bids emotional farewell during final ‘Late Show’ monologue: 'Thanks for being here'
With a heavy heart, ‘The Late Show’ host Stephen Colbert presented his final monologue, addressing the viewers and thanking them for being by his side throughout his journey. As soon as Colbert took the stage for his final episode, he received a standing ovation. The 62-year-old longtime host of the show welcomed the audience, "Welcome, welcome one and all to the Late Show. I'm your host, Stephen Colbert. If you're just tuning in to the Late Show, you missed a lot. Tonight is our final broadcast from the Ed Sullivan Theater. We were lucky enough to be here for the last 11 years. Can't take this for granted." The host later added, “Now, I'll say to you what I've said to every audience for the last 11 years, and I've meant it every time. Have a good show. Thanks for being here. And let's do it, y'all.”
Thursday, May 21, 2026, marked the historical ending of ‘The Late Show With Stephen Colbert.’ The CBS show has been running for 33 years, and it originally featured David Letterman as the host. In 2015, Colbert took the reins, and the rest is history. During the course of the show, he bid the audience an emotional goodbye as he said, “This show, I want you to know, has been a joy for us to do for you. In fact, we call this show 'The Joy Machine' because to do this many shows, it has to be a machine.” He added, “But the thing is, if you choose to do it with joy, it doesn’t hurt as much when your fingers get caught in the gears.” The host further mentioned, “I cannot adequately explain to you what the people who work here have done for each other, and how much we mean to each other.” Last year in July, the show’s cancellation was announced, and CBS said the move was "purely a financial decision against a challenging backdrop in late night."
During the host's final monologue, he was interrupted by Bryan Cranston (from ‘Breaking Bad’), Paul Rudd (from ‘Ant-Man’), and Tim Meadows (from ‘Mean Girls’). The three arrived as the final guests of the show and received a warm welcome. The guest lineup and other details about the final show were kept secret, so the reveal left fans over the moon. While this is the host's last episode on the show, he's already gearing up for the future as he's set to co-write the script for the highly anticipated Peter Jackson movie 'The Lord of the Rings: Shadow of the Past.' The movie will serve as a follow-up to ‘The Hunt for Gollum’ and adapt a previously unfilmed storyline from ‘The Fellowship of the Ring.’
