On Sat, Sep 10, 2011 at 1:47 PM, David Bruggeman <[email protected]> wrote:
> Granted, I'm a big Ferguson booster, but it's hard to miss the lack of > discussion of his show, for good or bad. Granted, the mention of Ferguson > having an 11:35 guarantee when Dave leaves is sort-of news, as much for it > conflicting with statements from SCG suggesting a lack of interest in moving > up. All of the concerns expressed when both Dave and Conan shifted from > 12:30 to 11:30 seem applicable to Ferguson, perhaps even more so. I can't > see his 'can you believe we're doing this crap' attitude surviving in a > marquee timeslot (to the extent that still matters). > > (SNIP) I would also push back that the Comedy Central shows are different > enough from their traditional cousins (both in content and time length) that > some comparisons aren't terribly effective. > > For all this talk, there still isn't any discussion of one of the shows > going away. With the exception of Lopez, either the host or the show in > each of the other cases has at least 6 years in, so there's a little bit of > history. But if margins are getting as tight as the data suggests, Carter > has not made the case for contraction that could be picked up from the > picture he's trying to paint. > I am not a big Ferguson booster, and I thought the main news in the late, late night show slot was that Fallon is on the upswing. I happened to catch one of his shows a few weeks ago, and noticed that it sucked much, much less than it had when I watched it pretty frequently in its first 2 months or so. Still not the kind of show that would attract me, but I can begin to see why the younger folks dig it (and the band is still cool). I don't see any circumstance in which CBS would force out Dave to get Ferguson on earlier, as NBC did to both Carson and Leno, and then Conan. Whatever the merits to Feguson's show, I don't see how he draws better numbers at 11:35 than Dave does, and his shiny, new thing buzz, so strong only a year or less ago, seems to have been largely taken over by Fallon. I agree that the TDS/CR hour is almost an orange in this discussion of apples. I never, ever watch it in the late night slot (sometimes I watch it at 8:00, the vast majority of the time I watch it sometime the next day after recording the early morning repeat). I have to force myself to remember to put it in the same category as other late night talk shows. I still love me some Dave - and his shows this summer, especially since the jihad, have been particularly strong. If I was Dave's executive producer I would make sure he was the target of some attack at least once per quarter - it always brings out the best in him, in terms both of his own interest in the show, and his creativity. One of his problems in the last 10 or 15 years is his rather good relationship with Moonves - Dave does his best work when he thinks he is working for assholes or pinheads. In any event, as we know, CBS still makes a shit load of money from Dave's show, and I don't think they will force him out, ever (though they may not talk him out of retiring as strongly as they might once have). Of course, the main point in this for me is, again, the moral and intellectual bankruptcy behind NBC's treatment of Conan. Arguably Leno should not have agreed to getting moved out in the first place, but the argument, made by NBC and Leno, that Conan had to go as host of an 11:35 NBC talk show because he failed to get good enough ratings was just a crock of raw shit. Leno could easily be fired now by the exact same standard - though there is no reason to (now) - as with Dave, he makes NBC a lot of money. It is unlikely that Conan's ratings, if he had stayed with the Tonight Show, would be worse than Leno's are now - but he almost certainly would have drawn a younger average audience than Leno does now, which was supposedly the whole point of the Leno for Conan exchange in the first place. I don't agree that the traditional late night format has runs its course. I do agree that they are overproducing this type of show, slicing the audience so thin no one program will ever have the kind of dominance Johnny, or even Dave & Leno, once had. As a viewer I would rather see just one or two of these shows on the air, so we don't get such a diluted or re-hashed set of guests and jokes and ideas, but I don't buy the idea that from the main broadcast/cable perspective, Leno, Letterman, Kimmel or O'Brien is anything other than a net profit-center (including the promotional base it gives them for the rest of their shows). -- TV or Not TV .... The Smartest (TV) People! You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "TV or Not TV" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected] To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [email protected] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/tvornottv?hl=en
