Jimmy Kimmel and Stephen Colbert have swapped late night war stories, with the latter giving his first interview since news of the Late Show's cancellation broke in July.
Revealing that he found out about his show's cancellation a mere day before its Emmy nomination, Colbert told Kimmel that their mutual manager James "Baby Doll" Dixon broke the news after requesting a 15-minute meeting. Considering that supposed five-minute meetings with Dixon apparently take an hour, this unusual request alerted Colbert that something strange was going on.
"I come home two and a half hours later," Colbert recounted. "And I walk into the apartment and [Colbert's wife] Evie goes, 'What happened? You get cancelled?'"
Colbert then explained how he told his crew, having initially debated whether to keep the Late Show's cancellation a secret so they could enjoy the summer break. He ultimately held off just until after they'd filmed the next day, so that his staff would be informed but wouldn't have to film the show while still digesting the news. Colbert's public announcement of the cancellation was recorded immediately after, the host having told the audience not to leave.
"I was so nervous about doing it right — because there was nothing in the prompter, I was just speaking off the cuff — that I fucked up twice and I had to restart," said Colbert. "And the audience thought it was a bit. And they started going, 'You can do it! Come on, Steve! You can do it!' Because I always messed up on the sentence that told them what was happening. And then I got to the sentence that actually told them what was happening and uh, they didn't laugh."
Kimmel shared that he was actually at a No Kings protest when he learned of Colbert's cancellation, and that he was "absolutely shocked because it's not right."
"I mean, it's their ball and they can take it home if they want," said Colbert.
"They don't have any balls, Stephen," said Kimmel. "Let's be honest."
The two late night hosts subsequently discussed Kimmel's more recent suspension, with Colbert showing a clip of the moment he found out the news while filming the Late Show.
"The first people I texted when I got the news that we were pulled off the air, I came into my office and I told some people, and then I texted you and Jimmy [Fallon] and Seth [Meyers] and the two Johns [Oliver and Jon Stewart] to let you know what had happened," said Kimmel, listing off his fellow late night talk show hosts.
"A bit of collateral damage I think from that whole scenario was it happened to be Jimmy Fallon's birthday the next day.... But you on that day sent a text to the group wishing Jimmy a happy birthday, and you wrote, 'Fallon, I think it's really selfish of you to have a birthday right now given how divided this country is. If anyone deserves a birthday it's Kimmel. But you just do whatever makes you happy, I guess.'"
Topics Jimmy Kimmel Live Stephen Colbert
