Stephen Colbert no longer has a desk at CBS, but he wasted no time finding a new one — this one bolted to the floor of a small public access studio in Monroe, Michigan.
Days after his long-running network program ended, Colbert launched a personal YouTube channel and filled it with a single piece of content: a guest hosting appearance on “Only in Monroe,” a community television program operated by Monroe Community Media.
The May 22 broadcast marked the second time Colbert has walked through the doors of that particular studio.
The first visit came in the summer of 2015, when Colbert used the Monroe public access platform as a runway before taking off into the CBS late-night landscape, where he would spend the next 11 years.
That CBS run came to a close in July 2025, when the network canceled his program during active merger discussions between Paramount and Skydance, citing financial considerations.
“Since I was last here in Monroe, Michigan, I spent 11 years as the primary host of “The Late Show with Stephen Colbert” on CBS, which came to an end last night,” Colbert told the Monroe Community Media audience.
He did not stop there. “It’s been an excruciating 23 hours without being on TV, so I am grateful to be able to be here on Monroe Community Media before they also get acquired by Paramount,” Colbert said.
The episode hit Colbert’s freshly created YouTube channel, listed as @Colbert, at exactly 11:35 p.m. simultaneously with its live local broadcast on Monroe Community Media, available to cable subscribers on Xfinity Channel 21 and Charter Channel 187.
The guest list for a public access program in a Michigan town of roughly 21,000 people turned out to be anything but ordinary.
Musician Jack White appeared, as did actor Jeff Daniels, both Michigan natives lending the homecoming broadcast a degree of local credibility.
Eminem also showed up, participating in what became one of the episode’s featured segments.
Actor Steve Buscemi took part in a commercial spot filmed for a Monroe-area eatery called Buscemi’s Pizza and Subs — a business Buscemi himself made clear carries his name purely by coincidence.
Byron Allen, the media executive who acquired the CBS late-night timeslots formerly belonging to Colbert’s program, joined the broadcast via FaceTime call.
Shortly after the episode went live, CBS and Paramount began firing off copyright takedown notices aimed at third-party YouTube accounts that had uploaded unauthorized copies of the broadcast.
A channel called “The Desk” had pulled in more than 620,000 views on an unsanctioned upload, outpacing the roughly 392,000 views Colbert’s own official channel had accumulated on the same content.
The takedown campaign quickly ignited accusations across social media that Paramount was deliberately working to bury the episode and limit its reach.
CBS pushed back against that narrative directly, with a spokesperson releasing a statement to Variety confirming the network had bankrolled the production itself.
“Stephen Colbert’s return to Monroe in the ‘Only in Monroe’ episode was financed and produced by CBS Studios and was posted on Stephen Colbert’s YouTube channel in collaboration with Monroe Community Media and ‘The Late Show’s’ YouTube channels,” the spokesperson said.
“As is our regular practice, we send copyright notices to unauthorized websites that post copyrighted content from CBS and our network/studio talent such as Stephen Colbert. However, for this episode, we have decided to waive further enforcement of this standard industry practice until additional review.”
The cancellation of Colbert’s CBS program has drawn scrutiny beyond standard business explanations, with the decision occurring against the backdrop of a lawsuit filed by President Donald Trump against Paramount tied to a “60 Minutes” segment that aired on CBS News.
