Steve Pond's Blog, page 121

Voice of America Rehires Persian-Language Staff After Iran Strike

Voice of America has rehired it’s Persian language staff following an escalating military conflict between Iran and Israel Thursday and Friday.

Following a sidelining from the Trump administration, employees who were put on administrative leave were informed by the US Agency for Global Media that they were to return to their roles providing counter-programming to Iranian state media.

“Effective immediately, you are recalled from administrative leave,” USAGM’s human resources department said in an email shared with Politico. “You are expected to report to your duty station immediately.”

According to The Washington Post, VOA’s Persian wing asked more than 50 people to return to work immediately after months of administrative leave.

“An admission by Trump administration of the network’s utility during crisis,” NPR media correspondent David Folkenflik said on X following the news.

The decision to bring back the Persian-language wing comes as the conflict between Iran and Israel escalated following missile strikes on Thursday and Friday night. Late Thursday, Israel launched missile strikes on Iran’s nuclear facilities and Friday Iran launched a retaliatory strike on Israel.

The service had been shut down as part of the Trump administration’s moves to cut all funding for U.S.-backed global media.

A federal judge blocked Trump’s attempts to cut VOA and other government-funded news services. Judge Royce Lamberth said the Trump Administration had “no method or approach” to shut down the U.S. Agency for Global Media, the VOA’s parent agency; he ordered the USAGM to restore employment to hundreds of staffers who had been placed on leave and to continue operating as before.

“It is hard to fathom a more straightforward display of arbitrary and capricious actions than the Defendants’ actions here,” the judge said in April.

More to come…

The post Voice of America Rehires Persian-Language Staff After Iran Strike appeared first on TheWrap.

Blake Lively Seeks Protective Order to Block Justin Baldoni’s Legal Team from Accessing Taylor Swift Messages

Blake Lively has requested a protective order to block Justin Baldoni’s legal team from obtaining her private communications with Taylor Swift amid ongoing litigation tied to Wayfarer Studios.

Despite the fact that Baldoni’s team dropped an earlier subpoena for text messages between the singer and the actress, Lively’s attorney, Esra Hudson, claims that the actor’s attorney’s have not abandoned their “media strategy,” which still involves Swift.

In a letter sent to U.S. District Judge Lewis J. Liman, which was obtained by TheWrap, Hudson also alleges that Baldoni’s camp is withholding documents that formed the basis of their original subpoena.

A spokesperson for Lively told TheWrap Baldoni and Wayfarer Studios “are still demanding access to Taylor Swift’s private communications” despite claiming they had already obtained what they needed.

“As reflected in today’s filing, their intent to drag Taylor Swift into this was evident as far back as August 2024,” the spokesperson for Lively said. “The ongoing attempts to once again try and use the world’s biggest star as a PR tactic in this matter reflects a public unraveling of epic proportions—and serves only to distract from the fact that Justin Baldoni’s lawsuits against Ms. Lively, Ryan Reynolds, their publicist, and the New York Times have been entirely dismissed.”

When Baldoni initially dropped the Taylor Swift subpoena on May 22, a spokesperson for Lively told TheWrap that they were “pleased” with the “It Ends With Us” director and star’s decision to end his “harassing” probe into Swift and her law firm.

“We supported the efforts of Taylor’s team to quash these inappropriate subpoenas directed to her counsel and we will continue to stand up for any third party who is unjustly harassed or threatened in the process,” the spokesperson said at the time.

TheWrap has reached out to Hudson and Baldoni’s attorney Bryan Freedman for comment.

In other recent developments, a judge dismissed Baldoni’s $400 million defamation lawsuit against Lively on Monday.

Freedman told TheWrap of the ruling, “Ms. Lively and her team’s predictable declaration of victory is false, so let us be clear about the latest ruling. While the court dismissed the defamation-related claims, the court has invited us to amend four out of the seven claims against Ms. Lively, which will showcase additional evidence and refined allegations.”

The post Blake Lively Seeks Protective Order to Block Justin Baldoni’s Legal Team from Accessing Taylor Swift Messages appeared first on TheWrap.

Byron Allen and McDonald’s Reach Settlement in Lawsuit Over Black-Owned Media Advertising Pledge

McDonald’s has settled its $10 billion lawsuit levied by Byron Allen and his media companies over black-owned media advertising pledges.

The settlement was reached Friday between the fast food company and Allen’s companies Entertainment Studios Network and the Weather Group. The settlement both dodges the upcoming July 15 court trial and also resolves claims made in a separate but related $100 million lawsuit against the company.

“We are pleased that Mr. Allen has come to appreciate McDonald’s unwavering commitment to inclusion, and has agreed to refocus his energies on a mutually beneficial commercial arrangement that is consistent with other McDonald’s supplier relationships,” McDonald’s said in a statement. “Our company’s unique three-legged stool model relies on mutual respect, and we look forward to ESN’s contributions to the betterment of our system.”

Byron’s pair of media companies Entertainment Studios Network and Weather Group also commented on the settlement.

During the course of this litigation, many of our preconceptions have been clarified, and we acknowledge McDonald’s commitment to investing in Black-owned media properties and increasing access to opportunity,” their statement read. “Our differences are behind us, and we look forward to working together.”

The original lawsuit came out of 2021 pledge by McDonald’s to more than double its spending on American media companies and production shops owned by Black, Asian, Latino, female and LGBTQ people, as well as individual content creators, by the end of 2024. Allen’s lawsuit came in 2023 and called this a “lie” and “false promise,” largely due to what it argued was insufficient spending on Allen’s companies in particular.

In February 2024, a Los Angeles Superior Court judge has dismissed the $100 million lawsuit filed citing California’s anti-SLAPP laws. Judge Mel Recana noted that the suit was filed nearly 2 years before McDonald’s self-imposed deadline, and as such called the accusations within it “purely speculative.”

The post Byron Allen and McDonald’s Reach Settlement in Lawsuit Over Black-Owned Media Advertising Pledge appeared first on TheWrap.

Alex Cooper’s Former Coach Says She Has ‘No Recollection’ of Harassment Alleged in ‘Call Me Alex’

After “Call Her Daddy” host Alex Cooper alleged she suffered years worth of sexual harassment from Boston University soccer coach Nancy Feldman, former assistant coach Casey Brown said she had “no recollection” of the incidents mentioned in Hulu’s “Call Her Alex” docuseries.

Cooper told The Boston Globe in an interview published Friday that, amidst a mononucleosis outbreak, she was the only player called into the office to explain “who” she’d been with and “how” she got it.

The podcaster said she pleaded with Brown, “‘Casey, help me’,” but instead, Brown “did nothing about it” and simply turned away.

In a statement to the Globe, Brown said she had “no recollection of what has been suggested” by Cooper.

Brown went on to say, “But let me be absolutely clear: I would never ignore, dismiss or turn away from anyone — a player, a teammate, a friend, a family member — who sought my help in any capacity. As a coach, I understood the weight of my responsibility to protect my players and act accordingly. The suggestion that I would do otherwise is completely false.”

The university also issued a statement on Friday, insisting that it has a “zero-tolerance policy for sexual harassment,”as well as a “robust system of resources, support and staff dedicated to student well-being” and “a thorough reporting process through our Equal Opportunity Office.”

“We encourage members of our community to report any concerns, and we remain committed to fostering a safe and secure campus environment for all,” the statement concluded.

Cooper was on the Boston team from 2013 to 2015 with a full athletic scholarship. As she explained in “Call Her Alex,” she did not feel she could speak out as it would jeopardize that scholarship.

In the two-part Hulu series, the podcaster said she noticed Feldman “really starting to fixate on me, way more than any other teammate of mine, and it was confusing,” during her sophomore year of college.

She added that her coach leveraged field time in exchange for stories about Cooper’s sex life and dating history. Cooper claimed she also made specific comments about her body and “always wanted to be alone with me.”

She also alleged in the documentary that the BU athletic director Drew Marrochello, who per the university’s website still serves in this position, declined to hear the evidence of harassment when her parents tried to present it to him.

According to Boston University, Feldman retired in 2022.

Toward the end of filming the documentary, Cooper said she found out that other women younger than her experienced the same abuse she did at the hands of her soccer coach.

“Everything changed for me that day,” she said in an episode of her podcast this week.

The post Alex Cooper’s Former Coach Says She Has ‘No Recollection’ of Harassment Alleged in ‘Call Me Alex’ appeared first on TheWrap.

What I Learned Reading the 846 Pages of Emmy Ballots

Nominating ballots for the 77th Primetime Emmy Awards were posted on the Television Academy’s website on Thursday to mark the beginning of voting. They were divided into 35 separate documents detailing all the eligible entries in 107 categories,  totaling 846 pages of everyone who’s eligible.

(Not all categories are included in the posted ballots, because some use judging panels or other methods of choosing nominees.)  

We’ve looked through all of those pages and learned a few things. So here’s an overview of Emmy nomination voting in 2025, which will last through Monday, June 23.

There are fewer entries than there were in 2024

Last year was a rough one for the Emmys, with the effects of the pandemic and the actors and writers strikes reducing the number of shows that made it on the air and cutting the number of entries in the vast majority of categories, sometimes by as much as 40%. But rather than rebounding to pre-strike levels, this year’s field is also down, though not nearly as much.

Of the 106 categories for which a year-by-year comparison is possible, 44 have more entries this year than they did last year; six have the name number of entries; and 56 have fewer entries. Overall, the number of submissions in all categories is down – but only slightly, with a total drop of 142 entries spread out across all of the categories.

Limited series had an off year

In the program categories, Outstanding Limited or Anthology Series took the biggest hit. Only 33 series qualified, 16 fewer than last year’s total and 28 fewer than the 61 eligible titles only two years ago. That led to the three biggest drops in the acting categories, which all took place in the limited series/TV movie categories: lead actor fell by 22, supporting actor by 37 and supporting actress by 32.

Something similar happened up and down the ballot: In every category devoted to limited series and TV movies, both above and below the line, this year saw a significant drop, almost always in double digits.

But we’ll have more nominees this year

Apart from the Outstanding Drama Series and Outstanding Comedy Series categories, which are set at eight nominees each, the number of nominees in each category is determined by how many submissions are made in that category. If it’s 20 to 80, the category gets five nominees; 81 to 160 gets six; 161 to 240 gets seven; anything over 240 gets eight.

And despite the overall drop in submissions, more categories appear to be in line to go up in size than to go down this year.

In the acting races, for example, lead actor in a drama series should drop from six nominees last year to five this year, and supporting actor in a limited series should drop from seven to six. But supporting actor in a comedy should go up from six to seven, guest actor in a drama should go up from five to six (with guest actress following because the rules dictate actor/actress equity) and performer in a short-form series should go up from three nominees last year to five this year.

Overall, eight categories are in line to grow in size compared to last year; only six are in line to go down.

“The White Lotus” (Credit: HBO)Category hogging in the acting categories is quite possible this year

For years, a small number of shows have grabbed a large number of acting nominations. “The White Lotus” is a prime example, dominating the supporting categories in its first two seasons by getting eight noms in its first year and nine in its second. “The Morning Show” got seven acting noms of its own last year, while “Succession” set a record with 14 acting nominations in 2022 and then tied it in 2023.

Could it happen again this year? The Emmy ballots suggest it’s possible, starting with the roster of candidates from “The White Lotus.” A full 20 of the actors from Mike White’s show were submitted, from favorites like Walton Goggins, Jason Isaacs, Carrie Coon and Aimee Lou Wood to lesser-known contenders like Nicholas Duvernay, Lalisa Manobal and Charlotte Le Bon. Nine men and 10 women are entered in the supporting actor and actress category, while Scott Glenn is the sole cast member entered in a guest category.

But while “Lotus” has had the greatest success among this year’s contenders in racking up multiple nominations in the past, it’s not the show with the most acting entries this year. Seth Rogen and Evan Goldberg’s “The Studio” has 22 entries, which include cast members along with 12 movie-industry figures who are submitted for playing themselves, or at least versions of themselves: Zac Efron, Dave Franco, Ron Howard (also up for playing himself in “Only Murders in the Building”), Zoe Kravitz, Greta Lee, Anthony Mackie, Sarah Polley, Martin Scorsese, Nicholas Stoller, Olivia Wilde, Ramy Youssef and, most surprisingly, journalist Matt Belloni.

Other shows with lots of acting submissions include “Abbott Elementary” with 12, “Hacks” with 13, “The Pitt” with 17 and “Severance” with 19. But they’re all slackers compared to our next item.

“Saturday Night Live” went all out

“SNL” celebrated its 50th season by submitting an astonishing 43 different actors to the Emmys. You’d think they could have gone for an even 50 to match the number of seasons – but there really wasn’t anybody left to enter. The “SNL” submissions included every one of the season’s 14 “repertory players,” all three of its “featured players,” five celebrity guests (Dana Carvey as Joe Biden, Jim Gaffigan as Tim Walz, Mike Myers as Elon Musk, Andy Samberg as Doug Emhoff and Maya Rudolph as Kamala Harris), and every single one of the season’s 20 hosts, from Jean Smart to Scarlett Johansson. Plus, Darrell Hammond was submitted for narrating the series’ anniversary special.

As fine as the anniversary spirit is, though, voters have been cooling on the show’s performers in recent years. After “SNL” averaged almost eight acting nominations a year from 2015 through 2021, it has averaged only three in the past three years. The only cast members to be nominated in that time have been Kate McKinnon once and Bowen Yang twice, plus nods for hosts Quinta Brunson, Jerrod Carmichael, Ryan Gosling, Pedro Pascal, Maya Rudolph and Kristen Wiig.

The choreography category has the ultimate category-hogger

There are 34 entries in the Outstanding Choreography for Variety or Reality Programming categories.  They come from shows that include Kendrick Lamar’s Super Bowl halftime show, “RuPaul’s Drag Race,” the Grammys and the Oscars and “Victoria’s Secret Fashion Show 2024,” with 18 different programs supplying 18 of the nominees.

And then there’s “Dancing With the Stars,” which submitted the other 16 entries in the category.  No other category has this kind of imbalance, with 47% of the entries coming from one program. But it’s worth noting that while “DWTS” has received 23 Emmy nominations for choreography and won five times (placing it a distant second to the 43 noms and 12 wins for “So You Think You Can Dance”), it hasn’t had more than one nomination in the category since 2021, and the only time it has had more than two was in its first year in the competition, 2006.

Some shows are worried about vote-splitting. Others, not so much

In the directing and writing categories, “How many episodes should we submit?” has long been a thorny question. If you enter multiple episodes, are you increasing your chance of being nominated or are you making it easier to split the vote and lose out entirely? Pundits tend to favor the latter theory, though it’s not hard to find examples of a popular show landing multiple nominations: “The Bear” did it last year for directing and “Shogun” did it for writing.

This year, many of the top contenders stop with one or two entries in those categories, though it’s fairly common to go up to three submissions in directing. In comedy directing, “Abbott Elementary,” “Agatha All Along,” “The Bear,” “Only Murders in the Building,” “Runing Point” and “Somebody Somewhere” are among the programs that entered a trio of episodes for directing, while “Poker Face” and “Shrinking” were the only two shows to enter four episodes.

Drama directing, though, was a different matter. Seventeen shows entered at least three episodes, with “The Pitt,” “Paradise” and “Severance” stopping at three but others going much farther. “The Boys” and “House of the Dragon” submitted five, “Will Trent” did six (including one directed by Howie Deutch and one directed by his wife, Lea Thompson), “Yellowstone” did seven and Ryan Murphy’s medical drama “Doctor Odyssey” submitted 11, one for each of its first season directors.

Writing submissions were more modest, with the “Star Wars” spinoff series “The Acolyte” submitting eight episodes and the comedy series “The Conners” and “Poker Face” submitting five. Among the shows that stuck with a single entry were the comedies “Abbott Elementary,” “Hacks,” “Only Murders in the Building,” “The Righteous Gemstones” and “The Studio” and the dramas “The Last of Us,” “Matlock,” “Severance,” “Slow Horses” and “The White Lotus.”

And yes, “Lotus” submitted the episode with Sam Rockwell’s monologue.

The post What I Learned Reading the 846 Pages of Emmy Ballots appeared first on TheWrap.

John Stamos Says He Broke the News of Brian Wilson’s Death to Cousin and Beach Boys Vocalist Mike Love: ‘His Face Went Blank’

John Stamos, who has been an honorary Beach Boy for 40 years, said he was the one to break the news of Brian Wilson’s death to his cousin and the band’s vocalist, Mike Love.

“I was with Mike, I got off the plane, and I got the text,” Stamos told the New York Post at the Songwriters Hall of Fame induction ceremony on Thursday at the Marriott Marquis.

“I was like, ‘Oh boy, I guess I better [tell him].’ I said, ‘Mike, your cousin passed away,’ and his face went blank.”

The “Full House” actor added, “We sat in the car for 2½ hours or so … he didn’t say one word. And I didn’t ask him anything, ask him how he was feeling. I knew how he was feeling.”

Stamos reflected on the connection between the two original Beach Boys members: You know, they had 80-plus years together. They made beautiful music together.”

Love co-founded the band with his cousins Brian, Dennis, and Carl Wilson, and friend Al Jardine in 1961. Brian was also a lead singer, but he left the iconic California band in 1964. He briefly returned in the ’80s.

Stamos first played with the Beach Boys at a Fourth of July concert at the Washington Monument in 1985. “This July 4th will be 40 years of nagging them and stalking them,” he told the Post.

The actor said he was lucky to have “spent a good amount of time” with Wilson, recalling the time when the late music legend stepped in for Love.

“We were doing some shows in Montreal, I was with them, and Mike couldn’t make about five shows,” he said. “And so Brian came out, and he’s the lead singer of the band … and it was great.”

“Without Brian Wilson, life would be a mistake,” Stamos added. “It’s been a big blow to all of us.”

The post John Stamos Says He Broke the News of Brian Wilson’s Death to Cousin and Beach Boys Vocalist Mike Love: ‘His Face Went Blank’ appeared first on TheWrap.

Where Was the Live-Action ‘How to Train Your Dragon’ Filmed?

The Isle of of Berk is insane, which Hiccup makes a point to warn you about multiple times in “How to Train Your Dragon,” cautioning that if you want to visit, you’ll have to be cool with dragons. But he doesn’t tell you exactly where to go, so that’s what we’re here to do.

To be clear, no, the Isle of Berk itself isn’t a real place. But the team behind the live-action “How to Train Your Dragon” definitely did bring it to life using real shooting locations. Of course, given the dragons of it all, much of it is indeed CGI. Nonetheless, there is some beautiful scenery that Hiccup (Mason Thames) and his crew fly through.

In theaters now, “How to Train Your Dragon” is a live-action remake of the 2010 animated film of the same name. Dean DeBlois returns to write and direct, and the story is largely unchanged, following a young viking boy as he attempts to change the relationship between humans and dragons.

In the original film, Hiccup notes that Berk is “twelve days north of Hopeless, and a few degrees south of Freezing to Death. It’s located solidly on the Meridian of Misery.” Expanded lore tells fans that the Meridian of Misery is part of the Barbaric Archipelago, which is in the Norwegian Sea.

It should make sense then that the live-action “How to Train Your Dragon” filmed partly in Iceland (which is indeed in the Norwegian sea), while production also took place in Northern Ireland, over in Belfast, where the bulk of filming took place.

“How to Train Your Dragon” is now in theaters.

The post Where Was the Live-Action ‘How to Train Your Dragon’ Filmed? appeared first on TheWrap.

Annecy: Laika’s ‘ParaNorman’ Returns to Theaters This Halloween With New Short

LAIKA’s “ParaNorman” is returning from the great beyond.

The 2012 feature, directed by Sam Fell and Chris Butler (who also wrote the screenplay), will have a one-week theatrical run this Halloween. Trafalgar Releasing will be handling international markets, with the movie debuting on Thursday, Oct. 23 and Fathom Entertainment is handling the movie’s rollout in the United States starting on Saturday, October 25. The movie has been remastered and will be presented in RealD 3D, along with traditional 2D exhibitions.

Additionally, there will be a brand-new short film from the world of “ParaNorman” included in this release.

“ParaNorman: The Thrifting” is directed by LAIKA’s lead character designer Thibault LeClercq and written by Chris Butler and is a fully computer-animated short, produced in association with Passion Pictures. The short stars “Stranger Things” breakout Finn Wolfhard and Anna Kendrick reprising her role of Norman’s older sister, Courtney Babcock.

The re-release of “ParaNorman,” the Oscar-nominated LAIKA favorite about Norman (Kodi Smit-McPhee) a strange kid who can see ghosts, follows the blockbuster re-release of LAIKA’s “Coraline” last year that racked up an astounding $56 million worldwide. Clearly they are looking to turn a theatrical outing to a LAIKA favorite into a yearly Halloween tradition.

“’ParaNorman’ was a breakthrough film for LAIKA — emotionally rich, visually daring, and proudly weird in all the right ways,” said LAIKA’s Chief Marketing & Operations Officer David Burke in an official statement. “Bringing it back to theaters in stunning remastered 3D, paired with a brand-new short film, is an invitation for audiences to rediscover the heart and humor of Norman’s world — or experience it for the first time. Today, horror has become a shared family ritual, and ParaNorman sits right at the intersection of spooky and meaningful. It’s the perfect ‘starter horror’ — a gateway into genre storytelling that’s as thoughtful as it is thrilling.”

”Fathom is very pleased to extend our distribution partnership with LAIKA and bring the critically acclaimed ‘ParaNorman’ back to US audiences this Halloween in both 2D and RealD 3D and with the exclusive consumer added value feature, ‘ParaNorman: The Thrifting,’” said Ray Nutt, Fathom Entertainment’s Chief Executive Officer in an official statement. “Coraline consumers voted with their wallets last year, resulting in approximately 70% of the record-breaking $34M+ U.S. theatrical box office coming in 3D.  ParaNorman is the ideal, spooky follow-up for audiences to enjoy on the big screen later this year.”

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Jimmy Kimmel Jokes That Trump Seeing ‘Les Misérables’ Is Like ‘Kanye Going to Fiddler on the Roof’ | Video

This week, Donald Trump went to a performance of “Les Misérables” at the Kennedy Center — an event in which many roles were performed by understudies because some of the main boycotted, and audience members specifically booed Trump. (You can probably guess why.)

Jimmy Kimmel was amused that Trump went to see the musical, especially because it advances values that are essentially the opposite of Trump’s. But before he went there, Kimmel started his monologue on Thursday by talking about the situation in Los Angeles.

“We are coming to you from the post-apocalyptic hellscape of Los Angeles. Somehow, we managed to survive another night. Wow. Give yourselves a round of applause,” Kimmel joked, referring to the highly exaggerated and often just straight up lies account of the situation in Los Angeles amid the ICE protests.

‘I mean, you were able to dodge the pipe bombs and the hand grenades to get in here? It’s like ‘Grand Theft Auto’ meets ‘The Walking Dead’ out there, you know?
The LA Philharmonic and the Mark Taper Forum had to cancel their shows tonight and this week because there’s a curfew in effect downtown,” Kimmel explained. “But there was no curfew in Washington last night, where it was opening night for the new and MAGA-friendly Kennedy Center, led by Donald Trump, their self-appointed chairman of the board.”

The President was in attendance to see one of his favorite musicals, ‘Les Misérables,'” Kimmel explained. “Now, ‘Les Misérables’ is, have you seen ‘Les Misérables’ Guillermo?” Kimmel asked, addressing his in-show sidekick. “It’s a musical largely about a revolution. It’s the people standing up against their King.”

“The rebellion happens in act two. Or, I should say, it usually happens in act two. After act one, last night Trump called in the National Guard and squashed the whole thing,” Kimmel joked, referring to what Trump is doing to Los Angeles.

“I have to say, Trump going to see ‘Les Misérables’ right now, is like Kanye going to ‘Fiddler on the Roof.’ It’s like Diddy going to see ‘Grease’ right now,” Kimmel quipped. “Usually when Trump watches a staged rebellion, it’s Fox News coverage of the ‘riots’ here in LA.”

Kimmel then noted some of the Trump administration figures who attended. This included Trump’s wife, Melania Trump, Vice President JD Vance and his wife Usha, Attorney General Pam Bondi, the anti-vaccines Secretary of Health and Human Services Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and Ohio Congressman Jim Jordan. Or as Kimmel put it, “the Tony Awards for people who want to take away the rights of everyone at the Tony Awards.”

Watch the whole monologue below:

The post Jimmy Kimmel Jokes That Trump Seeing ‘Les Misérables’ Is Like ‘Kanye Going to Fiddler on the Roof’ | Video appeared first on TheWrap.

Taylor Tomlinson Bids Farewell to ‘After Midnight,’ Admits She ‘Really Wanted CBS to Replace Me’ | Video

Taylor Tomlinson said goodbye to “After Midnight” Thursday with the final episode of the show’s second season — and thus, the final episode period.

And in her last-ever monologue, Tomlinson admitted she’s disappointed that CBS opted not to continue the show, telling her audience “it was my dream” that the network would replace her with a new host.

When Tomlinson decided to back away from the show to focus on her standup comedy career, CBS decided to let the show end with her exit. “After Midnight” will be replaced in the 12:30 a.m. slot with “Comics Unleashed With Byron Allen,” a show with a completely different format, starting in September.

In her monologue, Tomlinson alluded to the difficult decision she made to walk away, and to her reasons for leaving, but she mainly thanked the people working on the show who helped make it happen.

“I’m so grateful that I got a chance to do this. I never thought that I would be able to host a late night show. This was never something that was on my vision board at all because I I just didn’t think it was possible for me, like I’m a touring stand up. And I feel very grateful to have that career that I do, and this opportunity came along at a time in my life where I could take advantage of it, and while, unfortunately, I couldn’t keep doing the show, it just wasn’t sustainable for me. I just I can’t believe that I got to do it as long as I did,” she began.

“You know, it was my dream that I would get to finish out this season and hand it off to a new host. I really wanted CBS to replace me, because I just think there are so many amazing comedians who would have done a great job with this show,” she continued. “And the reason I feel that way is because, honestly, I can’t.”

“I can’t really express how special this team of people is that I got. When I tell you, I mean, a lot of people have told me, like, Oh, you’re so good at this job. Like, who else could have done it? I’m I’m not kidding. A lot of people could have done it because this team is so supportive and is so good at preparing people to be on television. I mean, we have three guests minimum every single night who are on the whole hour. We make them stand like the whole time, like, it’s a big it’s a big ask to have people do this show like I mean, I hope you guys. Let me just be sentimental for a second, but like, the amount of work that goes into doing a show like this, it’s insane,” Tomlinson went on.

The comedian then noted the staff her made her look good every night — hair, makeup, wardrobe, who she said “deserve an award,” and admitted that “I had no idea how to be on TV every day. I had no idea how to do any of this. I had no idea how much work it was to make a late night show every single day, and like, to be totally frank, like we didn’t have the budget of a traditional late night show. Like, I know we make jokes on the show, like we don’t have the budget set. We really didn’t. We really, really didn’t. And everyone who works here was doing the job of, like, several people, not just their own. Everybody was working overtime, and everybody cared so much.”

Tomlinson ran the audience through the show’s exhausting pace, noting it was often edited while they were still filming, that it had two showrunners, multiple producers. She nodded to the “so many people behind the scenes” who kept things running, from talent bookers, to her writers, a “room full of comedians who are incredible performers in their own right. And were also not only writing jokes for me every day, they were also writing jokes for minimum, three panelists, if not, like, a few more walk-ons.”

She also explained how they ended up adding a monologue to the show. “After Midnight” is of course a fake game show where comedians riff on current events for weird prizes. “When we started this show, we weren’t doing a monologue. That was something that we added at the end of season one. And yeah, when we started doing the monologue, it was just my friend Sophie Bottle writing them. And then we added, like, a few more of our writers from the team. But it’s a very it was a small team of people, I’m telling you, like, I we had a small we just, we just did so much with they stretched so little to become so much.”

She also thanked Percy Rustomji, the show’s announcer/hype man, who she said, “whenever people do this show, they leave and they’re like, this should be Percy’s show. And I’m like, I agree with you, by the way.”

She thanked the show’s digital strategy team, and after worrying she might have forgotten some people, said, “I just need everybody watching to know how much this experience has meant to me. And the reason I took this job was to work with these people who are so good at what they do, and anyone you see on stage tonight, behind the scenes, just know, like, this is the A team you guys.”

“So I just want to say on camera thank you so much to the staff and crew of after midnight for having me as your host for 200 episodes,” she added.

Watch Tomlinson’s final monologue below:

The post Taylor Tomlinson Bids Farewell to ‘After Midnight,’ Admits She ‘Really Wanted CBS to Replace Me’ | Video appeared first on TheWrap.