NY State Tax Break Seems Tailored For ‘Tonight Show’s Return To NYC

NY State Tax Break Seems Tailored For ‘Tonight Show’s Return To NYC:
Ross Lincoln is a Deadline contributor.
NBC may be publicly tightlipped on the matter of The Tonight Show succession, but that hasn’t stopped New York lawmakers from stepping into the fray. In the event that Late Night host Jimmy Fallon takes over for Jay Leno and wants to stay in New York, as is widely anticipated, that would mean relocating The Tonight Show from its current digs in Burbank. And the New York state Legislature is dangling a major tax break in front of NBC with the hope of bringing that to pass, the New York Daily News reports. Fallon’s current studio already is being renovated as part of a planned refurbishing of 30 Rock, according to sources. Now it turns out that a provision of the proposed state budget would expand the state’s film production tax credit to include TV shows, and the budget’s language is unmistakably written with The Tonight Show in mind. “A talk or variety program that filmed at least five seasons outside the state prior to its first relocated season in New York,” with a yearly budget in excess of $30 million and a studio audience of at least 200 people would be eligible for the tax credit, which reimburses up to 30% of the production’s cost. The proposed budget would also extend the tax credit in that form through 2019.