Stephen Colbert Lands a New Gig: Pretending to Do His Old Job
Stephen Colbert is going from pretending to be a comedian on late-night television to … pretending to be a talk show host on late-night television.
The soon-to-be-former host of “The Late Show with Stephen Colbert” — whose show is ending in May of next year — has already landed at least one new gig, according to the entertainment website Vulture.
And the episode could be killer.
Of all people, ‘Late Show’ host Stephen Colbert knows that working in TV can be murder. Now, Vulture has learned he’s going to put that real-life experience to work as a guest star on CBS drama ‘Elsbeth.’ https://t.co/k7hD05GvE0
— New York Magazine (@NYMag) August 2, 2025
According to Vulture, Colbert is set to appear on an episode of the CBS mystery series “Elsbeth.”
Colbert will play a version of himself as the host of a show called “Way Late with Scotty Bristol,” Vulture reported.
The actual outlines of Colbert’s part were not reported, but “Elsbeth” episodes generally follow the “howcatchem” format used by the classic “Columbo” series starring Peter Falk, in which the audience is shown a murderer in action near the beginning of the episode and the plot is devoted to the murderer’s arrest.
So, it’s possible Colbert is an actual killer in the episode. He could also be the victim. (The latter might sound like more of a winner for supporters of President Donald Trump, but there could also be a latent audience for seeing Cobert at least metaphorically brought to justice.)
The episode was recorded last week, the show business trade publication Variety reported Sunday. It did not report when it’s due to be broadcast.
Colbert upended the Democratic universe when he announced on July 17 that his late-night show had been axed by CBS amid a dwindling audience base, ludicrously leftist bias, and reported losses of $40 million a year for the network.
News of his shift from pretending to be an outrageously unfunny “comedian” to playing a talk show host on TV got generally a yawn on social media, but among the scant commentary there was a fair amount of ill-tempered amusement.
https://t.co/UrHjivcMWl. Might be the one episode of Elsbeth we can all skip.
— Dane (@realDaneFl) August 4, 2025
First step to getting the dnc presidential nomination.
His career is really taking off— Sero “zippy” Weeks (@SeroWeeks) August 4, 2025
Zzz. He is a biased loser.
— Swampy (@real_swampy) August 4, 2025
According to Vulture, Colbert’s appearance on “Elsbeth” comes after one of the show’s stars, Wendell Pierce, was a guest on “The Late Show” in February.
When Colbert said he would like to be on the series, Pierce reportedly responded that he could “make that happen.”
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