• by Adam Buckman , Featured Columnist, Yesterday

A new late-night show premiering Thursday is billed as the first-ever late-night show developed and designed specifically for YouTube.

The show, titled “Good Night with Ben Gleib,” originates from the Los Angeles home of Gleib, 47, a comedian who has a long resumé of cable comedy specials, movie and TV appearances, podcast interviews and show hosting (“Idiotest” on Game Show Network, 2014-17).

Gleib reportedly plans to produce 42 episodes of “Good Night” and 42 episodes of a companion “after-show” at an estimated cost of $1.5 million, Deadline.com reported.

The show starts running on YouTube on Thursday (May 28) at 10 p.m. Eastern. Plans call for one episode to be released every Thursday.

In a promotional video on YouTube, Gleib positions the show in the context of the changes roiling late-night on network TV.

“Now is the perfect time,” Gleib says. “This is when late-night is under threat. This is when late-night is being canceled. People are talking … is it the end of late night?”

He feels that as a platform, YouTube frees his show from the turbulence that can arise from corporate ownership, especially now. 

“The genre means so much to me. I love the format of it and I don’t think it should die. The natural progression is for it to move to YouTube,” Gleib says.

“This is the time to have an independently owned [show], not [one owned] by corporate multinational conglomerates that control narratives and have agendas,” he says. 

“It’s literally just a show about comedy … a mainstream show that is not overtly political to one side,” Gleib says.

The show will be financed at least in part through Creative Visions, a nonprofit based in Malibu, California.

The organization’s website, creativevisions.org, says it was founded in 1998 “to support creative activists who are using their creativity for good.”

Creative Visions is soliciting donations to support the show. “We can improve people’s lives by exposing them to life-changing ideas through comedy,” the organization says.

In its description of the show, Creative Visions imbues “Good Night with Ben Gleib” with ideals and goals that are loftier than the way Gleib describes the show.

“I want this to be a place we can all gather, feel good, laugh and just unwind,” Gleib says on the promotional video.

Creative Visions, on the other hand, positions Gleib’s comedy show as one that can “enrich the lives of people around the globe,” which seems like a lot to expect from a digital comedy show.

“Join us in creating the first late-night talk show for the internet, evolving the genre to not just feature celebrities, but also the thought leaders, change makers and innovators with the solutions to the problems we all face,” Creative Visions says.

“Through this show we can enrich the lives of people around the globe, by exposing the masses for the first time to these life-changing and planet-saving ideas,” the organization says.

In his promotional video, Gleib says nothing about saving the planet or changing lives around the globe. 

In a promotional clip also seen on YouTube, the comedian is seen interviewing a sex therapist who counsels him on how to persuade a partner to participate in a threesome.

As for “the masses” referenced by Creative Visions, what do they have to lose by taking a few minutes to sample “Good Night with Ben Gleib”? Nothing but their chains, said Marx and Engels.