--- title: Stephen Colbert Parodied Mariah Carey’s New Year's Eve Show description: Stephen Colbert had his own technical difficulties on The Late Show. canonical: https://time.com/4621864/stephen-colbert-mariah-carey-parody/ author: Melissa Locker article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2017-01-04T16:54:22.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-04-13T07:39:53.908Z og:title: Stephen Colbert Parodied Mariah Carey’s New Year's Eve Show og:description: Stephen Colbert had his own technical difficulties on The Late Show og:url: https://time.com/4621864/stephen-colbert-mariah-carey-parody/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde093bcdab65f2d0/6988d9b9bc6cfc69913e2a3c/time-logo.jpg?branch=production og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 675 og:image:alt: TIME og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Stephen Colbert Parodied Mariah Carey’s New Year's Eve Show twitter:description: Stephen Colbert had his own technical difficulties on The Late Show twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde093bcdab65f2d0/6988d9b9bc6cfc69913e2a3c/time-logo.jpg?branch=production --- # Stephen Colbert Channeled His Inner Diva to Parody Mariah Carey’s New Year’s Eve Performance by [Melissa Locker](https://time.com/author/melissa-locker/) ## Melissa Locker Jan 4, 2017 4:54 PM UTC by [Melissa Locker](https://time.com/author/melissa-locker/) ## Melissa Locker Jan 4, 2017 4:54 PM UTC [Mariah Carey’](http://time.com/84645/mariah-carey-album-title-generator/?iid=sr-link5)s New Year’s Eve performance is well on its way to becoming a pop culture legend, especially now that Stephen Colbert has skewered it on _The Late Show._ Carey [was the final act](http://time.com/4620015/mariah-carey-new-years-eve-performance/?iid=sr-link1) before midnight on ABC’s _Dick Clark’s New Year’s Rockin’ Eve with Ryan Seacrest_ and experienced technical difficulties. The performance was derailed as Carey gave up on singing (and [lip syncing](http://time.com/4620059/mariah-carey-new-year-lip-sync-snafu/?iid=sr-link3)), waltzing around the stage, while her back-up dancers continued on. “It just don’t get any better,” she said before leaving the stage. She left the stage but walked into history and into Colbert’s waiting opening monologue. On Tuesday night, Colbert got in touch with his inner diva, claiming he was also facing technical difficulties. “I’m sorry, there’s nothing in my prompter here. Jim, can we fix that?” Colbert said, as backup dancers surrounded him. “I’m sorry, I was not informed. Am I supposed to be singing right now?” Colbert was carried away by his dancers as he explained, “We’ve got a great show!” Watch below. ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/4621864/stephen-colbert-mariah-carey-parody/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/4621864/stephen-colbert-mariah-carey-parody/"},"headline":"Stephen Colbert Channeled His Inner Diva to Parody Mariah Carey’s New Year’s Eve Performance","datePublished":"2017-01-04T16:54:22.000Z","dateModified":"2026-04-13T07:39:53.908Z","description":"Stephen Colbert had his own diva difficulties on The Late Show","url":"https://time.com/4621864/stephen-colbert-mariah-carey-parody/","keywords":["Newsfeed","Television","Music","stephen colbert","late show","Mariah Carey","new years eve"],"thumbnailUrl":"","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Melissa Locker","jobTitle":"","url":"https://time.com/author/melissa-locker/"}],"articleSection":"","image":[],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/tag/time-section-newsfeed/","name":"Newsfeed"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/4621864/stephen-colbert-mariah-carey-parody/","name":"Stephen Colbert Channeled His Inner Diva to Parody Mariah Carey’s New Year’s Eve Performance"}}]}] ```