TomOpus

Not saying she wouldn't move, but I think Ellen has a pretty sweet gig on daytime. She films several shows a day so that will free up some days instead of it being an every day thing. Plus I would imagine her pay is pretty nice too.

Mike86

I honestly don't think whoever they get has to be that edgy. I'm sure all CBS wants is a name big enough to draw audiences in and is somewhat well known. Fallon is pretty much safe humor similar to Leno only for a younger audience. Kimmel can be a bit more edgy but that's always kind of been his style. I think Ellen is less likely more for the fact that her daytime show is such a hit and it's probably a pretty sweet gig for her as someone else mentioned. The biggest thing against Ellen may be that she's a bit older so may be a bit out of what CBS is looking for. I do think that she'd bring in some decent ratings though as her daytime show does well enough so she clearly has a segment of the audience who enjoys her style.

AaronHernandez

The only people I would be happy to see take over

Louie CK
Amy Sedaris
Eric Andre
Hypnotoad
Joel McHale


People I would least like to see

Jay Leno
Jerry Seinfeld
Chris Rock
Whitney Cummings
Dane Cook
Dr Phil
Dave Coulier

Mike86

Yeah I like Seinfeld a lot but I don't think he'd be a good fit as a host. He even has said before that he wouldn't want to do it because he wouldn't be able to feign interest in celebrities making small talk.

Jimmy James

So just to be clear, you'd prefer to see Larry the Cable Guy (not listed) to Chris Rock?

If it's more embarrassing, put Gallagher or Carrot Top in the place of Larry the Cable Guy.

madcougar

Seinfeld also has more money than god. Can't imagine him being interested in ever working that hard again.

I've never seen Michael Strahan on the daytime talkshow, but the guy seems to keep moving up in the world. Haven't seen his name mentioned, but he'd certainly be someone very different than what's on the air now.

PhantomStranger

Ellen makes more money in daytime than she ever would at 11:35. Syndication money for daytime talk shows is vastly greater if you build a consistent audience.

No broadcast network is crazy enough to put someone in the slot that has never hosted a talk show before. The 11:30 hour is a huge moneymaker and you can't take wild risks with it.

mcnabb

The problem with Stewart and Colbert is they wear their liberal politics too much and won't be able to capture a mass audience. They all work fine on Comedy Central because they play to a niche audience (I have friends who love them and other friends absolutely hate them), and I don't think that is what CBS is looking for.

Chelsea Handler (who I like) would be too edgy for an 11:30 audience, as she would just turn off too many people to be accepted by the masses.

I think the main problem with late night TV is that there just isn't anything new that they haven't done before, along with the talent being inferior to Carson. The shows are all pretty much the same anymore, and I don't look forward to any particular show unless they have a big time guest I want to see.

Atleast with Leno and Letterman era, I could look forward to Leno's monologue, and Letterman's interviews of guests, as they were both good at that. Now I see Fallon, Kimmel, Ferguson, Meyers, and they are just a bunch of lightweights. Actually, Jimmy Kimmel probably does the best interview out of the current late night hosts, as he has some sarcasm he mixes in on the guests to make it somewhat interesting.

Brack

Leno paved the way for "lightweight." I couldn't have been happier when he finally retired (or is he going to be the Brett Favre of talk show hosts?). Couldn't stand the guy. His jokes were painfully stale.

Shannon Nutt

Tina Fey would be a fantastic choice, but I doubt she'd say yes. Not only would I imagine she wants to avoid the daily grind that would be involved with a late night show, but I can't imagine she'd want to be direct competition to both Fallon (who is a friend) and her old network, NBC, whom she's worked for for over 15 years (and with whom she doesn't have a grudge, like Letterman did).

dolphinboy

Fallon is like Leno for the younger generation, I guess. I know a lot of people don't even watch any of these shows, but I just don't get his appeal. His gags are almost always annoying and those games he plays with celebrities are bad enough, but the times I've forced myself to watch the entire segment, Fallon would try so hard to win it made me want to punch him in the face. I read a review of Fallon the night after Letterman made his announcement where the writer basically likened watching Fallon's show to watching an hour-long birthday party.

While I still love Dave, I know a lot of people think he lost his edge a long time ago. Still, one of the most appealing things about him was that he was anti-celebrity in a way. He expected and still expects the celebrity to show up and deliver the goods. He isn't going to constantly try to pry the fun out of them and when they just came on and sat there, he'd usually zing them and not care if they didn't come back again.

Sure, he doesn't do that stuff at 66/67, but he's a pretty "hip" guy for being that old. If you just look at the musical guests he's championed from Warren Zevon to the Foo Fighters, you can tell he's one cool guy.

I'm still caught up in the sadness of his departure, but while he takes his one year victory lap, I will try to enjoy every last minute of it. The speculation about who will replace him is kind of exciting, especially since it's likely going to be both Letterman and Ferguson both leaving and being replaced.

Tina Fey seems like a homerun, but I just can't any way that will or could happen. Ellen was, in fact, a bit more edgy before she went to daytime, but I think dancing Ellen is here to stay, so even if she got the perfect offer, I'm not sure if she wouldn't be just a female, older, gay version of Fallon. Making me wince every time she plays some silly game or kisses the butt of every guest or dances her way onto the stage at the beginning of the show.

Give or take a year or two, Stewart would be THE guy to do this if he'd had TDS success earlier and he was younger. But TDS is very important to Comedy Central and Moonves runs all of Viacom I think, so he's not even thinking of poaching Stewart and now I don't think Stewart would want to give up his voice regarding politics and the media. Colbert could do it and it would not only be huge for him, but everyone he works with now would basically be getting a promotion and all these hosts definitely seem to think a lot about how their decisions impact everyone they work so closely with. I'm just not sure I'm that excited about Colbert as I thought I would be.

And who'd have predicted Conan would end up as almost an afterthought? He seemed like everybody's new favorite and now, not so much. If he had the same kind of appeal that he had before the Tonight Show fiasco, he'd also be any easy pick. I don't see him getting his mojo back for some reason. Not even sure how that all happened because I didn't watch him very often when he seemed like everyone's favorite and could do no wrong.

The dream scenario would be rotating the entire cast of Parks and Rec to host in character.

Jimmy James

Comedy Central is a Viacom property. Doug Herzog is the guy in charge.

CBS is a CBS property. Moonves is the guy in charge.

Sumner Redstone heads up both corporations. They were one in the same until somebody decided they were best split up.

I would therefore predict that if CBS really wanted somebody, Comedy Central couldn't stop it BUT that if Sumner Redstone thought it was a terrible idea he could.

You know, getting Nick Offerman could really give us something different from the rest of late night, particularly he did play a slightly toned down Ron Swanson (which is kind of what I hear Offerman is).

mphtrilogy

wouldnt mind seeing conan get the gig, but i think thats a longshot..

i'd like to see:
conan
colbert
stewart
louis ck
bill burr
marc maron
tina

windom

It's official. Stephen Colbert will be replacing Dave.

Gizmo

Yawn.

That was really quick. Wasn't expecting anything for several months.

Thank god for no Handler.

Double_Oh_7

That was fast. It had to be in the works before Letterman's announcement.

Bandoman

I'm not sure how Colbert will work in a traditional talk show environment. His whole thing is his fake conservative persona. Is he going to abandon that?

PenguinJoe

I kind of wanted Jon Stewart or Chris Rock, but I'm okay with Colbert.

Patrick_N

Awesome.

It's been great fun watching him on the Colbert Report but I am very curious to see him host the Late Show as himself. Always liked Dave a lot and will be sad to see him go but it is about time.

slop101

I hope Colbert will just take his same subversive shtick and move it over to CBS (the worry is that they might water him down - though I doubt he'd take the spot if they did) - hopefully they'll let him curse (with beeps, obviously).

Rypro 525

Granted it was a no brainer but it was also announced that Colbert will retire the 'report' character & be himself on the Late Show

BDB

I will be bummed to lose the Colbert Report..

Adam Tyner

Updated thread title.

Cellar Door

Colbert should be great. A lot of the humor on The Colbert Report doesn't actually depend on his conservative Republican shtick--it's more about just pointing out how ridiculous politics can be.

He's a good interviewer, and he's witty and funny off-the-cuff. And he's probably smarter than the rest of the night time hosts combined.

mcnabb

Colbert does nothing for me as I won't even bother DVR'ing his show. Way to alienate half of the country with another outgoing liberal host. And CBS wonders why they've been losing to NBC in late night for the past 15 years.....