NBC’s extremely late-night forays are coming to a close with the end of A Little Late With Lilly Singh.
The show, which airs at 1:30am, will be coming to an end with its second season and the network is moving out of original programming for the slot that it previously called a “creative playground”.
The move is a blow to the diversity of late-night television as Singh is the other woman hosting a show on a broadcast network, but it is unsurprising given the ratings attached to a show that airs so late. The final episode will air on Thursday June 3.
A Little Late with Lilly Singh launched in September 2019, a replacement for Last Call with Carson Daly, and followed The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon and Late Night with Seth Meyers. However, there was a large gap between seasons one and two due to the pandemic and Singh returned in January 2021 in a house rather than a studio.
Singh herself has struck a first-look deal with Universal Television Alternative Studio with her Unicorn Island Productions banner. The first-look deal will see her developing unscripted projects with the unscripted division of Universal Studio Group, which is run by President Toby Gorman, who called her a “creative visionary”.
She is also attached to star in a Netflix comedy series that she is developing with Kenya Barris. She didn’t disclose many details of this project, other to say that it is being produced by Barris’ Khalabo Ink Society with writers/executive producers Nell Scovell and Diya Mishra.
“Two years ago, I embarked on the wild journey of late night TV. I knew this show was about more than me, and I will be forever grateful for the opportunity and support. Today, I write to you from a similar place of deep gratitude to share some news,” she said. “I’m going to focus on the slate of projects my company Unicorn Island Productions is developing, and we’re saying goodbye to A Little Late with Lilly Singh. I have a desire to make longer form content telling underrepresented stories, which is difficult to execute on a nightly show.”
“This is just the beginning; I can’t wait to share more with you but this is all I can tease for now. I’m beyond grateful for your support past, present and future,” she added. “And to the Late with Lilly crew, I’m so proud of the progress we made in diversifying late night. We’ve given 21 people their late night debut this season. That’s pretty incredible and it’s been a true honour.”