The program premiered on November 4, 1991, and was NBC's second attempt at a late-night news program after
NBC News Overnight, which ran for seventeen months from 1982 to 1983.
Nightside differed from its two competitors –
CBS'
Up to the Minute and
ABC's
World News Now, which are both based in
New York City – in that rather than being broadcast from the headquarters of
NBC News itself in New York, it was instead based out of the
Charlotte, North Carolina facilities of NBC News Channel, the network's newsfeed service providing customized reports and video of national news to NBC's
owned-and-operated stations and
network affiliates, and which was based in studios connected to those of Charlotte's NBC affiliate
WCNC-TV.
Nightside also aired on Saturdays and Sundays during the overnight slot, whereas ABC and CBS's shows did not. Some of
Nightsides many anchors went on to national success, including
Antonio Mora and
Campbell Brown. Former NBC News president
Steve Capus once served as a senior producer for the program. Despite the show's financial profitability and decent ratings, the network canceled it in 1998 and aired its last telecast on September 20 of that year. Two days later, NBC filled the overnight timeslot with
NBC All Night, a block consisting of repeats of the network's late-night and daytime talk shows. Currently, the timeslot is the home to
syndicated and
paid programming on NBC's affiliates outside network contributions; NBC currently provides its affiliates a replay of that evening's
Top Story with Tom Llamas (itself a contribution from streaming network
NBC News Now, an Internet spin-off of NBC News
a la the NBC News Channel, which itself remains in operation), along with a late night replay of
The Kelly Clarkson Show to NBC affiliates carrying that syndicated talk show, with weekends featuring
LX programming after
Saturday Night Live and a
Meet the Press replay late Sunday night/Monday morning. Conversely,
Early Today, which formerly started two hours before
Today during the run of
Nightside, is now fed to NBC stations starting at 3:30 a.m. Eastern, as local morning newscasts have encroached into the early morning hours (starting as early as 4 a.m. local time). ==Anchors==