Byron Allen says he’s “not trying to replace” Stephen Colbert as his comedy show takes over The Late Show slot on CBS.
Allen, the comedian and media executive who founded Allen Media Group, told NPR that his Comics Unleashed show would avoid the political satire that became central to Colbert’s, particularly during Donald Trump’s presidencies.
“At the end of the day, I’m not trying to replace Colbert,” Allen, 65, told the public broadcaster ahead of his show’s debut on Friday. “I am not trying to hold on to his audience because Comics Unleashed has been around 20 years and has its own audience. And we’re speaking to people who have been ignored. And good luck finding another show that’s had on more comedians of every shape and size and colour.”
Comics Unleashed, launched in 2006, features Allen alongside a rotating panel of stand-up comedians discussing topical stories and performing short comedy routines.
The show previously occupied CBS’s post-midnight slot after James Corden’s departure from The Late Late Show. It returned to the network again in 2025 under a time-buy agreement in which Allen Media Group purchased airtime from CBS and handled its own advertising sales.
CBS announced in April 2026 that the programme would move into the 11.35pm slot following the end of The Late Show With Stephen Colbert.
The network announced last July that it was cancelling the long-running Late Show franchise, days after Colbert criticised Paramount for paying US president Donald Trump $16m to settle a dispute over a 60 Minutes interview with then vice-president Kamala Harris.
Colbert was one of the American president’s most visible television critics, regularly using his opening monologues to mock him and right-wing media figures.
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“Not everybody’s going to love me. Not everybody is going to love the fact that I am not being racist or anti-Semitic or sexist or I’m not being political. But there’s that 1 per cent or 2 per cent that will be like, ‘Hell, yeah, I’m rolling with you.’ And I learned that at an early age,” Allen continued.
He insisted that neither CBS nor its parent company, Paramount, had sought to place editorial limits on Comics Unleashed.
Asked whether executives at CBS or Paramount had discussed “boundaries not to cross or topics to avoid”, Allen replied: “Absolutely not.”
“I have absolutely not had any conversations with anybody at CBS or Paramount about what to say or not to say,” he said.
“Do you know that I have been taping this show here since July or August and somebody from CBS just came by to say hello and thank us. Visited the set one time, came by to say ‘We just want to see a taping because we haven’t been here.’”
Allen also said the network had offered little editorial feedback on the programme. “When we’ve sent the episodes over, they have barely given notes,” he said.
“CBS has not given me any notes, any feedback about don’t be political. I started the show 20 years ago, and we’ve been crushing it for 20 years.”
Allen praised Colbert, calling him “an American treasure” and saying he was “always invited” on Comics Unleashed.
“We talked. We laughed. We cried. We shared our ups, our downs, our pain, our love of talk shows, our love of comedy, our love of comedians, and our love of Johnny Carson,” he said while describing a meal that they shared recently. “We shared that.”
The final episode of The Late Show With Stephen Colbert attracted 6.74 million viewers, making it the most-watched weeknight episode during the show’s 11-year run.
In general, the series attracted an average audience of 2.7 million throughout its final season on air.
Colbert’s final guest was Paul McCartney, who ceremonially turned out the lights at the Ed Sullivan Theater, where the Beatles famously performed on The Ed Sullivan Show in 1964.
