Stephen Colbert’s Opening Monologue

Late night was back in full force on Monday night, and the hosts of “The Late Show with Stephen Colbert,” “The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon,” “Jimmy Kimmel Live” and “Late Night with Seth Meyers” were all expected to have something to say about it in their opening monologues.

Stephen Colbert’s Monologue

“It feels good to be back,” Colbert said at the start of his October 2 monologue — his first since May 1, the last evening before the WGA strike commenced the following day. “It feels good to be with all of you again here in the Ed Sullivan Theatre. Because after the first few months of the strike, [Colbert’s wife] Evie refused to keep chanting my name. But now the writers’ strike is over, with a new contract that includes protections from A.I., cost of living increases, better pay for streaming. Plus, thanks to the picket lines, my writers got fresh air and sunshine — and they do not care for that. Not they’re back safely in their joke holes, doing what they do best: Making my prompter word screen full of good and ha-ha!

Jimmy Fallon’s Monologue

“It’s been a long time since our last ‘Late Show.’ We looked at the calendar today, and check my math on this, I believe we have been off the air for 154 indictments,” he additionally quipped. “It was a crazy summer to be off. Packed with events. Obviously it would be stupid to recap everything that happened over the last five months. So here we go.”

Hosts’ Thank Yous

Seth Meyers’ Thank Yous

Meanwhile, on “Late Night with Seth Meyers,” the host thanked a wide variety of people for their support and patience during the strike.

“I wanted to take a moment to say how grateful I am to be back here with you tonight. I never take this show for granted, but being away from it for as long as I was away from it really hits home how much I love having this as a workplace. I would like to thank some people: I would like to thank the WGA negotiating committee, the guild leadership for all the time they put in. All the personal time they sacrificed to be in the room and negotiating for the very fair deal that all the writers deserved. I have friends on the negotiating committee, friends like Mike Schur, friends like Kay Cannon. Not just talented writers, but people who sacrificed their time to work for all writers. And I would call them a lot during it, and I’m sure a lot of their friends called them during the negotiations and said things to them like, ‘Sooooooo….? Any news?’ So I apologize to them for that but thank you for everything you did.

“I am so happy to be back in a room with my writers. I missed my writers so much. I was so happy to see them this morning. I will admit by lunch I was a little over it. They’re really talented, they just have a ton of opinions… I’d also like to thank my fellow late night hosts. It was great to have them. We talked a lot during the strike. Being on the same page with them made a hard period much easier to deal with. Thanks to Jimmy Kimmel, who suggested we do a podcast called ‘Strike Force Five.’

Other Late Night Returns

Jimmy Fallon’s Return

“The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon” shared a video clip of Fallon’s return today to host the show.

Other Late Night Shows

Haber Tusba is also keeping an eye on the monologues from Kimmel and Fallon, and will include excerpts of those once available.

Guests and Segments

Returning guests on Monday included Matthew McConaughey and John Mayer on “Tonight Show”; Arnold Schwarzenegger and musical guest Jason Isbell and the 400 Unit on “Jimmy Kimmel Live”; and Neil deGrasse Tyson with a musical performance by bandleader Louis Cato on “The Late Show.” Over on “Late Night,” Meyers is spending an hour without guests, and instead conducting a mega edition of his signature “A Closer Look” segment.

Other Late Night Shows

Colbert, Fallon, Kimmel, and Meyers join HBO’s late night returnees “Real Time with Bill Maher,” which was back on Friday, and “Last Week Tonight with John Oliver,” which returned on Sunday. (Comedy Central’s “The Daily Show,” with an as-yet unannounced guest host, is back on October 16.)

References on Other Late Night Shows

On “Real Time,” Maher made brief reference to the disruption in TV over the past five months. He thanked “my brilliant staff writers and non-writers who scrambled the jets to get us in two days.” And he extended thanks “to the union folks who expedited the paperwork” to allow talk shows and late-night shows to return to production on Sept. 27, two days after the WGA finally clinched a tentative three-year contract agreement with the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers.

And on “Last Week Tonight,” Oliver praised the “sacrifices” of all those who worked towards the WGA‘s new deal with Hollywood’s studios, but he had some choice words for those studios as well.

John Oliver’s Statement

“While I’m happy that [the WGA] eventually got a fair deal and immensely proud of what our union accomplished, I’m also furious that it took the studios 148 days to achieve a deal that they could have offered on day f—ing one,” he said. “Hopefully, this might encourage others, from auto workers to Starbucks baristas to healthcare providers, whether they are in unions or would like to be, to find power in each other. And within our particular industry.”

(William Earl and Joe Otterson contributed to this report.)