Tonight on NBC: "Here's Samsung"

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Last October, we saw an Eminem performance on the top of the Empire State Building shown on the Jimmy Kimmel Show. Parts of the event were recorded using a Pixel 3. Now, according to Variety, Monday night's episode of the Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon will have a different format since it was recorded in entirety using the Samsung Galaxy S10+. Instead of an opening monologue, and interviews with guests, the show is basically an ad for Samsung's current top-of-the-line handset.

Tonight's show is the result of a partnership between Samsung and NBCUniversal. Samsung is hoping that focusing on the phone in this format will allow viewers to pay more attention to the message than they would if the company merely ran commercials during a regular episode of the Tonight Show. Fallon will open the show tonight by talking about how the Galaxy S10+ was used in lieu of the usual high-end television cameras that normally shoot the program. We could see more sponsored programming of this type on broadcast television. NBCUniversal's Mark Marshall, the company’s president of advertising and client partnerships, has said, "I think these types of partnerships are going to become, hopefully, more frequent and done to this level."

Today's report notes that both Samsung and NBC have been discussing some type of hook up since last January's Consumer Electronics Show, held in Las Vegas. While prepping for tonight's show, Samsung had its marketing team and ad agency meet with NBCUniversal staff to make sure that the features of the Galaxy S10+ were represented correctly during the show.

The Galaxy S10+ has three cameras on back and two in front that were available to record the show. On the back there is a 12MP primary camera, a 12MP camera with 2X zoom, and a 16MP ultra-wide angle camera. In front are a pair of cameras found in the upper right side of the screen, thanks to the Infinity-O display's use of punch holes. One is a 10MP sensor, and the other is an 8MP depth sensor for the bokeh (blur) effect on portraits and selfies. The base model, with 8GB of memory and 128GB of storage, is priced at $999.99.

Samsung is also talking with ABC about doing sponsored programming


Fallon will take the viewers of Monday night's show on a tour of some of his favorite spots in the Big Apple. They also will see Fallon, show announcer Steve Higgins, and the show's resident band (The Roots) dining out, visiting a Jazz club, delivering food to firemen, interviewing Saturday Night Live Weekend Update anchor Michael Che and more.

The Samsung Galaxy S10+ is also expected to show up on other NBCUniversal shows including Today, Bravo’s Watch What Happens Live with Andy Cohen, Telemundo’s La Voz and E!’s Snapchat show The Rundown. During most of these appearances, viewers will be given a tutorial on how to shoot videos with the phone.

Besides arranging to have the Samsung Galaxy S10+ appear on NBCUniversal shows, Patricio Paucar, Samsung’s vice president of marketing, says that the company is talking about doing similar types of sponsored programming with NBC rival broadcaster ABC.


Tech companies like Samsung, trying to sell its latest high-end smartphone, are often attracted to late night shows, notes Variety. This is because these shows usually are very much into pop culture, and the program's staff often integrates the product being promoted into cutting-edge skits and gags that viewers are likely to remember.

The Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon is usually broadcast weeknights at 11:30pm local time on NBC.

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