America's Got Talent

For the Got Talent international franchise, see Got Talent. For the most recent season, see America's Got Talent season 19.

America's Got Talent
Genre
Created bySimon Cowell[1]
Showrunners
  • Jason Raff
  • Sam Donnelly[2]
Directed byRussell Norman[1]
Creative directors
Presented by
Judges
Country of originUnited States
Original languageEnglish
No. of seasons19
No. of episodes461
Production
Executive producers
  • Simon Cowell
  • Sam Donnelly
  • Jason Raff
  • Rob Wade
  • Trish Kinane
  • Richard Wallace
Running time60–120 minutes
Production companies
Original release
NetworkNBC
ReleaseJune 21, 2006 (2006-06-21) –
present
Related
Infobox instructions (only shown in preview)

America's Got Talent (often abbreviated as AGT) is a televised American talent show competition, and is part of the global Got Talent franchise created by Simon Cowell. The program is produced by Fremantle USA (as well as distributed by) and Syco Entertainment, and broadcasts on the NBC television network. It premiered on June 21, 2006, after plans for a British edition in 2005 were suspended, following a dispute within the British broadcaster ITV. Production would later resume in 2007,[4] following the success of the first season. Each season is mainly run during the network's summer schedule, and has featured various hosts over the course of the program's history. The current host is Terry Crews.

The program attracts a variety of participants from across the United States and abroad, who possess some form of talents. Acts range from singing, dancing, comedy, magic, stunts, variety and other genres. Each participant or act who auditions, attempts to secure a place in the live episodes of a season, by impressing a panel of judges. The current line-up consists of Cowell,[5] Howie Mandel, Heidi Klum, and Sofía Vergara. Participants making it into the live episodes, compete against each other for both the judges' and public's vote, in order to reach the live final. The winner receives a large cash prize (primarily paid over a period of time), and since the third season, a chance to headline a show on the Las Vegas Strip.

The show itself has been a rating success for NBC, drawing in on average around 10 million viewers per season. In 2013, a book titled Inside AGT: The Untold Stories of America's Got Talent was released, providing a description of the seasons, contestants, judges and production techniques of the show. It includes detailed interviews with contestants from all seasons, up to the date of the book's publication.[6]

The series has run for a total of nineteen seasons, with the nineteenth season airing May–September 2024, and has spawned four spin-off competitions: America's Got Talent: The Champions (2019–20), AGT: Extreme (2022), America's Got Talent: All-Stars (2023), and America's Got Talent: Fantasy League (2024). The main series returned for season nineteen in summer 2024 with host Crews and judges Cowell, Mandel, Klum, and Vergara all returning.

  1. ^ a b "About the Show". NBC. Archived from the original on June 3, 2015. Retrieved June 13, 2015.
  2. ^ Hailu, Selome (October 28, 2024). "'America's Got Talent': Jason Raff Out as Showrunner After 19 Seasons Due to Budget Cuts". Variety. Retrieved October 31, 2024.
  3. ^ a b "Brian Burke: From Performer to Director". The American Musical and Dramatic Academy. December 12, 2012. Retrieved May 19, 2021.
  4. ^ "Trade marks – find by number". Ipo.gov.uk. Retrieved November 29, 2011.
  5. ^ Chan, Anna (October 22, 2015). "Simon Cowell to Replace Howard Stern as Judge on America's Got Talent for Season 11". US Weekly. American Media, Inc. Archived from the original on October 23, 2015. Retrieved October 22, 2015.
  6. ^ Daly, Sean and Ashley Majeski. Inside AGT: The Untold Stories of America's Got Talent, CreateSpace Independent Publishing (2013) ISBN 1492203602