James Corden has said that quitting his US talk show, The Late Late Show with James Corden, is “absolutely terrifying”.
The Gavin & Stacey star announced that he was leaving the series last April and revealed that he would be moving back to the UK following his tenure in Los Angeles.
Ahead the show’s finale on April 27, the 44-year-old admitted that he feels “huge amounts of fear”, but is looking forward to focusing on his theatre career once back on home soil.
Corden shared at a PaleyFest event in LA on Sunday: “I haven’t felt this scared since I decided to take the show, to move here. I haven’t felt on such unstable ground... (But) I have to embrace that fear...
“I’m just aware that what I’m trying to do isn’t the road that’s often travelled.
“To go from like National Theatre, writing a TV show on the BBC, Broadway, host of a late-night talk show, shooting stuff in the middle of that, stopping the late-night talk show and then going, ‘Oh, I’d like to do another play now.’
“It just isn’t the road that’s been travelled to my knowledge, so with that comes a huge amount of fear. It’s terrifying, it’s absolutely terrifying.”
Speaking of his upcoming plans, he continued: “There’s loads of things I’d love to do, but they’re very reliant on people wanting me to do them... I think it’s going to be really important to take a breath and take a minute.
“It couldn’t feel more urgent within me to leave to do that [theatre].
“I will be really, really upset with myself if in the next year or year and a half or so I don’t go do another play or revisit a play I’ve already done. I would give anything to go back and do a show again, I’d give absolutely anything.”
Last April, Corden promised to “go out with a bang” as he announced his departure from the CBS series.
Revealing the news personally during an episode of the US talkshow at the time, he said the programme had “changed my life" and promised there would be “lots of tears" when his tenure came to an end.
Corden took over as presenter of The Late Late Show in 2015 from Scottish-born comedian Craig Ferguson, who spent 10 years as host.
His first episode, which aired in March of that year, featured Hollywood superstar Tom Hanks as a special guest.
George Cheeks, president and Chief Executive of CBS, told Variety at the time: “In my two years at CBS, I’ve had the privilege to see James’ creative genius up close and experience his valuable partnership with CBS, both as a performer and a producer.
“We wish he could stay longer, but we are very proud he made CBS his American home and that this partnership will extend one more season on The Late Late Show.”
