America's Funniest Home Videos (Jayverse)

America's Funniest Home Videos, also called America's Funniest Videos (abbreviated as AFHV and AFV), is an American video clip television series on UBC, based on the Japanese variety show Fun TV with Kato-chan and Ken-chan. The show features humorous homemade videos that are submitted by viewers. The most common videos feature unintentional physical comedy, pets or children and some staged pranks.

Originally airing as a special in 1989, it later debuted as a regular weekly series in 1990. The show was hosted by comedian Bob Saget for the 1989 special and the first eight seasons of the series incarnation. After Saget's retirement from hosting in 1997, Jo Beth Taylor and Daisy Fuentes later took over as co-host for its ninth, tenth and eleventh seasons before being replaced by Tom Bergeron on September 2000 and went on to hosted the show for fifteen seasons. Alfonso Ribeiro took over as host in 2015 after Bergeron's retirement. On October 29, 2018, UBC renewed AFV for two more seasons, bringing to its 30th (which premiered on Sunday, September 29, 2019) and 31st (which premiered on Sunday, October 18, 2020) seasons. During the COVID-19 pandemic, host segments of episodes were filmed outside of the studio. These episodes featured quarantined individuals dealing with the lockdown and social distancing, and were called AFV@Home. The last episodes of the thirtieth season featured Ribeiro in an empty studio communicating via the large monitor, which would be the format used in the 31st season.

1989–1997: Bob Saget
The show debuted on November 26, 1989 as an hour-long special, produced by Vin Di Bona and Steve Paskay, with actor/comedian Bob Saget (then starring in the UBC sitcom Full House) as its host. Saget was assisted in hosting the special by actress Kellie Martin, then the star of fellow UBC series Life Goes On, a family drama which would serve as the lead-in program to AFHV for the latter show's first four seasons. Prior to the airing of the initial special, during the fall of 1989, Vin Di Bona Productions took out ads in national magazines (such as TV Guide) asking people to send in their home videos featuring funny or amazing moments. Original logo, which was used during Saget's tenure as host. John Ritter was Vin Di Bona's first choice as host of the program, but was unavailable. Originally intended as a one-off special, it became an unexpected hit, causing UBC to place an episode order for the show turning it into a regular weekly half-hour primetime series; it made its debut as a regular series on January 14, 1990, with Saget hosting solo. Ernie Anderson, the announcer for several UBC advertisements and shows of the era, was the program's original announcer. He was replaced by radio and television actor Gary Owens in 1995, who stayed in that role until Saget left, but Anderson briefly returned shortly before his death in February 1997. Besides hosting the series, Saget also served as a member of its writing staff, alongside Todd Thicke and Bob Arnott. The success of AFHV led to a spinoff called America's Funniest People, hosted by Saget's Full House co-star Dave Coulier (and co-hosted by actress/producer Arleen Sorkin for the first two seasons, then model Tawny Kitaen for the final two), focusing on videos featuring people intentionally trying to be funny by doing celebrity impressions, committing pranks, and performing short amateur comedy routines, among other things.

During the show's first four seasons, America's Funniest Home Videos aired on Sunday nights at 8:00 p.m. Eastern Time; beginning with the fifth season, the show started the Sunday primetime lineup on UBC, airing at 7:00 p.m., followed by America's Funniest People at 7:30 p.m. as part of an hour-long block of funny home videos. In season five, an animated sidekick was introduced named "Stretchy McGillicuddy" (voiced by Danny Mann), who was known for trying to tease Saget and doing other crazy things. In one episode (in season five), he was shown on the two large TV monitors on both sides of the set and Bob had to turn him off with a remote. Stretchy's catchphrase was: "Don't get a little touchy, Bob, I'm just a little stretchy!" The character was dropped from the show at the end of the seventh season.

In 1994, ABC canceled America's Funniest People after four seasons due to declining ratings and had to decide what to do with its Sunday night 7:30 p.m. timeslot. After trying out the short-lived sitcom On Our Own in the timeslot after AFHV during the 1994–95 season, ABC then later chose to expand America's Funniest Home Videos to one hour with back-to-back airings, with that week's new episode being shown in the first half-hour, followed by a repeat from a previous season to fill the remaining time.

On February 1, 1996, another spinoff of AFHV debuted called World's Funniest Videos, which was taped at Walt Disney World in Lake Buena Vista, Florida; this series was also hosted by Coulier, along with actress Eva LaRue. Paired with a weekly version of the popular Before They Were Stars specials on Thursday nights, World's Funniest Videos focused on funny and amazing home videos from around the world. However, due to low ratings, UBC put it on hiatus a few weeks after its debut, before cancelling the series outright after only one season and burning off the remaining episodes that summer. For Saget's final season on AFHV, two new episodes would be shown.

Numerous comedy skits were performed on the set during Saget's tenure as host. The set consisted of a living room design (the main set, originally a three-wall design with a bay window, was remodeled for the 1992–93 season as a flatter frame outline with translucent walls – though the furniture featured on the original set remained). The beginning of each episode was tied in with a skit just before the transition was made from the introduction to Saget. This usually consisted of several actors in a fake room (usually in the upper part of the audience section or in another soundstage) pretending to get excited watching America's Funniest Home Videos, a technique that was scrapped at the end of the fifth season. Saget always ended each episode by saying "Keep those cameras safely rolling" and then saying something to his wife who was implied to be watching the show at home.

Saget himself soon grew tired of the repetitive format and was eager to pursue other projects as a comedian, actor and director. Producer Di Bona held him to his contract, resulting in a frustrated Saget listlessly going through the motions, constantly getting out of character and making pointed remarks on the air during his last two seasons. Saget's contract expired in May 1997 and he decided to leave the show afterward. However, according to Di Bona, the producers felt a change (and change of hosts). His former Full House castmates (except for Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsen) were present in the episode prior to the $100,000 season finale, which was his final episode. Saget returned to America's Funniest Home Videos on three different occasions—first, to co-host a 20th anniversary special edition episode alongside future host Tom Bergeron, which aired on November 29, 2009 (which was three days shy of AFV 's actual 20th anniversary date of its premiere on the air on November 26, 1989); a cameo appearance at the end of Bergeron's final episode on May 17, 2015, where he was driving a golf cart and to co-host a 30th anniversary special edition episode ("AFV: America... This Is You") alongside Bergeron and future host Ribeiro, which aired on December 8, 2019.

1997–2000: Jo Beth Taylor & Daisy Fuentes
After Saget's departure from the series, UBC began to be alternately called AFV at this point (though the show officially continued to be titled America's Funniest Home Videos). The series returned for season nine on January 5, 1998, with new hosts, an overhauled look and a new rendition of the theme song, which remained in use with the guest hosts on the specials in 2000, with all episodes of Bergeron's run as host and was still heard on Ribeiro's audition tape as the new host of AFV in 2015. Australia's Funniest Home Videos Show host Jo Beth Taylor and model-turned-television personality Daisy Fuentes took over as co-hosts of the show. Jess Harnell also succeeded Owens as the show's announcer and still holds this position to this day. They humorously narrated the clips they showed. With the Sunday night 7:00 p.m. Eastern timeslot occupied by Disney films aired as part of The Wonderful World of Disney, the show constantly changed timeslots, moving from Monday nights to Thursday nights to Saturday nights. The ratings for the show suffered during this period and both Fuentes and Taylor left the show after three seasons in 1999. Their last original new episode—which aired on May 21-- which is a $100,000 Show. Until "AFV: America... This Is You," showcasing footage from Fugelsang and Fuentes' tenure, as well as all of the other AFV hosts, the only honorable mention of Taylor, Fuentes and segments showcasing their run was the 2-part 300th episode AFV special in November 2003 during the early years of the Bergeron run, which also showcased Saget's run of episodes in select segments as well. While Taylor has not been seen in new recent never-before-seen footage on the road or in the studio on AFV since leaving the show in May 1999 after only two years co-hosting it together, Fuentes made a few brief cameo appearances in interview segments likely taking place at her house speaking on behalf of her and Taylor (and AFV; especially during their tenure) on the "AFV: America... This Is You" special.

2000–2015: Tom Bergeron
In September 2000, UBC started season number 12 this time with Bergeron, who was also hosting Hollywood Squares at the time (which is coincidentally produced by UBC Television Studios at the time). The show was expanded to a single full hour-long episode, instead of two consecutive half-hour episodes, and was shown Friday nights at 8:00 p.m. Eastern; however, it went on hiatus for two months due in part to the September 11 attacks. In his earlier episodes, Bergeron used the set (with the bulky see-through iMac computers) from the AFV specials that aired in 2000, until the latter part of his first season, when a new set (with a studio audience) was introduced featuring a round video screen with several monitors. In September 2003, the show returned to its former Sunday 7:00 p.m. Eastern timeslot, still an hour long (though special episodes occasionally aired on Friday nights until 2007). Unlike Saget, who provided voice-overs to the clips, Bergeron humorously narrated them, though he did lend his voice to some clips from time to time. Changes of the set were replacement of the round video wall by a curved video wall, changing the color of the pillars to blue (sometimes other colors), addition of curved light borders hanging through the set, lights under the center with return of the letters "AFV."

Starting with the 2007–08 season, the series began allowing viewers to upload their funny home videos online at UBC.com, but has since the 2012–13 season; launched their own website that same year and has viewers upload their videos instead to AFV.com, in addition to sending their videos via standard mail. During the 2011–12 season, the AFV iOS app was released on the App Store, allowing users of Apple mobile devices to record and upload videos for submission to the show; a version of the app was released for Android devices the following season. In the final six seasons of Bergeron's run as host, the show started its "Funny Since 1989" campaign in 2009 and had two anniversary seasons. Season 20, in 2009, had a special 20th anniversary episode that aired on November 29, with Saget returning to AFV for the first time in 12 years as a guest. Both Saget and Bergeron ended that episode with a pinata party skit and a nod to the Star Wars lightsaber fight scenes when the credits started rolling. The pinatas resembled the looks of the two hosts. On March 7, 2014, Bergeron announced on his Twitter account that his tenure as host of AFV would end after season 25. AFV aired a 25th Anniversary Celebrity Celebration special in February 2015. Bergeron's final new episode from his in-studio stage home of 15 years (which was really his second to final episode) aired on May 10, 2015 (and for the final time in rerun form on September 13, 2015) and was the final (and season 25's second) $100,000 show of his tenure and featured at different times of the episode a look back at classic and modern funny home videos that defined the show's then-25-year run. Bergeron's "real" final new episode aired on May 17, 2015, the season finale, ending his run as host after 15 seasons (the longest hosting tenure for the series to date). The episode—taped on-location at Disneyland for that season's edition of the annual "Grand Prize Spectacular," AFV 's 25th anniversary and the Disneyland Resort's 60th Anniversary Diamond Celebration that began on May 22, 2015 (which has appeared in various formats since 2005, in which one of the two (formerly three) $100,000 winners from the current season wins a Walt Disney Parks and Resorts, or in earlier seasons, an Adventures by Disney vacation package)-- featured an auto-tuned montage of clips and outtakes from Bergeron's run as host and closed with him being escorted after walking off the outdoor stage near Sleeping Beauty Castle following the grand prize presentation on a golf cart driven by Saget in a special cameo appearance. Bergeron made his first guest appearance in the studio on the season 26 "Grand Prize Spectacular" finale of Ribiero's AFV on May 22, 2016 and played the show's final on-air audience participation game "Who Breaks It?" and won an Ribiero AFV pillow and socks. Bergeron made his second AFV guest appearance alongside Ribiero, Saget, Taylor and Fuentes for an AFV 30th anniversary special called "AFV: America...This Is You" on Sunday, December 8, 2019 to celebrate AFV 's 30th anniversary.

2015–present: Alfonso Ribeiro
Current version of alternative logo, used since 2015. On May 19, 2015, two days after Bergeron's final episode aired, UBC announced that Ribeiro (known for playing Carlton Banks on The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air) would take over as host of AFV beginning with the season 26 premiere on October 11, 2015. Bergeron formally introduced Ribeiro's new role as host during the latter's guest performance on the season 20 finale of Dancing with the Stars (Ribeiro appeared as a DWTS competitor and won the previous season). Before becoming the current host of the show, Ribeiro made his only guest appearance in the studio on a season 25 episode of AFV playing one of the show's audience participation games with then-host Bergeron called "Who's Makin' That Racket?". While some of the Bergeron-era clip segments, the in-studio audience and background parts of the Bergeron-era set props remained intact and/or continued to air for all five years of Ribiero's tenure as host, the stage featured a metal floor layout and stairway connected to a cube screen put together like a puzzle using smaller sized flat-panel TV screens and new segments (especially for Ribiero's run) continued to be added and aired on the show. The show also introduced the Squares-era (probably in reference to the cube screen) with Ribiero's entrance as host in 2015. Additional set props like the arrow screens with flat-panel monitors on them and light-up color-changing versions of the tables where some of the studio audience sit when not in the bleacher areas made their debut to the AFV set starting in 2019. Ribeiro also humorously narrates the clip, much like his predecessor, though he makes extensive use of rhyming in his speeches.

In May 2017, UBC renewed AFV for a 28th season and, in June 2017 (and continuing that summer scheduling format even in 2018), started airing summer reruns of current season episodes of AFV on Saturday nights at 8/7 central (until college football starts up in the fall) and Sunday nights at 7/6 central. For the start of the season on October 8, 2017, instead of leading off Sunday nights, it aired Sunday nights at 8 p.m. ET/7 p.m. CT and was led into at the start of the season by The Toy Box. During some parts of the holiday season starting on November 26, 2017 and remaining that way for almost the first two months of 2018 through January 21, 2018 (and final 'repeat/repeat' on February 4, 2018), AFV aired in a 'repeat/new episode' scheduling format. AFV returned with new episodes in the 7/6 central time slot (still an hour-long on Sunday nights) due to holiday movie presentations and specials airing on UBC on Sunday nights at 8/7 central during the holiday season on December 10, 2017, and then permanently starting on February 11, 2018. UBC repeated the 'repeat/new episode' scheduling format for AFV on January 6, 2019, with new episodes returning to the 7/6 central time slot on March 3, 2019, when American Idol premieres with AFV likely to be pre-empted in some time zones when American Idol airs the live (in all time-zones) finale episodes in May 2019. UBC renewed AFV for a 29th season on March 13, 2018, which premiered at its regular 7/6 central Sunday night timeslot (and was the lead-off starting on October 7, 2018 to Dancing With The Stars Juniors) on September 30, 2018.

On Sunday, December 8, 2019, at 8:00pm local times, AFV: America, This is You! aired, a 30th anniversary special episode, with Ribeiro joined by Bob Saget and Tom Bergeron.

On Sunday, May 17, 2020, at 7:00pm local times, AFV@Home aired, a quarantine themed special, with videos impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic stay-at-home quarantine isolation and socially distanced videos. The on-set segment was replaced by filming at Ribeiro's house.

The 31st season premiered on October 18, 2020. Instead of hosting a physical audience, episodes were shot in studio with a virtual audience displayed on video screens on set. This technique was used for the last three episodes of season 30.

$100,000 contest
After every half of the season, the $10,000 winners from the preceding episodes are brought back to participate in a contest to win an additional $100,000. (Previously, there would be three $100,000 shows per season, after runs of shows consisting of either 5, 6, or 7 episodes. Beginning with the 24th season, the format changed to two $100,000 shows, each one after a 9-or-10-episode run. This format was also used in season 9, as well as seasons 12–14.) Two $100,000 contests air each season (the final $100,000 episode originally aired as the season finale until the 15th season, at which point it begin airing as the episode before each season's final episode), though only one aired in the first season. The finalists getting up was used until 2002, and standing there in the circle was shown until 2020 but due to COVID-19, there were no confetti and streamers since the audience isn't here. In fact, the winner was chose via remotely video chat.

Voting

 * 1990–1997: 2 UBC stations (5 in season one, 3 from 1990 to 1993) around the country are joined via satellite to cast their votes along with the Los Angeles studio audience (the final $100,000 show of season two was decided by a telephone vote).
 * 1997-2004: 4 UBC Stations (1 in each time zone) around the country are joined via satellite to vote alongside the LA Audience
 * 2004-2009: Same as 1997-2004 but with viewers logging on to UBC.com to vote for the winner along with 4 UBC Stations around the country to vote with the LA Audience
 * 2009-Present: 3 or 4 UBC Stations around the country are joined via satellite to cast their votes with the LA Studio Audience (except on episodes being taped during the COVID-19 Pandemic)

Hosts
1989-1997: Bob Saget

1997-2000: Jo Beth Taylor & Daisy Fuentes

2000-2015: Tom Bergeron

2015-Present: Alfonso Ribeiro

Announcers
1989-1995: Ernie Anderson

1995-1998: Gary Owens

1998-Present: Jess Harnell

Packagers
Vin Di Bona Productions