Old School. Biblically Independent.
By Andrew Sanford | News | May 15, 2026
The Ed Sullivan Theater is a magical place that has been home to seismic events in entertainment history. I was lucky enough to see Paul McCartney play on the marquee over a decade ago, and it’s something that will live in my head forever. It was one of the many things that made me fall in love with New York. You could just walk outside, and if you could wait around for a little bit, you could see a member of one of the greatest bands in history play a quick set, or, in this case, you could see two talk-show hosts destroying things.
Stephen Colbert’s last show airs next week, and it’s finally starting to feel real. At its core, this was a decision made by the wealthy elite for what seemed to be purely political reasons (no matter how much they cry about the losses they claim to incur). And one of the most frustrating aspects of that is that it makes regular folks feel powerless. There’s a lot of that going around right now. It’s a big club and you ain’t in it, etc. So, in moments like this, it feels good to see a couple of folks break some s***.
David Letterman used to have a blast tossing things from the roof of the Ed Sullivan Theater, and I’m happy to say that that’s still the case. He took Colbert to the roof to toss a few of CBS’s chairs onto a big CBS logo, and it is incredibly satisfying to watch. The man is so freaking giddy the entire time. Whenever anything gets thrown from the roof, be it a chair, cake, or watermelon (and there are plenty of those), he’s hotting and hollering. It’s the absolute best.
It’s also fun to see Colbert get a little frustration out. The man is classy, so he hasn’t gone on TV every night and told the Ellison family to go make love to themselves (that’s the phrase, right, Charlize?) because that’s not how he rolls. It has been more of an emotional end, with the occasional wink and nod, while getting incredible guests and letting them tell stories and sing songs. He’s putting on good shows. Still, you can see the satisfaction on his face when he’s tossing a (likely pretend) cake from the network.
The whole clip is a blast and just put me in the best mood this morning. It also feels like something that could (or should) have been saved for the last week, given how it ties into the history of the show, so I can only imagine what he’s going to come up with next week.
