UPDATE 10:30 AM CST/8:30 AM PST
Statement from NBC:
NBC confirmed today that popular late-night host Jay Leno will return to host "The Tonight Show With Jay Leno" from 11:35 p.m.-12:35 a.m. (ET) beginning March 1, 2010 and that "Late Night With Jimmy Fallon" will continue to be broadcast from 12:35-1:35 a.m. (ET). The announcements were made by Jeff Gaspin, Chairman, NBC Universal Television Entertainment.
"We're pleased that Jay is returning to host the franchise that he helmed brilliantly and successfully for many years," said Gaspin. "He is an enormous talent, a consummate professional and one of the hardest-working performers on television."
Leno previously hosted "The Tonight Show With Jay Leno" from May 1992-May 2009. The program will continue to showcase many of the features that made Leno America's late-night leader for more than a dozen years.
And the joint statement from NBC and Conan O'Brien:
NBC and Conan O'Brien have reached a resolution of the issues surrounding O'Brien's contract to host "The Tonight Show With Conan O'Brien."
Under terms of an agreement that was signed earlier today, NBC and O'Brien will settle their contractual obligations and the network will release O'Brien from his contract, freeing him to pursue other opportunities after September 1, 2010.
O'Brien will make his final appearance as host of "The Tonight Show" on January 22.
UPDATE 6:27 AM CST/4:27 AM PST
From an NBC spokeswoman:
"NBC confirms a deal is signed and an official announcement will be made this morning."
ORIGINAL POST 3:00 AM CST/1:00 AM PST
Our long national late-night nightmare is over.
After nearly two weeks of protracted, oft-bitter and highly publicized divorce proceedings, "The Tonight Show" host Conan O'Brien and NBC have finally put pen to paper on a $40 million-plus breakup agreement. O'Brien's manager, Gavin Polone, confirmed the signing to TheWrap early Thursday.
"It's signed," Polone said.
Among the final sticking points, according to reports in recent days, was severance for O'Brien's staff. There were other issues as well, insiders said.
"In the end, Conan was appreciative of the steps NBC made to take care of his staff and crew and decided to supplement the severance they were getting out of his own pocket," Polone told TheWrap. "Now he just wants to get back on the air as quickly as possible."
NBC reps couldn't immediately be reached early Thursday. (Update: An NBC rep, reached early Thursday morning, declined comment.)
O'Brien will end his seven-month stewardship of a national institution on Friday, unwillingly handing back custody of an iconic television brand badly bruised by a series of management missteps breathtaking in their ineptitude.
Then, it's expected that on March 1, "Tonight" will return with new/old host Jay Leno, the well-liked but never beloved stand-up comic who unapologetically campaigned to replace Johnny Carson in the 1990s, dominated the ratings through much of the 2000s and now finds himself charged with maintaining the relevancy of a 60-year talk-show formula threatened with extinction in an era of viral comedy and ceaseless celebrity exposure.
