Conan O'Brien Leaving (AKA Fuck NBC)

[Calleja]

I've never really been a fan of Dave's show, but he has always been a class act.

Unless you're married to him...[/QUOTE]

The affairs he had were mostly in the 90's, which was before he was married to Regina in early 2009. No one has said an affair happened after he was with her, the scandal was more of the "oohh, he slept with interns on his show, unhealthy work environment" more than adultery.

 

[Dave]

I've never really been a fan of Dave's show, but he has always been a class act.

Unless you're married to him...[/QUOTE]

The affairs he had were mostly in the 90's, which was before he was married to Regina in early 2009. No one has said an affair happened after he was with her, the scandal was more of the "oohh, he slept with interns on his show, unhealthy work environment" more than adultery.[/QUOTE]

My bad. I thought some of these happened during his marriage.

 

[Calleja]

He still apologized on-air to his wife for the whole debacle of having his sex life dragged through the public eye, but that was, to my somewhat informed knowledge of late night debacles, the only mention of Regina in the scandal. The big issue was that someone had tried to blackmail him, so instead he just publicly talked about it rather than letting the blackmailer call the shots.

 

[kaykordeath]

Letterman and Conan have always been on friendly terms... Letterman went even so far as to appear as a guest on one of Conan's first ever Late Night shows, even though he had just left NBC in the most unfriendly of manners. He has always said he's glad it was Conan who inherited Late Night from him... i've never really been a fan of Dave's show, but he has always been a class act.

Letterman's production compnay, Worldwide Pants produced Late Night with Conan (as well as produces Craig Furguson's show).[/QUOTE]

What, no it wasn't. Late Night was Broadway Video (Lorne Michael's production company) until Conan took over everything with his Conaco production company.[/QUOTE]

What the fuck was I thinking!?? Why the hell did I think that?

But it doesn't change that Letterman had been very supportive of Conan from very early on...

....

And now, stolen from Fark...Leno leaving NBC?

http://www.popeater.com/2010/01/13/jay-leno-leaving-nbc/?pimped

 

[Calleja]

I'd get a lot of respect for Leno back if that actually came to be and he retained his dignity and walked away too.

 

[Frank]

I just got cynical tonight watching Conan. Could all this be just an elaborate ruse by Leno, NBC and Conan to bring more attention to their shows (both of which have been very disappointing ratings wise)?

I was thinking about it. They have every news outlet and rival talkshow host talking about them.

 

[Ravenpoe]

If it is all a ruse, then it's a good one, because it got me to tune in.

 

[Dave]

I rather doubt it's a ruse.

 

[North_Ranger]

I rather doubt it's a ruse.

Mah Engleesh, she fails me. Do you mean you are doubtful of it and think it is a ruse, or are you doubtful of the claim that it could be a ruse?

Just curious; that whole "doubt that X is something" has always seemed a bit... ambiguous to me.

 

[Dave]

I don't think it's a ruse.

 

[North_Ranger]

I don't think it's a ruse.

Thank you.

 

[Dave]

And now the threats start:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/01/14/jeff-zucker-threatens-con_n_423278.html

NBC is threatening Conan to try and keep him off the air for 3.5 years.

 

[sixpackshaker]

I don't think NBC's lawyers are that good.

It must suck to be owned by the man.

 

[Jay]

This is why NPC was sold for a few coins. Sad sad network.

 

[Shakey]

If anything I have a feeling this is all an attempt by NBC to get Jay back in the Tonight Show. They knew Conan wouldn't want to get pushed back again, so this way they can put Leno back in and hope by the time Conan can get back on the air people will have forgotten about him.

 

[Calleja]

Howard Stern has something to say about all this... he reckons that Leno, knowing that in late night TV it's all about the lead-ins, purposefully took the 10pm show just to steal Conan's thunder AND give him a shitty lead-in, stealing half his ratings in the process, knowing that eventually they'd cancel him and give him back the Tonight Show.

What was surprising is that Stern, who's hated NBC and not appeared in it for 25 years, is considering flying down to LA cause Conan invited him on The Tonight Show. He hates Leno THAT much.

Hear it all yourself: http://tv.gawker.com/5448264/howard-stern-despises-jay-leno-gets-a-call-from-conan

 

[Charlie Don't Surf]

I've watched more late night TV in the past week than all of my life before it.

 

[Calleja]

Yeah, I've been hearing that a lot. Thankfully that means that all the ratings land Conan an actually decent offer if he's shoved out of NBC. I'm a bit worried about the evilness of Zucker, though.

It'd be a little bit poetic if Conan ended up on Fox, where he started it all writing for the Simpsons. I'm not sure it'd be the right move, though, competing against both Letterman AND Leno in a network no one watches unless they're playing cartoons.

 

[Charlie Don't Surf]

Yeah, I've been hearing that a lot. Thankfully that means that all the ratings land Conan an actually decent offer if he's shoved out of NBC. I'm a bit worried about the evilness of Zucker, though.

It'd be a little bit poetic if Conan ended up on Fox, where he started it all writing for the Simpsons. I'm not sure it'd be the right move, though, competing against both Letterman AND Leno in a network no one watches unless they're playing cartoons.

House and American Idol and Glee are pretty big successes

 

[sixpackshaker]

Yeah, I've been hearing that a lot. Thankfully that means that all the ratings land Conan an actually decent offer if he's shoved out of NBC. I'm a bit worried about the evilness of Zucker, though.

It'd be a little bit poetic if Conan ended up on Fox, where he started it all writing for the Simpsons. I'm not sure it'd be the right move, though, competing against both Letterman AND Leno in a network no one watches unless they're playing cartoons.

Then Conan will be going on at 11:30 following an hour of COPS reruns.

 

[Calleja]

NBC spent more time building the new Tonight Show studio than they let Conan use it. That's how stupid they are.

 

[Covar]

Yeah, I've been hearing that a lot. Thankfully that means that all the ratings land Conan an actually decent offer if he's shoved out of NBC. I'm a bit worried about the evilness of Zucker, though.

It'd be a little bit poetic if Conan ended up on Fox, where he started it all writing for the Simpsons. I'm not sure it'd be the right move, though, competing against both Letterman AND Leno in a network no one watches unless they're playing cartoons.

House and American Idol and Glee are pretty big successes[/QUOTE]
Don't forget all the sports.

Grabbing the NFL contract was a huge deal for Fox.

 

[Calleja]

So are you guys saying that starting the first late night talk show over at Fox in years and years would be a good move for Conan? I hope so, I really don't want that redheaded tall freak gone from TV.

 

[Krisken]

It should be interesting. I'm hoping Leno sticks to the idea that bumping Conan would be a bad move. I'm curious how much of a fall out this would be for him if he does decide to take back the slot after Conan refused to be bumped to the later time.

 

[Calleja]

No one can deny Conan's motives are sound. It's not like he's doing it for the compensation money since we know they're loop-holing him out of that. He's stepping away cause he respects the Tonight Show franchise and doesn't want to bone Jimmy Fallon and his beloved Late Night franchise either. And people know that, that's why there isn't a single TV personality out there that's on Leno's side beside Leno.

That means that if Leno is given the Tonight Show back he's going to do it with a lot of people, both celebrities and audience, pissed off at his lack of class. I hope this will be his undoing.

 

[Shakey]

Moving to Fox would be a hard move for Conan I think. As it's already been shown, he isn't doing too hot right now. Competing with Letterman and Leno on the same time slot would be even worse. It'd probably be better than getting bumped though.

 

[Calleja]

Moving Conan to Fox would be a hard move for Fox, too. It'd be a huge investment and they've even said that even though they'd love to have Conan, it'd be a hard thing to sell to their affiliates who are happy with Simpsons reruns and all that crap they air at that time slot.

 

[Charlie Don't Surf]

Fox would be in a real awkward position since they do only two hours of content a night, and have news at 9 cst/10 est

 

[Calleja]

They've been rising into the "big three" territory so much lately, though, that I think they want to keep competing with ABC, CBS and the network Conan doesn't want named... and that means getting back into the late night talk show race. What better way than doing it the way CBS did it with Letterman, really?

I don't know, I'm really afraid Zucker is going to get his way and deprive us of Conan for a while.

 

[Shakey]

If Conan leaves he's going to be gone for a while no matter what. If he does get another deal they are going to need to get a new set built and get all the behind the scenes stuff worked out.

 

[Calleja]

Yeah, but a few months is not 3 and a half years

 

[AshburnerX]

I was under the impression that Leno was threatening to walk too, if they bumped Conan out. He seems to realize that it looks like he WANTS NBC to do this to Conan and that it's killing his reputation, so he figured that it'd be better to leave NBC than to lose any chance to work in show business ever again.

I know I saw a report of this somewhere...

 

[Shakey]

Nice. http://www.tmz.com/2010/01/14/conan-obrien-pinkvisual-porn-porno-movie-xxx/

Adult-film company Pink Visual reportedly sent O'Brien a letter offering him a position due to the current high demand for "tall, lean, pale, male 'gingers' that have a David Caruso kind of thing going on."

 

[Calleja]

I was under the impression that Leno was threatening to walk too, if they bumped Conan out. He seems to realize that it looks like he WANTS NBC to do this to Conan and that it's killing his reputation, so he figured that it'd be better to leave NBC than to lose any chance to work in show business ever again.

I know I saw a report of this somewhere...

Yeah, I think it was a rumor I read somewhere too... but it hasn't left the rumor area since and it's been more than two days, which is enough for Leno's people to deny or confirm, and neither has happened. Considering how much crap he's taking his continued silence probably means it was never more than a rumor. So it looks like Leno is going along with it. The bumping of Conan, I mean.

 

[Calleja]

Nice. http://www.tmz.com/2010/01/14/conan-obrien-pinkvisual-porn-porno-movie-xxx/

Adult-film company Pink Visual reportedly sent O'Brien a letter offering him a position due to the current high demand for \\"tall, lean, pale, male 'gingers' that have a David Caruso kind of thing going on.\\"

Oh man, that's hilarious, considering one of Conan's monologue jokes was precisely that he could go on to porn. I hope he got the offer early enough that he can incorporate it into tonight's monologue, that's comedy gold.