NBC is reportedly putting one night of The Tonight Show to bed. According to USA Today, the show is downsizing from five to four new episodes a week for the upcoming fall season, meaning that host Jimmy Fallon will have fewer chances to guffaw at his guests. Repeats are now expected to air on Fridays, as they have been during the off-season this summer. NBC confirmed to USA Today that it will be sticking to the four-night schedule, but declined further comment. Sources told Deadline that the Tonight Show team was informed of the decision on September 5.
Reportedly, this scheduling shift is because of budget adjustments as the audience for late-night TV gets smaller (apparently, viral YouTube and TikTok clips can’t pay all the bills). Fallon’s Tonight Show is joining an existing late-night trend — other major shows like The Late Show with Stephen Colbert, Jimmy Kimmel Live, Late Night with Seth Meyers, and The Daily Show already currently air four originals a week. But that doesn’t mean networks have completely given up on late-night! According to the Los Angeles Times, NBC has signed a deal with both Meyers and Fallon to keep them hosting through 2028. Cost-cutting is believed to be the reason that Meyers’s in-house band was dropped. Finances probably won’t ever get so dire that Fallon will need to start hosting The Two-night Show, right?