Lilly Singh had a big night on Monday. She was on The Tonight Show. She was on Late Night With Seth Meyers. Oh, and then she was on her own NBC late-night talk show, A Little Late With Lilly Singh, which officially bumps Late Call With Carson Daly from the late-night firmament forever. (Dry your eyes.) For Singh, the first woman to hold down a nightly late-night network gig since Cynthia Garrett closed down the pre-Daly late-late talkfest Later back in 2001, the premiere of A Little Late also marks her transition from the internet to network TV. As she told Fallon on his show, that’s been a two-way learning experience, as her introduction to stringent union rules and the bleep button about as stressful as NBC’s dawning and belated realization that a woman late-night host has different needs than Jimmy and Seth. (Not going to pay for Singh’s manicures, NBC? Please.)
For her first-ever guest, Punjabi-Canadian Singh brought out someone especially meaningful to her as a media mogul, fellow Indian woman with plenty of experience busting down TV barriers, Mindy Kaling. (Kaling’s Office-mate Rainn Wilson first did a bit of welcoming prop comedy.) The two swapped praise and gratitude, Singh to Kaling for blazing a trail for women who look like her in comedy and television, and Kaling to Singh for doing the same on late-night. Telling Singh that, for a woman of color, a lifelong love of late-night TV was a lifetime of “loving something that didn’t love [her] back,” Kaling expressed appreciation for how her new daughter will have someone like Singh to watch “20 years from now, when you’re still doing it and wish you didn’t have to.” Singh and Kaling were also excited to pass the torch to 17-year-old, Tamil-Canadian Maitreyi Ramakrishnan, the first-time actress who’ll be playing, essentially, young Mindy on Kaling’s upcoming, autobiographical, and as-yet-unnamed Netflix series.
As far as the late-night chit-chat portion of the gig, Singh was her unflappable self, asking Kaling what pop cultural trends and fads Michael Scott would be running into the ground if The Office were still on the air. (Dabbing, certainly, plus leaving “thirsty comments” on celebrities’ Instagram, according to Kaling.) Kaling also expressed surprise at the show’s enduring popularity, at least as it translates to “15-year-old white boys” calling out her name in airports, which, she says, makes her feel “with it.” Singh tested the reality of that by playing a game of guess the post-millennial slang (Kaling is not, as it turns out, with it), although Kaling’s well-publicized love for HBO’s sexy teen drama Euphoria might buy back some cred. (Even if, as Kaling admitted, watching it so raptly as a middle-aged mom makes her “a creep.”) Playing another game (Fallon, watch your back), Singh and Kaling then speed-applied some stick-on Euphoria face-bedazzling, although Singh admitted defeat, crying out “Nothing sticks! I’m too sweaty!” She was a little bit, although, for a first episode, Singh looked plenty poised to anchor her own late-night show.
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I went into it really hoping to like it, I saw her interviews on Jimmy and Seth and I was really looking forward to it, but personally I thought it was pretty awful. It just wasn’t funny at all. Honestly, what was the funniest joke? I remember cracking a smile once or twice but that’s about it.I always enjoy a good joke at the expense of white people, but… they 👏 have 👏 to 👏 be 👏 funny 👏Seriously, it felt like every single joke was the same thing and none of them were funny. I also thought it was a bit ridiculous that she went out of her way to say “my show won’t be political” and then her whole show she just does racial jokes.Lilly, if you want to break down barriers and show that a bisexual woman of color can have a funny late night show, just do it! You can talk about your identity and make jokes about white people, but you still have to be funny and entertaining, that should be the top priority for a comedy show, right?I genuinely hope she does well. I hope she realizes that this was not a good start for her show and I hope she starts improving. I will keep watching 🙂
Tldr: why won’t the show cater to meeeeeeeeee?
Yeah, why won’t it cater to me, someone who thinks comedy shows should be funny.All of jokes were variations on the same theme, it was basically like doing a stand up set that repeats the same joke. And I’m pretty sure we’ve all heard the jokes before, right?
Did you watch it? I was rooting so hard for her, and it was such an over-eager display of a one-note sense of humor. I don’t know if that was nerves, or trying to live up to her/NBC’s “but-I’m-such-a-trailblazer” marketing approach. It was painfully bad – like a demo tape bad. I will admit that I have never seen her YouTube show, but her interviews and late night appearances in the months prior to last night were all more natural and engaging than I found her actual show — save the thermostat part of the opening song bit. She essentially just talked (low key screamed) the entire show, and seemed very much in her nerves of “we’re having so much fun and I’m so different, okay? OKAY?!”Also, I understand that Mindy Kaling is her idol, but it was a risky move to have her first guest be someone who is so comfortable in her skin, effortlessly funny, and not cloyingly earnest. It was harsh constrast to what I hope Lilly settles into being. Most other people who get a late night show have many more years of TV experience under their belts, and it really showed last night. Chill out, Lilly, and you’ll get better.
Fortunately she has way more in her arsenal than the same old “aren’t white people ____?” racial/racist jokes we’ve heard for decades. I’m willing to bet some NBC suits probably made the call to go safe for the first few episodes. Once the playbook is opened up, she should shine.
I haven’t seen any of her youtube videos but I’m sure she does have a lot more to work with and I’m looking forward to seeing it 🙂
Talk to me in November, or even January. These shows take awhile to find their legs and the first few nights are all about propping up a few name and not alienating potential viewers. It took a good long while for Colbert to catch on with the CBS audience, but now he’s consistently near the top of the ratings. She has a much lower bar to hit in terms of ratings simply based on when she’s on, so she has a lot of room to play with. Let’s see what happens when the gaze of network execs drifts away and she and her staff can find their groove.
That set looks like A LOT
Good for her. The good news is she should get a fair shot, as I can’t imagine the bar (ratings wise) is particularly high at that hour. Nor is “funnier than Carson Daly”, for that matter.
“The two swapped praise and gratitude, Singh to Kaling for blazing a trail for women who look like her in comedy and television, and Kaling to Singh for doing the same on late-night.”Wow, two celebs telling each other how wonderful they are, that sounds like must see TV!
Poor Cynthia Garrett… she hosted a late-night talk show for several months, and doesn’t even have a Wikipedia page…
Mindy Kaling may be proud of who she is but her brother notoriously faked his way through medical school pretending to be black. https://www.cnn.com/2015/04/07/living/feat-mindy-kaling-brother-affirmative-action/index.html
I was disappointed. It’s not that every new identity represented in a media form needs to revolutionize it or everything, but damn if that wasn’t some bland, paint-by-numbers talkshow comedy content. And the thing is, that would be ok, except that that it’s paired with that self-congratulatory girlboss schitck, so it comes off as hypocritical and hollow bravado with nothing to back it up. It’s just the same shit, and that shit isn’t even in the upper 50th percentile of quality amid an overflowing field of options. Maybe this will be regarded as important (and a positive indicator for representation in US TV), but it ain’t good.
oops, double post