18 Facts About Tonight Show

1.

Tonight Show is an American late-night talk show that has aired on NBC since 1954.

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2.

The Tonight Show is the world's longest-running talk show and the longest-running, regularly scheduled entertainment program in the United States.

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3.

The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson aired for 30 seasons between October 1962 and May 1992.

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4.

Format of The Tonight Show can be traced to a nightly 40-minute local program in New York, hosted by Allen and originally titled The Knickerbocker Beer Show.

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5.

Tonight Show would continue to perform the same service for most of the major talk shows for decades, including those hosted by Paar, Carson, Merv Griffin, and Mike Douglas, among others.

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6.

The Jack Paar Tonight Show was moved to the evening's prime time and aired weekly on Friday nights through the 1965 season.

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7.

Lewis subsequently wound up hosting a lavish 2-hour prime time talk show for ABC entitled The Jerry Lewis Tonight Show, which was famously unsuccessful, and continued his more successful movie career.

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8.

David Letterman not only wanted to move into that earlier time slot from his Late Night spot after The Tonight Show, and was considered personally by Carson as his natural successor despite Leno having been Carson's permanent guest host for several years.

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9.

Jay Leno Show debuted in September 2009, three months into O'Brien's Tonight Show tenure, performing to significantly lower ratings than the primetime dramas it had replaced on NBC and trailing the competition.

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10.

One publicist reported that the aggression was such that The Jay Leno Tonight Show had signaled to potential guests that doing O'Brien's program before Leno's would be punished with secondary placement in the line-up.

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11.

When Oprah Winfrey later quoted this statement to Leno during an episode of The Oprah Winfrey Show in the aftermath of the fallout, he responded: "Well, if you look at where [Conan's Tonight Show] ratings were, it was already destructive to the franchise".

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12.

Leno's last Tonight Show aired on February 6,2014, featuring guests Billy Crystal and Garth Brooks.

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13.

Jimmy Fallon assumed The Tonight Show hosting role on February 17,2014, with his initial guests being Will Smith and the rock band U2, plus an assortment of celebrity cameos, including an appearance by one of Fallon's direct broadcast competitors, Stephen Colbert, and another by former permanent guest host Joan Rivers, making her first appearance on Tonight since cutting ties with Carson in 1986.

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14.

Fallon's Tonight Show has gone on the road to produce episodes remotely in its first year, spending four days at Universal Orlando Resort in Florida in June 2014 to promote new attractions at NBCUniversal's theme parks there.

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15.

In 1992, The Tonight Show Band welcomed its first female member, Vicki Randle.

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16.

Tonight Show officially announced his departure after 18 years on April 12,2010, with his final episode airing May 28.

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17.

Tonight Show became the first American television program to broadcast with MTS stereo sound in 1984, at first sporadically, by audio engineer Ron Estes.

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18.

On March 19,2009, The Tonight Show became the first late-night talk show in history to have the sitting President of the United States as a guest, when President Barack Obama visited Jay Leno.

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