By now, everyone has heard that Stephen Colbert is replacing David Letterman as host of CBS' The Late Show, but it seems that there are more changes in store for the network. The host of their own The Late Late Show, Craig Ferguson was overlooked for the job in exchange for $5 million and those coming changes are going to hurt him even more. The CEO of CBS, Les Moonves hinted that Ferguson will be replaced as well, making way for a whole new late night at CBS, and maybe even a more diverse one.
The first warning sign has been there all along, inside Ferguson's contract. The same contract that earned him the sorry-we-skipped-you consolation prize is set to expire in June, so CBS could renew it for only one more year, if that, starting both a new Late Show and Late Late Show around the same time. Then came Moonves' comments which basically closed the door on the possibility of Ferguson sticking around. He told Bloomberg that, "12:30 is up in the air," adding, "Obviously, we’re considering all sorts of candidates and women are among them. A woman would be great in late night."
So not only are we likely to have two new late night hosts on CBS next year, but one might actually be a woman. Let's just hope that Moonves is not only serious about women (plural!) really being considered for The Late Late Show, but that one actually gets it. Besides late night TV being desperately in need of a female voice, if Ferguson has to lose his job, we'd hate for it to just lead to more of the same.
If CBS really wants to shake up their late night programming, they need to hire one of those women. Otherwise they'll have just fired one white guy, who doesn't even deserve to lose his job, to hire another, joining their brand new white guy replacing the one who's retiring. It's a confusing chain of white guys.
So come on CBS, if you're gonna change things, really change them. Audiences have had enough of the same old hosts.
