Stephen Colbert’s late-night peers joined his show on Monday to announce a surprise gift to both Colbert and his fans.
Jimmy Kimmel, Seth Meyers, John Oliver, and Jimmy Fallon were all interviewed by Colbert at the same time. They came to show their support for The Late Show with Stephen Colbert as it heads towards its final episode on May 21.
Colbert announced in July last year that CBS had canceled his show. CBS’s decision was immediately criticized by other late-night hosts, with Jimmy Kimmel telling the network, “F--- you and all your Sheldons” in a fiery Instagram post.
During their conversation on Monday, the five hosts reminisced on their popular, short-lived podcast Strike Force Five.
They had started the podcast during the 2023 writers’ strike. The program ended on Oct. 10, 2023, after only 12 episodes... or so it seemed.
“We’ll do another episode tonight after the show, right?” Kimmel announced.
Colbert confirmed to a cheering audience, “We’re going to do an emergency episode of Strike Force Five. That’s right."
The new episode of the podcast will be made available May 13, Deadline reports.
Kimmel explained to viewers how the podcast started:
“It is and always will be a group of five individuals who went on strike along with their writers, who were paying their writers, who then really, really wanted to stop paying their staff. And so they did a podcast that paid a tiny little portion of that,” Kimmel said.
The surprise 13th episode of their famous podcast was new, but the hosts’ five-man reunion had been revealed by Meyers a week earlier.
Meyers reportedly let slip that the Strike Force Five would reunite during a post-show Q&A segment last Wednesday.
Kimmel, Meyers, and Fallon all canceled their shows on Monday to make time for Colbert. The only other late-night show airing was The Daily Show with Jon Stewart.
Colbert jokingly explained Stewart’s exclusion, saying, “Now, the five of us being here right now, obviously it’s dangerous because we represent so much of late night. Jon Stewart is our designated survivor.”
Colbert joked further, “Someone has to survive for the president to be mad at. And do our eulogies.”
