late night show
Best TV of the '00s: Late Night Moments

More of our best of the decade coverage, which started on Tuesday. You can read the other posts at the link above. Here, we talk about the funniest or most surprising late night moments of the last ten years.
In the past decade, late night shows continued to bloom in popularity. However, some of our favorite late night shows were shuffled around while some got new hosts.
No matter what network executives decided to do to the line up of US late night shows, their hosts and guest stars gave us plenty fantastic, OMG!, and WTF? moments that generated tons of watercooler talks and forum discussion threads.
Below are some of the best late night moments of the past decade as chosen by some of the TV Squad bloggers. We realize there are tough choices in this category, so we hope you'll add your own favorites in the comments section below.
Will Tina Fey play Sarah Palin this weekend?
OK, so everyone has made the observation that new Vice President nominee Sarah Palin looks a lot like Tina Fey (and to a lesser extent, Megan Mullally). So we're all wondering who is going to play Palin when the new season of Saturday Night Live bows this weekend. Fey is no longer on the show, so will they have to find someone else on the show to play Palin, perhaps Amy Poehler or Kristin Wiig?There could be a subtle clue in this New York profile of 24 year-old humorist and SNL writer Simon Rich. After all the talk about his new book and the talk about how he desperately needs an ending to the novel he's writing, the interviewer asks him if Fey is indeed going to play Palin this weekend. The answer?
30 Rock gets a full season
In another display of confidence in a show that isn't exactly lighting the ratings world on fire (see also Friday Night Lights, Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip), NBC has given a full season to the Tina Fey sitcom 30 Rock. At first is looked like they were just ordering a few more scripts, but they gave the green light for a full season this afternoon.
But this move is actually ratings-oriented, because the show got its best ratings to date last night, in its new Thursday slot between Scrubs and ER. It was up 25% from last week.
So now we'll get full seasons of two shows about the behind-the-scenes goings on at a late night comedy show. Three if you count Saturday Night Live, and four if you count the possible web showings of the SNL Friday night rehearsal. I still think Studio 60 is the better show. 30 Rock isn't bad (and Alec Baldwin is funny as hell), it just isn't incredibly funny, which stands out when you're a straight-ahead comedy. But I do watch it every Thursday night, and it's not really fair to compare a half hour comedy with a one hour comedy/drama, even if they are about the same thing.
TV Squad Hot Topics
Most Popular Articles
From Our Partners
- 'Parks and Recreation': Bradley Whitford guests in 'West Wing'-referencing episode
- Becki Newton, 'How I Met Your Mother' creators join forces for FOX comedy pilot
- TV ratings: 'Grimm' and 'Shark Tank' rise, CBS stays on top Friday
- John Goodman, Roseanne Barr reunite in NBC pilot 'Downwardly Mobile'
- 'The Vampire Diaries' recap: In which Elena is starting to get on our nerves
- More From Zap2it
- CSI: NY Exclusive: Jaime Ray Newman Returns!
- James Wolk Enters Political Fray, Joins USA Network's D.C.-Based Drama Series
- Ratings: Shark Tank Makes a Splash, Fringe Matches Low, Supernatural Dips and Grimm Gains
- Shameless' Justin Chatwin Previews Steve's Quest to Win Back Fiona and His 'Sticky' Mess
- Pilot Scoop: Michael B. Jordan Reunites with Friday Night Lights Boss on NBC's County
- More From TVLine
