The Definitive Guide to Comedy
In case you missed it, Wednesday night’s episode of Late Show with David Letterman found our host Dave complimenting the great schools of improv comedy at The Second City in Chicago and Toronto, as well as The Groundlings in Los Angeles. It was all just a set-up, though. The punchline: …
CBS Entertainment Chair Nina Tassler told TV critics Monday during the TCA Winter Press Tour what most astute viewers probably already had figured out: Stephen Colbert’s edition of The Late Show will kick off this September. Specifically, Tuesday, Sept. 8, 2015 — the night after Labor Day. The Late Show …
The final night of the official 2014-2015 TV season also will bid a fond farewell to Late Show with David Letterman, as Letterman, his Worldwide Pants production shingle and CBS announced today that his final broadcast would air May 20, 2015. “David Letterman has given to all of us a …
TV networks may still use Nielsen ratings as their primary measuring stick for how successful their programs in gaining viewers and selling advertisements. But Last Week Tonight with John Oliver is on HBO, where such ratings are even less reliable and relevant than they are for the broadcast networks. So …
Did you know Jim Gaffigan tried out for the Indianapolis Colts this summer? Yeah, well. Not a spoiler alert, but Gaffigan did not make the 2014 Colts team, or even the practice squad. But he did eat some donuts, more doughnuts, exchanged words with Andrew Luck and said Pat McAfee …
Almost every comedian I know shared a photo and/or an anecdote about Joan Rivers tonight in the wake of her death at 81, a week after she suffered cardiac arrest and stopped breathing during throat surgery. (Read the obituary of Joan Rivers here) Looking at all of these photos shows …
For millions of students and teachers, it’s time to go back to school this week. For a handful of lucky comedy students, it’s also the start of a very specialized schooling, as Joe Toplyn leads a new group of would-be TV writers in his Comedy Writing for Late-Night TV class …
How long has it been since Dave Chappelle left his Comedy Central series, Chappelle’s Show? Long enough that in his first appearance on Late Show with David Letterman in a decade, Chappelle joked to Letterman that he just says to Comedy Central that he hasn’t quit. “I am seven years …
They came not to bury him, but to praise him by metaphorically burying him. Which, when you’re a legendary comedian such as Don Rickles who made your bones by busting balls of the famous and infamous for more than six decades, is tribute indeed. Particularly coming on the occasion of …
Neil Patrick Harris was on my list, as well as many others, as a potential late-night TV host for CBS in 2015. NPH confirmed this morning on Howard Stern’s SiriusXM radio show that CBS chief Les Moonves and entertainment president Nina Tassler had him on their list, too! Harris said …
