- After months of saying the decision was mainly about finances, CBS revealed that Stephen Colbert’s show was losing around $40 million every year.
- CBS says its new agreement with Byron Allen is expected to make $15 million in profit for the network.
- Even though Byron Allen’s program, Comics Unleashed, has opened with much lower ratings compared to Late Show, CBS is focused on reducing costs and improving profit
CBS has officially shared details about why the network decided to end The Late Show with Stephen Colbert and move in a new direction. After months of saying the decision was mainly about finances, the company revealed that Colbert's show was losing around $40 million every year.
At the same time, CBS says its new agreement with Byron Allen is expected to make $15 million in profit for the network. According to the media company, this creates a difference of nearly $55 million. The network recently confirmed its partnership with Allen on a different programming model that replaces the expensive format used for traditional late night talk shows.
Even though Allen's program, Comics Unleashed, has opened with much lower ratings compared to Colbert's show, CBS is focused on reducing costs and improving profits instead of chasing bigger audience numbers.
Speaking with Deadline, CBS said, “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. 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.”
The financial figures shared by CBS have also created new questions about how the network calculated the losses from The Late Show. Many are wondering what details were included in the numbers and exactly how it reached the claim that Stephen Colbert's show was losing around $40 million each year.
David Letterman, who originally started The Late Show before Stephen Colbert took over, has criticised CBS over the situation in a conversation with The New York Times. He believes the network removed Colbert for reasons connected to the planned sale of CBS to Skydance rather than because of money problems.
According to Letterman, the company wanted to avoid any issues during the business deal and decided to end the show as part of that process. He openly said he does not believe the explanation given by the network and accused company leaders of being dishonest about the real reason behind the decision.