Ed McMahon in the context of Sidekick

A late-night talk show is a genre of talk show, originating in the United States. It is generally structured around humorous monologues about the day's news, guest interviews, comedy sketches and music performances. It is characterized by spontaneous conversation, and for an effect of immediacy and intimacy as if the host were speaking directly to each member of the watching audience. Late-night talk shows are also fundamentally shaped by the personality of the host.

The late-night talk show format was popularized by Johnny Carson and his sidekick Ed McMahon with The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson on NBC. Typically, the show's host conducts interviews from behind a desk, while a guest(s) is seated on a couch. Many late-night talk shows feature a house band which generally performs cover songs for the studio audience during commercial breaks and occasionally will back up a guest artist.

The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson is an American television talk show broadcast by NBC. The show was the third installment of The Tonight Show. Hosted by Johnny Carson, it aired from October 1, 1962 to May 22, 1992, replacing Tonight Starring Jack Paar and was replaced by The Tonight Show with Jay Leno. Ed McMahon served as Carson's sidekick and the show's announcer.

For its first decade, Johnny Carson's The Tonight Show was based at the RCA Building at 30 Rockefeller Plaza, New York City, with some episodes recorded at NBC Studios in Burbank, California; on May 1, 1972, the show moved to Burbank as its main venue with extended returns to New York for several weeks over the next 12 months. After May 1973, however, the show remained in Burbank exclusively until Carson's retirement. The show's house band, the NBC Orchestra, was led by Skitch Henderson, until 1966 when Milton Delugg took over, who was succeeded by Doc Severinsen less than a year later.