Late Night with David Letterman

Late Night with David Letterman is an American late-night talk show hosted by David Letterman on NBC, the first iteration of the Late Night franchise. It premiered on February 1, 1982, and was produced by Letterman's production company, Worldwide Pants, and Carson Productions. Letterman had previously hosted his own morning talk show on NBC from June to October 1980. The show's house band, The World's Most Dangerous Band, was led by music director Paul Shaffer. In 1993, Letterman announced that he would leave NBC to host the Late Show with David Letterman on CBS. The final episode of Late Night was broadcast on June 25, 1993. The series has continued as Late Night with Conan O'Brien, Late Night with Jimmy Fallon and Late Night with Seth Meyers. In 2013, this series and Late Show with David Letterman were ranked No. 41 on TV Guide's 60 Best Series of All Time. During its run, the show was nominated for the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Variety Series 11 times. It was also nominated for the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Writing for a Variety Series 14 times, winning 4, and won one Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Directing for a Variety Series out of 7 nominations. History In the wake of his short-lived NBC morning show being cancelled in October 1980 after only 18 weeks on the air, David Letterman was still held in high enough regard by the network brass, especially NBC president Fred Silverman, that upon hearing the 33-year-old comedian was being courted by a first-run syndication company, NBC gave him a US$20,000 per week ($1,000,000 for a year) deal to sit out a year and guest-host The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson on multiple occasions. Earlier that year in May, after significant acrimony, NBC and Carson had reached an agreement on a new contract, which—among other concessions to Carson—granted the powerful and influential host the control over the time slot immediately following The Tonight Show. From late fall 1980 until the end of 1981, in addition to guest-hosting 22 episodes of the Tonight Show, as outlined in his one-year holding deal with NBC, Letterman also appeared five times as Carson's guest on the highly-rated program as the network groomed the 34-year-old for a new project.