Editing Johnny Carson (section)

=== Move to Burbank ===
On May 1, 1972, ''The Tonight Show'' moved from 30 Rockefeller Plaza to the [[The Burbank Studios|NBC Studios]] in Burbank, California, because of the studio's proximity to celebrities.<ref name=lnsca>{{cite news |url=https://news.google.com/newspapers?id=kWgzAAAAIBAJ&pg=4717%2C4323677 |newspaper=Lodi News-Sentinel |location=California |agency=UPI |title="Here's Johnny" to come to California permanently |date=March 1, 1972 |page=16 }}</ref>

From 1980, Carson stopped hosting five shows per week. Instead, Mondays featured a guest host, leaving Carson to host the other four weeknights. Shows were videotaped in Burbank at 5:30 pm, fed from there to the [[Central Time Zone|Central]] and [[Eastern Time Zone]] stations via cross-country television line at 8:30 pm [[Pacific Time Zone|Pacific time]] (11:30 pm [[Eastern Time Zone|Eastern time]]), and later sent from Burbank to the Pacific Time Zone stations at 11:30 pm Pacific time. Since only two feeds originated from Burbank, Central Time Zone stations received the Eastern feed one hour earlier at 10:30 pm local time, and [[Mountain Time Zone|Mountain time]] stations received the Pacific time zone feed one hour later, at 12:30 am local time. {{citation needed|date=August 2022}}
<!-- In the Mountain Time Zone, The Tonight Show was broadcast at 10:30 pm (12:30 ET, 9:30 PT); it was delayed just one hour from the Eastern/Central broadcast, not three hours. -->

Carson announced in April 1979 that he was leaving ''The Tonight Show'' after seventeen years hosting the program. At the time, media analysts estimated the show generated 17% of NBC's pre-tax profits. He negotiated a three-year deal to remain with the show in May 1980, reducing the program's length from ninety to sixty minutes while decreasing his workload from four to three nights each week.<ref>{{cite news |last1=Lindsey |first1=Robert |title=Carson Leaving 'Tonight Show' |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1979/04/20/archives/carson-leaving-tonight-show-setback-to-nbc-carson-tells-nbc-he-will.html |work=The New York Times |date=April 20, 1979}}</ref><ref>{{cite news |last1=Carmody |first1=John |title=Carson Signs for Three More Years On a Shorter 'Tonight' Show for NBC |url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/lifestyle/1980/05/07/carson-signs-for-three-more-years-on-a-shorter-tonight-show-for-nbc/2bf2c715-d357-49f4-b20b-9501fb835449/ |newspaper=The Washington Post |date=May 7, 1980}}</ref> [[Tom Snyder]]'s ''[[The Tomorrow Show|Tomorrow]]'' added a half-hour to fill the vacant time. [[Joan Rivers]] became the [[permanent guest host|"permanent" guest host]] from September 1983 until 1986. ''The Tonight Show'' then returned to using rotating guest hosts, including comics [[George Carlin]] and [[Garry Shandling]]. [[Jay Leno]] became the exclusive guest host in fall 1987, later joking that although other guest hosts had upped their fees, he had kept his low, assuring himself more bookings. Eventually, Monday night was reserved for Leno and Tuesday night was reserved for ''The Best of Carson''—rebroadcasts usually dating from a year earlier, but occasionally from the 1970s.

Although Carson's work schedule became more abbreviated, ''The Tonight Show'' remained so successful that his compensation from NBC continued to rise; by the mid-1970s, he had become the highest-paid personality on television, earning about $4 million a year (${{formatnum:{{Inflation|US|4000000|1978|r=-3}}}} today), not including [[nightclub]] appearances and his other businesses. Carson refused many offers to appear in films, including title roles in ''[[The Thomas Crown Affair (1968 film)|The Thomas Crown Affair]]'' and [[Gene Wilder]]'s role in ''[[Blazing Saddles]]''.{{r|tynan19780220}} He also declined director [[Martin Scorsese]]'s offer to co-star with [[Robert De Niro]] in the 1983 film ''[[The King of Comedy (film)|The King of Comedy]]'', with the role of a TV talk-show host then going to [[Jerry Lewis]].<ref>{{cite book|title=Scorsese on Scorsese|series=Directors on Directors Series|isbn=978-0-57117-827-8|date=1989|edition=1996|publisher=[[Faber & Faber]]|last=Scorsese|first=Martin|author-link=Martin Scorsese}}{{Page needed|date=November 2024}} [https://www.theguardian.com/film/2004/oct/08/extract.features Excerpt]</ref>

In recognition of his 25th anniversary on ''The Tonight Show'', Carson received a personal [[List of Peabody Award winners (1980–1989)#1985|Peabody Award]], the board saying he had "become an American institution, a household word, [and] the most widely quoted American." They also said they "felt the time had come to recognize the contributions that Johnny has made to television, to humor, and to America."<ref>{{cite web | url= http://www.peabody.uga.edu/winners/details.php?id=307 | title= Johnny Carson Personal Award | year= 1985 | publisher= [[Henry W. Grady College of Journalism and Mass Communication|Grady College of Journalism and Mass Communication]] | access-date= April 26, 2011 | url-status=dead | archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20120126050633/http://www.peabody.uga.edu/winners/details.php?id=307 | archive-date= January 26, 2012 | df= mdy-all }}</ref>