Members Chris B Posted January 23, 2010 Members Share Posted January 23, 2010 Funny. This attention could've been the trick to finally get Conan's ratings up. He'd already done so well in 18-49 and this would get more of a general audience to him. I don't think NBC took into account The Jay Leno Show possibly splitting viewers. Leno wasn't an overnight success either. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Administrator Toups Posted January 24, 2010 Administrator Share Posted January 24, 2010 I agree, that's probably the best bit from this Late Night fiasco. Kimmel is awesome. I think it too Leno about 2 years to find audience. It's a shame Conan only got 7 months. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Sylph Posted January 24, 2010 Members Share Posted January 24, 2010 Jay Leno triumphs over what's cool (Meanwhile, Conan O'Brien was handed Letterman's vacated spot after Leno. O'Brien had never been before the camera. He was a writer. But he was a great idea for a late-night show host: Harvard-educated, then trained at the writers' tables on "Saturday Night Live" and "The Simpsons." It didn't get any cooler than that. Even if he was as jittery as a nervous Chihuahua and milked his handful of jokes for everything they were worth by shameless mugging, he was young and different -- a hipster. In his defense, O'Brien claimed he needed time to build his audience, though detractors could parry that he had 17 years to build an audience. Put less charitably, O'Brien may have been modish, but he wasn't funny.) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Sylph Posted January 24, 2010 Members Share Posted January 24, 2010 After seven months, Conan says farewell The Big Picture: After the NBC late-night bloodbath: What is Conan O'Brien's future? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members DRW50 Posted January 24, 2010 Members Share Posted January 24, 2010 I'm surprised they think anyone "triumphed" in this. Everyone came out looking bad, in one way or another. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Sylph Posted January 24, 2010 Members Share Posted January 24, 2010 I think that they are referring to Leno-esque late night show (tradition) triumphing over trendier, hip Conan-esque Tonight (modernity, younger audiences): tradition triumphing over modernity. You can scratch Leno and O'Brien and put different names in the respective places, I don't think it's so much about them... Don't know, really... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members JaneAusten Posted January 25, 2010 Author Members Share Posted January 25, 2010 That's exactly it. Almost like a victory for middle america. The bigger challenge is that while Conan was a complete failure on the Tonight Show, Leno's ratings were dropping to the tune of 700K viewers in the year before he "retired", going from a demographic rating of 1.8 to 1.4 in a year. That was published in an article last week in the Washington Post, where it layed out the rational as to why NBC saw Conan as a viable candidate for the Tonight Show even when Leno was still number 1. Their argument, Leno's audience has dropped for the last 5 years and the gap between he and Letterman narrowing that perhaps NBC looked for Conan to help improve the demographics initially and to help grow the "next generation" Tonight show audience longer term. But his so called "hipper" style turned off the traditional older viewer and the "watered down" version of his comedy altered for the Tonight Show didn't appeal to the younger folks who NBC expected him to pull in. The question was where does this leave late night broadcast Television. Leno may regain his viewers but is he going to grow an audience? Is Letterman? Neither are. Could Letterman's impending retirement and Leno's someday mean an end to this type of late night entertainment leading into something different? Or will that be the time they really start experimenting more. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Sylph Posted January 26, 2010 Members Share Posted January 26, 2010 Want to buy a commercial to welcome Jay Leno back as host of NBC's "The Tonight Show"? It'll run you only about $35,000. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Sylph Posted January 27, 2010 Members Share Posted January 27, 2010 Apparently, NBC bought a picked up a pilot produced by Conan's company. It's about a Supreme Court justice who resigns to open a private practice. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Sylph Posted January 27, 2010 Members Share Posted January 27, 2010 http://www.variety.com/article/VR1118014334.html?categoryid=14&cs=1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Juliajms Posted January 28, 2010 Members Share Posted January 28, 2010 I believe he's right and the Olympics will help them. It's a nice long break and people tend to have short memories. Despite being on "team Coco" I actually hope the Network itself manages to turn things around. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members DRW50 Posted January 28, 2010 Members Share Posted January 28, 2010 I don't want a broadcast network to die, but the smugness of that network, which goes back ten or more years (even their promos were smug -- the ER promos used to drive me nuts) has been such that I've enjoyed their decline. They got away with crappy programming for eons just because of the NBC brand, which they have thoroughly trashed. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Juliajms Posted January 28, 2010 Members Share Posted January 28, 2010 I agree with you there. I really hope that Comcast cleans house. Zucker needs to go. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members bellcurve Posted January 28, 2010 Members Share Posted January 28, 2010 There's so much that's wrong with this... To have hit shows, you need to build hit shows and be realistic about what constitutes a "hit." The Office is not a "hit." I don't give a flip how the fanboys spin it. I don't care how much it generates in ad revenue. Eyeballs matter, especially when it comes to sitcoms. You can't build a broadcast network brand on cult followings. Even FOX executives(back when it was an upstart) knew this early on and canceled sitcoms/shows that were not working, not bringing in eyeballs, or something they knew they couldn't build a brand with(Roc, Herman's Head, Models Inc). All three were interesting shows in their own right, but at the end of the day, FOX realized they had to cut their losses. Chuck Lorre sitcoms are the bane of most people's existence because of the laughtrack, the formulaic sitcom structure, and the fact that there are three cameras and none of them are handheld. But look at CBS' Monday Night Chuck Lorre Lovefest as an example of what works. Those shows(I believe) average about five to ten million more total viewers than The Office and 30 Rock. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members JaneAusten Posted January 28, 2010 Author Members Share Posted January 28, 2010 Transcrpt of Jay's interview with Oprah Winfrey. Deferring any comment. Jay-Oprah Interview Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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