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Author Topic: Late Night Host Smackdown Chris Slycord Film God Posts: 2986 From: 청주시, 경북도, South Korea Registered: Mar 2007 posted 01-25-2010 08:29 PM                     quote: Bill Enos It wasn't about who's the better performer, strictly ratings. Leno finished "Tonight" with higher ratings than Letterman and by the end, Conan's ratings were less than half of Letterman and still falling, the affiliates were screaming, something had to change. Conan had the opportunity to prove himself and failed to make it in the big time. You seem to forget that it took Leno ~2 years to get decent ratings. Using your Conan reasoning, Leno should've been dropped several months in.  |  IP: Logged Mike Blakesley Film God Posts: 12767 From: Forsyth, Montana Registered: Jun 99 posted 01-25-2010 09:02 PM                        They should have let Conan stay on the Tonight Show. Leno should never have accepted their offer to take it back. He agreed to give the show up. He's such a flip-flopper, he should be in politics. Conan took a couple of years to work into the 12:30 slot...he needed more time to find his way at 11:30. He had what, a 2-year contract? If he wasn't performing by that time they could have brought in a different host, maybe a new guy. They could have found a more middle-of-the-road guy, he would have worked cheap and they could have created a new star. Bottom line, NBC has a bunch of dopes at the wheel and Leno is a bottom-feeding slug in my book. They should have just canceled his show and let that be the end of it. Just the thought of what this mess would do to Conan should have been enough to make him back away from the new deal.  |  IP: Logged Chad Souder Jedi Master Film Handler Posts: 962 From: Waterloo, IA, USA Registered: Feb 2000 posted 01-27-2010 07:07 AM                     quote: Chris Slycord You seem to forget that it took Leno ~2 years to get decent ratings. Using your Conan reasoning, Leno should've been dropped several months in. What do you mean by "decent?" If memory serves, Leno was beat by Letterman early on, but he still had far better ratings than Conan did in his 7 months. Granted there was no Adult Swim back then stealing a massive chunk of viewers, but Leno did better in that time slot at any point of his Tonight Show career than Conan did. Conan wasn't just getting beat by Letterman, he was getting dominated. They didn't have 2 years to cross their fingers.  |  IP: Logged Greg Anderson Jedi Master Film Handler Posts: 766 From: Ogden Valley, Utah Registered: Nov 1999 posted 01-27-2010 07:33 AM                        I'm impressed by the fact that Johnny Carson used guest hosts often and it didn't seem to hurt his show nor his own popularity. It seems like that's the first thing Jay Leno decided he could never do... allow someone else to handle his show now and then. When I think about it now it makes Leno seem like a very selfish person. I realize that Letterman doesn't use guest hosts unless he's too ill to work. But at least Letterman has used guest hosts.  |  IP: Logged Richard Hamilton Phenomenal Film Handler Posts: 1341 From: Evansville, Indiana Registered: Jan 2000 posted 01-27-2010 11:04 AM                     They should let Chelsea Handler fill that spot. Her show is much funnier than the other late night shows, plus she has a midget named Chuy...added bonus.  |  IP: Logged Sean McKinnon Phenomenal Film Handler Posts: 1712 From: Peabody Massachusetts Registered: Sep 2000 posted 01-28-2010 12:39 PM                        Just to play devils advocate here... So Greg are you saying that as an unselfish person you should allow me to fill in for you at your gig one day a week and pay me for it? I know Rosie stuck her big fat mouth into this because she was upset that Jay would not let her guest host his show. The thing is though it was HIS show. He was trying to build his ratings through CONSISTENCY, and he enjoyes working. How is it selfish for him to want to work hard to build a succesful show? Rosie does a show on Sirius/XM satellite radio and I would like to see how "unselfish" she is by giving up a portion of her time to another comedian and paying them for it. Guess what, It ain't going to happen! And FYI I don't even watch these shows. I have no love or hate for Conan, Leno, Letterman, Kimmel or anyone (Except Rosie I hate her!) I have just heard from people who work with him that Jay is a very nice, hard working, succesful guy who never asked for, or wanted any of this and is now being made to look like the bad guy when NBC caused this mess not Jay Leno.  |  IP: Logged Greg Anderson Jedi Master Film Handler Posts: 766 From: Ogden Valley, Utah Registered: Nov 1999 posted 01-28-2010 01:26 PM                        Ah, you devil! Without being political, I’d like to use the example of Rush Limbaugh (analyzing this purely from an entertainment business perspective). Whenever he can’t do his own show, he rarely plays a rerun and almost always has a guest host. Most of his former guest hosts from the 1990s now have their own radio programs. As a result the market is flooded with conservative radio talk show hosts and there are very few with the opposite perspective. Most of those “competitors” to Rush Limbaugh know that they owe their careers to him and they will never say an unkind word about him. Limbaugh’s unselfishness when it came to guest hosts has created a huge industry and he is the undisputed “king” of it. Johnny Carson was the same way. Johnny relished the opportunity to give young comics their “big breaks” by letting them do 5 minutes of stand-up on his show and, sometimes, letting them guest host. Johnny always seemed to be at ease in his own skin and never pushed to make an interview funny. He didn’t care if he was the funniest guy in the room or if it was someone else who made him break into hysterical laughter. It’s a rare gift. If there was one thing that Leno and Letterman would never have dreamed of in the early 1990s (when they were competing for Johnny’s job) it was bad-mouthing Johnny. I’ve worked on sets of comedy movies where “the star” of the show, off camera, would sit stone-faced whenever someone else tried to be funny. It’s like they were giving up power, somehow, by not being the unchallenged “funniest guy in the room.” But I suppose it’s no surprise that a lot of comedians are personally insecure. quote: Sean McKinnon So Greg are you saying that as an unselfish person you should allow me to fill in for you at your gig one day a week and pay me for it? If it was a day that I was going to miss work anyway, why not? Is a Jay Leno rerun really better than a new show featuring a lesser-known comedian? I’m not a fan of Rosie so I can understand if Jay isn’t either. But maybe the wise move would be to let her try the gig and then, if she fell flat, he could have a good excuse to fire her. And if she succeeded then it would seem like a win-win, wouldn’t it? (Or maybe he was afraid that if she was too good then the back-stabbing NBC brass would fire Jay.)  |  IP: Logged Sean McKinnon Phenomenal Film Handler Posts: 1712 From: Peabody Massachusetts Registered: Sep 2000 posted 01-29-2010 07:37 PM                        I personally think that Jay was afraid she would stink and kill his already struggling ratings when he first took over. Maybe he doesn't let them guest host (and maybe he should you have a point about re-runs that I never considered) but he gives opportunity to a lot of comedians for example Little Jimmy Norton From the Sirius/XM "Opie And Anthony" Show (he is very very funny) was given a segment "Uninvited Guest" on the 10pm show, and hopefully will get to move back to 11 with him.  |  IP: Logged

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