Comedy Central canceled “The Nightly Show with Larry Wilmore” because of poor ratings, but the show’s host who threw around the N-word at the White House Correspondence Dinner has another theory.
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Wilmore is also now an executive producer on ABC sitcom black-ish, which he served as the showrunner for until The Nightly Show began, and recently co-created upcoming HBO comedy Insecure with Issa Rae.
“The Nightly Show With Larry Wilmore” still has one more week on the air and the last episode will be aired on Thursday, Aug. 18, 11:30 p.m.
Fans on Twitter decried the news, saying Wilmore tackled current events and life issues in a unique way.
Wilmore then went back to talking about the election, or as The Nightly Show has been calling it, “Blacklash 2016: The Unblackening”.
“But I’m also saddened and surprised we won’t be covering this insane election or “The Unblackening” as we’ve coined it”, his statement said, referring to the fact that a white candidate will be replacing President Barack Obama and all that entails. “Really our show was at its best when the news was at its worst”. He said the show had steadily improved, “but unfortunately it hasn’t resonated with the audience in a way that it would need to for us to continue”.
“Given the importance of “Daily Show” franchise to Comedy Central, it’s no surprise that the cabler would devote more energy and resources to promoting Noah rather than ‘Nightly‘”.
The network’s president, Kent Alterman, said of the cancellation: “We just didn’t feel like we had enough traction to sign up for another year. I guess I hadn’t counted on “The Unblackening” happening on my show”.
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When it launched in January 2015 to replace Steven Colbert’s “The Colbert Report”, “The Nightly Show” benefited from the lead-in of network stalwart “The Daily Show With Jon Stewart”. Meanwhile, “Nightly Show” lagged behind, perhaps since its competitors could “capitalize on airing weekly and with the looser restrictions of cable”, as Daniel Fienberg noted in The Hollywood Reporter.
