You Say Goodbye ...

Welcome to What’s Helping Today, a newsletter about the everyday work of staying alive on earth — written by author and journalist Sandy Ernest Allen.

Hey everyone,

What’s Helping Today is watching the last episode of The Late Show …

A fun fact about my own life is that I happened to be sitting in the mostly empty Ed Sullivan theater itself, out in the audience, the first time Stephen ever sat behind that desk (as it was being constructed). My partner was a writer there at the time; I was meeting them at the end of the workday and we happened to be sitting there, as that moment occured.

Myself, I’d been a Stephen Colbert fan since The Daily Show and especially his Colbert Report days. The latter I had watched rather religiously. Starting back my senior year of college when it began, and I lived alone, I’d sit in my kitchen (usually hungover) and watch The Report. This continued through my mornings in Iowa (almost always hungover) and into Brooklyn (again almost always hungover).

Colbert, his presence, was a constant friend of a sort. So much so, when I’d moved to New York City — sleeping on a series of friend’s floors and couches initially before finding a sublet in a Williamsburg loft paid in cash and agreed upon over pickleback shots — other than figure out somewhere better to live and a job, my first only real order of business was to go see The Colbert Report show tape.

So one spring afternoon, I did the thing. I lined up and sat in the studio audience and laughed. Then, the world of late night felt very remote still.

Unbeknownst to me that day, my future spouse was in the room during that taping, as we’d later figure out. But we met-met some time later, online dating, normal stuff. They were then on that break between the two shows.

Hence I found myself in the theater that afternoon as Stephen first took a seat behind his new desk. My partner continued on working at the Late Show through its first few years. Sometimes I’d come by and hang out with them; I grew to know many of their hilarious and wonderful colleagues.

I’d sometimes get to sit out in the audience if some musician I loved was playing that episode. One time I stood around in a tight cooridor as they taped a bit with (my hero) “Weird” Al.

My ultimate fan experience (as it sometimes felt back when) grew into something much more real, through the years. I came to know Stephen the actual person, not just the personae, inasmuch as he was business partners (and friends) with my now-spouse. I was also honored to get to know his wonderful wife Evie some as well.

Though it’s been a while since I watched The Late Show regularly, I did sit and watch this last episode. I got emotional at the end. This episode was, in my view, like all of them: Imperfect. Some jokes I cackled at; others fell flat. Certain moments of it totally surprised me, others felt extremely unsurprising. Overall it was clever in conceit, and moving. It all felt very Stephen.

He brought out a last remaining Beatle, Paul, and they had a chat. They all played a song at the end. As those of the Boomer generation especially don’t need to be explained, that same Ed Sullivan stage is where the Beatles debuted in America — and Beatlemania took over the world.

In a way, this finale felt even more like a last episode than the equally star-studed finale of The Colbert Report, perhaps because of the circumstances under which the former ended. And because the Late Show run began so soon after and with many of the same people making it — however changed the premise, however higher the stakes.

When the 2016 election went as it did, those rose all the more. Soon after, my spouse quit there and we moved up to the woods here of The Catskills. Many other changes have occured in my life as well — like quitting booze nine years ago now, like coming out as trans.

During COVID lockdown days, like so many others I took comfort in Colbert’s Late Show as he and Evie and their son engineered a low-budget version on the fly. And I listened to Stephen and several other late night hosts’ (genuinely funny) Strike Force Five podcast during the writers strike — which helped them keep their staffs paid. Just to add, I did enjoy this reunion episode they did for this occasion and their bit during the episode itself.

Our actual connection notwithstanding: I remain first and foremost just a fan of Stephen’s. I admire his values, what he tries to communicate to the wider public. I admire his tenacity. Like many, I was very moved by and have revisted his conversations with Anderson Cooper about grief (especially lately, as grief upends my life).

Thinking back to myself, lonely at my kitchen tables back during my twenties, hungover and watching Colbert, I know he helped me survive. Our relationship was merely parasocial then and yet: He felt a friend.

I do also feel for his show’s staff (some of whom I know), who have all lost their jobs now. I really appreciated his friend Anderson’s summation on this situation overall:

Whatever (and all) he does next, what Stephen has given us already is so gigantic. Like many others, I am just grateful.

Sandy Ernest Allen

Thanks for reading What’s Helping Today, a newsletter by me — author and journalist Sandy Ernest Allen.

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