*The last time Arsenio Hall hosted his talk show, the Internet wasn’t even in its toddler phase, a tweet was just a noise uttered by birds and faxing something was all the rage.
On Sept. 9, the comedian ends his 19-year absence from late night with the relaunch of “The Arsenio Hall Show,” and he’s chomping at the bit to host in a landscape with web sites and social media at his disposal – marketing tools that didn’t exist during his run from 1989-1994.
“I remember one time Debbie Gibson sent me a fax and she had drawn a picture of herself holding a microphone. And at the bottom it said, ‘Mr. Hall I would like to sing on your show.’ That was a text back then,” recalled Hall Monday at the Television Critics Association press tour in Beverly Hills.
“I remember Barbara Streisand called me once because she had a Bill Clinton question. She can tweet me now,” he said. “That’s how it was done back then – to get me on the phone, you call a guest, you call each other, you have a fax. [The digital age] has actually made it interesting and more unique. I’m excited to jump back into it.”
Below, Arsenio explains each step of his road back to late night, and the help he’s received along the way from future rivals, including an assist from his good friend Jay Leno.