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Jay beats ‘Late Show With David Letterman’ in his first week back, but the gap narrows in the second week. By Josh Wigler Jay Leno on “The Tonight Show” Photo: NBC Despite the strong showing of fan support for freshly ousted “Tonight Show” host Conan O’Brien, it appears that many late-night television viewers have settled their personal differences with NBC and Jay Leno. According to The Associated Press, Leno averaged 5.6 million viewers in his first week back as the host of NBC’s “The Tonight Show,” easily outmatching the 3.66 million that tuned in for CBS’ “The Late Show With David Letterman.” Letterman, who consistently beat O’Brien in ratings throughout the recently departed host’s run on “The Tonight Show,” famously finished in second place next to Leno before he vacated the talk-show chair for his failed prime-time experiment, “The Jay Leno Show.” Additionally, Leno’s return to late night proved beneficial to “Late Night With Jimmy Fallon.” Entertainment Weekly reports that the “Saturday Night Live” castmember-turned-host beat out CBS’ “The Late Late Show With Craig Ferguson” by a margin of 147,000 viewers. While Leno’s first week marked a decisive win for NBC over CBS, his second week back wasn’t quite as victorious. From Monday through Thursday of this week, Leno averaged 4.3 million viewers against Letterman’s 4 million, depicting a much closer race between the late-night hosts than Leno’s first week back behind the desk seemed to indicate. Leno returned to “The Tonight Show” last week following a widely publicized dispute between NBC and Conan O’Brien. In his first show following his return to the 11:35 p.m. time slot, Leno joked that he would hold on to the “Tonight Show” hosting gig “at least for a while.” Since his departure from “The Tonight Show,” O’Brien — who is contractually prohibited from making television appearances until September 2010 — has kept his presence intact by joining Twitter and announcing a national comedy tour that will take place from April 12 through June. Have you been tuning in to Jay’s “Tonight Show” return? Do you miss Conan? Let us know!

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Jay Leno’s ‘Tonight Show’ Returns To First Place