I would never bet against Jay. His humor isn’t for everyone, especially self-important hipsters, but he is smart enough to know his core audience and target them. He’s not up there being himself; he’s up there selling a product that his customers want to buy. That’s why he consistently beats the competition…TRM
True. I read “The Late Shift” and what I got from it is that Dave was a self-important prick who would sell his own mother for the Tonight Show, and that Jay was a nice guy with a bitch of a manager (although if she were male, she would have been respected as a “tough negotiator”). Jay got the Tonight Show because he had been guest hosting very successfully for years and he worked his ass off for the network. And, at his peak, he was howlingly funny (a bit where a guest from a zoo put this huge frog in Jay’s hand and he just started riffing with it is on my Top Ten funniest things).
I’ve drifted away from all late night shows but I thought Conan lost the best thing he ever had when Andy left. I’ll watch it again when he comes back. I’ve never found Letterman particularly funny. I have little tolerance for his belief that things become funnier the more you repeat them, and about the third time he’s repeated something, I get kind of stabby.
The move is all about numbers, so let’s look at them.
NBC’s 10 pm shows have all been doing consistently awful this year. I couldn’t find full season numbers but the last figures I found on zap2it.com indicates that they were getting ratings of 5-6, except for Southland, which managed a 3.
Leno averages about a 4.
Audiences are larger are 10 than they are at 11:30, so if Leno gets just a proportionate share of the extra viewers then he’ll be in the 5 range, maybe even a 6. NBC loses nothing by putting Leno there.
What are the gains? NBC gets nothing from a syndicated show unless it happens to own it, which is still rare. Shows it owns are good for the network since the payments to the production company are huge. Guess who owns The Tonight Show? NBC. I can’t find if NBC will own the new program, but it’s a good bet that it will own at least part.
How much are payments to the production company? A drama averages $3 million per episode, or $15 million per week. Leno’s new show is estimated to cost $2 million, plus less than $1 million a week in his salary. $12 million a week in savings.
But it’s probably even better than that. NBC makes all its money from advertising. That’s a big question. NBC will likely charge about three times the rate for a commercial at 10-11 than at 11:30-12:30. Will advertisers pay it? Hard to know. Will they want Leno’s demographics? Only about 1/3 of his viewers are in the favored 18-49 bracket. That’s considerably lower than what NBC averages now. OTOH, most people don’t realize that Leno beats Letterman in that demographic, although that’s narrowed. Reports are that the other networks are worried that Leno will take numbers away from them, and that has to make NBC happy.
The move has nothing to do with whether you individually like Leno or not. He has the numbers. All he has to do is stay as popular as he is and NBC wins big. Because the costs are so much less, NBC wins even if his numbers drop a bit.
It’s always possible that he will bomb entirely because nobody wants to watch a comedy show at that hour. The fact that he doesn’t appeal to the sort of hipster crowd that is moving away from television anyway makes that less likely. The numbers make this look very good from NBC’s pov. I’d say it’s much more likely that in three years another network will put up a competitor to him than that he bombs.
From what I see, NBC saw the fact that Leno and Letterman attracted different types of audiences. I know lots of people who watch Letterman and switch to Conan.
To me, it seems Conan and Letterman attract the same type of people. They styles seem alike to me. I don’t think Conan can keep the same type of show, with the same humour and beat Letterman.
So if NBC let Leno go, he’d have moved to FOX or the CW, or maybe ABC. This way if Conan can’t hold his audience, NBC hasn’t lost Leno.
Andy’s back?!?!?!?!?! :):):):):):)
Welcome to Earth, Cyberhwk. I hope we can make your stay a pleasant one.
Sorry NBC, Conan’s weird semi-hipster comedy won’t play in Peoria.
I consider him smary and the opposite of funny, myself.
I’m really excited about the prospect of Leno at 10. There’s never been anything on at 10 that I’ve wanted to watch. Actually, I’m not really sure what’s on at 10, but I think it’s all dramas and local news, right? I find Leno to be moderately entertaining and exactly right for 30 minutes of zoning out before bed, but 11:30 is too late for me.
Shall we all get off your lawn now?
I think Leno’s humor *is *for everyone. He casts the widest net with the broadest comedy, alienating only those who believe they’re too cool for school. That said, I’m not a fan (guess why).
Leno will SLAY at 9pm (Central). My parents are in their mid-fifties and are probably in a significant demographic portion of his audience - a portion that’s getting older and turning in sooner all the time. Where before they’d likely watch the Tonight Show’s monologue and first segment, they’ll now watch the entire show and then the ten o’clock news.
I was a Conan fan since day one, but I stopped tuning in a few years back when he was really treading water. I’ve heard his Irish mother potato story at least six times. If taking the reins of the Tonight Show gets him to bring his A game and hopefully a more money for better writers, he’ll do fine.
For my buck, the funniest and most underrated host working is Craig Ferguson. That guy has improved leaps and bounds, and gets the biggest laughs with a non-existent budget.