NBC Considering Moving Back Leno, Conan and Fallon

[Youk]

You know he's still going to use that shit, but just change it a little bit. In the Year 3001.

 

[NAHSTE]

http://www.nytimes.com/1992/12/23/a...-nbc-on-tonight-cliffhanger.html?pagewanted=1

From 1992:

Jay Leno, expressing what he called "surprise and disappointment" with NBC executives, said yesterday that he believed his performance as the host of the "Tonight" show should have more than satisfied the network and that he did not deserve to be threatened with losing the leading show in late-night television to David Letterman.

"Am I crazy?" Mr. Leno said in a telephone interview. "The ratings are going up, the advertisers are happy and so are the affiliates." And yet Mr. Leno said he had not received any assurances from NBC executives in New York that he would not be dropped in favor of Mr. Letterman by Jan. 15. That is the deadline NBC is facing to match a CBS offer to give Mr. Letterman about $16 million to star in a nightly talk show at 11:30, the same time as the "Tonight" show.

"I am disappointed," Mr. Leno said. "I feel like a guy who has bought a car from somebody, painted it, fixed it up and made it look nice and then the guy comes back and says he promised to sell the car to his brother-in-law." Go Elsewhere? 'Of Course'

Mr. Leno said he would "obviously leave NBC immediately" if the network decided to give the "Tonight" show to Mr. Letterman. He said he would absolutely refuse to do a show in the 12:30 A.M. spot now occupied by Mr. Letterman's show, "Late Night," and would indeed consider creating the same problem for NBC that Mr. Letterman's proposed deal with CBS caused.

"Would I go to CBS if they asked me?" Mr. Leno said. "Of course. I'm not going to do some little happy hour from Omaha at 12:30."

In the last week, factions inside NBC have been taking sides between Mr. Leno and Mr. Letterman. "NBC's West Coast executives have said everything is O.K.," Mr. Leno said of Warren Littlefield, the president of NBC Entertainment, and John Agoglia, the president of NBC Enterprises.

"But the East Coast people won't say that," he added. Specifically, Mr. Leno said he had heard from Robert C. Wright, the president of NBC, to whom both West Coast executives report. "He said they don't know what they're doing yet," Mr. Leno said. "I appreciate the candor, but it does disappoint me."

The comedian became the host of the "Tonight" show in May after Johnny Carson retired after 30 years on the show. At the time, NBC chose Mr. Leno over Mr. Letterman for the position. 'A Guy With Two Girlfriends'

Now it faces the same choice, but the stakes are much higher. Beyond the $16 million to Mr. Letterman, NBC would have to pay Mr. Leno about $10 million if it breaks its commitment to him to be the host of "Tonight." NBC now pays Mr. Leno $3 million a year as the host of "Tonight."

"NBC is like a guy with two girlfriends who doesn't know which one he's going to marry on Jan. 15," Mr. Leno said. "And the longer you wait, the madder they both get."

He said NBC's indecision was hurting him even if he survived the Letterman threat, because the network executives were letting it be known publicly that they have some doubts about him, doubts, he said, that are unjustified. 'This Isn't About Dave'

To compound the emotional aspect of the conflict, Mr. Leno acknowledged his own debt to Mr. Letterman. "I would not have this job if not for Dave," he said. Mr. Letterman had Mr. Leno on his own show as his most frequent guest in the early 1980's. "This isn't about Dave. Dave is worth whatever somebody wants to pay him. Anything I can do toward keeping him at NBC, I'd do." Short of giving up his own show, that is.

"It's a tricky situation," Mr. Leno said. "Dave is truly a star and terrific, and this is a terrible position NBC is in. But fragging your own soldier doesn't make any sense to me."

He argued that he ought to have satisfied NBC by now because his ratings have shown growth in recent weeks, after a period of turmoil when Mr. Leno's former manager and the show's former producer, Helen G. Kushnick, enraged NBC executives with her tactics in booking guests. 'We Have Great Morale'

NBC fired her. Since then, Mr. Leno said, the show has been running smoothly. "We have great morale," he said. "Everybody is having fun, except for some long faces when we read all these bad things about the show in the newspapers."

Mr. Leno reached about a 4.9 national rating in recent weeks, which is up from a low of about 4.2 in the summer. (Each rating point represents 931,000 homes.)

"I've always said, 'Just judge me by my performance,' " he said. "I've done stand-up comedy for a lot of years. When I go out and see a full house of 3,000 people, I know I'm making money for somebody. If I see only 1,200 people and the house is half-full, I know I've got to do another show to make it up to the guy. But the affiliates, the advertisers, they're all happy."

Mr. Leno said he would not be reluctant to have to face-off against Mr. Letterman at 11:30 each night. "In the comedy clubs I used to say, put me on after Richard Pryor," Mr. Leno said. "Competition is really the only way you get better."

Despite the indecision in New York, Mr. Leno said he did not believe that NBC would force him out. "I don't think it will happen," he said. But he added, "I'm not sure, and that's the annoying part."

 

[IamMedellin]

"I thought maybe I should address this. At least give you my view of what has been going on here at NBC. Oh, let’s start in 2004. 2004 I’m sitting in my office, an NBC executive comes in and says to me, listen, Conan O’Brien has gotten offers from other networks. We don’t want him to go, so we’re going to give him ‘The Tonight Show.’ I said, ‘well, I’ve been number one for 12 years.’ They said, ‘we know that, but we don’t think you can sustain that.’ I said, ‘okay. How about until I fall to number two, then you fire me?’ ‘No, we made this decision.’ I said, ‘that’s fine.’ Don’t blame Conan O’Brien. Nice guy, good family guy, great guy. He and I have talked and not a problem since then. That’s what managers and people do, they try to get something for their clients. I said, ‘I’ll retire just to avoid what happened the last time.’ Okay.

So time goes by and we stay number one up until the day we leave. We hand - (applause)-No, no. Okay, but I’m leaving before my contract is out. About six to eight months early. So before I could go anywhere else, I would be at least a year or 18 months before I could go and do a show somewhere else. I said to NBC, ‘would you release me from my contract.’ They said, ‘we want to keep you here.’ Okay. What are your ideas? They said, ‘how about primetime?’ I said, ‘that will never work.’ No, no, we want to put you on at 10:00. We have done focus groups. People will love you at 10:00. Look at these studies showing Jay’s chin at 10:00. People will go crazy. Didn’t seem like a good idea at the time. I said, ‘alright, can I keep my staff?’ There are 175 people that work here. I said, ‘can I keep my staff?’ Yes, you can. Let’s try it. We guarantee you two years on the air, guaranteed.

Now for the first four or five months against original shows like “CSI” you’ll get killed, but in the spring and summer when the reruns come, that’s when you’ll pick up. Okay, great. I agree to that.
Four months go by, we don’t make it. Meanwhile, Conan’s show during the summer, we’re not on, was not doing well. The great hope was that we would help him. Well, we didn’t help him any, okay. They come and go, ‘this show isn’t working. We want to let you go.’ Can you let me out of my contract? No, you’re still a valuable asset to this company. How valuable can I be? You fired me twice. How valuable can I be? Okay. So then, the affiliates are not happy. The affiliates are the ones that own the TV stations. They’re the ones that sort of makes the decisions, they’re not happy with your performance and Conan is not doing well at 11:30. I said, ‘what’s your idea?’ They said, ‘well, look, how about you do a half hour show at 11:30?’ Now, where I come from, when your boss gives you a job and you don’t do it well, I think we did a good job here, but we didn’t’ get the ratings, so you get humbled. I said, ‘okay, I’m not crazy about doing a half hour, but okay. What do you want to do with Conan?’ We’ll put him on at midnight, or 12:05, keeps “The Tonight Show” does all that, he gets the whole hour. I said, okay. You think Conan will go for that? Yes, yes. (laughter) Almost guarantee you. I said okay. Shake hands, that’s it. I don’t have a manager, I don’t have an agent, that’s my handshake deal.

Next thing I see Conan has a story in the paper saying he doesn’t want to do that. They come back to me and they say if he decides to walk and doesn’t want to do it, do you want the show back? I go, ‘yeah, I’ll take the show back. If that’s what he wants to do. This way, we keep our people working, fine.’ So that’s pretty much where we are. It looks like we might be back at 11:30, I’m not sure. I don’t know. (applause) I don’t know. But through all of this - through all of this, Conan O’Brien has been a gentleman. He’s a good guy. I have no animosity towards him. This is all business. If you don’t get the ratings, they take you off the air. I think you know this town, you can do almost anything. You get ratings they keep you. I wasn't getting the ratings. He wasn't getting the ratings. That was NBC’s solution. It didn’t work. So we might have an answer for you tomorrow. So, we’ll see. That’s basically where it is."
- Jay Leno on tonight's Leno Show

http://tv.gawker.com/5451462/leno-s...not-doing-well?skyline=true&s=i&autoplay=true

What A Fukin Phony

 

[SethMode]

The issue that I have with the ratings argument is that I think Conan was unfocused and felt doomed to fail from square one because of Leno being on at 10.

 

[EmpireWF]

The insult tossing continued tonight.

Leno made a few infidelity jokes about Letterman (that's the only thing he keeps joking about) and referred to Conan as an overrated millionaire.

Conan once again tore into NBC and its execs. He also joked about the stories that he won't be able to keep the intellectual properties and joked that a smoking dog and a masturbating bear can be considered intellectual properties.

Letterman may be at his best during this whole drama. He tore into Leno again. He had a skit that directly said Leno stole his headlines gimmick from Letterman's Late Night and jaywalking from Howard Stern. Letterman hates Leno and tore threw Leno's address from Monday night. "Don't blame Conan? Nobody's blaming Conan."

 

[Marley]

The insult tossing continued tonight.

Leno made a few infidelity jokes about Letterman (that's the only thing he keeps joking about) and referred to Conan as an overrated millionaire.

Conan once again tore into NBC and its execs. He also joked about the stories that he won't be able to keep the intellectual properties and joked that a smoking dog and a masturbating bear can be considered intellectual properties.

Letterman may be at his best during this whole drama. He tore into Leno again. He had a skit that directly said Leno stole his headlines gimmick from Letterman's Late Night and jaywalking from Howard Stern. Letterman hates Leno and tore threw Leno's address from Monday night. "Don't blame Conan? Nobody's blaming Conan."

ironiclulz

 

[Sean]

yea when he was starting to do the red head, overrated, millionaire joke, you could tell people in the audience knew Conan would be mentioned, but i think he didnt say Conan because he still had some respect for him, even if it was a little

 

[NAHSTE]

SMH at anyone who thinks Jay Leno is funny. My freshman year, my friend's suitemate ran in and goes "Guys, it's almost 11:30, you know what that means!"

"No, what?"

"HEADLINES!!!!!"

These dudes watched Jay Leno show every night. I was like WTF? Luckily, I remained friends with them for 4 years and managed to get them to not watch that unfunny fuck anymore.

 

[SethMode]

Damn Dave just eviscerates Leno here:

http://bit.ly/7gHxpf

 

[IamMedellin]

http://tv.gawker.com/5452391/as-obr...ng-vintage-jay?skyline=true&s=i&autoplay=true

 

[Fox1994]

Haha. When EmpireWF said "masturbating bear" I thought of "The Masked Bear"

 

[EmpireWF]

TMZ reports Conan and NBC have completed their negotiaitons.

Conan will receive $32.5 million from NBC whether he gets a new TV job or not.

Conan's staff will receive $7.5 million and the executive producer will receive $4.5 million.

 

[Goober]

Lots of win right here:

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<object width="512" height="296"><param name="movie" value="http://www.hulu.com/embed/cDPWl4K6HJKpUruRlZ9owQ"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><embed src="http://www.hulu.com/embed/cDPWl4K6HJKpUruRlZ9owQ" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowFullScreen="true" width="512" height="296"></embed></object>

 

[EmpireWF]

http://www.aintitcool.com/node/43711

Conan will be able to "pursue other opportunities" after September 1st.

Conan's last show will be Friday. Leno will return on March 1st with reruns airing in between.
http://www.aintitcool.com/node/43712

Some NBC-owned concepts we're likely never to see again, shoved asisde to make room for Headlines and Jaywalking:

Triumph The Insult Comic Dog
The Masturbating Bear
PimpBot 3000
Preparation H Raymond
The Horny Manatee
FedEx Pope
Vomiting Kermit
Quackers
The Walker Texas Ranger Lever
Slip Nuts
Joe's
If They Mated
The Interrupter
Coked Up Werewolf
Conan O'Brien Hates My Homeland
Hanging Out With Jordan Schlansky
Coanado
New Coins and Stamps

 

[JBauerisGod]

http://www.aintitcool.com/node/43711

Conan will be able to "pursue other opportunities" after September 1st.

Conan's last show will be Friday. Leno will return on March 1st with reruns airing in between.
http://www.aintitcool.com/node/43712

Good god they raped him in with all the IP stuff. I don't really understand why they're keeping that stuff because I doubt people actually watched Conan just for the rare appearance from Triumph or the Masturbating Bear. Plus he's funny enough to come up with better bits anyway.

 

[LiquidLarry2GhostWF]

So, instead of a Masturbating Bear he can come up with Self Pleasure Donkey?

 

[hoodyallen]

http://jalopnik.com/5453417/conan-obriens-15-million-bugatti-veyron-mouse


He spent 1.5 million on the car and on royalties for using the rolling stones song. I <3 Co Co.

 

[Marley]

You can't take away meh Triumph!

 

[Sean]

What tribe are you? imnotaho! i LOLed so fucking hard

 

[EmpireWF]

Robin Williams is crazy and awesome.