WATCH: Stephen Colbert Immortalized With Star-Studded Finale
Stephen Colbert said goodbye to the “Colbert Report” on Thursday night, but fear not — he’s been immortalized.
Colbert, who’s headed to CBS to take over David Letterman’s “Late Show,” announced that he defeated death, before being joined by his famous friends for his final number.
“I was going to say goodbye, but now that I’ll live forever, who knows,” he said, before breaking out into song.
Jon Stewart first took the stage for “We’ll Meet Again” with Randy Newman at the piano. Tom Brokaw, James Franco, Andy Cohen, Barry Manilow, Jeff Daniels, Neil DeGrasse Tyson, Bob Costas, Arianna Huffington, George Lucas, Doris Kearns Goodwin, Kareem Abdul Jabbar and even Big Bird and Cookie Monster sang along, among others, bidding adieu to Colbert. (A full list is posted below the video.)
Colbert will take a seat on the “Late Show,” sometime in 2015 after Letterman’s final May 20 episode.
Here’s the full list of participants:
Willie Nelson
Doris Kearns Goodwin
Bryan Cranston
Francis Collins
Yo-Yo Ma
Lil Buck
Mandy Patinkin
Neil DeGrasse Tyson
Tom Brokaw
Randy Newman
Jon Stewart
Henry Kissinger
Cyndi Lauper
Trevor Potter
Big Bird
Cookie Monster
Jeff Daniels
David Hallberg
Andrew Sullivan
Ken Burns
Ric Ocasek
Katie Couric
Charlie Rose
Samantha Power
Mark Cuban
Michael Stipe
James Franco
Toby Keith
Kareem Abdul-Jabbar
Gloria Steinem
Dean Kamen
Barry Manilow
Bill De Blasio
George Saunders
General Ray Odierno
Andrew Young
Jeff Tweedy
Andy Cohen
Christiane Amanpour
David Gregory
Patrick Stewart
Peter Frampton
Stone Phillips
Naquasia Legrand
Arianna Huffington
Cory Booker
Alexi Lalas
George Lucas
Alan Alda
Elijah Wood
Mike Huckabee
Tim Meadows
Garrett Reisman
Shepard Fairey
Steven Pinker
Paul Rieckhoff
David Leonhardt
Claire McCaskill
Ed Viesturs
Jake Tapper
Jeffrey Toobin
Emily Bazelon
Brian Greene
Lesley Stahl
Matt Taibbi
Father Jim Martin
Norm Ornstein
Elliot Spitzer
Terry Gross
Jonathan Alter
Paulina Porizkova
Nate Silver
Maureen Dowd
Richard Clarke
David Remnick
Dan Savage
Jimmy Wales
Grover Norquist
Eleanor Holmes Norton
Joe Quesada
Andrew Young
Katrina vanden Heuvel
Bradley Whitford
Ann Patchett
Tom Friedman
Cass Sunstein
Cliff Sloan
Bing West
Evie Colbert
Madeleine Colbert
Peter Colbert
John Colbert
Related stories
Stephen Colbert Signs Off, And CBS Should Rest Easy
Stephen Colbert Signs Off 'Colbert Report' with Star-Packed Sing-Along
'The Colbert Report' By the Numbers
Get more from Variety and Variety411: Follow us on Twitter, Facebook, Newsletter
