On Sat, Aug 18, 2012 at 1:19 AM, PGage <[email protected]> wrote: > > There are several irritating things about this article. Just to point out > two: > > 1. "Leno has said publicly that he’s able to bank his entire Tonight Show > salary and live on the hefty fees he makes from his hectic personal > appearance schedule." This makes it sound like he said it once in an obscure > french language news magazine interview, instead of what he actually does, > which is say almost every freaking time he is interviewed. > > 2. "When his ratings dipped, O’Brien was asked to move The Tonight Show‘s > time slot later to make room for Leno’s return at 11:30 PM. O’Brien refused. > NBC gave Conan a $40M payoff (including salaries for his staff) to leave The > Tonight Show hosting job which Leno resumed in 2010." I have sworn a blood > oath to call bullshit on this whenever I see it for the rest of the 21st > century. Bullshit. O'Brien was asked to move the Tonight Show to 12:01 am > when *Leno's* primetime ratings "dipped" (read, "tanked"). Conan's Tonight > Show ratings were not off track for where he was in his trajectory, and not > worse than ratings Leno had when he returned. The idea that Conan got fired > (or "relocated") because of his bad ratings is the cover story that assholes > at NBC concocted to save face, and that has been perpetuated be Leno every > chance he gets.
I'll point out that when I first posted the link to the article, which is about an hour before you posted, that paragraph was not part of the article. I don't know why they felt they needed to add it. Maybe they thought people would find the link through Google, read the first paragraph, and be confused because they do not know who Jay Leno is. It irritates me more that they had to add the paragraph than the truth of what they reported. One thing we have no grasp of is late night show economics. Each host, since Johnny, has a production company and a deal with his network. I think Donz knows the breakdown better for the Late Show and I remember him posting back in the day on usenet a.f.l. about one of Dave's contracts, that the amount they say Dave is getting actually goes to his production company and pays Worldwide Pants staff and not all into his pocket. I assume Leno has a similar deal as agents usually push for them whether a client needs them or not. The fact that NBC could lay off so much staff hints that Jay might have given the network more power than Dave does. I also cannot be sure that late night is a cash cow any more. In The War for Late Night, Bill Carter wrote that over the years late night had become a less valuable daypart and morning news had become the cash cow. It was one sentence and he did not elaborate or support it with numbers or even say when the change happened. Whoever wrote in Deadline that late night is a cash cow may be making an assumption based on obsolete information. -- 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
