It would be an understatement to say that the late-night TV landscape has evolved considerably in recent years, and that’s become harder to ignore. Veteran host Jimmy Kimmel is fully cognizant of those changes and, with that, he hasn’t held back in sharing his thoughts. Kimmel has been candid about late night’s future, opining that the medium, as the public knows it, probably won’t last too much longer. With that said, Kimmel recently revealed one reason he still has hope for new talent hoping to break into show business.
What Have Jimmy Kimmel And Others Said About The Future Of Late-Night TV?
Kimmel has discussed the future of late-night TV a few times in recent years and, during an interview from 2024, he got real about addressing the “elephant in the room.” At that point, Kimmel admitted he wasn’t sure if there would be any late-night talk shows on network TV in a decade, citing the changes in viewer preferences as a key reason for that. Late Night host Seth Meyers was also cautiously optimistic about what might lie ahead for the medium in the years to come.
Meanwhile, Conan O’Brien got honest about the future of television, noting that there were people who were scared of what might happen in the years to come. O’Brien said he was still planning to remain upbeat for several reasons, though. As the former Conan host put it, “streaming changes the pipeline, but the connection, the talent, the ideas that come into our homes,” remains the same.
Still, it’s hard not to take notice of the changing dynamics, considering the cancellation of Stephen Colbert’s The Late Show, which will be signing off this coming May. All in all, we can’t say exactly what the talk show landscape will look like but, Jimmy Kimmel is looking forward to at least one thing in the near future.
Why Jimmy Kimmel Is (Still) Excited For What Lies Ahead, Despite The Late Night Landscape
Kimmel is of the same generation of talk-show hosts that includes the likes of Stephen Colbert, Jon Stewart and Conan O’Brien, and they found TV success by traveling down different avenues within the comedy sphere. Of course, the dynamics are quite different now for myriad reasons.
In short, it’s now become harder for comics or other prospective hosts to get their foot in the door, so to speak. Kimmel recently brought up a great point about up-and-comers while appearing on IMO with Michelle Obama & Craig Robinson:
I love the niche aspect to comedy now, where you can — like our announcer on our show, Lou Wilson, he does a show that’s very popular on the Internet about Dungeons & Dragons. It’s a funny, Internet show about Dungeons & Dragons, and he can do it and he can get an audience and he makes money from it. And it’s amazing to me because, when I was coming, up in order — you had to, first, get on the radio, which is basically, how do you get on the radio if you’re not on the radio? You just have to hang around, you just have to annoy them until they put you on a little bit and then they put you on a little more and then, hopefully, you get better. But, now, you could open up your computer, you could do a whole show for your friends or for nobody, whatever, and, then, if it’s good, usually, it catches on.
The Internet – specifically social media – has indeed opened the floodgates for comedic talent to find more unique ways of jumping into the entertainment business. In many ways, gone are the days of hopeful hosts and writers going the route of landing gigs at radio or TV stations and working their way up. That was key for the talk show host pipeline, and it produced some talented stars. While Kimmel knows some people are wary of how the web is changing the comedy game, he’s down for it:
I think that's a lot of fun, and a lot of people see that as like the end of comedy as a business. But I think it’s great. I mean, I think you’ll see a lot more people doing it, maybe not for as much money but, if you’re good, you can make a living and really only talk about what you want to talk about.
So, given the uncertainty involving late night, young comics can indeed find a niche in other ways, and that could lead to a fresh assortment of content down the road. Still, it’s hard not to think about the direction that the talk show business is heading in as a whole. We'll have to wait and see when late night wraps this TV season, then returns to the 2026 TV schedule this fall.
