Craig Ferguson leaving The Late Late Show in December

[mrbellamy 6,272]

http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/live-feed/craig-ferguson-exit-late-late-show-699470

Bummer. I always thought he was the most entertaining late night host

[Jay 37,322]

NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[Koray Savas 2,251]

I like him, but I stopped watching those late night talk shows a long time ago.

[King Mark 3,626]

I'm way more distraught about Letterman retiring, since I watched his his show from the beginning

[Jay 37,322]

Ferguson has the best late night show by miles and miles. It's nothing like the other ones; It's completely improvised with little regard for the late night talk show formula. He has a robot skeleton for a sidekick!!

[King Mark 3,626]

I can't watch his show more than 5 minutes before getting tired of him

I liked Craig Kilborn better

[Jay 37,322]

This is hilarious

[Wojo 2,453]

I always enjoyed Craig Ferguson's show, but I never stayed up late enough to watch it, even on Fridays when it made the most sense.

[Jay 37,322]

Who cares about when it happens to air? That's what DVRs are for man!

~

Jay Leno and Jimmy Fallon have already called Craig about the late night swap of 14/15

[mrbellamy 6,272]

His humor's not for everyone (clearly, since his ratings have been floundering) but I always get a real kick out of him. As Jason said, there's seemingly nothing he won't try, usually on the goofier end of the spectrum -- Geoff Peterson, improvised interviews, mouth organ competitions, puppet intros, censor tags that blurt out foreign phrases like "Oh la la!" or "Ay carumba" instead of the standard *beep* -- but he also dares to venture into more serious or educational territory relatively often, like his weeklong shows touring Scotland and France, devoting his monologue to the history of apartheid followed by an interview with Desmond Tutu, holding an hour long chat with Stephen Fry without a studio audience present, or turning his monologue into a personal testimony on alcoholism:

He also chose not to air his monologue after the Aurora shooting, instead giving a short speech from the desk offering his sympathies to the victims.

I love his irreverent vulgarity, but it seems that few seemed to take notice of how he often proved himself to be, ironically enough, the classiest guy in late night.

[Hlao-roo 389]

Maybe we can start a Craig Ferguson quotes thread.

[Jay 37,322]

Iceland is in the North Atlantic, it's capital city is Reykjavik...

[KK 3,307]

What?! Man, he was my favourite late night tv host too. That sucks! He'll be missed.

[Jay 37,322]

1 ding

Ve are Gernam

2 dings

Still German

3 dings

Italian Bill Clinton! "Whassa-come-and-ago"

4 dings

Dracula!

5 dings

Room Service!

[BLUMENKOHL 1,068]

...boo hoo?

[Jay 37,322]

Secretariat? Who's that at the door!

[BLUMENKOHL 1,068]

9 Hours...geez...

[Jay 37,322]

Haha, scanning through that quickly it seems to be entirely Craig with female guests

[Wycket 36]

I would have loved to have a two hour block dedicated to Colbert and Ferguson. It always seemed to me like he was never really in it for the money and was just having fun. I guess he saw that time coming and decided to leave before it became a job. Not entirely surprising since he always said he would leave if Letterman did, but I'll miss him.

Hopefully he continues his standup specials as they are usually pretty great.

[mrbellamy 6,272]

Haha, scanning through that quickly it seems to be entirely Craig with female guests

A lot of those compilations are like that. There's even an entire YouTube channel called "Craig Ferguson and The Ladies"

What do people think about the possibility of Neil Patrick Harris taking over? He's a regular on the show so I think he'd make sense in that way.

I remember once during an interview with Craig, actually, he said that he'd one day love to start up an Ed Sullivan type variety show, which could be a nice change for late night.

[Jay 37,322]

The guy who plays Geoff Peterson, Josh Robert Thompson, wants to start a variety show like that too

[mrbellamy 6,272]

They can start a double act!

Also in honor of the Star Wars cast announcement...

(skip to 20:45 for the interview....Ford's awkward as ever but he actually smiles a few times! Helps that Ferguson can talk aviation with him )

[KK 3,307]

My favourite interviews have him with Ewan McGregor. They're great together.

[Dixon Hill 4,233]

I liked him on The Drew Carey Show. Didn't see his late night program much.

[Sir Hilary Bray 235]

Loved his interviews with Rickles. Rickles going off in true fashion and Craig letting it sort of ride.

[nightscape94 965]

I don't watch late night anymore (used to watch Letterman when I was in college), but every now and then I'll put something on, and Craig's show always jumped out as being the most unique. It was completely different and the guests seemed to know what they were getting into and responded in kind. He had a couple of good interviews with Sandy Bullock.

[Quintus 5,399]

Ferguson is a complete unknown in the UK, but I did just see this:

Carrie Fisher is freakin' awesome!

[Jay 37,322]

She has been on his show a bunch of times, they have great chemistry together

[mrbellamy 6,272]

She's the one who brought him that kangaroo ballsack from Australia!

[mrbellamy 6,272]

A few updates:

James Corden will be the replacement Late Late Show host, starting in March.

Metallica will perform as the house band all next week.

Jay Leno will be the final guest. Other December guests will include Kristen Bell, Tim Meadows, Carrie Fisher, Drew Carey, Betty White, and Larry King.

[Jay 37,322]

So sad he's leaving still. The show has been on it's A game for the past 4 years straight. I got to go to a taping when I was in LA in September and it was awesome to see it all happen live.

[King Mark 3,626]

Do live tapings get interrupted a lot or it happens more or less like you see on TV. What are "commercial breaks" in real time?

[Jay 37,322]

I'm sure it's different from show to show, but for Craig's show the music pumps as they go to commercial, and it's very short and then he brings it back. He might use the break to chat with the producer about something but that's about it. It probably took less than an hour to tape the whole show, but I dunno (we couldn't bring our cell phones in, and I don't wear a watch)

[King Mark 3,626]

But why do they even need commercial breaks if those shows are aren't live?

[Jay 37,322]

What do you mean? Of course you have to throw it to commercial. What do you want them to do instead, interview for 10 minutes straight and have some editor insert a fake commercial break later?

[King Mark 3,626]

hmm, ok

[King Mark 3,626]

What I find amazing is how he can have entire conversations with his talking robot like it's a real person. Is the guy voicing his sidekicks near the stage or something

[Jay 37,322]

Yup, he's right behind the left side of the stage, basically behind the fireplace. He not only voices and controlls Geoff Peterson, but also voices and controls Sandra the Rhino, is the voice of every member of Alfredo Sauce and the Sky Fellas, and is the voice of every caller Craig gets on his phone (and all the flies).

His name is Josh Robert Thompson, he's a talented guy. I listen to his podcast

http://www.jrtvoices.com

After the taping ended, Craig introduced him and he came out and waved to the audience real quick. I gave him a standing O

[mrbellamy 6,272]

So sad he's leaving still. The show has been on it's A game for the past 4 years straight. I got to go to a taping when I was in LA in September and it was awesome to see it all happen live.

Oh cool! Who were the guests?

[Jay 37,322]

The one I went to was the Labor Day episode, his first episode back after taking the entire month of August off from filming. It would never have been my first choice, because I knew it would be a bit of a "rusty" and "catchup" episode, but I really had no choice, it was my only chance to go. Anyways, the first guest was Ray Liotta, and the second guest was Annaleigh Ashford (actress on Masters of Sex).

Here's the episode. I think you can almost see the back of my head at 2:39 (I sat in the left side which was cool cause I could watch Geoff the whole time and see Secretariat really well).

[mrbellamy 6,272]

Brilliant ending!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fl5NZDc16xA

[Jay 37,322]

Haha, that was great!

I watch every episode of the show, have since basically the start of the Geoff Peterson era. But I'm about a month behind now. I think I'll savor them rather than plow through them all. But I'm glad you posted that ending, I watched it and it was very inspired and funny.

[KK 3,307]

I'm less than 2 weeks behind. I'm going to refrain from watching the ending till I get there.

But I heard he acknowledged Josh in the cold open, which is great!

[#SnowyVernalSpringsEternal 10,265]

I never saw the appeal in these kind of late night shows. Assembly line comedy.

[mrbellamy 6,272]

I agree overall. Even with Ferguson, I personally couldn't watch him too regularly because he would recycle material quite a lot, but he really played fast and loose with the format which was great fun to me. It was a major network show but he often treated it like he was taping from his basement. You never knew when he'd open with something like this:

Most other talk shows are completely devoid of that kind of personality. I'll probably still watch Graham Norton and Conan every now and then, but other than that I get pretty bored with them.

[KK 3,307]

He recycles material, but it's all so loose and on the spot that you can't help but love it. He really found his footing in recent years with a great setup that made for some great moments. Ferguson was a real comedian with real personality. I'd take him over Fallon's flashy celebrity games any day.

[Sweeping Strings 2,346]

Ferguson is a complete unknown in the UK, but I did just see this:

Carrie Fisher is freakin' awesome!

Hmmm ... I remember him as a stand-up comedy performer/actor on UK television and in movies long before he became a US TV chat show host. And 'back in the day' he and Peter Capaldi were in a band together, so there's a nice symmetry to how one of Ferguson's (a HUGE Whovian) old friends is now playing the Doctor.

[nightscape94 965]

Nice St. Elsewhere reference.

[Jay 37,322]

Quote

Thank you, Grant Imahara, for being (and building) a friend. Your genius and creative spirit will be sorely missed. “My heart? He’s got a place there.” -Geoff Peterson ‬🖤💔 • The very first time I met Grant, he showed me how to operate/puppeteer Geoff Peterson. One switch to move his mouth, one to swivel his head, and one to move his then only working arm. Without Grant, there would be no Geoff. I am forever grateful for his kindness and insight. Rest In Peace.

 

https://www.facebook.com/thejrtshow/photos/a.10157283837856075/10158134440811075/

[mrbellamy 6,272]

Yes, very sad! First thing I thought of when I heard Imahara had died.