Joan Rivers

(1933 - 2014)

After appearing on The Tonight Show with Jack Paar as a comedian in the late 1950s, Joan Rivers made her first of many appearances on The Tonight Show with Johnny Carson on February 17, 1965. After filling in as a guest host, she became first woman to headline a late-night talk show. She became a permanent guest host in 1983, but the offer of a competing late-night show caused a rift between Rivers and her mentor Carson, who never invited her on the show again. She returned to The Tonight Show, hosted by Jimmy Fallon, on March 27, 2014, twenty-six years after she was banned.