Watch Stephen Colbert’s Final Sign-Off From ‘Late Show’ — With a Little Help From Iconic Musician

After an elongated lead-up, more than 10 years and 1,800 episodes, The Late Show With Stephen Colbert has come to an official end.

Colbert closed out his final show Thursday night with a little help from a lot of his friends — Bryan Cranston, Ryan Reynolds, Paul Rudd, Tim Meadows, Tig Notaro, and many more. But his final guest was the legendary Sir Paul McCartney.

Although McCartney was Colbert’s sole guest on the final-ever Late Show, the series finale was packed with several quick cameos from even more guests.

Colbert began, “I want you to know this show has been a joy for us to do for you. In fact, we call this show The Joy Machine. We call it The Joy Machine because to do this many shows it has to be a machine, but the thing is, if you choose to do with joy, it doesn’t hurt as much when your fingers get caught in the gears, and I cannot adequately explain to you what the people who work here have done for each other, and how much we mean to each other.”

He referenced his old show on Comedy Central. “On night one of The Colbert Report, back in the day, I said, ‘Anyone can read the news to you. I promise to feel the news at you’. And I realized pretty soon in this job that our job over here was different. We were here to feel the news with you, and I don’t know about you, but I sure have felt [the news] and I just want to let all y’all know, in here and out there, how important you’ve been to what we have done. The energy that you’ve given us, we sincerely need that to have done the best possible show we could have for you for the last 11 years.”

In his final monologue, Colbert noted the history of the Ed Sullivan Theater. “We’ve been honored to have been just a small part of it, Nichols and May played on the stage. The Beatles made their American debut here, and, backstage, Elvis used the bathroom and didn’t die,” he added.

There were a number of celebrity cameos during the monologue. Cranston kicked things off by asking if Colbert wanted a “surprise celebrity cameo popping up out of nowhere.” “No, Bryan, those always feel kind of forced,” Colbert replied.

“Maybe I could be your last guest,” the Breaking Bad star said. “That would be great, Bryan. The thing is, we already have a pretty special one lined up,” Colbert replied.

From then on, Rudd, Meadows, Notaro and Reynolds all took turns popping up and asking if they were the show’s final guest.

Before introducing said guest, Colbert teased the rumor that Pope Leo XIV would be his final interview. “My guest tonight is not just perfect, he is, in fact, infallible. Please welcome all the way from the Vatican…” he started. But turns out the final guest was McCartney.

After looking back fondly at The Beatles’ famous start in the USA at the Ed Sullivan Theater — the very same they broadcasted from Thursday night — McCartney and Colbert settled into a comfortable, typical Late Show interview.

Later, after another celebrity-packed pre-recorded piece — including appearances from Neil DeGrasse Tyson, Jon Stewart, Andy Cohen, Seth Meyers, John Oliver, Jimmy Kimmel and Jimmy Fallon — Elvis Costello turned up to play “Jump Up,” a track from 1977 with Colbert singing alongside his former bandleader, Jon Batiste, on piano and his current bandleader, Louis Cato, joining Costello on guitar.

But it was McCartney who gave the show’s final musical performance. He played The Beatles’ famed 1967 single “Hello, Goodbye” before the audience and Colbert’s friends and family joined him on stage.

The Late Show began in August 1993 with David Letterman as host, when he moved over from NBC after he didn’t get The Tonight Show gig. Letterman retired from the show in May 2015, and Colbert, who had previously starred on The Daily Show and The Colbert Report, took over in September 2015. CBS canceled the show last year ahead of its 11th season. It will be replaced by Comics Unleashed with Byron Allen.