Disclaimer: Even if you don’t believe this as you keep reading, understand that I am with Coco. Conan forever!
Even a deadly earthquake in Haiti didn’t stop the world from learning that Conan got the shaft from NBC. He didn’t get a fair shake and no one was oblivious to this; at the very least, NBC should have stuck to their original deal of giving Conan et. al a year to establish themselves in their new time slot. Jay Leno’s ratings started shaky when he took the reins from Johnny Carson in 1992, and it took several months before his show hit its stride. Why did NBC give Jay a chance and not do the same for Conan?
Well, think about it. Jay Leno took over The Tonight Show after 30 years of Johnny. Of course Jay was going to start off with crappy ratings, regardless of how good those early shows might have been; He succeeded the King of Late Night, for cryin’ out loud! Letterman would have struggled just as much – and so would have anyone else, for that matter. No one can (and ever will) fill Johnny’s shoes.
Conan didn’t face the task of following a comedy legend as big as Johnny. Despite that, it is notable that Jay still held his own in the 17 years he hosted the show. He kept NBC happy by leading Letterman in the ratings and holding the numbers steady until the very end. Jay may not be a comedy legend in my opinion, but he is good in his own rite. I see Jay as the ultimate general audience comic. He has just a little something for everybody and therefore his audience range is broad. In other words, even if you don’t completely like the guy, he’ll still pull a laugh out of you before the night is over.
In contrast, Conan is edgier with a more risque style of comedy. This appealed to people in my then-teenage and early twentysomething generation because we were growing up in the mid ’90s – an “anything goes” era, as I remember it – and the crazier you were, the better. The fact that Conan wasn’t quite as mainstream of a comic as Jay was part of his appeal to people my age, and we couldn’t help but fall for characters like the Masturbating Bear and Gaseous Wiener. We couldn’t get enough out of the live via satellite “interviews” with topical characters and the “If They Mated” skit. We ate it up! We stayed up late just for our nightly dose of goofy shenanigans.
So when it was announced in 2004 that Conan would inherit The Tonight Show in 2009, I was ecstatic. I figured he would rock the house down every night (and he did on his last show, as a matter of fact). And yes, I thought Conan would do a better Tonight Show than Jay. But I was (and am) a fan of Conan. Not everyone is. And Conan’s appeal is to a more specific crowd than Jay. Add this to nervous NBC execs, and you get a shitty spur-of-the-moment decision, which as we all know was exactly what happened.
Conan’s come out of this a hero. Whatever he does next, it will be revered. It’s Jay who looks like the bad guy. He’s been the butt of countless jokes and now faces the task of reigniting The Tonight Show after a widely unpopular decision. Take note that it wasn’t Jay who made this decision, but the execs who have let Jay take all the blame. Strangely enough, Jay seems okay with this, and I think it’s his absence of standing up to the bigwigs that is pissing people off. Why would Jay be so agreeable with these assholes if he hadn’t wanted The Tonight Show back all along? That greedy bastard.
Because, people, it’s not just about him. It’s part of the reason why Conan didn’t leave quietly. Jay could have settled his contract for a hefty sum, just as Conan did. The thing is, Jay has more longevity on his side. Buying Jay and his staff out of their contracts would have cleaned NBC out. NBC knows that and Jay knows that. By moving Jay et. al back to The Tonight Show, Jay’s staff isn’t left scrambling for work, NBC isn’t bankrupt, and NBC feels that it has a chance of winning its loyal audience back.
That, unfortunately, is where NBC is wrong. They set themselves – not Jay – up for failure. No matter how good The Tonight Show is when it returns on March 1, it will not win back all its fans. Too many people are pissed at the way this whole fiasco happened. NBC will ultimately have to own up to its poor decisions by suffering in the ratings – the very thing that started all this shit in the first place. Jay will pay in the short-term either with eventual failure himself or waiting out a turbulent period of criticism and poor viewership until this series of unfortunate events is erased from the short-term memory of the American public. Either way, Jay is just another pawn – much like Conan – in NBC’s game of lousy management. The thing is, Jay knows this and that’s why he’s putting up with it. It’s business. Regardless of the end result, Jay will also come out of this a winner – either in the form of a second long reign of hosting The Tonight Show, or going down with a sinking ship and taking NBC for all it has when they fire him, too. It’s NBC that’s screwed, not Jay. If you wanna point a finger, at least point it in the right direction.
Things I Want to Punch in the Face
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