"A Little Late": Lilly Singh is making history with her own late-night show to replace Carson Daly on NBC
Canadian YouTube star Lilly Singh is making history with her own late-night talk show on NBC. Singh will take over the time slot currently filled by "Last Call with Carson Daly," making her the only woman to host her own daily late-night show on a major TV network. The star announced the big news on "Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon" Thursday.
Fallon said Singh was going to make a big announcement and Questlove started a drumroll as she geared up to reveal the news. "Your girl is getting her own NBC late-night show," Singh exclaimed. The audience erupted in applause. "And to clarify, it's not Jimmy's slot," she joked.
"It's called, 'A Little Late with Lilly Singh,'" the comedian said. The show is sent to premiere in September and will be similar to her YouTube channel, "except now I'll have more than three staff members," Singh joked.
"A huge shoutout to all the women who have been before me and are currently in the space, because I couldn't have done it without them paving the path," Singh said. "But I do think it's a little awesome for an Indian-Canadian woman to get her own show."
In a statement, Singh called it "a dream come true," the Associated Press reports.
Fallon let Singh test out his desk to see what it feels like to host, and she started interviewing him about being having late-night show. NBC's late-night lineup will now be Fallon, followed by "Late Night with Seth Meyers," and then Singh's show starting at 1:35 a.m. ET.
During the segment, Fallon, Meyers and Singh took a selfie together — but one of them is not like the other. Only a handful of women have been given late-night hosting opportunities, and all of them have been on cable, making Singh a notable exception in the homogenous late-night universe.
Not only does Singh bring a new perspective to late-night because she is a woman of color, but she is also bisexual. In a February 24 Instagram post, the star wrote that she is "female, coloured, bisexual."
"Throughout my life these have proven to be obstacles from time to time," Singh wrote. "But now I'm fully embracing them as my superpowers. No matter how many 'boxes' you check, I encourage you to do the same."
The comedian from Ontario has made appearances in "Fahrenheit?451," "Bad Moms" and "Ice Age: Collision Course." She got her big break on YouTube in 2010 under the pseudonym IISuperwomanII. In 2018 she made Forbes' list of top 10 highest-paid YouTube stars. That year she reportedly made $10.5 million.
Singh's YouTube channel currently has over 14 million subscribers and has amassed nearly 3 billion views. If her YouTube success is any indication of how her late-night show will be, the history-making host will be a smash at it.
