The Stand-Ups on Late Night Television: A Mid-Year Review and Report Card

The days when a five-minute appearance on The Tonight Show with Johnny Carson could make a stand-up’s career are long gone, but the late-night television circuit remains a showcase for comedy and can be a handy barometer for the state of stand-up.

We took a look at the top late-night talk shows in the U.S. that feature stand-up comedians performing stand-up. (The Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon, Conan, Late Night with Seth Myers, The Late Show with Stephen Colbert, and The Late Late Show with James Corden and Jimmy Kimmel Live) and examined how much each show featured stand-up comedy in 2016 to date.

Here are some of the trends we discovered. To be completely fair, this article only looks at comedians who performed a stand-up set; it does not include comedians who appeared as a couch guest either to promote movies, television or even stand up shows, specials, albums and tours. Hannibal Buress, Noel Fielding, Colin Quinn, Dave Attell, Sarah Silverman, David Cross, Moshe Kasher, Tom Segura, The Kids in the Hall are just a few examples of stand up comics who have been couch guests on shows and are not included in this article.

Conan is the most stand-up friendly show…. And Jimmy Kimmel Live is the least. Conan led the pack with 28 stand-up appearances this year, including two appearances by Daniel Sloss, the only stand-up to perform twice on any one talk show this year (Mark Normand and Nick Griffin had two appearances each, but on different shows). Conan has also featured the most racially diverse group of comics, including Fahim Anwar, Dulce Sloan, Aparna Nancherla, and Joel Kim Booster, among others.

Fallon books the headliners. Music is an integral component of Fallon’s show, and Fallon usually books musical acts over stand-ups by a 10:1 ratio, but when he books stand-up, he swings for the fences. Brian Regan, Andrew Dice Clay, Jimmy Carr, Gabriel Iglesias, Nate Bargatze and Iliza Shlesinger are half of the twelve stand-ups who have performed on The Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon this year. Disappointing side note however, for most of their stand up performances, the Tonight Show doesn’t even bother to upload the stand up clips to their popular YouTube account.

No one does edgy like Stephen Colbert. Late night talk shows have become pretty benign and formulaic through the years, and stand-ups usually play things safe with sets that play to middle-America without offending anyone. Not so on The Late Show, where Sam Morril said “Having a penis is like having a Republican son. It’s a part of me so I have to support it, but these are not the views that I endorse.” Bonnie McFarlane riffing and the need to practice texting while driving and Maria Bamford’s descriptions of the various “lotions and potions” and “jams and jellies” she and her husband use in the bedroom were refreshingly edgy.

There’s still a significant gender gap in comedy. Of the 60 stand-ups who performed on late night shows this year, only 16 were female (about 25 percent). Female comics like Bonnie McFarlane and Iliza Shlesinger are changing the game, but comedy still remains largely a boys club.

There’s a youth movement under way. While comedy veterans like Regan, Clay, and Harland Williams performed this year, the overwhelming majority of stand-ups featured on late night this year have been lesser-known comics in their 20s and 30s, such as Daniel Sloss, Rhea Butcher, and Carmen Lynch. Some of the more established stand-ups (ie: Kevin Hart, Lewis Black) have transitioned to films or just doing panel on the shows. They still kill in their appearances, but those appearances are as fun interview subjects and not for stand-up performances.

Politics is surprisingly absent. In an unprecedented election year such as this, Trump and Hillary seem to be low-hanging fruit, but most of these stand-ups steered clear of politics in their late night sets. Again, maybe that was due to their willingness to please middle America and avoid alienating half their audience by displaying a political preference, or maybe they just wanted to avoid topics that would potentially be covered in the opening monologue. In any case, the lack of the political material in an election year such as this one is striking.

Here are our grades for the late night shows based on their 2016 class of late night stand up performances. We graded based on overall support of stand up comedy including number of performances this year, comics invited to perform, diversity, actual promotion and presentation of the sets and performances. Fifty eight comedians gave sixty performances on late night talk shows so far in 2016. Sixteen were women.

Conan, TBS, 29

Grade: A

Rory Scovel, January 7

Joe List, January 11

Marques Ray, January 11

Brad Wenzel, January 27

Fahim Anwar, February 1

Daniel Sloss, February 2

Dulce Sloan, February 8

Adam Clayton-Holland, February 9

Leonard Ouzts, February 22

Carmen Lynch, March 1

Shane Torres, March 8

Emily Galati, March 21

Josh Gondelman, March 23

Nick Griffin, April 4

Quincy Jones, April 11

Steve Gillespie, April 25

Myq Kaplan, May 3

Gad Elmaleh, May 11

Matt Donaher, May 12

Mark Normand, May 23

Tom Papa, June 9

Daniel Sloss, June 13

Doug Smith, June 20

Joel Kim Booster, June 22

Rhea Butcher, June 30

Aparna Nancherla, July 7

Gary Gulman, July 13

Matthew Broussard, July 26

Noah Gardenswartz, August 22

The Late Show with Stephen Colbert, CBS. 10 stand up, 1 sketch duo

Grade: B

Jerry Seinfeld, January 6

Maria Bamford, January 15

*Key & Peele (sketch), February 27

Sam Morril, April 22

Ryan Hamilton, May 6

Nick Griffin, May 13

Marina Franklin, May 27

Paul Mercurio, June 15

Bonnie McFarlane, July 15

Cory Kahaney, July 23

Mark Normand, August 5

The Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon, NBC, 12

Grade: B-

Iliza Shlesinger, January 8

Mary Lynn Rajskub, February 26

Jimmy Carr, March 17

Gabriel Iglesias, March 23

Nate Bargatze, April 1

Andrew Dice Clay, April 5

Nick Guerra, April 15

Jack Whitehall, April 29

Harland Williams, May 24

Lucas Brothers, June 8

Brian Regan, June 17

Jeff Dye, August 3

The Late Late Show with James Corden, CBS 4

Grade: C –

Jamie Lee, January 14

Cameron Esposito, March 10

Rachel Feinstein, April 18

Jared Logan, July 26

Late Night with Seth Myers, NBC, 3

Grade: D +

Michelle Wolf, April 14

Joe Pera, May 12

Fortune Feimster, June 15

Jimmy Kimmel Live, ABC, 1

Grade: Fail.

Dino Archie, July 29