Stephen Colbert!

I will watch but am afraid he will have to tone down the things that made him popular. This isn't cable and the humor must be homogenized for a broader audience.

My Colbert Drought ended two weeks ago, as I was lucky enough to score test show tickets. The show was a fun time. The theater looks amazing. I had Jon Batiste play a bar of music a foot away from me, and Stephen came down and shook my hand and others in the audience. It was great.

Wait... Whaaaaat? When I did I stop paying attention to everything that was happening in the real world? This is so exciting!

I wrote a trip report on my Test Show experience. For those wondering, the Shake reference was in regards to receiving free shakes at my last Letterman taping on May 11th.

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On Thursday, August 27th, 2015, I, Bill Lehecka, made my first trip to see The Late Show With Starring Stephen Colbert at the Ed Sullivan Theater in New York City.

About 3 weeks ago, Stephen Colbert tweeted a link to test show tickets. As much as I wanted to go on September 8th, I figured the first test show would be even more special. I was only able to secure one ticket.
Being that the trip was similar to my Letterman journeys through the years, the trip itinerary didn't change much. I took Amtrak from Albany down to NYC. From Penn Station, I take the 1 train two stops uptown to 50th Street and walk the rest of the way. I figured I'd stop by Rupert's for lunch and then get in line before 3pm.

One slight problem: my train was late 50 minutes. That's... A bit of a delay.

I ended up in the city around 1:40pm. I had to forego Rupert and get right in line. There were about 100 people in front of me.

While waiting, I took in the ridiculous new marquee with its flashing lights and vertical Colbert sign above. It truly is bombastic and ridiculous... But it matches the inside of the theater. I'll get to that in a bit.

Around 3:15 a Late Show audience team member with a headset and an iPad came by and scanned my ticket and checked my ID. I was subsequently stamped with a lion illustration on my right and and put back in line.

Around 3:30, they started letting everyone into the outer lobby. We were lined up in a serpentine style, two by two. In the secondary lobby there are new flat screens. They showed some current YouTube videos Stephen has made since he started back in June.

People had their phones out and were tweeting and facebooking. It was a bit surreal to see this after years of being told no pics inside the lobby.

A woman came out and gave the audience spiel. It only lasted about 5 minutes and it was basically have fun, no photos inside the theater (which I got chastised for because I figured I would try to record her spiel), and have fun and laugh. Very low key. She said Stephen would be taking questions.

Around 4:30 they opened the secondary lobby doors and let us into the theater. Since I was a single, they sat me third row left side, right in front of the new desk. As an Ed Sullivan Theater veteran, this was a normal seating location for me. My first Letterman taping I was on the left side two rows back. My second Letterman taping I was first row on the left side.

The renovated theater was truly a sight to behold: LED lighting, brick walls, columns that lend to the beautiful views of the inside, stained glass windows. The audience area was painted a faint hue of yellow. The seats were widened for comfort. It was spectacular. The dome is now fully viewable and the wooden chandelier is just magnificent. The ceiling had Stephen's grinning face projected all around. It almost looked like the Sistine chapel. I wish I could've saw more, but I just snuck one photo inside and wasn't feeling any more. Pat Farmer and Harold Larkin are still on staff, with Pat being very active in setting up props before and during the show. In the middle of the set, a gigantic "The Late Show With" sign was hanging above the stage.

On the left stood the new desk with "The Late Show With" logo on front. It was shaped like a C and had LED lighting effects. A Matte Print of NYC was behind. To the left and right were the continuations of the matte print, but were Projection screens that could also show video. To the extreme left were various tchotchkes from his past show. To the right was the Band setup. There was a Steinway Grand Piano which dominated the area and a Tuba ready to be played.

At 5pm, Paul Mercurio came out to warm up the audience. He was a very active warmup guy. He would talk to individual audience members and bring a couple up on stage. It felt like 20 solid minutes of warmup. Not sure if this was because he was stalling or that's how long it will take. He hit a comedy gold mine when her found rabbis from Alabama in the audience. He told us when Batiste and when Colbert came out to give them standing ovations.

After Paul's warmup, he introduced Jon Batiste and Stay Human. They play a very melodic mix of southern style creole music. Very New Orleans feeling. It lent to a chill atmosphere. Not only would be okay, his band members would get up and wander the stage, the catwalk, and even the audience playing. It felt very interactive. They played 3 songs (Hell if I could identify them) and then there was a little more stalling. And then Stephen Colbert came out to chants of "Stephen! Stephen!"

Colbert had a grin on his face like he finally arrived. He came from the middle of the stage, where there are brick walls leading the way out. He told us that while this was a test show, we got to witness the first actual show... So this was truly a special moment for us in the audience. And to the people visiting on September 8th... "Fuck those guys!"

Colbert did a brief monologue and then headed to his desk.

I was instructed not to tweet about the show I watched because it does seem they'll be using these bits when the show premieres in two weeks, so I won't spoil them here. Needless to say they were funny and you won't be disappointed. He was very comfortable on stage.
During the commercial breaks, he was surrounded by about 5 or 6 people discussing the show. Colbert seemed very involved with everything. During this, Batiste and his band kept playing, and came out from behind the piano with his band and got into some soulful music playing. At one point Stephen came out and danced with Jon. The band would go up and down the aisles playing. It was very immersive. During one break, Batiste went down my aisle and played a bar a foot away from my face.

After Colbert finished talking with his staff, he looked over the audience and looked to be in serious awe. He would point and gesture to the crowd. He truly seemed happy to be performing again.

The guests were former head coach and CBS Sports football analyst Bill Cowher and 2 time poet laureate Billy Collins. Since the show will never air on TV, many fucks were thrown around.

When the show ended, Colbert thanked everyone for coming and shook hands with the first couple of rows of audience members. I got to shake his hand. He went back up on stage and did a Q&A with the audience for a couple of minutes. Someone asked him "Why The Late Show With?" He said "Because I'm right here. If I put my name on there it would be redundant." He said good night and we were led out of the theater.

As we were walking out, staff members gave us all baseball cards with Bill Cowher's face and "stats" on the back. Very cute.

After exiting, I headed over to Steak 'n Shake for a refreshing shake. I had to pay for it this time.
I headed back to Penn Station and hopped on my train home.

Overall, I was in the theater for 2 hours. I'm sure once they get a couple of test shows under their belts, it won't be such a time commitment. There was a lot of energy. It was definitely different than a Letterman taping. Very chill but also very high energy.

I recommend going down and seeing for yourself.

The POTUS approves.

Was skipping through shows on my DVR and ran across sunday morning, this article was pretty good:

http://www.cbsnews.com/news/stephen-colbert-for-real/