Seth Meyers Is Mentally Preparing for 'Late Night' To Be Canceled

CBS pulling the plug on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert has sent shockwaves through the late-night industry, particularly as the real picture came into focus. What at first seemed like a politically motivated move actually came down to an equally scary but predictable reason: money. As Dustin expertly explained last week, advertising rates are in the toilet for every industry, and of course, Seth Meyers is smart enough to see the writing on the wall.

While appearing on the latest episode of Armchair Expert, which was filmed before CBS took Colbert out back, Meyers was clear-eyed about the future of the late-night industry. Namely, that it ain’t lookin great.

Via THR:

“There is this weird thing that I feel like I shifted from fearing that I wouldn’t be good enough. And now my fear is weirdly more outside of my control, which is … just at some point, the ecosystem might not support [late night].”

“I guess that’s better than thinking it’s your fault, but it is weird to not feel any control over it,” he added.

Again, this interview happened before the Colbert fiasco, and without that information, Meyers still readily admitted that he expected Late Night to be canceled at any minute. However, he’s not worried about his paycheck, it’s what the heck to do with himself. Fortunately, Meyers has already been noodling on a career pivot.

“I would worry about myself, like, mental health-wise,” Meyers said. “But I put a lot of thought into diversifying my skill set. Certainly, financially, I could have been fine just doing the show for the last eleven years. But then it was like, oh, you know what? I feel like there’s something to trying to build a stand-up career and trying to do other things.”

I thought all of this seemed familiar, and sure enough, Meyers actually released a stand-up special back in October 2024 on HBO Max. Clearly, he’s been sticking his finger in the wind way before the current late-night apocalypse.