Comedy Central

Comedy Central is an American pay television channel owned by Viacom Global Entertainment Group, a unit of the Viacom Media Networks division of Viacom, based in Manhattan. The channel is geared for mature audiences and carries comedy programming in the form of both original, licensed, and syndicated series, stand-up comedy specials, and feature films.

Since the early 2000s, Comedy Central has expanded globally with localized channels in Europe, India, Southeast Asia, Latin America, New Zealand, Middle East, and Africa. The international channels are operated by Viacom International Media Networks.

Comedy Central is available to approximately 86,723,000 households in the United States as of September 2018.

First Years (1989-1991)
On November 15, 1989, Time-Life, owners of HBO launched The Comedy Channel as the first cable channel devoted exclusively to comedy-based programming. On April 1, 1990, Viacom (who owned MTV, VH1, and Nickelodeon) launched a rival channel called Ha! that featured reruns of situation comedies and some original sketch comedy.

The Comedy Channel's programs were broadcast from the HBO Downtown Studios at 120 East 23rd Street in Manhattan. The format prior to the merger with Ha! included several original and unconventional programs such as Onion World with Rich Hall and Mystery Science Theater 3000, as well as laid-back variety/talk shows hosted by comedians, including The Sweet Life with Rachel Sweet, Night After Night with Allan Havey, Sports Monster, and The Higgins Boys and Gruber, the latter of whom performed sketches in between showings of vintage television series like Supercar, Clutch Cargo, and Lancelot Link, Secret Chimp.

The standard format for The Comedy Channel's shows usually involved the various hosts introducing clips culled from the acts of stand-up comedians as well as classic comedies of the 1970s and 1980s, such as Young Frankenstein and Kentucky Fried Movie, presented in a style similar to music videos. In the early days, certain hours of the day when clips were shown without "host segments" were dubbed Short Attention Span Theater. In 1990, hosts under this title, Jon Stewart and Patty Rosborough, were introduced. Comedian Marc Maron also hosted the series.

While The Comedy Channel broadcast mostly low-budget original programming, Ha!'s schedule featured sitcom and sketch comedy reruns (many of which had been previously licensed for sister network Nick at Nite) as well as complete 90-minute reruns of Saturday Night Live from the sixth through 16th seasons.

After two years of limited distribution, the two channels merged into one, relaunching on April 1, 1991 as CTV: The Comedy Network; it later changed its name to Comedy Central on June 1, 1991 to prevent issues with the Canadian broadcast television network CTV, which would eventually be its Canadian content partner through The Comedy Network when that channel started operations six years later. Comedy Partners was originally a partnership of Home Box Office, Inc., the subsidiary of Time Warner that owned The Comedy Channel and HBO's half and Viacom Hearty Ha! Ha! LLC, the subsidiary that owned Ha! and Viacom's half of the network during its first years on air. Viacom bought out AOL Time Warner's half in April 2003 for $1.23 billion. Despite HBO's exit from the venture, the Viacom Media Networks division in charge of Comedy Central is still called Comedy Partners, currently being a partnership of Viacom International, the operating subsidiary of Viacom of which Viacom Media Networks is a division and Viacom Hearty Ha! Ha! LLC, the subsidiary that owned Ha! and Viacom's original half of the network.

1991-1997
From the late 1980s through the mid-1990s, much of the programming on Comedy Central and its predecessors consisted of comedy films, sitcom reruns, half-hour specials, and clip shows featuring comedians. Except for the cult favorite Mystery Science Theater 3000, the channel had a relatively small viewership. A notable early success was Politically Incorrect with Bill Maher, which after showing promise on Comedy Central was quickly snapped up by ABC. Additionally, The Daily Show had got its start with original host Craig Kilborn, although it would take a few more years for the show to reach high popularity (and a shift toward a focus on political humor) with the introduction of Jon Stewart (who was former co-host of Short Attention Span Theater from 1991).

Dr. Katz, Professional Therapist was also a notable original program from this era, as well as the game show Win Ben Stein's Money. Successful non-original programming included Canadian comedy group The Kids in the Hall and British shows such as the U.K. edition of Whose Line Is It Anyway? (the predecessor of the U.S. version, featuring much of the same American cast as would later be seen in the U.S.) and the sitcom Absolutely Fabulous. Some later seasons of AbFab, as it was informally known, were partially financed by Comedy Central. Comedy Central also had the national rights to broadcast reruns of Seattle's Almost Live! between 1992 and 1993.

An earlier variant of the 1992 logo has the "Comedy Central" text bigger, almost taking up the marquee sign; that variant lasted until 1995.

1997-1999
The channel made a breakthrough when South Park premiered in 1997. Being the first major basic cable show to carry the TV-MA rating for mature audiences, the show was considered too controversial to be picked up by any mainstream network; the Fox Broadcasting Company (known for The Simpsons) for example refused to pick up the series due to the over-the-top offensive content at the time. As word of mouth spread, the number of people who requested that Comedy Central be added to their cable providers increased, and the channel became available in over 50% of American homes by 1998.

2000-2003
On November 13, 2000, Comedy Central introduced a modernized version of its globe logo, by straightening the buildings and removing the transmitter and marquee. The management of the network said that the transmitter of the 1992 and 1997 logos was said to "communicate the 1950s broadcast era". In 2002, Comedy Central Records was formed as a means of releasing albums by comedians that have appeared on the network.

Since 2003, Comedy Central has created a tradition of roasting comedians in the style of the New York Friars' Club roasts. During these roasts, friends of the roastee, along with other comedians, take turns making fun of the roastee, the other roasters, and occasionally audience members. So far, the roastees have included Denis Leary, Jeff Foxworthy, Pamela Anderson,  William Shatner, Flavor Flav, Bob Saget, Larry the Cable Guy, Joan Rivers, Rob Reiner, David Hasselhoff, Donald Trump, Charlie Sheen, Roseanne Barr, James Franco, Justin Bieber, Rob Lowe, Bruce Willis, and Alec Baldwin.

Featured Channels
'''This page was created by JakCooperThePlumber on November 25, 2019. '''
 * 1) The Daily Show with Trevor Noah
 * 2) Comedy Central Stand-Up
 * 3) Key & Peele
 * 4) Comedy Central Originals
 * 5) Lights Out with David Spade
 * 6) You Up with Nikki Glaser
 * 7) South Park Studios
 * 8) MTV
 * 9) Paramount Network
 * 10) VH1