by Sam Sullivan, RD
Late night TV is one of the greatest inventions ever made: loved by insomniacs, stoners, and college students alike. It all started with Ed Sullivan and moved onto Johnny Carson (one of the best hosts ever). Now in the new millennium we have Jay Leno, Conan O’Brien, Dave Letterman, Jimmy Kimmel, Jimmy Fallon, Craig Ferguson, and Carson Daily. But let’s focus on Conan and Jay at this moment since they are in the media a lot lately. If you are unsure of what is going on, let me fill you in.
A while back Jay Leno decided to move into the primetime slot. I believe he starts at 10pm or something to that nature. NBC decided that Conan O’Brien would move from Late Night to The Tonight Show to fill the open position. Who’s a better candidate than him! In my opinion I think Conan is hilarious and I loved “Late Night.” Everyone won in this situation: Conan moved up in time and Jay got a better show. Recently, however, things have changed. Due to poor ratings for both shows, NBC has decided to move Leno back to his old time slot and moving The Tonight Show to midnight. Everyone is giving Conan the bad rap and saying that he’s not pulling in enough viewers. However, he just came into this new position in June.
He has not even had a year to prove that he can do the new show. I mean, Late Night took a bit to get started and he did that for about 15 years!
Many rumors have surfaced saying that Conan will go over to FOX, similar to Letterman going over to CBS several years ago when Leno became Carson’s successor. However, Conan himself has squashed this rumor. On both shows, and even on Kimmel’s show, they have poked fun at this whole mess. But underneath, I don’t believe that they are joking. More recent of a rumor than Conan moving to FOX was that of a statement made by NBC president Jeff Zucker. He basically said that due to the rift between Conan and himself, once Conan is out of Late Nightt he will not be able to work the late night talk show circuit for three years! A little too much, I think. Luckily, that was proved also to be false. Thank Jesus!
People on Twitter and Facebook (myself included) have become apart of this battle as well, posting “I’m with Coco” pictures all over the Internet. But alas, even though Conan has all this support, it is still not enough. Recently, NBC has decided to give the boot to O’Brien and keep Leno. But he is not leaving without a pretty penny to show for it, though numbers have not been mentioned.
Like I stated before, I love Conan O’Brien and will be his fan for many years to come. I hope he comes back to late night somewhere and keeps us laughing. In my opinion, I think Leno is not funny at all. The only funny thing is his huge chin and stupid laugh.
Well, we all wish you the best Conan. And I hope it all works out!
