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3 weeks ago
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EXCLUSIVE: America’s Got Talent is losing one of its longest-tenured talents.
Jason Raff, who has served as showrunner of the long-running NBC hit for 19 seasons, has left the show.
After 482 original episodes including 140 hours of live episodes, Raff told Deadline that he was informed that he was being let go the day after season 19 finished at the end of September due to budget cuts.
Raff also developed and served as showrunner for all of the show’s spinoffs including America’s Got Talent: The Champions, AGT: Extreme, America’s Got Talent: All-Stars and America’s Got Talent: Fantasy League.
Sam Donnelly, who has served as showrunner alongside Raff, will continue as solo showrunner on Season 20 show, which is produced by Fremantle and Syco Entertainment, and will likely air in May 2025.
He told Deadline that nearly 20 years ago, he was handed a DVD of a presentation for British broadcaster ITV called Paul’s O’Grady’s Got Talent. The UK network had passed but NBC picked it up to air in June 2006. Raff, who had previously worked in news and on NBC’s Dateline before serving as a supervising producer on early NBC reality show Average Joe, had an overall deal with NBC at the time.
He started on the show in 2006 as a co-exec producer, alongside showrunner Ken Warwick, who also worked on American Idol, before Warwick left and Raff become executive producer.
“I was offered two shows in the same week. One was a celebrity cooking show and the other was Got Talent. It had Simon Cowell, who was pretty big at the time. It was a variety show and I could juggle and ride a unicycle, so I was like that looks good,” Raff told Deadline.
The celebrity cooking show was being stripped across the week and was canceled by the Wednesday so it was a wise move.
“There hadn’t been much variety for a while but it was this throwback to Ed Sullivan or The Gong Show. The set was so simple back then, I don’t think we even had any moving lights or anything,” he added.
The first season was hosted by Regis Philbin with David Hasselhoff, Brandy Norwood and Piers Morgan, in his first role on American television as the judges. Subsequent judges including Jerry Springer, Nick Cannon, Tyra Banks and currently Terry Crews. Judges have includes the likes of Cowell, Sharon Osbourne, Howard Stern, Howie Mandel, Mel B, Heidi Klum, Gabrielle Union, Julianne Hough and Sofia Vergara.
Raff said that some of his most-cherished memories including getting to film at Radio City Music Hall and discovering the likes of a 12-year old Grace VanderWaal, who won Season 11 by performing her own originals (the “next Taylor Swift”, per Cowell).
“We take thousands of people each year so most of it was quite mundane but sometimes someone would come in and, this is the best feeling I ever got from the show, when someone would come in and perform and you’d get goosebumps because you knew in six months, this person’s life is going to completely change,” he said.
He also managed some challenges over the last 19 seasons including producing seasons during Covid and someone getting shot with a flaming bow and arrow.
“Ever since they handed me that DVD… I never thought I’d get 19 years. It’s definitely bittersweet because I love the show and all of the crew that work on it. It came as a surprise to me [when they asked me to leave], they’d have to explain it but I was told it was it was the budget,” he added.
Raff, who runs his own Furry Prawn Productions banner, has also worked on shows including The Wall and The Clash of Choirs and is now looking to find new projects to work on.
Fremantle COO Suzanne Lopez said, “Over the last 19 years Jason has been instrumental in growing AGT to become the world’s largest talent showcase. His vision and creativity are top-notch, and we are incredibly grateful for all of his contributions to this franchise.”
