Late night shows have always had a unique place in the Hollywood landscape, and at any point there are a number of them competing for viewership. Even though Stephen Colbert's Late Show was cancelled, there are still a bunch on the air. That includes Late Night with Seth Meyers, which is airing on NBC (and streaming with a Peacock subscription). The SNL alum recently broke down why these shows take hiatuses so often, with his comments coming as Jimmy Kimmel begins a week-long break.
Kimmel has taken breaks earlier this year, and he's once again going off the air for a week. Some fans are curious why these shows stop airing new episodes every now and then, and luckily Seth Meyers spoke about this subject in an interview with The Wrap. Addressing his seven-week absence from Late Night, he offered:
There’s a nice consistency to our show when it’s rolling, and we want to be able to provide that as much as we can, as much as is in our control, to our audience. Obviously we’re not going to go straight through, but if we can find our way into that SNL schedule that relies on summers off to make sure that when more people are watching TV, we’re on with better regularity, we’re going to do that.
It looks like Meyers' time on SNL is influencing his schedule for Late Night. He aimed to take one very long break, rather than going on shorter ones throughout the year. So we shouldn't expect him to go back on hiatus anytime soon. Unfortunately for fans of the genre, the same can't be said for his colleagues like Kimmel.
Meyers has spoken about the unique hours for late night talk shows, and his comments about hiatus allow for another peek behind the curtain. In the same interview, the 52-year-old host and comedian spoke more about his take on breaks. He offered:
We’ve always really wanted to let people know that we would rather be doing the show than not. And if it was in our hands, there would be more weeks on the air for us, and people don’t quite believe that. Certainly over the course of a long summer break, people have every right to call us out for what they perceive as sort of a laziness and living a good life.
It sounds like Seth understands the public perception of his job, especially when taking off for a whopping seven weeks. Perhaps his comments might help to offer some much-needed context for critics who aren't happy with him being off the air for so long. The same bit of understanding might be needed for Jimmy Kimmel and Jimmy Fallon as well.
New episodes of Late Night with Seth Meyers air weeknights on NBC as part of the 2026 TV schedule. Fingers crossed that he doesn't go back on hiatus anytime soon. From the sound of it, he won't be.
