For awhile there politics eclipsed Hollywood for interesting drama. Hollywood has finally gotten its edge back and
no matter what Harry Reed or John McCain's campaign staff might have said, the focus today is on Jay Leno, Conan O'Brien and Simon Cowell.
Conan and Jay vs. NBCNews leaked out over the Internet earlier this week, and was later confirmed by NBC, that they were strongly considering moving Conan O'Brien to midnight and putting Jay Leno back on at 11:30 for a half-hour show. This is because Conan has lost 50% of Jay's Tonight Show audience, and at the same time Jay's 10 o'clock show, which was just a cost-saving measure by NBC anyhow, has not pulled in enough viewers to the affiliate station's 11 o'clock news to satisfy them. This proposed fix sounds sensible, but sloppy, and will likely confuse casual viewers.
Conan O'Brien is incensed about the idea, and
issued a press release yesterday about how he feels.
Conan really oughta shut up. He has no record to stand on. So really, he'll take his low ratings to the highest bidder? Really? He says, "I will not participate in the destruction of The Tonight Show." Hasn't he already done that by scaring off half the viewers? Conan complains in that press release that Jay Leno had two years to build his Tonight Show audience. Yes, but here's the difference: Jay had never had a TV show before, Conan has been on NBC for
16 years! O'Brien and his supporters say he's younger with time to build an audience -- 16 years wasn't enough? Cheers and Seinfeld went on the air, dominated the ratings, and disappeared in less time than that, and Conan is still trying to find his feet?
Conan O'Brien only has what NBC has handed him on a silver platter: he was a writer for Saturday Night Live, a plum job in itself, and had no experience as a performer before taking over David Letterman's show. After middling along for 16 years there he got The Tonight Show and began bleeding viewers right and left. I keep reading younger people on the Internet saying they prefer Conan: so where are they at 11:35 when he's playing to empty seats?
Jay Leno, on the other hand, had his calendar booked year-round doing standup everywhere from theaters, to casinos, to corporate events since the early `70's. He paid for his Beverly Hills mansion in cash before his name was even in the pot for The Tonight Show, and he's still in Vegas constantly. He doesn't even need NBC! THAT'S a record you can negotiate with!
The Jay Leno you see today isn't nearly as funny as the one I remember from guest spots on Late Night with David Letterman in the `80's, but he's still twice as funny as Conan O'Brien. Have fun doing your silly dances and funhouse mirror faces over at FOX, Conan.
Simon Cowell Leaving American IdolSpeaking of guys who never really needed TV to be rich, Simon Cowell says this is his last season on American Idol. Okay. Two seasons too late, if you ask me.
I'm one of those guys who has no interest in sports, but the season finales of American Idol were like a Super Bowl for me. I really looked forward to it for days and was glued to my seat with my dinner in my lap for the big, over-the-top finale shows. Other than The Office, this is the only show I watched with any regularity in the past 15 years.
Maybe four seasons ago, though, I sensed this show had taken a big turn. On the season opener after Ryan Seacrest said, "THIS is American Idol!," they cut to a teenage girl bawling her eyes out for a full minute, no cutaway. Was this why they thought I liked to watch the show, to see teenage girls cry? It was depressing! That one shot cast a pall over the whole season, which is the one where they got flak for Simon telling some guy he looked like a goofy jungle animal. I liked frank critique of someone's singing ability or fashion sense, but chopping them down for things about their appearance they couldn't change was too far.
The next season they tried to compensate by nicing it up too much, and that was the last season I watched. The following season started off awkwardly with a former contestant killing themselves near Paula Abdul's house and Paula claiming the show had put her in danger with a stalker. To top this off, they brought in some unknown fourth wheel as a permanent judge. As we say on the Internets, WTF?! I never tuned in once.
So this year not only do we have the fourth wheel still around, but Ellen DeGeneres is being added as a fifth? And yesterday I just happened to tune in the debut show, not even knowing it was on, and there's the four judges listening to auditions, but the much-publicized fifth wheel was MIA. What the hell? Forget it, man! Plus the whole appeal of being the winner is tainted when the largest part of them have fallen in the Where Are They Now? file within weeks of winning. Taylor Hicks? Ruben Studdard? Katherine McPhee? The guy who won last year?
Everyone wondered when the juggernaut would end, but I saw no reason for it to. It was like Miss America, a pageant thriving on new faces. Miss America has been around since the `40's or `50's. Why has Idol lost its way before even a decade was up?
Oh, well, more time to sit here entertaining you with my thoughts, or trying to.
Does he deserve to sit behind Johnny's desk? No, but who does...Jon Stewart is one of the few, and even he may be a stretch...
The fact remains that the 10am slot exposed Jay as the boring, unimaginative personality he is. His 10 on 10 failed, and he (and NBC) failed to realize that they could not draw anyone from a competitor network on a 10pm competitve slot to go up against whatever the competitors had running against it. What was left was a cavelcade(sic) of NBC stars from low ratings shows that no one cared about. Put a fork in him...Jay is done.
The gold standard is Mr. Letterman. He is consistently funnier and is having a field day with the NBC soap opera (as is Conan of late, which is really fun to watch).
What's worse for NBC is the dismal failures of Carson Daly and especially Jimmy Fallon, who has yet to perfect the 5 minute cold openings for his show. Train wreck number four.
So where do they go from here? Down the same dismal track they have been going thanks to some terrible contract negotiations. It seems Conan can be easily bought out and will go away to host award shows.
But Jay is damaged goods, and the way Conan was summarily demoted due to Jay's failure to retain enough viewers as a lead in to the affiliates news shows can't do much for his (Leno's) popularily.
The Tonight Show needs someone who can innovate, someone fresh, someone charismatic and funny....someone hip and today. Sound like anybody you know? Me either, and if there was someone out there who fit the bill...they wouldn't touch the Tonight show franchise with a ten foot pole.
But just for fun, let's fire Fallon and replace him with ashton Kutcher, he might just work out into something.
Again, Jay had twice the Tonight Show viewers that Conan did, and all Conan had to do was bring his 12:30 viewers up an hour. Didn't happen. Jay had about the same number of viewers at 10 as he did at 11:30, but at that time of night that's not a winner. However NBC was just trying to fill the 10 p.m. slot that was already written off, they didn't expect a blockbuster.
Jay "failed" at 10 (though he did just as well as NBC projected) for the same reason comedy clubs aren't open at 9 a.m.: there are times a comedy show feels right and times it doesn't. 10 p.m. is one of those times it feels wrong.
Carson Daly: I used to think that guy had pre-empted Ryan Seacrest's media position, but I guess not. He and Fallon's failure show Lorne Michael's isn't really any great judge of talent.
I would touch the Tonight Show franchise with a two foot pole! Call me up!
And none of them is Steve Allen either! He practically invented all the gags they're still using today. Jay's no Johnny Carson either. Conan? No Ernie Kovacs for that for that matter. He invented all the rest of the common sight gags that he did not directly inherit from vaudeville.
In that light, I came up with this theory of Rethuglican Presidents. Here it is: Since well, Herbert Hoover. Hoover? Probably a certified genius. You could look it up. Has the only presidential institution ever even mentioned in the media: (the Hoover Institution in Ca.) He toiled there for years after his disgraced Presidency, and actually helped to regain some of his prior reputation before the Great Depression. Yes, he was once known as the 'Great Engineer' (trained as a Civil Eng), helped reconstruct Europe after WW1, and helped avert certainly greater disaster during the Great Miss. flood of 1927 as Commerce Secretary. Media savvy he made certain he got credit for it all too, in an age well before modern mass media advertising. He never really had the right tools to address the coming Great Depression, and so was caught flatfooted with old nostrums about how 'everything was going to be alright as long as no one panicked'. Of course that was his down fall. But the solutions? Were actually being invented by John Maynard Keynes as the event was happening. Hoover, took no mind of such a 'radical' Shame that.
The Next Repug President? Still pretty damn smart, and still then as was Hoover, a 'liberal' or moderate Repug. (They're extinct now). He'd have to run as a Dem today actually. Led all the allied land forces to win WW11. Actually was President of Columbia University for a few years after the war. Smart articulate, self assured, and well educated, he led the nation during the 'quiet 1950's' and saw a scientific expansion of government's role in both the sciences & research. Go figure, right? Then as now attacked by fellow Repug's as basically a commie. Today? They're still at it.
But apply the simple algebraic algorithm here. Subtract about 5-10pts. off the IQ of each successive Repug Prez, and you get to the certified mendacious moron, G. W. Bush (Duybya/Shrub). And yes, of course Ronnie was actually smarter than Bush 41, if you're asking. And yes, who but Nixon could elect Nixon? Not once either!
Same things going on with late night. We're all getting dumber, less talented, and less entertaining. There's a blandness to all the shows today, everyone's there pitching something. Always. Much less exciting night after night. Nothing much novel, new, or even really amusing on a nightly basis. The 'stand up jokes'? They're the most reliable shtick for most of the decent shops. Triumph the insult comic dog? Probably the only lasting invention of the Conan show. The masturbating bear notwithstanding. So, late night? Not as funny as it ever was. Even back when. But you're right on the timing bit too. Still all in all? Might as well be reading something decent actually!
Cheers & Good Luck, 'VJ'