The Late Show with Stephen Colbert (2015-????)

CBS is rolling out all the platforms for the show today, including this video:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rFtam2eAkfo

The continued bits of shaven beard falling on the hot dog is grossing me out, but that's probably intended.
Sort of a weird tone about the whole thing, though. If this show ends up completely low-key and strange like Craig Ferguson's show was, I'll love it!

Also, some podcasts.

lol

https://www.yahoo.com/tv/stephen-colbert-late-show-video-david-letterman-120634160835.html

d'oh sorry

tone is v Strangers w Candy so = YES

this is going to suck

My hopes and dreams of They Might Be Giants as The Late Show house band are dead. Jon Batiste is cool, though.

http://time.com/3907726/jon-batiste-bandleader-stephen-colbert/

huh. something about him has always bugged me, but i look forward to seeing lots of New Orleans musicians on, hopefully.

https://twitter.com/kylebuchanan/status/606538376242528256

And Conan's bandleader is Italian and Kimmel's is Latino.

The last new host younger than Letterman/Conan to have a white bandleader was Carson Daly—that was Joe Firstman—and he was HORRIBLE. I'm all for affirmative action in late night band hiring, because we've seen the alternative and the alternative is not good.

Oh wait, I completely forgot about Seth Meyers and his band of 90s indie rock burnouts (+ Marnie Stern) who play the limpest rejoinder music on tv.

Fred Armisen is all races

you misspelled RAPISTS

i can def. imagine someone in HR hiring fred armisen and then joyously ticking off every box on the "diversity in the workplace" survey.

http://morningafter.gawker.com/stephen-colbert-paints-his-nails-talks-to-eminem-on-pu-1715231700

8^O

The colbert public access thing was good, esp liked the news item on the local yelp beef

I would rather watch him interview local nobodies instead of celebrities.

It could have taken a mean turn but he did a good job keeping the show human and giving the guests space to have fun with the thing too. He seems like a pretty generous-spirited guy.

http://www.gq.com/story/stephen-colbert-gq-cover-story

why do writers exist

We were talking about the logistics involved in pulling off something like this, and how great it felt for him to be improvising in front of a camera again, and the curious tensions that popped up in his interview with Eminem. And then we got onto the subject of discomfort and disorientation, and the urge he has to seek out those feelings, and from there it was a quick jump to the nature of suffering. Before long we were sitting there with a plate of roast chicken and several bottles of Cholula on the table between us, both of us rubbing tears from our eyes.

Ten years ago, the country was palpably more afraid and angry.

haha waht

that's probably true

In 2005 9/11 was a much fresher and more frightening memory and the ongoing catastrophe that was the Iraq war gave plenty of cause for anger.

it SHOULD be fucking terrified right now

That's a hard way to live, morbs. There are too many terrors to take them all into account all the time, and most people are grateful to have a few days of respite from them, even if it is by turning a blind eye.

why do writers exist

whatever, it's a good article

fluffy

kinda weird to watch his first show because usually first shows (and first weeks and months) kinda suck for late night guys, but i've been watching colbert for so long that it's tough to give him the new guy break. show had it's moments, good and bad.

lol at jeb! but that was gonna be lol no matter what

ITS

his logo looks like the 700 club or something

Seems like it's about half Colbert Report and half typical network late night show. Works for me.

forgot it was tonight

the non colbert report parts were pretty awk though it feels like he had a lot of meetings with very panicky cbs execs who don't know how to function in this strange jimmy fallon world

i know it'll get better but yeesh

turned it off during jeb that was tough to watch

Eh, I thought he handled the parts of the show that he's not been doing for the last 9 years already pretty well. Clooney's not traditionally a great talk show guest (he seems like one on paper, but in reality he's kind of a stiff). Jeb! Bush was as disengaged and awkward as I'd expected he would be, so no surprise there. Stephen may handle the interview segments better when he has guests that better fit what he's going for.

i generally detest Clooney's personality, but he had a fine moment on Letterman once. "...We're doing Ocean's 12.... (big grin) Because Solaris bombed."

I liked the bit where he paid tribute to "the man who has owned that stage for the last 22 years...I'm talking about Biff Henderson".

I remember during that awesome last Tom Waits performance hoping the moment wasn't ruined for Dave because he was handcuffed to George Clooney

It was a good show. The Trump and Jeb bits could've run as is on the Report. I don't get people who immediately write him off because he's on a network now, or act like network comedy is somehow always inherently inferior to cable. I'm seeing that on Twitter about Colbert's show and it's just kind of silly.

Yeah, I mean he's at 11:30 on a broadcast network and going against The Tonight Show and Jimmy Kimmel. CBS isn't going to allow him to go full Colbert with the position he's in. Should they? Yes. But they aren't going to.

I really hope the first half of the show is spent at the desk every night Report-style. If that sticks, the rest is gravy.

If there's one thing I think they should be OK dropping, it's the standing bit at the start.

Unless he continues to spot his turns like that.

Caught the end of this, it was pretty entertaining. Fun music performance at the end. I like the 'new' character.

I did like Clooney's fake movie skits, it kind of felt like something Letterman would have done.

Since all of my reality seems to be on a 20 hour tape delay I'm just watching this now. I like that the band leader plays a melodica.

Hoo boy, second night was a little bit rougher.

Kendrick fucking slayed it though!

Yes and yes.

I just watched Kendrick's performance and holy shit

the sketchy CBS stream i was using blew up just before he came on so i missed it.

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/05/02/business/media/letting-stephen-colbert-be-stephen-colbert-whoever-that-is.html

looks like a new showrunner has been brought in. i haven't watched since the first week or two (thought i'd give him a year or so to figure things out) - has anyone else?

I've been watching semi-regularly. It's alright! Not much chemistry with the bandleader/band, who doesn't seem like he has any banter skills at all. Shame.

CBS is like some convenience store bathroom you need to ask for a key to get into, but the cashier is fighting with his girlfriend on the phone so you just decide to use a bush outside (Hulu)

Reading that article, I keep hearing Garry Marshall as Sumner Redstone.

Not much chemistry with the bandleader/band

I don't know who decided on Baptiste and Stay Human, but yeah, weird fit for the show and even the moments where they almost achieve an amusing anti-chemistry don't quite make it. I like the show overall but it's so mediocre compared to the Report, part of which is just a function of format and time slot, obviously.

I thought he decided on them, didn't he? In the podcast he said that the way Stay Human interacted with the Report audience made Colbert think they would be a good fit for the show. I feel like Colbert has overestimated the extent to which the live experience bleeds through to the audience at home. Any time I watch it, I feel like I'm missing a great blues gig that keeps being interrupted by dull chat.

the band def. seem to exist in a different show altogether. there are these awkward moments in the would-be "repartee" with batiste where you realize they don't know each other at all. they don't have enough camraderie to even engage in the sort of gentle ribbing/roasting that seems an essential part of the dynamic for a contemporary talk show host/bandleader.

i mean, i don't actually expect coworkers to be best friends, but at least jimmy fallon and questlove at least give the impression that they know and like each other enough to needle each other in a mildly entertaining way.

the show i wonder about how is seth meyers'. does that show have /any/ fan base? does anyone watch it?

I watch it. It's good. They basically reset him to where he's doing a Weekend Update type opening, he has a few good bits.

Yeah, the few times I've watched Seth's show since they put him back behind the desk for most of the opening half of the show (WU style), it's been a lot better than it was when it began. I still don't think he actually enjoys music in any way, though, and his band full of 90s indie rock pensioners plays the limpest, most polite music in late night.

Every once in a while I catch Kimmel's show and, while it's cool that his bandleader is also his childhood BFF, they don't act any more familiar with each other than Fallon and Quest typically do.

I've been watching more Conan recently than I have in quite a while, mostly because I'm still not that into Trevor Noah, and Conan is still basically the Conan of 8-10 years ago when the clock was winding down on Late Night—except now it's more sad than comically awkward, there's way less interplay with the band (which was always one of my favorite parts of his old Late Night show).

I think Conan's gotten better lately, marginally. There's been some dark/weird shit that kind of reminds me of his heyday; he should realize he's probably not going to lose his audience and just do whatever bizarre bits he wants to.

I still don't think he actually enjoys music in any way, though, and his band full of 90s indie rock pensioners plays the limpest, most polite music in late night.

I totally agree on both accounts! I kind of wish they had a cool booker who would just throw some interesting new bands on (because Seth doesn't care anyway), but it's clearly not a priority. The guest musicians are clearly just an attempt to do the sitting-in thing Fallon does while distracting from Armisen's absence.

can someone tell stephen colbert aussie isn't pronounced awsee

I don't think anyone here knows him.

what's the point of this thread then

The jazz lessons made me laugh.

Colbert's response to Orlando seemed, of all the major talk show hosts, the most scripted, forced, insincere and just... weird. I'm out on this guy.

So do all of these recent Daily Show/Colbert Report tie-ins represent a course correction?

so that Trump-Putin-cock-holster joke by S.C.... standard 'obscene' thing the FCC has a history of investigating, that's just a fact.

(also unfunny and homophobic, but that's allowed)

God deliver us from Dems shouting 'fire' at bullshit while Trumpism runs rampant.

It doesn't scan homophobic to me. If he'd said Trump's mouth was the cock holster for all kinds of dicks, sure, but this was very specifically about Vlad. Context matters.

I don't want to dismiss a homophobic read out of hand, but I've also been somewhat dubious about that claim. The pejorative end of that joke's stick is everything COMING OUT of Trump's mouth.

not gonna do a 1990-vintage argument, jf, but that is soooome bullshit

it's homophobic but mostly it's just not funny

colbert report was good but i have zero interest in his late show. anything is preferable to jimmy fallon though

when all concerned are getting outclassed by kimmel it's time to reconsider the entire concept

Not funny, not homophobic, but forgettable. Nail Trump, as he is, in 4 words or less and you've won immortality on the cheap.

If homos buy into this tempest, they get what's coming to them.

And it is coming to them.

Colbert (and Stewart, for that matter) left their posts at respective peaks but way too early. At least Stewart basically pulled a Letterman, but Colbert immediately shifted into an inferior role hampered by a calcified format. Kimmel seems most comfortable in this role. Fallon found a way to bring it down to his level. But Colbert, it sort of feels like Conan - a gifted guy cast by fate/greed/bad timing into purgatory. It doesn't help that Colbert really romanticizes the more traditional/stodgy aspects of late night TV, but his strengths lie in being more subversive.

i just watch the trump-era monologues and they are totally worth watching. i never see anything else. though i do get really tired of his bandleader's yukking it up during the monologue. cock holster didn't bug me but forced laughter by black bandleader in 2017 does kinda bug me. reminds me of how bad i used to feel for kevin eubanks.

^^ yeah cosign all of that. idk if his show is as good as Kimmel's but the monologues and certain interviews are alright. I do wonder how his old character would have translated into the Trump era, if that would've worked or if it's one of those things that's just beyond parody.

It would have worked because Trump would have totally believed he was real.

last night's episode, which brought back a bunch of ex-Daily Show people, was pretty nice

i noticed they only invited people with a certain.... pigment

Stephen left TDS in 2005. Aasif was the first person of color to be a correspondent and he didn't arrive until 2006, plus he's in Los Angeles now (and, according to his recent appearance on WTF, elbows deep in a project).

Trevor Noah appeared (briefly)

they probably sent invites to everyone he worked with, I imagine?

It would've been funny if only, like, Mo Rocca, Rachael Harris, and Vance Degeneres showed up.

Vance! He was really good. I think.

is it weird that mo rocca is one of the first people i think of when i think of 2004 election era TDS (when the show was most relevant)

i can't actually remember anyone other than him and stewart/colbert/carrell

You tend to not forget about guys named "Mo Rocca"

I had no idea John Oliver was around back then. I thought he came on way later.

apparently mo rocca wasn't even on the show by 2004

(i mean he left in 2003, not that he started after 2004)

he fit in pretty seamlessly with everyone else from that era who went on to have as much success as is possible in comedy, i wonder if he's sad

you know I might've had Mo Rocca and young John Oliver confused

pretty much everyone on the Daily Show kinda fit the same mold back then, didn't they?

I had no idea John Oliver was around back then. I thought he came on way later.

He wasn't. He was playing the part of "Steve Carell" last night.

he fit in pretty seamlessly with everyone else from that era who went on to have as much success as is possible in comedy, i wonder if he's sad

he got a gig as a CBS correspondent and had a kid's show on Saturday mornings, so I think he's fine

Oliver apparently joined in 2006 - I thought he was like...2011

he looked about 14 in the clip they showed

gotta say I did love Stewart's "why did age hit me harder than any of you?" quip

Death to America. pic.twitter.com/StY5SgZ3ru

— Malcolm Harris (@BigMeanInternet) September 18, 2017

may we celebrate Indictmas henceforth every halloween eve :)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NbXO52kWT9g

Jimmy Carter rules

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tQR5G3kvfNQ

returned to a live audience last night. man, his shtick works so much better in front of a crowd.

It's going to be such a shock when John Oliver is once again getting consistently interrupted with whoops and hollers.