Bye Bye Leno

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will.15's Avatar
Semper Fooey
NBC has wanted to get rid of him for a long time and now they are going to do it, but what if the new heir aparent sinks in the ratings? Will they bring that unfunny tired old fossil back again? Probably not. They are not worried about Letterman anymore, but the new kid on the block, Jimmy Kimmel, and the young audience he is getting.
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They haven't wanted to get rid of him. He's gotten them great ratings for about as long as he's been doing this. The whole fiasco with Conan happened precisely because they wanted to keep him.



will.15's Avatar
Semper Fooey
They haven't wanted to get rid of him. He's gotten them great ratings for about as long as he's been doing this. The whole fiasco with Conan happened precisely because they wanted to keep him.
He is still giving them ratings, but they see the handwriting on the wall and a general erosion in the prime demographic with younger viewers, which is why they wanted to replace Leno with Conan. NBC did want to get rid of Leno. They thought they had a deal with him he would retire, but when it became clear he would try to get a late night show elsewhere, they got worried. But now they don't care. He has no where to go late night. His stock has fallen. Now the question is how long will it will it take for CBS to dump Letterman? He is looking real old and so is the show.



I really don't understand the way NBC is treating Jay Leno. Correct me if I'm wrong, but hasn't Jay Leno been number one in late-night for more than 20 years? During this period of time, has there ever been anybody else who has a bigger audience than him? I think the answer to these questions is yes to the first and no to the second. Given that they already tried to force Jay Leno out prematurely, and it turned out to be a disaster for NBC, why are they only a few years later trying to do the same thing again? From what I can gather, the concern is that years from now, Jimmy Kimmel may grow an audience that can rival Leno's, and that Fallon taking over for Leno will help NBC maintain supremacy in the 18-49 demographic, but again, correct me if I'm wrong, isn't Jay Leno winning this demographic already? It seems like we've seen this movie before, and things didn't end well for NBC, so why are they trying to make a sequel when the first movie in the series bombed? This was the exact rationale for Conan replacing Leno in 2009. Conan supposedly had a younger audience, but that audience obviously wasn't large enough and didn't follow him to the Tonight Show, because Conan O'Brien was the biggest disaster in recent history for one of the most enduring franchises in late-night. Wouldn't it be a better idea to drop this stupid idea and let Jay Leno retire when he wants to, since he is still number one in late-night, including in the key demographic, and earlier attempts to force him out didn't prove successful?

I sleep at 11PM, so I don't watch any of these programs, and don't really have a dog in this fight, but it seems to me that Jay Leno is doing just fine. You don't back a different horse when the one you've already got is consistently winning the race.



He is still giving them ratings, but they see the handwriting on the wall and a general erosion in the prime demographic with younger viewers, which is why they wanted to replace Leno with Conan. NBC did want to get rid of Leno. They thought they had a deal with him he would retire, but when it became clear he would try to get a late night show elsewhere, they got worried. But now they don't care. He has no where to go late night. His stock has fallen. Now the question is how long will it will it take for CBS to dump Letterman? He is looking real old and so is the show.
I don't see how it makes a lick of sense to say they've wanted to get rid of him for a long time when they bent over backwards to keep him, and then sided with him over Conan. They paid $35 million to keep him instead of Conan, for crying out loud.

If you're saying they want to get rid of him now, that's different. I don't know if I think that's true, either, but it's definitely not something they've wanted for long. It's been the exact opposite.



will.15's Avatar
Semper Fooey
I don't see how it makes a lick of sense to say they've wanted to get rid of him for a long time when they bent over backwards to keep him, and then sided with him over Conan. They paid $35 million to keep him instead of Conan, for crying out loud.

If you're saying they want to get rid of him now, that's different. I don't know if I think that's true, either, but it's definitely not something they've wanted for long. It's been the exact opposite.
I'll say it again.

They had a deal (they thought) that Leno would step aside for Conan. It was agreed to years before. Conan didn't get the Tonight Show because Leno was getting the prime time show. That was a last minute decision made for two reasons. Leno was making it clear that he would not retire and would look for a late night gig. When they had made the deal with Leno to gracefully (they thought) to step aside), they were still number one in the ratings and were confident Conan could hold the audience while doing better with younger viewers. Now they had to worry about keeping their only show still number one in the ratings (Tonight) and Leno going to another network, most likrly ABC, and competing in the same timeslot. They gave Leno the prime time slot because in just a few years their ratings in prime time had shot to hell. They were hoping Leno would give Conan a strong lead their current shows were incapable of. It didn't happen. Now we have deja vu. They have made clear to Leno they won't give him another contract. He didn't have a contract the other time either. The difference this time is they are not worried about him landing at ABC and they know Leno is of no use as a lead in to Fallon. It still strikes me as a gamble because Fallon looks to me as far worse than Conan, but that network looks like it is run by a bunch of fools.

If Leno had retired as was the original plan, if he wasn't looking for another late night show, they would not have offered him the prime time slot. That is why I said they tried to get rid of him. It wasn't his plan to retire. It was under pressure from NBC who made it clear to Leno they saw Conan as the future.



Yeah, heard it the first time, and I don't see how it reconciles the initial statement. The fact that they didn't want him to leave for another network in no way demonstrates that they wanted to get rid of him. The only thing even remotely suggesting that is the fact that they made an announcement of succession at all, and it's widely known that they did that not for a desire to get rid of Jay, but for a fear of losing Conan. And everything else they did after saw them paying a very heavy price to keep him. So no, they haven't wanted to get rid of him for a long time. Nor should they have wanted to; he was pulling in great ratings in the entire time, for all the scorn he gets.



Dude, honestly, **** Jay Leno. I'd take Conan, Fallon, and Kimmel over that pompous, overrated caricature any day.

Just wait til Seth Meyers comes in and outclasses everyone (sans Conan).
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will.15's Avatar
Semper Fooey
Yeah, heard it the first time, and I don't see how it reconciles the initial statement. The fact that they didn't want him to leave for another network in no way demonstrates that they wanted to get rid of him. The only thing even remotely suggesting that is the fact that they made an announcement of succession at all, and it's widely known that they did that not for a desire to get rid of Jay, but for a fear of losing Conan. And everything else they did after saw them paying a very heavy price to keep him. So no, they haven't wanted to get rid of him for a long time. Nor should they have wanted to; he was pulling in great ratings in the entire time, for all the scorn he gets.
It wasn't just a succession. It was Leno at a certain date, decided years earlier, would leave The Tonight show. Meaning they wanted to get rid of Leno. They wanted him to retire from late night so they could get a younger guy in there. They were talking at the time maybe giving him a few prime time specials, not a talk show in prime time. That was only done last minute when the planned change date in hosts was coming. They had gone from first to third in the ratings and Leno had gone back on his promise to gracefully step aside and not go to another network. If they were aggressively trying to replace Leno with Conan on a specific date, and only offered Leno a gig because circumstances had changed after the original agreement, of course they were trying to get rid of him. At the time they put a higher value of keeping Conan over Leno. But their later poor ratings and Leno trying to land somewhere else made them reconsider. They wanted to get rid of him, made a deal with Leno to go away, then circumstances made then not want to get rid of him, but they already had his successor in place on The Tonight Show which was done when they wanted to get rid of him.

If NBC was still number one in the ratings when Conan took over Tonight, which they were when the original deal was made, they would have let Leno go and stuck it out much longer with Conan.



I remember the entire timeline, I was following it very closely. The dropping ratings you're talking about are pretty much Exhibit A as to why they didn't want to get rid of him. He was wildly successful even during the time you're saying they wanted to ditch him. And by the logic you're using, they could have just as easily decided they could afford to lose Conan, instead.

As I said before, literally the only thing in the entire saga that suggests any desire to get rid of him is announcing the end date, which almost everyone said at the time was a desperate move to keep Conan. They had zero reason to want to do that except for their hand being forced. That's the only reason it happened. If they actively wanted to drop him, they wouldn't have run right back to him and dropped $35 million on a buyout to keep him when push came to shove in the end.



will.15's Avatar
Semper Fooey
I remember the entire timeline, I was following it very closely. The dropping ratings you're talking about are pretty much Exhibit A as to why they didn't want to get rid of him. He was wildly successful even during the time you're saying they wanted to ditch him. And by the logic you're using, they could have just as easily decided they could afford to lose Conan, instead.

As I said before, literally the only thing in the entire saga that suggests any desire to get rid of him is announcing the end date, which almost everyone said at the time was a desperate move to keep Conan. They had zero reason to want to do that except for their hand being forced. That's the only reason it happened. If they actively wanted to drop him, they wouldn't have run right back to him and dropped $35 million on a buyout to keep him when push came to shove in the end.
How was it a desperate move to keep Conan? He was under contract. The problem was in the future possibly, not at the moment, and to give Conan the Tonight show was getting rid of Leno because Leno had no contract. They both couldn't co host Tonight. NBC had to decide who was more important and they chose Conan. They were without a plan to keep Leno except they would have liked to give him some kind of deal to keep him happy that did not involve a regular talk show. Leno's contract was up, not Conan. Leno was not wildly successful when the change was being made. He was still number one, but there had been ratings erosion. Letterman had picked up a little and won a few nights here and there. NBC's poor ratings had hurt Leno's ratings, not dramatically, but they had. NBC was concerned about it. Yeah, they could have decided to dump Conan suddenly, but he would have cost them big money (which eventually they were forced to do). Leno wasn't a problem. His contract was up. And they still saw Conan as the future. Giving Leno a prime time talk show was seen as a possible solution to a big problem Leno created for them by looking for another show elsewhere. If it had workd out they would have had a cheap alternative to regular programming and a good lead in for Conan. Instead Leno was a ratings disaster and hurt Tonight Show with the new host even worse than would have been the case with normal programming. What I have a hard time getting with you is how you don't think NBC telling Leno they wanted to replace him with Conan on a certain date is not trying to get rid of Leno. At the time there were zero plans for Leno to have a replacement show.



How was it a desperate move to keep Conan? He was under contract.
He was under contract for a little over another year. That's when you renegotiate these things. Competitors were already courting him, as mentioned in in this NYT piece written at the time. And if you want more, consider The War for Late Night. It's an entertaining book and it details everything I'm talking about.

Leno's contract was up, not Conan. Leno was not wildly successful when the change was being made. He was still number one, but there had been ratings erosion. Letterman had picked up a little and won a few nights here and there. NBC's poor ratings had hurt Leno's ratings, not dramatically, but they had. NBC was concerned about it. Yeah, they could have decided to dump Conan suddenly, but he would have cost them big money (which eventually they were forced to do). Leno wasn't a problem. His contract was up.
Except they resigned Leno to a five-year extension in 2004, shortly before the plan was announced. That doesn't fit the "they wanted him gone" narrative.

What I have a hard time getting with you is how you don't think NBC telling Leno they wanted to replace him with Conan on a certain date is not trying to get rid of Leno.
Simple enough: they wanted to keep both (hence both Leno's extension and the very, very far in advance announcement), and this is what they came up with. Obviously they decided they go to give it to Conan in the long-term, but the distinction is that it's not something they cooked up to push Leno out, it's something they cooked up to try to keep both guys as long as possible. The threat of Conan leaving when his contract was up forced their hand, but in every other instance they fought like mad to keep Leno any way they could.



will.15's Avatar
Semper Fooey
He was under contract for a little over another year. That's when you renegotiate these things. Competitors were already courting him, as mentioned in in this NYT piece written at the time. And if you want more, consider The War for Late Night. It's an entertaining book and it details everything I'm talking about.

But not your interpretation of what it meant. Bottom line, they wanted Conan to replace Leno. They could have waited until his contract was up to see what they actually needed to do if all they wanted to do was keep Conan. it wouldn't have really been that important to keep him if they actually did want Conan to replace Leno, which they did.


Except they resigned Leno to a five-year extension in 2004, shortly before the plan was announced. That doesn't fit the "they wanted him gone" narrative.

Yes it does. They wanted him gone by their schedule. They didn't want him to be an unhappy camper. He was still valuable in the talk show circuit market, even more so than Conan. They tried to use the contract negotiations to get him to agree to an amicable separation when the extension was up by retiring when he was close to the age Carson voluntarily retired.
Simple enough: they wanted to keep both (hence both Leno's extension and the very, very far in advance announcement), and this is what they came up with. Obviously they decided they go to give it to Conan in the long-term, but the distinction is that it's not something they cooked up to push Leno out, it's something they cooked up to try to keep both guys as long as possible. The threat of Conan leaving when his contract was up forced their hand, but in every other instance they fought like mad to keep Leno any way they could.
That's is not the way I see it at all. NBC never tried to push Carson out. He was an institution and had no competitor for very long and none when he retired. Leno never had that clout. They had a problem. They saw Leno as not appealing to a younger demographic. His audience was getting older. While his audience was much larger than Letterman's, in the key demographic Letterman was very competitive. I don't consider trying to dump Leno in five years being the far future. They were thinking by that date Leno is getting old. Get the new kid in there and meanwhile he will have five more years to grow and become a seasoned performer.



No interpretation is required: you asked why they would be desperate to keep Conan, and the article says that Conan was being wooed by other networks. Question answered. The ins and outs of this wooing are described in tremendous detail in the aforementioned The War for Late Night. It was a substantial effort. And what you're talking about--letting someone's contract actually expire before figuring out what you need to do to keep them--is simply not done in the industry. Not at this level.

The delay between the announcement and the transition itself was conspicuously long, as pretty much everybody pointed out at the time. There's a very good reason for that: they didn't want it to happen any sooner than was necessary to keep Conan from bolting. I don't think this is a controversial statement to anyone in the industry.

Boil it all down to two sentences though, and you have this: the idea that they wanted both and tried to keep them both as long as they could is supported by absolutely everything that happened. On the other hand, the idea that they really wanted to get rid of Leno is contradicted by most of what happened. It's really that simple.



will.15's Avatar
Semper Fooey
It isn't a contradiction. This is what they wanted. They wanted Leno to go away on their timeline, but they didn't want him to go to another network doing the same show and compete against them. They wanted him to retire. Leno told him during the contract extension he would retire. Then he didn't. If NBC was still number one in prime time when the change was to take place instead of being in the cellar, they would not have put Leno at ten. If they had a crystal ball, they would have not been so worried about Conan going. Why were they concerned about Conan going? Because it was so important to NBC he do the show after Leno? Hosting that show was no big deal at the time. CBS didn't have a show of any consequence against it. No Ferguson. He was valuable because they saw him as Leno's successor. And the proof they indeed wanted to get rid of Leno is they are doing exactly the same thing now. They re going to replace Leno with Fallon next year. When Leno is still number one in the ratings. And Leno doesn't want to go. But now they can be more definite about it. Leno ain't got no place to go. ABC is sticking with Kimmel and CBS has Letterman. Fox is out of the talk show game. As for Conan, NBC could have waited to see what the actual offers were and tried to match it. The supposed offers were vapor. They were in the wind, not reality at that point in time.



It isn't a contradiction. This is what they wanted. They wanted Leno to go away on their timeline, but they didn't want him to go to another network doing the same show and compete against them. They wanted him to retire.
See, when you say stuff like this, it makes me wonder if you even know what this is about. Wanting him to retire is not mutually exclusive with anything I'm saying. The question is: why? To make the best of a bad situation, to try to keep both for awhile and then hand things over to Conan? Or because they actively wanted to get rid of him, and this was one of the ways to do it? The former is far more consistent with the facts. But whether you agree or not, the mere fact that it happened isn't what's under dispute, and thus nothing is accomplished or contradicted by recounting it.

Why were they concerned about Conan going? Because it was so important to NBC he do the show after Leno? Hosting that show was no big deal at the time.
We have multiple sources saying that other networks were courting Conan, and that NBC didn't want to lose him. This is coming from the New York Times and a book I read on this very topic just last year. If you have some contradictory evidence beyond just saying otherwise over and over, let's hear it.

And the proof they indeed wanted to get rid of Leno is they are doing exactly the same thing now.
I don't know what you think proof means, but this ain't it. This is about whether or not they've wanted to ditch Leno for a long time, not whether or not they want to do so now.

Fox is out of the talk show game. As for Conan, NBC could have waited to see what the actual offers were and tried to match it. The supposed offers were vapor. They were in the wind, not reality at that point in time.
They're out of it now. They weren't then. This is all in The War for Late Night. On what basis are you suggesting otherwise?



will.15's Avatar
Semper Fooey
See, when you say stuff like this, it makes me wonder if you even know what this is about. Wanting him to retire is not mutually exclusive with anything I'm saying. The question is: why? To make the best of a bad situation, to try to keep both for awhile and then hand things over to Conan? Or because they actively wanted to get rid of him, and this was one of the ways to do it? The former is far more consistent with the facts. But whether you agree or not, the mere fact that it happened isn't what's under dispute, and thus nothing is accomplished or contradicted by recounting it.

Now we have semantics going. They had Leno and Conan. They had the Tonight Show. That is what it was all about.They wanted Conan to take over and not wait until Leno decided when it was time to move on. They didn't want him to be Bob Barker quitting The price is Right when he was past eighty. They wanted Leno to go quietly away by their timeline, not his. I see no difference between what you are saying and what I am saying. they didn't want to get rid of Leno because he was doing a bad job. They wanted to because they didn't see him long term as host. They wanted him out when he was closing in on sixty. The fact interest in Conan made them possibly up the time a little when the transition was made unimportant. If they wanted Leno out of Tonight because they liked Conan better doesn't change they wanted him gone.


We have multiple sources saying that other networks were courting Conan, and that NBC didn't want to lose him. This is coming from the New York Times and a book I read on this very topic just last year. If you have some contradictory evidence beyond just saying otherwise over and over, let's hear it.

Other networks? Doing what? The only network they would have been seriously concerned about was ABC. They could have matched any other offers because none of the others would have involved doing a late night network show against Leno. Other offers by themselves would not have motivated them to put pressure on Leno to step aside for Conan. They wanted to keep Conan for one reason only, to take over Tonight when Leno got around retirement age or a little sooner. You think Conan would have left NBC to do the same show after Letterman on CBS? For more money? NBC would have matched the money. Conan's goal was a 11:30 time slot. The worry was Conan competing against Tonight, not because they thought it was important he do Late Night in perpetuity.


I don't know what you think proof means, but this ain't it. This is about whether or not they've wanted to ditch Leno for a long time, not whether or not they want to do so now.

It is the same situation. They want to get rid of him now for the same reasons they did then. The only difference is his stock has dropped in the interim and ironically they helped cause that because his ratings never quite got back to where they were when he was briefly gone from Tonight.


They're out of it now. They weren't then. This is all in The War for Late Night. On what basis are you suggesting otherwise?
Yes and no. They were out of it since they had no show. They bombed when they tried twice (arguably three) and it was enormously expensive as Rivers and Chase did not come cheap. The affiliates were now fiercely against it. It would have been harder to launch. It was far from a sure thing they would have actually made a commitment to Conan even though they were talking to him. Preliminary talk is cheap. The odds were from what I read at the time that they would actually make the move less than fifty/fifty. Why talk to Conan if it was still very iffy they would get back in the late night game? Because they know NBC is watching and they like to stir the pot.
There was a lot of debate at Fox at the time if they wanted to go through launching a late night talk show again. With the Fox situation with affiliates, there is no way a Fox late night show would have seriously competed against Tonight. It might have been successful for Fox as a niche player and eroded Tonight with young viewers. But was NBC REALLY WORRIED ABOUT Conan AS A COMPETITOR AT FOX? NO. THE CONCERN WAS THEY WANTED HIM to remain at NBC to be Leno's replacement on Tonight.



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.