James Corden remembers George Michael, original ‘Carpool Karaoke’ star, on ‘Late Late Show’

Following the death of George Michael on Christmas Day last year, one of the more interesting things that we learned was that the legendary singer was actually one of the reasons why “Carpool Karaoke” now exists. Michael hopped in a car with James Corden many years ago for what was then a sketch for a Comic Relief special in the UK, and it’s now become a cornerstone of “The Late Late Show with James Corden” here in America.

On last night’s edition of the show, Corden paid tribute to the legendary man by recounting a little bit of the time that he spent with him not only doing the sketch, but also planning for it. After getting in touch with Michael’s people, he was told that George would be calling him from Australia to talk it over. This led to the two having a lengthy conversation 3:00 a.m. London time that led to everything coming together. You can see a tiny version of the sketch below (watch the full version over here); it’s not identical to the version of “Carpool Karaoke” that you see today, but it is very clear that it contains much of the same DNA is there.

You can see in the video precisely how much Michael meant to Corden beyond just helping get this sketch off the ground, and interestingly, it was him alone that helped this become a major part of the U.S. show. When the show convinced Mariah Carey to do “Carpool Karaoke” in the early going, apparently she determined that if the idea was good enough for George Michael, it was good enough for her.

Now, almost every artist out there wants to be a part of this, just like so many of us want to be like George Michael. He’s still missed, but we’re so grateful to be getting TV tributes to him like this.

Our thoughts still go out to everyone who loved George, both in terms of his music and who he was as a person. (Photo: CBS.)