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Colbert Taps Stewart, Spielberg, Springsteen & More for Final Week

CBS's The Late Show with Stephen Colbert has Jon Stewart, Steven Spielberg, Bruce Springsteen, and more planned for Colbert's final week.



Article Summary

  • Stephen Colbert’s final Late Show week is set, with Jon Stewart, Steven Spielberg, Bruce Springsteen, and more.
  • Colbert kicks off with a “Worst of” special, then welcomes David Byrne and Stewart for a star-packed farewell run.
  • Wednesday spotlights "Colbert’s Questionert" with special guests, followed by a Bruce Springsteen performance.
  • Colbert is keeping the May 21 Late Show series finale a secret, with no details released.

With late-night host Stephen Colbert set to wrap up his run next week, we're learning how CBS's The Late Show with Stephen Colbert plans on going out – at least, up until the final show. As you can see from the schedule below, Colbert will be showing off the best of the worst, speaking with some very famous faces, and… keeping any and all details about the final show on Thursday, May 21st, under wraps:

Monday, May 18th: The Worst of The Late Show with Stephen Colbert (Not a clip show!)

Tuesday, May 19thJon Stewart; Steven Spielberg; special performance by David Byrne and Stephen Colbert

Wednesday, May 20th: Stephen Colbert takes "The Colbert Questionert," featuring special guests; performance by Bruce Springsteen

Thursday, May 21st: The Late Show with Stephen Colbert Series Finale

Colbert
The Late Show with Stephen Colbert during Thursday's May 14, 2026 show. Photo: Scott Kowalchyk ©2026 CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved.

"I will tell you, when I got knocked off the air for a few days, people canceled Disney+. Why aren't people canceling Paramount+? Because you never had it in the first place?" Colbert reassembled "Strike Force Five" as his guests ahead of his departure: Jimmy Fallon, Jimmy Kimmel, Seth Meyers, and John Oliver. And as you can tell from that line from Kimmel that we opened up with, the five didn't exactly hold back when it came to their thoughts on Donald Trump, how his FCC has been threatening late-night as a larger attack on free speech, how Paramount Skydance and Disney have tried to play nice with the Trump Administration, and how it's gotten them nowhere, and more – including the current state of late-night. "We have a lot of shows. 30,000 people watching each one, and it adds up. People watch us on YouTube now. People have a lot of different options, and they keep coming to us," Kimmel argued, pushing back on the idea that late-night programming on the networks was dying off.

Colbert
THE LATE SHOW WITH STEPHEN COLBERT – Photo: Colbert/Scott Kowalchyk ©2026 CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved.

Colbert asked about Trump – specifically, how each of them has found themselves on the receiving end of social media and press grief from Trump and his lackeys. Kimmel noted how it goes to a whole new level when Melania Trump calls you out. In case you missed it, Melania attempted to connect a joke Kimmel made during his show two days before the shooting at the White House Correspondents' Dinner. "You know what's even weirder? Doing a job that his wife has strong feelings about," Kimmel shared. Oliver followed up by sharing his reaction to learning in their group chat that Melania was making headlines by trying to throw Kimmel under the bus.

"It's an amazing thing to get, in a group text, a text from Jimmy saying, 'Oh, boy.' And then a picture of Melania mad at him," Oliver said. But Meyers had a "silver lining" way of looking at Trump's rants against late-night and wanting all of them fired: at least someone is still watching network television live. "The thing I like, he posts when the show airs, and I want to say I appreciate that he is watching linear television. If I would make my case for late-night, it's that leaders of the free world are watching it when it airs," Meyers offered.


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Ray FlookAbout Ray Flook

Serving as Television Editor since 2018, Ray began five years earlier as a contributing writer/photographer before being brought onto the core BC team in 2017.
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