Days of future past on ‘The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon’

By Kate O’Hare © Zap2it

With ratings-challenged

NBC struggling to find its feet as the broadcast network world shifts and rolls beneath it, and with broadcast television itself being regularly lamented as having one foot in the grave and the other on slippery ground, one might be tempted to think the Peacock might as well fold its tail feathers for good.

But there is a center of gravity to the NBC universe, and it is every weeknight, right after your local news — “The Tonight Show.” On Monday, Feb. 17, that center shifts from its longtime home in Los Angeles (aka “beautiful downtown Burbank”) to its ancestral home of New York, where it launched with host Steve Allen in 1954.

After the departure of host Jay Leno (again) following a 22-year run — briefly interrupted by a failed experiment with Conan O’Brien in 2009-10 — “The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon” makes its debut from Studio 6B at 30 Rockefeller Plaza in Manhattan. NBC is hoping that injecting new blood into its most venerable franchise will help the network get its mojo back. It might even be counting on a friendly ghost or two.

Studio 6B is same space where Jack Paar was host of “The Tonight Show” from 1957 to ’62, and where Johnny Carson did the first third of his run, from 1962 to ’72 (he stayed until 1992, when Leno came in). Lorne Michaels of “Saturday Night Live” fame comes in as executive producer of the new iteration, with Josh Lieb as producer.

“There’s that great feeling,” says Lieb, “of bringing it back to where the show came from, to the studio where Paar and Carson were. It gives us a little more impetus to feel like we have something to live up to. In a good way, the halls echo with the legends.”

With Seth Meyers replacing him as host of the “Tonight” companion show, “Late Night,” the 39-yearold Fallon, a new father of a 7-month-old daughter, brings his house band, the Roots, along with his skills as a comic, an interviewer and a song-and-dance man.

“In a way,” says Lieb, “it’s the closest thing to a real variety show that’s on TV today.”

ACROSS

1. Dad on “Little People, Big World” (2)

9. Setting for “Hogan’s Heroes”: abbr.

10. “Sesame Street” fellow

11. “__ Pray Love”; 2010

Julia Roberts movie

13. 1961 Charlton Heston classic (2)

15. “The __ Gate”; 1999

Johnny Depp film

17. Dylan McDermott series

18. Initials for singer Flack

20. “__ With Her” (2003-04)

21. Presidential monogram

23. Mean Amin

24. Sushi bar offering

25. Dover’s state: abbr.

26. Harris or Begley

29. Actor Molinaro

Down

1. Role on “Alice”

2. Part of the foot

3. Danson and Knight

4. Lansing’s initials

5. Yoga mantra

6. Actress on “Cheers”

7. Marshes

8. “__ Actress”; 2005 series

9. Actor on “CSI” (2)

12. Will Arnett series (2)

14. “__ Centre Street” (2001-02)

16. Suffix for cash or court

19. Wilma’s hubby

20. “The Big __ With Donny Deutsch”

22. Setting for “The Golden Girls”: abbr.

23. “__ Do Anything”; song from “Oliver!”

27. “Say __ to the Dress”

28. Role on “Roseanne”

30. Tres __; very well

31. Tim Daly’s sis

32. Ma, for one (hyph.)

33. Like a poor excuse

35. School in Tempe, for short

37. Like some verbs: abbr.

40. Setting for “Evening Shade”: abbr.

41. Initials for pianist Cliburn