The Amber Ruffin Show is the late night show you need to be watching

The Amber Ruffin Show has been a force to be reckoned with for quite some time now. It may still be a relatively new show but Amber Ruffin has quickly established it as one of the genre’s best.

The Amber Ruffin Show has been premiering on Peacock every Friday since September 2020. But don’t be fooled–this is not Ruffin’s first foray into late night TV. The Emmy and Writers Guild of America Award nominee has been a writer and performer for NBC’s Late Night with Seth Meyers and was the first African American woman to write for a late-night network talk show in the U.S. Additionally, she has been a writer and performer for the Golden Globe Awards and has written for the HBO sketch comedy series A Black Lady Sketch Show.

While Ruffin co-writes her show, she’s retained her job as a writer on Late Night with Seth Meyers. Jenny Hagel, another Late Night writer, serves as Ruffin’s head writer with additional writing credits coming from Dewayne Perkins, Demi Adejuyigbe, and Shantira Jackson. The show recently received a 10-episode order extension for the upcoming year.

Ruffin’s known for her bubbly and high-energy personality on Late Night and has no problem translating that to her own show as she refines her hosting skills. Her show is formatted similarly to the standard late night set up and is even taped in Late Night’s Studio 8G. Ruffin sits behind a desk to report her latest take on the news alongside her sidekick, Tarik Davis, an actor and writer who was last seen in Broadway’s Freestyle Love Supreme. Not only do Ruffin and Davis showcase their improvisation backgrounds on the show, but they’ve also been able to build up a very endearing rapport of one-offs and have formed an engaging dynamic that is comparable to the likes of other late night duos such as Conan O’Brien and Andy Richter and Jimmy Kimmel and Guillermo Rodriguez. They’re sure to put a smile on viewers’ faces.

The show focuses on summarizing the week’s most talked-about news rather than relying on just what happened earlier in the day on Friday, similar to Real Time with Bill Maher. So while The Amber Ruffin Show may take elements familiar to late night TV fans, it is very much its own thing driven by Ruffin’s perspective and sensibilities.

What happened last night on The Amber Ruffin Show?

In last night’s episode, Amber Ruffin highlighted stories ranging from former Vice President Mike Pence sneaking off to the Virgin Islands for a vacation to news about National Fart Day, a “holiday” that is held on Feb. 5…if you weren’t aware.

Viewers can witness “Tarik’s Sports Minute”, a satirical segment where Davis claims to cover all sports news in one minute. Ruffin interjects to ask about the validity of the segment and how that coverage can even occur. The segment ends with Davis and Ruffin switching topics as they end up singing a part of the One Tree Hill theme song.

Ruffin’s show also isn’t afraid to tackle hard-hitting topics like race and politics. As Ruffin does shed light on issues plaguing her own community, she also understands her audience comes from a wide range of backgrounds. Educating and informing them on those issues is of the utmost importance to her. For this episode, she touched upon Black History Month and why it’s important to celebrate it. At the end of the episode 30 Rock and Saturday Night Live alum Tina Fey pops in for a cameo in which she signs off for Ruffin but ends up messing up in an egregious but very humorous way.

While her show is susceptible to flying under the radar due to its once a week appearance in the Peacock programming schedule, there’s no doubt that Ruffin provides a much needed and diverse voice to the late night space. NBC has clearly invested in The Amber Ruffin Show as it continues to build momentum and its following. There is no better time to start watching.

You can watch The Amber Ruffin Show for free on Peacock when episodes premiere on Peacock at 9:00 P.M. EST.

Do you plan on starting or continuing to watch The Amber Ruffin Show? Let us know in the comment section and enjoy your weekend!