Tom Hanks Is Making His Last Late Show Appearance
For eleven years, Tom Hanks has walked into the Ed Sullivan Theater to sit across from Stephen Colbert. Those conversations have covered movies, fatherhood, typewriters, and the particular experience of being one of the most recognized human beings on the planet. On Wednesday, May 13, Hanks will do it for the 18th and final time, as The Late Show with Stephen Colbertenters its last full week of production before the May 21 series finale ends the franchise's 33-year run on CBS.
Hanks is one of several guests announced for what Colbert's team has framed as a deliberate farewell rather than a countdown. Julia Louis-Dreyfus, who has appeared on the show seven times and whom Colbert considers among his closest connections in entertainment, will stop by Tuesday, May 12. Pedro Pascal, weeks away from the May 22 theatrical premiere of Star Wars: The Mandalorian and Grogu, will also appear that night. Billy Crystal, Ina Garten, and John Krasinski round out the penultimate week's confirmed lineup.
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The Monday, May 11 episode brings a reunion of the Strike Force Five (Jimmy Fallon, Jimmy Kimmel, Seth Meyers, and John Oliver appearing together on television for the first time), three years after their 2023 podcast run that supported striking writers and crew. On Thursday, May 14, David Lettermanreturns for only his second appearance since handing the franchise to Colbert in 2015, and his first since 2023. Letterman, now 79, has not been quiet about his opinion of the cancellation, calling CBS leadership 'lying weasels' in a recent New York Times interview and asserting that Colbert was pushed out during Paramount's Skydance merger negotiations, not for financial reasons.
The finale episode itself, May 21, has not had its full guest list confirmed. Billie Eilish has reportedly taped an appearance for the finale, per published reports. Barack Obama, who sat for a 'Colbert Questionert' segment during the penultimate week, represents one of the recurring formats the show used to reveal something unguarded in famous people, a segment that became a viewer favorite across dozens of installments.
The Late Show launched on CBS in August 1993 with Letterman as host, after he moved from NBC's Late Night where he had spent eleven years. Colbert took over in September 2015 after Letterman's retirement. Under Colbert, the show reached its first-ever number-one position in the late-night ratings and won its first Emmy for Outstanding Variety Talk Series in 2025, the same year the cancellation was announced.
Colbert has said publicly that he was offered a contract extension fewer than two years before CBS ended the show, a timeline he has noted without bitterness, though with evident curiosity about what changed. His stated intention for the remaining episodes has been to focus on the work: the guests, the segments, the writers and crew who have been with him since 2015, and the audience he has sat with every weeknight for a decade.
The guest list for this final week, read together, functions as a profile of that decade. The actors and friends who kept showing up, and continued showing up right until the end.
The Late Show with Stephen Colbert airs weeknights at 11:35 p.m. ET on CBS. The final episode airs May 21, 2026.
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This story was originally published May 9, 2026 at 11:11 AM.