In a nod to longtime Late Show host Stephen Colbert, The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon joins Jimmy Kimmel in the decision to air a repeat on Thursday, May 21, the night of Colbert‘s final CBS late-night show.

The Tonight Show will air a new episode on Friday, May 22, featuring Robert De Niro and Jane Rosenthal, and musical guest Maluma.

Kimmel announced Monday that ABC’s Jimmy Kimmel Live! would run a repeat episode during Colbert’s May 21 finale “out of deference to Colbert’s sendoff,” per LateNighter.

On Monday night, Colbert hosted fellow late-night hosts Fallon, Kimmel, Seth Meyers and John Oliver (aka the self-named Strike Force Five), who paid tribute to Colbert’s show, in a reunion that featured lots of good wishes and good-natured jibes.

CBS announced in a shocking announcement in July 2025, that it was ending The Late Show franchise in 2026. At the time CBS said it was “purely a financial decision against a challenging backdrop in late night” and “is not related in any way to the show’s performance, content or other matters happening at Paramount.” The “other matters” likely were CBS’ parent company Paramount’s efforts to complete a merger with David Ellison-owned Skydance.

The cancellation also coincides with Colbert’s contract coming up at the end of 2026, and it came days after Colbert, a frequent critic of Donald Trump, called Paramount Global’s $16M settlement of Trump’s lawsuit a “big fat bribe.”

From Universal Television, a division of Universal Studio Group and Broadway Video, The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon is executive produced by Lorne Michaels and produced by Chris Miller and Gerard Bradford. Miller is the showrunner.  

The Tonight Show tapes before a live studio audience from Studio 6B in 30 Rockefeller Center and airs at 11:35 p.m. ET/PT on NBC and streams the next day on Peacock.