Later (talk show)
Encyclopedia
Later was a nightly half hour-long talk show
that ran on NBC
from 1988
until 2001
. Later typically aired for half an hour at 1:30 a.m. following Late Night with David Letterman
from 1988 to 1993, and Late Night with Conan O'Brien
from 1993 to 2001. It was succeeded by Last Call with Carson Daly
in 2002.
hosted Later from 1988
until 1994
. Created and produced by Dick Ebersol
, the programme in this period was something of a break from the typical American TV talk show format of the era, featuring Costas and a single guest having an intense conversation for the entire half hour, without a house band, opening monologue, studio audience or guest musical performances, similar to what Tom Snyder
did on Tomorrow
during the 1970s and again on the The Late Late Show in the mid-1990s. Later was taped in New York City
at GE Building
's famous Studio 8H. Costas interviewed a single guest for 45 minutes to an hour in real time before turning the material over to editors, who condensed it down to 22 minutes plus commercials. On several occasions, an interview with a particularly interesting guest (examples include Paul McCartney
, Don Rickles
and Martin Scorsese
) was shown over multiple nights, and these in-depth discussions won Costas much praise for his interviewing skills. Interestingly, Costas resided in St. Louis all through his run on Later, flying to New York City once per week to shoot a week worth of shows, recording all four in a single day.
Guests during the first week on air were Linda Ellerbee
and Billy Crystal
. In May 1991, Later did a week of shows from Los Angeles
. The show occasionally had guest hosts substituting for Costas, including Chicago DJ Jonathon Brandmeier
and Tom Snyder. Snyder's 1991
interview with Howard Stern
, who came to plug his Crucified by the FCC CD boxset was particularly notable since the host and the guest, while mostly remaining cordial and civil, aggressively and cynically expressed dislike for each other throughout the interview, often engaging in heated, testy, and uncomfortable exchanges. Though the two met face to face for the first (and last) time on this occasion, they had a prior record of mutual attack on their respective media outlets that continued after the show.
During one of his last shows Costas said personal considerations led to his decision to leave Later as he didn't want to move his family to New York and he felt worn out by the workload consisting of his obligations with NBC Sports
and his duties on Later.
. The show relocated to Los Angeles, where it was taped at NBC Studios in Burbank, California
, featuring an opening monologue, studio audience, and comedy bits as well as quick one-segment interview with contemporary TV and movie personalities plugging their projects. Simultaneous to his duties on Later, Kinnear continued hosting Talk Soup
on E!
as well as fostering his budding acting career. Sometime during 1995, he quit Talk Soup and in December of the same year movie Sabrina
opened, a big budget motion picture remake in which Kinnear had a notable supporting role. The favourable exposure led to more movie offers for him and it wasn't long before he quit Later.
, somewhat matching the format of the time of Friday Night
(which aired instead of Later on that evening.) Friday Night host Rita Sever
was the most consistent guest host during this period of time. Other guest hosts came from just about any facet of public life in the United States, including such unlikely hosts as supermodel Cindy Crawford
.
.
However, this iteration of the program was little promoted, even within NBC's promotional claims of being America's Late Night Leader, and several NBC affiliates pre-empted it completely in order to better profit from the low-rated half-hour with their own programming (i.e. infomercial
s). Garrett left the program in 2000 after agreeing to become an on-air personality for the then-new TV Guide Channel
. Around this time, NBC began to negotiate with Carson Daly
to take over the Later timeslot, but this would not happen for well over a year.
, the time slot was used for time and content-edited repeats of the Canadian sketch comedy SCTV
, a show which had previously aired on NBC from 1981 through 1983. A new voice-over introduction by Rita Sever plugged the program as "Later presents SCTV", but the series was otherwise identical to the syndicated repeats of the show that had been airing for years.
In 2001
, NBC announced that MTV VJ Carson Daly
would be the new host of Later. However, when Daly took over the time slot in January 2002
, the "Later" name was retired and the show went on the air as Last Call with Carson Daly
.
Talk show
A talk show or chat show is a television program or radio program where one person discuss various topics put forth by a talk show host....
that ran on NBC
NBC
The National Broadcasting Company is an American commercial broadcasting television network and former radio network headquartered in the GE Building in New York City's Rockefeller Center with additional major offices near Los Angeles and in Chicago...
from 1988
1988 in television
The year 1988 in television involved some significant events.Below is a list of television-related events in 1988.For the American TV schedule, see: 1988-89 United States network television schedule.-Events:-Debuts:...
until 2001
2001 in television
The year 2001 in television involved some significant events.Below is a list of television-related events in 2001.-Events:-Debuts:-1940s:*Meet the Press .*Candid Camera .*CBS Evening News ....
. Later typically aired for half an hour at 1:30 a.m. following Late Night with David Letterman
Late Night with David Letterman
Late Night with David Letterman is a nightly hour-long comedy talk show on NBC that was created and hosted by David Letterman. It premiered in 1982 as the first incarnation of the Late Night franchise and went off the air in 1993, after Letterman left NBC and moved to Late Show on CBS. Late Night...
from 1988 to 1993, and Late Night with Conan O'Brien
Late Night with Conan O'Brien
Late Night with Conan O'Brien is an American late-night talk show hosted by Conan O'Brien that aired 2,725 episodes on NBC between 1993 and 2009. The show featured varied comedic material, celebrity interviews, and musical and comedy performances. Late Night aired weeknights at 12:37 am...
from 1993 to 2001. It was succeeded by Last Call with Carson Daly
Last Call with Carson Daly
Last Call with Carson Daly is an American late night talk show that is broadcast on NBC. The show is hosted by Carson Daly, the half-hour show featuring celebrity interviews, documentary-style coverage of a topic, and musical performances. Last Call airs weeknights at 1:35 a.m. Eastern / 12:35 a.m....
in 2002.
Nominations and awards
During Bob Costas' tenure as host, the show won the 1993 Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Informational Series. It was nominated in the same category in 1992, and in the Outstanding Achievement in Graphic Design and Title Sequences category (currently called the Main Title Design category) in 1989.1988-1994: The Bob Costas era
Sportscaster Bob CostasBob Costas
Robert Quinlan "Bob" Costas is an American sportscaster, on the air for the NBC network since the early 1980s.-Early life:...
hosted Later from 1988
1988 in television
The year 1988 in television involved some significant events.Below is a list of television-related events in 1988.For the American TV schedule, see: 1988-89 United States network television schedule.-Events:-Debuts:...
until 1994
1994 in television
The year 1994 in television involved some significant events.Below is a list of television-related events in 1994.For the American TV schedule, see: 1994-95 United States network television schedule.-Events:-Debuts:-Miniseries:...
. Created and produced by Dick Ebersol
Dick Ebersol
Duncan "Dick" Ebersol is an American television executive and a senior adviser for . He had previously been the chairman of NBC Sports, producing large scale television events such as the Olympic Games and National Football League broadcasts....
, the programme in this period was something of a break from the typical American TV talk show format of the era, featuring Costas and a single guest having an intense conversation for the entire half hour, without a house band, opening monologue, studio audience or guest musical performances, similar to what Tom Snyder
Tom Snyder
Thomas James "Tom" Snyder was an American television personality, news anchor and radio personality best known for his late night talk shows The Tomorrow Show, on the NBC television network in the 1970s and 1980s, and The Late Late Show, on the CBS Television Network in the 1990s...
did on Tomorrow
Tomorrow (TV series)
Tomorrow was an American late-night television talk show hosted by Tom Snyder...
during the 1970s and again on the The Late Late Show in the mid-1990s. Later was taped in New York City
New York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
at GE Building
GE Building
The GE Building is an Art Deco skyscraper that forms the centerpiece of Rockefeller Center in the midtown Manhattan section of New York City. Known as the RCA Building until 1988, it is most famous for housing the headquarters of the television network NBC...
's famous Studio 8H. Costas interviewed a single guest for 45 minutes to an hour in real time before turning the material over to editors, who condensed it down to 22 minutes plus commercials. On several occasions, an interview with a particularly interesting guest (examples include Paul McCartney
Paul McCartney
Sir James Paul McCartney, MBE, Hon RAM, FRCM is an English musician, singer-songwriter and composer. Formerly of The Beatles and Wings , McCartney is listed in Guinness World Records as the "most successful musician and composer in popular music history", with 60 gold discs and sales of 100...
, Don Rickles
Don Rickles
Donald Jay "Don" Rickles is an American stand-up comedian and actor. A frequent guest on The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson, Rickles has acted in comedic and dramatic roles, but is best known as an insult comic....
and Martin Scorsese
Martin Scorsese
Martin Charles Scorsese is an American film director, screenwriter, producer, actor, and film historian. In 1990 he founded The Film Foundation, a nonprofit organization dedicated to film preservation, and in 2007 he founded the World Cinema Foundation...
) was shown over multiple nights, and these in-depth discussions won Costas much praise for his interviewing skills. Interestingly, Costas resided in St. Louis all through his run on Later, flying to New York City once per week to shoot a week worth of shows, recording all four in a single day.
Guests during the first week on air were Linda Ellerbee
Linda Ellerbee
Linda Ellerbee is an American journalist who is most known for several jobs at NBC News, including Washington, DC correspondent, host of the Nickelodeon network's Nick News, and reporter and co-anchor of NBC News Overnight, which was recognized by the jurors of the duPont Columbia Awards as...
and Billy Crystal
Billy Crystal
William Edward "Billy" Crystal is an American actor, writer, producer, comedian and film director. He gained prominence in the 1970s for playing Jodie Dallas on the ABC sitcom Soap and became a Hollywood film star during the late 1980s and 1990s, appearing in the critical and box office successes...
. In May 1991, Later did a week of shows from Los Angeles
Los Ángeles
Los Ángeles is the capital of the province of Biobío, in the commune of the same name, in Region VIII , in the center-south of Chile. It is located between the Laja and Biobío rivers. The population is 123,445 inhabitants...
. The show occasionally had guest hosts substituting for Costas, including Chicago DJ Jonathon Brandmeier
Jonathon Brandmeier
-Career:Born John Francis Brandmeier to a German father and a Lebanese mother, Brandmeier started his radio career in 1973 at WFON in Fond du Lac, Wisconsin...
and Tom Snyder. Snyder's 1991
1991 in television
For the American TV schedule, see: 1991-92 United States network television schedule.The year 1991 in television involved some significant events.Below is a list of television-related events in 1991.-Events:-Debuts:-1950s:...
interview with Howard Stern
Howard Stern
Howard Allan Stern is an American radio personality, television host, author, and actor best known for his radio show, which was nationally syndicated from 1986 to 2005. He gained wide recognition in the 1990s where he was labeled a "shock jock" for his outspoken and sometimes controversial style...
, who came to plug his Crucified by the FCC CD boxset was particularly notable since the host and the guest, while mostly remaining cordial and civil, aggressively and cynically expressed dislike for each other throughout the interview, often engaging in heated, testy, and uncomfortable exchanges. Though the two met face to face for the first (and last) time on this occasion, they had a prior record of mutual attack on their respective media outlets that continued after the show.
During one of his last shows Costas said personal considerations led to his decision to leave Later as he didn't want to move his family to New York and he felt worn out by the workload consisting of his obligations with NBC Sports
NBC Sports
NBC Sports is the sports division of the NBC television network. Formerly "a service of NBC News," it broadcasts a diverse array of programs, including the Olympic Games, the NFL, the NHL, MLS, Notre Dame football, the PGA Tour, the Triple Crown, and the French Open, among others...
and his duties on Later.
1994-1996: The Greg Kinnear era
Following Costas' departure in February 1994, Later reverted to a conventional talk show format, hosted by young television personality and aspiring actor Greg KinnearGreg Kinnear
Gregory "Greg" Kinnear is an American actor and television personality who first rose to stardom in 1991. He has appeared in more than 20 motion pictures, and was nominated for an Academy Award for his role in As Good as It Gets.-Early life:Kinnear was born in Logansport, Indiana, the son of...
. The show relocated to Los Angeles, where it was taped at NBC Studios in Burbank, California
Burbank, California
Burbank is a city in Los Angeles County in Southern California, United States, north of downtown Los Angeles. The estimated population in 2010 was 103,340....
, featuring an opening monologue, studio audience, and comedy bits as well as quick one-segment interview with contemporary TV and movie personalities plugging their projects. Simultaneous to his duties on Later, Kinnear continued hosting Talk Soup
Talk Soup
Talk Soup was a television show produced for cable network E! that debuted on January 7, 1991, and aired until August 2002. Talk Soup aired selected clips of the previous day's daily talk shows—ranging from daytime entries like The Jerry Springer Show and to celebrity interview shows like The...
on E!
E!
E! Entertainment Television is an American basic cable and satellite television network, owned by NBCUniversal. It features entertainment-related programming, reality television, feature films and occasionally series and specials unrelated to the entertainment industry.E! has an audience reach of...
as well as fostering his budding acting career. Sometime during 1995, he quit Talk Soup and in December of the same year movie Sabrina
Sabrina (1995 film)
Sabrina is a 1995 romantic comedy-drama film adapted by Barbara Benedek and David Rayfiel, based on the 1954 screenplay of the same name, which in turn was based upon a play titled Sabrina Fair....
opened, a big budget motion picture remake in which Kinnear had a notable supporting role. The favourable exposure led to more movie offers for him and it wasn't long before he quit Later.
1996-1998: The Guest Host era
After Kinnear's departure for a film career in 1996, the network struggled to find a permanent replacement. Until 1998, the program featured a 'guest host of the week' format which was heavily dependent on performances by stand-up comediansStand-up comedy
Stand-up comedy is a comedic art form. Usually, a comedian performs in front of a live audience, speaking directly to them. Their performances are sometimes filmed for later release via DVD, the internet, and television...
, somewhat matching the format of the time of Friday Night
Friday Night Videos
Friday Night Videos is an American music video show broadcast on the NBC television network from July 29, 1983 to December 30, 2000, and was the network's attempt to capitalize on the emerging popularity of music videos as seen on MTV...
(which aired instead of Later on that evening.) Friday Night host Rita Sever
Rita Sever
Rita Sever is an American television hostess. Sever, who is the youngest of seven children, was born on November 7, 1963 in San Francisco, California. She is best known as the host of the NBC late-night series Friday Night Videos from 1994 to the show's end in 2000. She has also appeared as a host...
was the most consistent guest host during this period of time. Other guest hosts came from just about any facet of public life in the United States, including such unlikely hosts as supermodel Cindy Crawford
Cindy Crawford
Cynthia Ann "Cindy" Crawford is an American model. Known for her trademark mole just above her lip, Crawford has adorned hundreds of magazine covers throughout her career. She was named #3 on VH1's 40 Hottest Hotties of the 90s...
.
1998-2000: The Cynthia Garrett era
The program finally settled on Cynthia Garrett as permanent host in 1998. The show then took on a low-budget and low-profile feel through those two years, featuring smaller profile guests that wouldn't usually appear on the pre-1:35am talk shows. Returning to the show's initial Bob Costas-led format, some episodes of the series even took place without a studio audienceStudio audience
A studio audience is an audience present for the taping of all or part of a television program. The primary purpose of the studio audience is to provide applause and/or laughter to the program's soundtrack . A studio audience can also provide volunteers, a visual backdrop and discussion participants...
.
However, this iteration of the program was little promoted, even within NBC's promotional claims of being America's Late Night Leader, and several NBC affiliates pre-empted it completely in order to better profit from the low-rated half-hour with their own programming (i.e. infomercial
Infomercial
Infomercials are direct response television commercials which generally include a phone number or website. There are long-form infomercials, which are typically between 15 and 30 minutes in length, and short-form infomercials, which are typically 30 seconds to 120 seconds in length. Infomercials...
s). Garrett left the program in 2000 after agreeing to become an on-air personality for the then-new TV Guide Channel
TV Guide Channel
TV Guide Network is an American cable network owned by Lions Gate Entertainment Corporation....
. Around this time, NBC began to negotiate with Carson Daly
Carson Daly
Carson Jones Daly is an American television host. He is the host of NBC's Last Call with Carson Daly, a late-night talk show that began airing on January 7, 2002. Before his role as host of that program, Daly was a VJ on MTV's TRL, and a DJ for the Southern California based radio station KROQ-FM...
to take over the Later timeslot, but this would not happen for well over a year.
2000-2002: Later presents SCTV
Following Garrett's departure in 20002000 in television
The year 2000 in television involved some significant events.Below is a list of television-related events in 2000.For the American TV schedule, see: 2000-01 United States network television schedule.-Event:-Debuts:-1940s:...
, the time slot was used for time and content-edited repeats of the Canadian sketch comedy SCTV
Second City Television
Second City Television is a Canadian television sketch comedy show offshoot from Toronto's The Second City troupe that ran between 1976 and 1984.- Premise :...
, a show which had previously aired on NBC from 1981 through 1983. A new voice-over introduction by Rita Sever plugged the program as "Later presents SCTV", but the series was otherwise identical to the syndicated repeats of the show that had been airing for years.
In 2001
2001 in television
The year 2001 in television involved some significant events.Below is a list of television-related events in 2001.-Events:-Debuts:-1940s:*Meet the Press .*Candid Camera .*CBS Evening News ....
, NBC announced that MTV VJ Carson Daly
Carson Daly
Carson Jones Daly is an American television host. He is the host of NBC's Last Call with Carson Daly, a late-night talk show that began airing on January 7, 2002. Before his role as host of that program, Daly was a VJ on MTV's TRL, and a DJ for the Southern California based radio station KROQ-FM...
would be the new host of Later. However, when Daly took over the time slot in January 2002
2002 in television
The year 2002 in television involved some significant events.Below is a list of television-related events in 2002.For the American TV schedule, see: 2002–03 United States network television schedule.-Events:-Debuts:-1940s:...
, the "Later" name was retired and the show went on the air as Last Call with Carson Daly
Last Call with Carson Daly
Last Call with Carson Daly is an American late night talk show that is broadcast on NBC. The show is hosted by Carson Daly, the half-hour show featuring celebrity interviews, documentary-style coverage of a topic, and musical performances. Last Call airs weeknights at 1:35 a.m. Eastern / 12:35 a.m....
.