Larry Wilmore (briefly) takes over ‘The Late Show with Stephen Colbert’

“The Nightly Show with Larry Wilmore” was recently canceled by Comedy Central, but we are rather pleased to see that the show’s host is not off the late-night map.

At the start of tonight’s “The Late Show with Stephen Colbert,” you can see Wilmore make a brief cameo as he comes out in order to start performing the monologue, telling a joke about Donald Trump’s immigration speech before Colbert comes out and cuts him off. What ensues is a pretty funny bit in which Larry acts shocked to learn that he does not automatically get to take over “The Late Show” because his Comedy Central show came to a close.

It’s felt fairly clear that Colbert and Wilmore have a close friendship dating back to their mutual ties to “The Daily Show” and its former host in Jon Stewart. When “The Nightly Show” was first canceled, for example, Stephen sent him over a series of tiny bottles of booze. We’re hoping that he continues to make occasional appearances on the show just for the sake of there continuing to be a venue for his voice, if he doesn’t get another show at some point down the road … which we do still think is a possibility. He did earn many fans, and there are some other streaming or cable venues who would almost certainly love to have him on board, provided that he wants to go.

Meanwhile, we’re down for Colbert having as many different former “Daily Show” people on his show as he wants. John Oliver has been a regular guest, and we’ve also seen appearances from Stewart himself.