Stop talking in this thread. I'm tired of seeing "Bye Bye Leno" keep popping up. So Leno is leaving? Get over it.
Bye Bye Leno
I can see what Will is saying here, Yoda. NBC wanted Leno to retire and have Conan take over the Tonight Show. At the time this decision was made, Leno did not want to retire. Taking these things as true, the facts do seem to indicate that NBC wanted to get rid of Leno back then. If they didn't want to get rid of him, they wouldn't have forced him out of the Tonight Show when it was clear that he did not want to retire. How is anything that you are saying contradicting these facts? Perhaps this is an issue of semantics rather than an actual disagreement, or perhaps you both like arguing a little too much If what you are saying is that NBC never had an axe to grind against Leno and didn't wanted to get rid of him at all costs, than I agree with that, but the facts, both then and now, indicate that NBC wanted to move on from Leno. How is this not consistent with wanting to get rid of him? I do agree that when they brought him back and bought Conan out of his contract, their plans changed, but this current plan seems to indicate that they have reverted back to their previous position.
On the other hand Will, Yoda has read an entire book on this, so perhaps he knows more details about this whole matter than you and I do. Presumably this book was well-researched, and if you don't have facts that contradict it, than why continue to argue about it?
I am curious though Yoda, why did you choose to read an entire book on this matter? I can think of a lot more worthy topics to devote my time to. Since you seem to really enjoy discussing things of substance, that are usually more relevant and public policy oriented, I am somewhat surprised by your interest in something that by comparison is rather trivial.
On the other hand Will, Yoda has read an entire book on this, so perhaps he knows more details about this whole matter than you and I do. Presumably this book was well-researched, and if you don't have facts that contradict it, than why continue to argue about it?
I am curious though Yoda, why did you choose to read an entire book on this matter? I can think of a lot more worthy topics to devote my time to. Since you seem to really enjoy discussing things of substance, that are usually more relevant and public policy oriented, I am somewhat surprised by your interest in something that by comparison is rather trivial.
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I can see what Will is saying here, Yoda. NBC wanted Leno to retire and have Conan take over the Tonight Show. At the time this decision was made, Leno did not want to retire. Taking these things as true, the facts do seem to indicate that NBC wanted to get rid of Leno back then. If they didn't want to get rid of him, they wouldn't have forced him out of the Tonight Show when it was clear that he did not want to retire. How is anything that you are saying contradicting these facts?
Perhaps this is an issue of semantics rather than an actual disagreement, or perhaps you both like arguing a little too much If what you are saying is that NBC never had an axe to grind against Leno and didn't wanted to get rid of him at all costs, than I agree with that, but the facts, both then and now, indicate that NBC wanted to move on from Leno. How is this not consistent with wanting to get rid of him? I do agree that when they brought him back and bought Conan out of his contract, their plans changed, but this current plan seems to indicate that they have reverted back to their previous position.
I am curious though Yoda, why did you choose to read an entire book on this matter? I can think of a lot more worthy topics to devote my time to. Since you seem to really enjoy discussing things of substance, that are usually more relevant and public policy oriented, I am somewhat surprised by your interest in something that by comparison is rather trivial.
Heck, I read a book about traffic patterns a couple of months ago.
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Okay. I think I understand what you are saying now. What you are saying is that the reason that NBC hatched the plan to have Leno retire was that they were afraid of Conan bolting to another network, and they didn't want to have him competing against "The Tonight Show." What they did is to push off retiring Leno as long as they could, while still promising Conan that he eventually would be his successor, which took away the incentive for Conan to bolt to another network. What Will is saying is that this plan is evidence that NBC always wanted to get rid of Leno, and that that was the rationale for the succession plan. What you are saying is that the original plan wasn't primarily motivated by getting rid of Leno, but by keeping Conan, and the plan they came up with was the best way they could think to do that. Is this a fair reading of your and Will's arguments?
If all of this is true, what I don't understand is why would NBC want Leno to retire, either then or now? Leno is number one in the ratings now, and he was then. Even if Conan were to bolt to another network, Conan never had the audience that Leno did, so what evidence was there that Conan was a real threat to Leno? Isn't the same thing true with Fallon and Kimmel now? Leno is number one. Why would NBC want to get rid of someone who is making them number one in late night on the basis of a theoretical concern that sometime in the future someone could challenge him? This makes even less sense when you factor in that the very people that they are concerned about posing a threat to Leno in the future are currently competing against him now, and losing to him in the ratings. From the book you read and your own analysis, can you explain this?
If all of this is true, what I don't understand is why would NBC want Leno to retire, either then or now? Leno is number one in the ratings now, and he was then. Even if Conan were to bolt to another network, Conan never had the audience that Leno did, so what evidence was there that Conan was a real threat to Leno? Isn't the same thing true with Fallon and Kimmel now? Leno is number one. Why would NBC want to get rid of someone who is making them number one in late night on the basis of a theoretical concern that sometime in the future someone could challenge him? This makes even less sense when you factor in that the very people that they are concerned about posing a threat to Leno in the future are currently competing against him now, and losing to him in the ratings. From the book you read and your own analysis, can you explain this?
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I can't speak for will, but yes, that's exactly what I'm saying, and it's what I understand will's position to be. If Conan had been willing to stay at 12:30 another five years without demanding a legal commitment, I think they would've been just fine with that.
As for the rest: yeah, it doesn't make a lot of sense to me, either. I think they were motivated by the fear of losing Conan, even though it would've been better to just let him go. That and image, which seems to play a far larger role in the late night firmament than is entirely rational. There's a big identity politics thing going on with this circle of hosts. And I've heard it suggested that the primary difference between CBS and NBC is that CBS doesn't really care how hip something is perceived to be, it just focuses on results. I think maybe NBC has occasionally tried to hit home runs with wild programming decisions when it'd be better to try to string a few singles together.
I honestly don't know what I'd have done in NBC's shoes. They got a lot of grief for how they handled stuff, and understandably so, but I don't think they had any good options. If anything, they were a victim of their own success in late night. The only really unforced error I thought they made was abandoning the new setup so quickly.
As for the rest: yeah, it doesn't make a lot of sense to me, either. I think they were motivated by the fear of losing Conan, even though it would've been better to just let him go. That and image, which seems to play a far larger role in the late night firmament than is entirely rational. There's a big identity politics thing going on with this circle of hosts. And I've heard it suggested that the primary difference between CBS and NBC is that CBS doesn't really care how hip something is perceived to be, it just focuses on results. I think maybe NBC has occasionally tried to hit home runs with wild programming decisions when it'd be better to try to string a few singles together.
I honestly don't know what I'd have done in NBC's shoes. They got a lot of grief for how they handled stuff, and understandably so, but I don't think they had any good options. If anything, they were a victim of their own success in late night. The only really unforced error I thought they made was abandoning the new setup so quickly.
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And another thing, why are people so upset at Jay Leno? Isn't it true that Jay Leno didn't really want to retire in 2009, or did he change his mind on that later on? If you never really wanted to retire and you were forced out to make room for someone else, and your successor fails to succeed in the position, and NBC offers you the job again, which you never wanted to relinquish in the first place, and you take it, why are you the bad guy?
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It's a good general rule that the amount of evidence you have should not be inversely proportional to the length of the post. Case in point: that last post could've been a lot shorter if you'd just say "why no, I actually do not have any competing evidence which contradicts what you've provided. How about another five paragraphs of my own speculation, instead?"
The New York Times and the book I keep mentioning both contradict your take about the 2004 deals. Unless you're a sleuth Hollywood reporter, I'm not sure why you would feel comfortable just flat-out contradicting them.
So given the evidence, it seems to me there are two ways to go here. And feel free to use this as a summary for the whole discussion: either both these sources are wrong, and they gave Leno an extra-long lead time even though they wanted to get rid of him, and then turned right back to him when things went south even though they wanted to get rid of him, and they dropped $35 million to avoid losing him even though they wanted to get rid of him...or maybe they just didn't want to get rid of him.
The New York Times and the book I keep mentioning both contradict your take about the 2004 deals. Unless you're a sleuth Hollywood reporter, I'm not sure why you would feel comfortable just flat-out contradicting them.
So given the evidence, it seems to me there are two ways to go here. And feel free to use this as a summary for the whole discussion: either both these sources are wrong, and they gave Leno an extra-long lead time even though they wanted to get rid of him, and then turned right back to him when things went south even though they wanted to get rid of him, and they dropped $35 million to avoid losing him even though they wanted to get rid of him...or maybe they just didn't want to get rid of him.
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As you may recall, your objection was that NBC had no reason to worry about losing Conan. The cite contradicts that, by suggesting that NBC was worried. Obviously the offers weren't firm yet: he still had a year under contract. They were standard, early overtures, but based on multiple sources they were enough to convince NBC that they had to appease Conan to keep him around. That's the point.
You are free to speculate, sans any significant evidence, as to how likely any of these counterfactuals might have been. The only relevant part is that NBC was worried about them, which in turn explains the half measure they ultimately resorted to in a way perfectly consistent with their desire to keep Leno around.
You are free to speculate, sans any significant evidence, as to how likely any of these counterfactuals might have been. The only relevant part is that NBC was worried about them, which in turn explains the half measure they ultimately resorted to in a way perfectly consistent with their desire to keep Leno around.
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And another thing, why are people so upset at Jay Leno? Isn't it true that Jay Leno didn't really want to retire in 2009, or did he change his mind on that later on? If you never really wanted to retire and you were forced out to make room for someone else, and your successor fails to succeed in the position, and NBC offers you the job again, which you never wanted to relinquish in the first place, and you take it, why are you the bad guy?
Anyway, I think lots of his critics would suggest that he had a more active role in what went down than his supporters believe. I dunno if that's true or not, but I do find the whole thing to be far more dramatic than is necessary. And it probably doesn't help that so many people think he swiped The Tonight Show from Dave in the first place. Very easy to assume the same sort of thing happened here.
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Didn't Leno take a substantial pay cut to keep members of his staff from getting fired? That seems like a pretty great guy to me. I always have a hard time reconciling Leno's reputation, which is often pretty bad, with actual facts I learn about the guy, which seem to be pretty good, and make him look like a stand-up guy to me.
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Okay. I think I understand what you are saying now. What you are saying is that the reason that NBC hatched the plan to have Leno retire was that they were afraid of Conan bolting to another network, and they didn't want to have him competing against "The Tonight Show." What they did is to push off retiring Leno as long as they could, while still promising Conan that he eventually would be his successor, which took away the incentive for Conan to bolt to another network. What Will is saying is that this plan is evidence that NBC always wanted to get rid of Leno, and that that was the rationale for the succession plan. What you are saying is that the original plan wasn't primarily motivated by getting rid of Leno, but by keeping Conan, and the plan they came up with was the best way they could think to do that. Is this a fair reading of your and Will's arguments?
If all of this is true, what I don't understand is why would NBC want Leno to retire, either then or now? Leno is number one in the ratings now, and he was then. Even if Conan were to bolt to another network, Conan never had the audience that Leno did, so what evidence was there that Conan was a real threat to Leno? Isn't the same thing true with Fallon and Kimmel now? Leno is number one. Why would NBC want to get rid of someone who is making them number one in late night on the basis of a theoretical concern that sometime in the future someone could challenge him? This makes even less sense when you factor in that the very people that they are concerned about posing a threat to Leno in the future are currently competing against him now, and losing to him in the ratings. From the book you read and your own analysis, can you explain this?
If all of this is true, what I don't understand is why would NBC want Leno to retire, either then or now? Leno is number one in the ratings now, and he was then. Even if Conan were to bolt to another network, Conan never had the audience that Leno did, so what evidence was there that Conan was a real threat to Leno? Isn't the same thing true with Fallon and Kimmel now? Leno is number one. Why would NBC want to get rid of someone who is making them number one in late night on the basis of a theoretical concern that sometime in the future someone could challenge him? This makes even less sense when you factor in that the very people that they are concerned about posing a threat to Leno in the future are currently competing against him now, and losing to him in the ratings. From the book you read and your own analysis, can you explain this?
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But younger viewers are not sitting at home watching TV at 11:30 at night. Viewers in their twenties and thirties are out at bars and clubs, not sitting at home patiently waiting for late night. The whole idea that the late-night audience should capture the "younger viewers" is a bit nonsensical, since the natural audience for this type of program is not younger viewers, but middle aged and older viewers, who are far more likely to be consistent and reliable viewers of this type of programming. Leno does great with this demographic, so why replace him to satisfy an unrealistic hope that someone else will be able to get younger viewers to stay home to watch late night?
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