Full Frontal with Samantha Bee

Production

Samantha Bee served as a correspondent on The Daily Show for 12 years, becoming its longest tenured correspondent. She was not approached about succeeding Jon Stewart as the show's host when Stewart announced he would leave the show. Bee and her husband, Jason Jones, pitched television shows to networks, and their scripted series, called The Detour, was picked up by TBS in February 2015. TBS then decided to extend their relationship with Bee to develop a late-night talk show to pair with Conan.

Bee hired Jo Miller and Miles Kahn, formerly producers of The Daily Show, as executive producers for her new show. They set up a blind process for hiring writers that hid the gender and experience level of the applicants, resulting in a writing staff that is approximately half female and 30% non-white. The show is written by Samantha Bee, Ashley Nicole Black, Pat Cassels, Eric Drysdale (episodes 12–present), Mathan Erhardt, Joe Grossman, Jo Miller, Jason Reich (episodes 1–31), and Melinda Taub. The show hired Winter Miller to help develop a mentorship program to help diversify the writing room.

Before the show's format was finalized, Bee indicated that she would have segments that focus on news headlines, field pieces, and "grab bag" segments. She filmed a segment about how the Veterans Health Administration was not prepared to treat female soldiers, and filmed a segment in Jordan. Showrunner Jo Miller indicated that the show will be more interested in injustice than in hypocrisy. There are no interview guests on the series, but a number of guest actors have appeared in various segments. For example, the May 9 episode featured both the singer Michelle Branch and comedian Patton Oswalt.

As of January 2017, the show has four contributors who appear in field pieces: Mike Rubens (senior field producer) Ashley Nicole Black (writer), Allana Harkin (co-producer), and Amy Hoggart.

Full Frontal shares a studio with Last Week Tonight with John Oliver, and Bee's offices previously housed Stephen Colbert and his staff while renovations were taking place at the Ed Sullivan Theater for The Late Show with Stephen Colbert. At the time of its debut, Full Frontal was the only airing late-night talk show in the United States which was hosted by a woman.

On October 31, 2016, Full Frontal aired an interview Bee conducted with President Barack Obama.

In January 2017, Bee announced that the show would be hosting a gala to counter the White House Correspondents Dinner, with the profits benefiting the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ).

On 9 March 2017, Full Frontal apologized for saying that a conservative activist, who was undergoing chemotherapy for brain cancer, had "Nazi hair". The show said they were unaware of his condition and donated to his medical expenses on GoFundMe.

Broadcast

In the United States, the first season of Full Frontal with Samantha Bee aired weekly on Mondays at 10:30 p.m. EST on TBS. On November 16, 2016, it was announced that TBS renewed the show for a second season, as well as moving it to Wednesdays at 10:30 p.m. EST, starting January 11, 2017.

In Canada, the show airs on The Comedy Network. In Australia, the series is broadcast on SBS Viceland. In New Zealand, the series is broadcast on DUKE.

Reception

Full Frontal with Samantha Bee was met with critical acclaim. On Rotten Tomatoes, the first season has an approval rating of 100% based on 24 reviews, with an average rating of 8.5/10. The site's critical consensus reads, "Full Frontal with Samantha Bee adds a female perspective to late-night TV – and one that's fresh and funny enough to deserve more than just one show a week." On Metacritic, the first season holds a score of 84 out of 100, based on 16 critics, which constitutes "universal acclaim".

TheWrap's Diane Gordon praised the show, saying "With Full Frontal, TBS truly has a comedy show that's sure to become part of the cultural conversation and possibly fill the void felt by Jon Stewart‘s departure. There's so much scathing, insightful, intelligent funny packed into Full Frontal and Bee's ability to land a joke is beyond impressive." Vulture called Full Frontal "a formidable force of political satire. It demands your attention," and the blog named Bee's "Trump Conspiracy Theory" segment as its #1 clip on its list of "The 10 Most Important Late-Night TV Moments in 2016."