One thing was clear Sunday night in Newark, New Jersey’s sumptuous sold-out performing arts center: Mom had gotten to the audience.
The Late Show’s Stephen Colbert sat down with longtime late night fixture Conan O’Brien for a conversation as part of the annual fundraiser for Montclair Film, where Colbert’s wife, Evelyn Colbert, serves as president of the board.
“I was the youngest of 11 children and I always thought, I still think, they are the funniest people in the world … but I was terrible at telling stories,” Colbert said to a rapt crowd. “I remember once hearing my mother say to my brothers and sisters who were groaning about how terrible my stories were, I heard my mother say, ‘You listen to his stories, it’s so important to him.’”
“To this day, if someone enjoys a story of mine I think, ‘Mom got to you.’”
For roughly 20 years, Stephen Colbert, 61, has sat behind a desk and told his stories to audiences who have looked to him to make them laugh. In May 2026, Colbert’s latest chapter of storytelling will come to an end. The shocking announcement that The Late Show would cut the lights for good came in July after Colbert criticized CBS’ corporate parent Paramount for making a $16 million settlement with Donald Trump amid its $8 billion merger with Skydance.
While the president’s name wasn’t said onstage Sunday, the specter of Colbert’s exit hung heavy in the auditorium. In opening remarks, even New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy couldn’t help but address the obvious, saying that he wanted to be in attendance to exchange notes with Colbert, seeing as they were both on their way out the door.
O’Brien, who hosted Late Night, The Tonight Show and Conan for nearly 30 years, offered Colbert some words of wisdom — mixed in, of course, with trademark faux deprecation — since ending his show in 2021, when, Colbert said, O’Brien actually asked him if he’d considered quitting.
“I ended my thing four years ago and God damn it I’ve had so much fun. I’ve really enjoyed myself and it was a great lesson for me,” O’Brien said. “These shows are just a way for Stephen Colbert to relate to people, they are not the way. There are so many different things that you can do and that you’re going to do that are going to give you enormous amounts of pleasure, and you’re going to be really great at it.”
“You’re going to have people on the street saying ‘Oh my God, I loved…’ and it’s going to be this other thing that you’re doing,” O’Brien continued. “You’re just not there yet, you haven’t begun that yet.”
One of the first things on Colbert’s list, the two men joked (perhaps), is a ridiculously self-serious Hallmark Christmas movie wherein O’Brien would play a careerist who thinks his girlfriend’s wish for a Christmas miracle is grossly impractical, until she journeys back to her hometown to find Colbert running a candy cane factory with his three daughters, Tinsel, Holly and Popcorn String.
Leaving late-night TV after more than 20 years behind the desk, Colbert lamented the loss of a more than 30-year staple in American entertainment. All Colbert and O’Brien wanted were shows reminiscent of vaudeville, the pair said.
“This is a really old television form; one of the oldest and most successful forms that through radio is tied to vaudeville,” Colbert said. “I love who I work with, and I enjoy what I do. I’m kind of sad for the form; that there’s one less place for people to have that experience.”
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