Well, it’s official. Jay Leno is out of the 10pm slot. His laugh-an-hour late night show, which had gotten steady bad ratings since its debut, is now done. Kaput. While the network hasn’t made any formal announcements about what the late night schedule will be, they have decided to revert back to “two hours of scripted, another reality hour and combination of ‘Dateline’ or repeats.”
Oh boy.
As for Late Night, the plan du juor is to move Jay to a thirty minute show (oh boy!) at 11:30, pushing Conan’s Late Night back to midnight and Jimmy Fallon’s Late Late Night to 1am. So just to reiterate, they are fucking with the time-honored, TV standard Late Night, so that they can squeeze in another shitty program with Jay Leno.
Wow, wow, wow.
I found this quote to be particularly interesting about the whole ordeal. Prior to launching this Leno at 10pm, NBC had promised to give Leno a full year to grow into the time slot. He’s had about 5 months…
When asked why NBC abandoned its 52-week strategy with Leno, giving him a year to settle into primetime before making any decisions, Gaspin pointed to affiliate concerns.
“I would have liked nothing more than to give this a 52-week try,” Gaspin said. “Affiliates started calling, saying local news was being impacted more than expected. In some cases, they had the No. 1 news show, and now they were No. 3.”
Oh, the wittle afiwwiates dwopped in watings?? Waaaah, wahh, waaah. You think maybe their numbers are dropping because the show sucks? No, couldn’t be. It has to be something else. It can’t be the content.
Look, clearly I’m not the hugest fan of Leno. But that’s beside the point. Leno is not even supposed to be on Late Night at this point — his contract was done last year and Conan was supposed to take his slot.
NBC is like a grandmother holding onto a box of Cracker Jack prizes from 1950 in her closet. She’s terrified to get rid of them because “they might be worth something” and is also horrified that her cleaning lady Maria might steal them. NBC doesn’t want other networks to get Leno, so they’re hoarding him like grandma, even though it’s just making things more difficult.
And because of it, they’re probably (I hope) gonna lose the one valuable asset they have…Conan.
Leno is expected to agree to the change, though it’s unclear if O’Brien is willing to stay with the network. The comedian has had multiple overtures from networks and on Friday a Fox source called O’Brien “a good fit” for the network.
I hope Conan leaves NBC for a network that will give him a fair shake as the #1 Guy. He deserves it. That’s what he was supposed to be at NBC, and they have shafted him not once, but now twice (and actually 3 times if you count them pushing back his time slot — that a double fuck with no kisses. Prostitute style).
So in conclusion: NBC, congrats on shooting yourself in the foot again. You truly have outdone yourself this time. With such amazing support and devotion to your own programs, you’re sure to never have another hit show ever. And Conan, make the right choice. Go be the top dog. You’re hilarious.
