Access Hollywood

Access Hollywood is a weekday television entertainment news program covering events and celebrities in the entertainment industry. It was created by former Entertainment Tonight executive producer Jim Van Messel, and is currently being directed by Kim Anastasia (in previous years, Doug Dougherty and later Christopher A. Berry have directed the program). Access Hollywood primarily focuses on news in the music, television, and movie industries. It began broadcasting on September 9, 1996 and is nationally syndicated in the United States. In 2003 a British version of the show began production and in 2006 Channel 6 of Ireland also began producing their own version of the show.

In the United States, the current hosts are Billy Bush and Nancy O'Dell, with Tony Potts, Shaun Robinson, Tim Vincent and Maria Menounos as correspondents. Previous correspondents include Amy Powell, Rawley Valverde and Jeff Probst.

Previous hosts include Giselle Fernandez, Larry Mendte and Pat O'Brien, who hosted the show alongside O'Dell until late 2004, when he left to host the Entertainment Tonight spin-off The Insider. Giselle Fernandez and Larry Mendte were the shows original hosts when it debuted in 1996. Mendte also co-hosted the weekend edition with Nancy O'Dell.

In the United Kingdom, the show was hosted by Kate Garraway and Vincent. The Irish show is hosted by Jenny Buckley.

The program is produced by NBC and has changed distributors over the years, first with New World Television, followed by 20th Television (after News Corporation bought New World), then Warner Bros. Television, and finally to NBC Enterprises when the network started up a syndication division. Today, what is now NBC Universal Television Distribution is solely responsible for its production and distribution.

The program has had some short-lived spinoffs in the last few years, including AMC Access for the AMC channel, and Real Access for Noggin/The N. The programs also does entertainment segments for NBC's cable news channel, which are titled Access MSNBC.

Sgments Alluded To

 * Hollywood Spotlight