#nielsen data

It had been widely reported that The Late Show was costing CBS millions, but that had never been confirmed until Friday, when the network issued a statement praising Colbert’s successor, Byron Allen‘s Comics Unleashed. “We’re proud to partner with Byron Allen on a new business and programming model for late night that proactively addresses a network daypart that was cost-prohibitive to continue,” CBS said in the statement published by Deadline and The Daily Beast. “With this ‘time buy’ model, we have shifted an hour that was losing roughly $40 million annually to $15 million in profit — a $55 million swing.” Instead of producing Comics Unleashed, Allen is buying the hour from CBS for a flat fee of $15 million a year. He will get to keep the ad revenue he generates, while CBS saves on production costs for the now-defunct Late Show. Television ratings for Comics Unleashed will be of no concern to CBS. Kimmel called cancellation ‘nonsensical’ As reports swirled over rumours that CBS was losing $40 million a year to produce The Late Show, Colbert’s fellow late-night hosts ran to his defence.

“There’s just not a snowball’s chance in hell that that’s anywhere near accurate,” Jimmy Kimmel told Variety last summer when he was asked to comment on CBS’s reported loss at the time. “The idea that Stephen Colbert’s show was losing $40 million a year is beyond nonsensical.”Tonight Show host Jimmy Fallon said he was “shocked” by the news and called Colbert “a true friend” in a post shared on Instagram. David Letterman, who hosted The Late Show from 1993 to 2015 before Colbert took over, addressed the production’s end in an interview with The Barbara Gaines Show last month.“ They don’t want to spend any money, so they’re going to make money,” Letterman said, according to Variety.

“They have never been losing money … This is pure cowardice,” Letterman told Gaines last year.