It may still be over five months away, but the official countdown now begins: his Worldwide Pants production house announced that May 20, 2015 will be David Letterman’s final appearance as host of CBS’ The Late Show. Given that we’ve known since April that Letterman was retiring next year—not to mention we’ve had plenty of time to adjust to the idea of new host Stephen Colbert—the news isn’t exactly surprising. Still, it puts a definitive end date on the term of the longest-tenured late night host in television history.
Letterman has been hosting his own show for more than 32 years, the first decade spent at NBC on Late Night With David Letterman, the subsequent time doing The Late Show for CBS. Since Late Show debuted in 1993, it’s garnered nine Emmy awards and 70 nominations. When his time as host comes to an end on May 20, Letterman will have presided over 6,028 total episodes of Late Night and Late Show. He will be missed, and there’s perhaps no better way to pay tribute to the man than by rewatching his 1987 interview with Crispin Glover—still arguably the high-water mark for “holy shit that just happened” late-night talk show moments.
