Canadian Comedian and YouTube personality Lilly Singh recently announced that she has landed her own talk show, set to air on NBC in September.
Singh’s show, A Little Late With Lilly Singh will replace Carson Daly’s slot on weeknights, making her the first and only woman and LGBTQ+ person to host a late-night show.
Singh’s success is a win for the representation of women and LGBTQ+ people, as well as for those of Indian and South Asian descent on major networks. This is especially important in an industry whose demographics largely consist of straight men.
Singh has used her platform numerous times to advocate for mental health support and feminist causes.
She started the hashtag #GirlLove, which encourages girls and women to spread love and support amongst each other, and partnered with Me to We to sell bracelets in support of female education across the globe.
Singh is also a graduate from Toronto’s York University. She has published a book, which quickly became a number one bestseller across North America, and has played several television and movie roles. She has also been nominated for and won countless awards for her online content: most notably The Shorty awards and Teen Choice awards.
She started her YouTube channel under the username “IISuperWomanII” in 2010, and rose to success fast. Some of her relevant YouTube achievements include crossing the 10 million subscriber mark and being included in YouTube’s annual ReWind video every year since 2014.
I’m personally not a huge fan of talk shows, but I can guarantee my interest in tuning into her show come September.
In 2017, she held tenth place on Forbes’ highest earning YouTube stars. Her YouTube success highlights the power that social media platforms hold in today’s age.
It’s becoming commonplace to see “normal” people reach success through platforms created for everyday use. Some might see her success and think she is undeserving because of how she gained it, but I think her success is an example of something positive resulting from the increase of social media usage.
Fans and celebrities took to Twitter and other platforms to congratulate her on her success. It seems as though there isn’t a single person who isn’t happy for her, and rightly so.
I think it’s fair to say that lately, people have been noticing the lack of representation of minority groups, and TV networks and other companies are finally picking up on it. Singh’s new show is a positive step in the right direction for TV representation.
LGBTQ+ alliance group GLAAD wrote that “Lilly is a beacon of hope and a role model to countless LGBTQ people, and her new role on late-night will serve to inspire countless more.”
Besides the obvious reasons for minority representation on screen — such as, well, minorities deserving representation just as much as any other group. I can only imagine this opportunity working wonders for NBC’s ratings.
Singh’s victory is a testament to the types of representation people want to see. Her show will only work to draw in a whole new audience who, at one point, were disenfranchised from talk show representation.
I’m personally not a huge fan of talk shows, but I can guarantee my interest in tuning into her show come September.
Normalizing positive female, racial minority, and LGBTQ+ representations will only work to help pave a path for even more representation in the future.
