That's the rumor and according to this and TMZ, it's happening right after the Olympics.

http://www.nj.com/entertainment/tv/index.ssf/2010/01/is_nbc_moving_jay_leno_back_to.html

TMZ Drop

http://www.tmz.com/2010/01/07/jay-leno-nbc-conan-obrien-tonight-show/

Edited January 8, 201015 yr by JaneAusten

Oh and this from Jimmy Kimmel is actually probably the best thing I've seen done on all this Late Night nonsense. I have to hand to to Kimmel. While I'm not a fan, the stuff he has done regarding this tops anything Conan, Letterman, or Leno has done.

I agree, that's probably the best bit from this Late Night fiasco. Kimmel is awesome.

Leno wasn't an overnight success either.

I think it too Leno about 2 years to find audience. It's a shame Conan only got 7 months.

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.)

Edited January 24, 201015 yr by Sylph

After seven months, Conan says farewell

The Big Picture: After the NBC late-night bloodbath: What is Conan O'Brien's future?

Edited January 24, 201015 yr by Sylph

I'm surprised they think anyone "triumphed" in this. Everyone came out looking bad, in one way or another.

I'm surprised they think anyone "triumphed" in this. Everyone came out looking bad, in one way or another.

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...

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...

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.

Edited January 25, 201015 yr by JaneAusten

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.

Edited January 26, 201015 yr by Sylph

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.

http://www.variety.com/article/VR1118014334.html?categoryid=14&cs=1

LAS VEGAS -- Jeff Gaspin's crisis-management media tour continued at the NATPE confab Tuesday. In a wide-ranging Q&A, the NBC Universal TV Entertainment topper admitted that NBC U erred in failing to invest as much in programming for NBC as it did for cablers USA Network, Bravo, Syfy and others.The push to beef up "the investment in USA and Bravo came at some extent at the cost of investment in NBC," he said in the 45-minute sesh moderated by Broadcasting and Cable editor Ben Grossman. "We probably took a little too much out of the broadcast business."

Now, in the wake of "The Jay Leno Show's" demise, the net is going full steam ahead with a slate of 20 pilots, most from high-profile (read: expensive) auspices. Gaspin admitted that NBC is now in the process of rebuilding many key relationships in the creative community after the turmoil of the Leno decision and other moves. "You want the (creative) community to want you to succeed," he said.

Gaspin said he hopes the two weeks of Winter Olympics coverage beginning Feb. 12 will be a "cleansing moment" for the Peacock that will allow the network to move past being the butt of jokes for the messy Leno-Conan O'Brien shuffle.

Over the long term, Gaspin said he's confident NBC's image will improve and that Leno's appeal has not been tarnished beyond repair.

"Over the next several months and the balance of the year, the audience (for ''The Tonight Show'') will start to come back. People will realize that what Jay did so well for 16 years he's still doing well," he said.

NBC's only problem with viewers is the paucity of successful shows.

"In the end, the audience wants hit shows," Gaspin said. "What has hurt us is not having enough hits on the air."

Gaspin said he has reasonable goals for the Peacock's development team to deliver at least one successful new series in the fall.

Gaspin said he hopes the two weeks of Winter Olympics coverage beginning Feb. 12 will be a "cleansing moment" for the Peacock that will allow the network to move past being the butt of jokes for the messy Leno-Conan O'Brien shuffle.

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.

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.

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.

I agree with you there. I really hope that Comcast cleans house. Zucker needs to go.

"In the end, the audience wants hit shows," Gaspin said. "What has hurt us is not having enough hits on the air."

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.

Transcrpt of Jay's interview with Oprah Winfrey. Deferring any comment.

Jay-Oprah Interview

I'm not a big Jimmy Kimmel fan but I don't get the wah wahing about Kimmel's insults against him. He seems so thin-skinned. I'm tired of he and NBC making him a victim.