Talk show host James Corden revealed his reasoning behind walking away from “The Late Late Show.”
On Tuesday, Corden appeared on “The Drew Barrymore Show” and shared the show was not meant to be “the final destination.”
“Look, it’s not easy in any way to walk away from something that is so … I mean I’ll never work in a better environment than the one I work in now. Nothing about leaving the show was to do with not enjoying it. I love it, but the truth is, it became a very easy decision because I always knew it was an adventure and I never ever considered it to be the final destination,” he told Barrymore.
Corden also shared his then-10-year-old son helped influence his decision.
“One day, I was filming on a Sunday and I came downstairs, it was about 6 a.m. and my son, who was 10 at the time, was sat on the stairs and he said, ‘Are you working today?’ and I said, ‘I am,’ and he said, ‘I thought, well, it’s Sunday,’ and I said, ‘I know, buddy, but this schedule’s just all over the place. We just got to get it done because we only have a tiny amount of time before we have to go back and do the show,’ and his face just kind of dropped,” he said.
He added, “I got in the car and I called my wife Jules and I said, ‘I’ve realized, best-case scenario, we have six more summers where Max is like, even remotely wants to be around us and I cannot waste another one.'”
Corden went on to say he did not want his career to be at the expense of his children and family.
“That is really all it comes down to,” he explained. “I will be a mess on that last show. I will cry my eyes out. But I will know in my core that the best thing for me and the best thing for us as a family is to put down some roots in London, and it feels absolutely right in every single way.”
In 2022, Corden tearfully announced it would be his “last year hosting The Late Late Show.”