In 1957, Ed Sullivan’s Sunday night show on CBS was one of the biggest hits on television…a fact which amazed many who felt that Mr. Sullivan was the least-talented man in show business. Someone at NBC had the idea they might be able to counter Sullivan with the most talented guy they had in their stable — Steve Allen. At the time, Allen was the host of Tonight, the late night series later known as The Tonight Show.
Tonight was then an hour-and-forty-five minutes every night, five nights a week, so Mr. Allen was already working pretty hard. As of June 24, 1956, he was doing both shows — five late night shows each week and an hour variety program Sunday nights opposite Sullivan. Steve’s Sunday show did pretty well but it failed in its primary assignment, which was to knock Ed off the air. Ed continued to get (usually) higher ratings.
Steve, working as hard as he did, was starting to get weary and someone decided that he needed to devote more time to the Sunday show. So as of October 1, Steve began doing Tonight only three nights week. Ernie Kovacs began hosting it on Monday and Tuesday nights.
The change did not help boost the ratings of the Sunday night show so it was eventually decided that Steve would give up the late night show completely and focus wholly on Sunday nights. Kovacs was reportedly offered full-time hosting of Tonight but he declined it. So what were they going to put on there? Well, someone at NBC had an idea for a new kind of show to go into that time slot so in late January of ’57, Steve Allen and Ernie Kovacs did their last episodes of Tonight. On 1/28/57, a series called Tonight – America After Dark debuted.
Anchored at first by announcer/broadcaster Jack Lescoulie, Tonight – America After Dark was, it is said, a bit of a mess. It consisted a lot of short segments where different newspaper columnists or other personalities would interview different stars or newsmakers. Viewers tuned out quickly and local NBC affiliates stopped carrying it…and on July 29, it was replaced by Jack Paar hosting Tonight in a format more like what Allen and Kovacs had done.
Steve Allen now was doing only the Sunday night show and it was a pretty good one. Still, it never quite sent Ed Sullivan off to the unemployment office. Then in September of ’57, ABC programmed a new western called Maverick starring James Garner against Ed and Steve. It began to sometimes win the time slot over both of them.
Maverick lasted five seasons. Steve Allen’s show moved to Monday nights in 1959, conceding the time slot to Ed who lasted there — amazingly — until March of 1971.
Years later, Steve was asked what guests on his show had attracted the most viewers to switch over from watching Ed Sullivan. He mentioned Elvis Presley, Tony Bennett, Pearl Bailey and many other stars…and said that, curiously, they got enormous tune-in when he featured The Three Stooges. Here are three sketches that the Stooges did on Steve’s show. They are gloriously, wonderfully stupid and despite what die-hard Stooge lovers may think, Joe DeRita is better in them than Moe or Larry…
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