Commentary

James Corden's Exit Likely Marks End Of 'Late Late Show' On CBS

When James Corden ends his eight-year run this week as host of “The Late Late Show” on CBS, the show goes with him.

Corden, 44, is the fourth and now last host of the show the began 28 years ago in January 1995 as an interview show hosted by Tom Snyder.

After Corden says good-bye on Thursday, “The Late Late Show” will close down -- reportedly to be replaced sometime in the foreseeable future by “@midnight,” a late-night game show revived from a version that aired on Comedy Central from 2013 to 2017.

The original “@midnight” was a half-hour show. Whether or not it will expand to an hour to replace “The Late Late Show” has not yet been reported.

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Whatever its length, Stephen Colbert will reportedly be its executive producer. Comedy Central and CBS are both owned by Paramount Global. 

It has been 30 years since CBS launched David Letterman’s “Late Show” and in the process, became a viable competitor in late-night entertainment television for the first time.

“Late Late Show With Tom Snyder” (without a “The”) was launched just two years later, thus rounding out and completing CBS’s entry into the late-night wars. The show was subsequently hosted by Craig Kilborn, Craig Ferguson and then Corden starting in March 2015.

Replacing “The Late Late Show” with a game show would seem to represent a retreat from late-night -- or at least the kind of late-night show that was, and still is, traditional in late-night’s second hour of 12:37-1:37 a.m. (eastern).

Whatever the financial reasons (and financial considerations are always the reason), one can hardly blame James Corden, whose tenure as host of the “The Late Late Show” was marked by a high level of creativity.

He had no experience whatsoever as a TV talk show host when he was asked to host the show, but he had stage presence and entertainment ability, having won a Best Actor Tony in 2012 for the madcap play “One Man, Two Guvnors.”

His tenure on “The Late Late Show” became best-known for his “Carpool Karaoke” segments in which top recording artists sang with him while they rode in a car. Sometimes he drove, and sometimes they did.

Name a big singing star and he probably had them -- Barbra Streisand, Stevie Wonder, Lady Gaga, Celine Dion, Mariah Carey, and the list goes on and on.

One highlight was Paul McCartney. Another was Adele, whose “Carpool Karaoke” segment in 2016 has become the most-watched of all of them on YouTube -- more than 260 million views, according to CBS.

To mark his final evening on Thursday, Adele will be back for a second “Carpool Karaoke” performance. 

In addition to his final show in its regular late-night period that evening, CBS is giving Corden a prime-time send-off earlier in the evening from 10 p.m. to 11 p.m. (eastern) with a special featuring many of the most memorable “Carpool Karaoke” segments.

Harry Styles and Will Ferrell are announced as guests on the final James Corden “Late Late Show,” but other than that, little is known about the show.

Anyone familiar with the show in the Corden era can expect the kind of showmanship that was one of its hallmarks.

Among other attractive attributes, Corden seemed game for anything, even skydiving with Tom Cruise in one memorable show.

In an interview on “CBS Sunday Morning” this past weekend conducted by Ben Mankiewicz, Corden said his decision to leave the show was guided by family considerations -- mainly, moving with his wife and three children back to his native England.

At age 44, Corden is the youngest of the current group of network late-night hosts. Stephen Colbert is 58, Jimmy Kimmel is 55, Seth Meyers is 49 and Jimmy Fallon is 48.

Reruns of the Corden “Late Late Show” will fill the show’s time period starting next week, until (or if) “@midnight” arrives to take its place.


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