With only a few episodes left on the desk at “The Late Show,” Stephen Colbert dedicated Monday’s show to the bits, sketches and graphics that didn’t air.
“We definitely have enough material to make a ‘best of’ clip show, but you have YouTube, so that’s up to you,” Colbert joked in a relaxed monologue. “We thought it would be more fun to show you something we made that didn’t air and call it ‘The Worst Show of Recent Times.’ However, what you’re about to see is technically the best thing we’ve ever made.”
As is customary during “Late Show” rehearsals, Colbert ate steamed chicken from a to-go container while performing for the crew. “If they find something they don’t like, it’s their fault!” said the master.
One of the old sketches in which Colbert first appeared on air was a parody commercial for a product called Erotic Body Gravy, used for post-Thanksgiving dinner sex.
“When I saw it, I said, ‘Those actors are too attractive for a comedy.’ You ended up just making soft-core gravy porn,” Colbert said. To make matters worse, “unbeknownst to me or anyone else at the time, my appendix had already burst before rehearsal, leaking poisonous bile into my abdominal cavity.”
In one of the corners, “Graphic Graveyard,” Colbert and his art director Andro Buneta resurrected various graphics that disappeared before the show aired. Among them is a Thanksgiving porn magazine called Giblets. This is the cover of the book “The Giving Tree,” but the tree is wearing a bondage costume and the title is “The Very Giving Tree.” And an image of Hillary Clinton, the 45th president. “Oh, growing up! Everything was fine,” Colbert joked.
Mr. Colbert also welcomed the return of the character Shrieking Joe, a Kid Rock-style political candidate whose two appearances on “The Late Show” led to unprecedented ratings declines per minute, CBS executives said.
And he, along with “Late Show” writer Michael Cruise Cain, sang a song that never aired. The duet was “It’s Raining Fish,” set to the tune of “It’s Raining Men,” a song Colbert rejected four times over the years. The gist is “It’s raining fish/Bluefin tuna, my favorite food.”
Colbert ended the episode with a heartfelt message to his staff: “We could never have made something as bad as it was or some of the good things we showed without the amazing people in this room. This staff is so good, so supportive, so creative, so kind.”
He then urged viewers to watch the final three episodes, promising, “They’re going to be better than this!”
