Jay Leno left The Tonight Show a high note. The headed-for-10 p.m. host scored his highest Friday overnights ever according to the NBC release. At the very end of the show, viewers saw the legacy of 17 years and 3775 shows on the air–all the children born to Tonight Show staffers during Leno`s tenure.
The finale also boosted Late Night host Jimmy Fallon to his second-highest overnights ever.
Tonight scored an 8.8 rating, 20 share in metered-market households. It was the second-highest rating this year, behind only the big turnout to see president Barack Obama guest in March. Beyond that, it was Leno`s highest score in more than four years, dating back to a special episode paying tribute to Johnny Carson, who died in January of 2005.
Closer to home, in the greater Toronto market, Leno`s Friday farewell scored 150,000 viewers on Barrie`s CKVR and picked up another 24,000 on Buffalo`s WGRZ. That`s well up from the 40,000 to 60,000 who usually watch Leno and Letterman each night in the GTA. A Letterman rerun on OMNI1 drew 36,000 the same night. In Vancouver, Leno drew an overnight estimated 57,000 on West Coast A channel CIVI, more than doubling Letterman`s 21,000 take on OMNI West.
Other scores from the weekend: CTV`s Spectacle slumped to a new low Friday of 346,000 (BBM overnight estimates, `commercial.`). Hockey roared back on CBC as the Detroit-Pittsburgh Stanley Cup opener drew 1,726,000 Saturday. Another 1,875,000 tuned in Sunday night for Game Two.
advertisement