Appearing at the end of NBC’s Television Critics Association winter press event, late night talk show hosts Jimmy Fallon and Seth Meyers each teased their new shows.
When Fallon begins his reign as The Tonight Show host on Monday, February 17, his first guests in his New York studio will be Will Smith and U2. The latter’s involvement is particularly interesting because there are rumors of a new album on the horizon. They could perform one of their two new songs “Mandela: Long Walk to Freedom” or “Invisible” (the latter hasn’t been released yet). We can also imagine a musical performance/skit starring Smith and Fallon.
The current Late Night host confirmed that his in-house band The Roots will go with him to Tonight. He also says that his monologues will be about ten minutes long as opposed to their current 4 minute length, at the advice of outgoing host Jay Leno who told him viewers depend on the monologue for “a complete view of the news.”
In case anyone will miss an LA-based Tonight Show, Fallon says that he will bring the show to Southern California “a couple times out of the year.”
His Late Night successor Seth Meyers also spoke to the media on Sunday to tease his new show which begins on February 24. He confirmed that his final night at Saturday Night Live’s Weekend Update desk is February 1, and teased his show’s unique format. “We are going to have a monologue, guests, music, comedian, but the biggest way we can define ourselves is the two or three acts of comedy before the guests come out,” he said.
One way he’ll be able to pull off these skits will be by creating new characters like those seen on SNL. “It would be fun to develop characters like that from our show.”
Meyers’ first guest will be friend and NBC star Amy Poehler, who’s half-hour comedy Parks & Rec will very likely be picked up for a seventh season.