Fan Fare

Late night gets political as Leno, O’Brien and Letterman look to the future

Conan O’Brien’s departure from NBC’s was ugly from the start, but now that it’s over, and Jay Leno is about to reclaim “The Tonight Show,” who has come out looking like the bad guy?
This is important because if Leno and O’Brien end up competing against each other in the same time slot (with O’Brien on Fox or another network), how the public views each of them could affect their ratings.
Leno himself has acknowledged he has been getting bad press as a result of the shakeup, with fellow talk show hosts David Letterman, Jimmy Kimmel and Rosie O’Donnell accusing him of pushing out O’Brien.
But judging by a poll of 65,000 respondents at celebrity website PopEater, the controversy doesn’t seem to have hurt Leno that much.
Forty-four percent of respondents said they would watch Leno over O’Brien if the two were to go head-to-head in the 11:35 p.m. time slot, with only 33 percent opting for O’Brien.
Leno enjoys the advantage of having reigned as the top-rated late night talk show host from 1995 until he gave up “The Tonight Show” in May 2009. After he left, David Letterman’s “Late Show” on CBS climbed to the top of the heap.
Can Leno reclaim some of those viewers from Letterman when he returns to “The Tonight Show”? Letterman has launched a nasty campaign against Leno, mocking him every chance he gets on his show.
Meanwhile, Leno has tried to take the high road, calling O’Brien a “great guy” during his show Monday. But of late he has fired back at Letterman during his monologues.
With Letterman “going negative,” and Leno having given what amounted to a speech on Monday with his side of the story, this late night war has turned into something like a political campaign.
For his part, O’Brien has ravaged NBC during his monologues, and he has never returned Leno’s favor by also calling him a “great guy.”
Despite the hipster “I’m with Coco” campaign that has emerged, especially online, in support of O’Brien, his $32.5 million payout may hurt his image.
True, we are in the age of corporate executives getting away with million dollar bonuses after their own failures, and Conan has scored sympathy for securing money for his staff.
But wouldn’t we all like to walk away with say, $30 million, after seven months of poor ratings, weak reviews and (to use one of O’Brien’s jokes) not even a new haircut?
In a PopEater poll, only 28 percent of respondents said they feel sorry for O’Brien now that he has received his huge payout, and 38 percent said they never did.
With none of the talk show hosts seeming to have a monopoly on public sympathy, they may want all want to work harder on their campaign skills, because this new age for the talk show arena looks to be as cut-throat as ever.

(Additional writing by Christine Kearney)

Top 5 late-night jokes about Conan and Jay

On Thursday, NBC and Conan O’Brien finally reached a deal that will see him leave “The Tonight Show,” which won’t end all the late-night jokes about the debacle but may well put a damper on them — at least from O’Brien himself since his last show is Friday. It’s been an entertaining couple weeks that gave Jay Leno, O’Brien and other comics plenty of material. Here are what we believe to be the Top 5 comic segments that have come out of the controversy, with video below. For the handful out there not in the know, Leno is poised to reclaim his job hosting “The Tonight Show” in a move that will bump out O’Brien. 1. On Jan. 12, Jimmy Kimmel impersonated Leno during his own late-night show on ABC, showing up with a big prosthetic chin and gray hair to look just like the NBC veteran. “Hello, my name is Jay Leno. And let it hereby be known that I’m taking over all the shows in late-night,” Kimmel said. Later on, comedian Chevy Chase came out dressed like O’Brien for more yuks. 2.  Later in the week, Kimmel appeared via satellite feed on “The Jay Leno Show,”  in an awkward interview led by none other than Leno himself. During the interview, Kimmel was asked what was the best prank he ever pulled. His response told little about himself, but more about the recent history of Leno and O’Brien, at least from Kimmel’s jaded perspective. Kimmel said, “I told a guy that ‘five years from now, I’m going to give you my show.’ And then I took it back almost instantly. I think he works at Fox or something now.” To that, Leno just laughed and moved on to the next question. 3. On the “Late Show” on Jan. 13, David Letterman gave his “Top 10 Messages Left on Jeff Zucker’s Voice Mail.” Of course, Zucker is the head of NBC Universal, and the executive at the center of the controversy over Leno and O’Brien.  Some of the jokes on Letterman’s list of supposed phone messages on Zucker’s answering machine were, “What the hell are you doing?” “Hi, it’s Burt Reynolds. Just so you know I’m available” and “What the Zuck?” 4. Conan O’Brien subjected NBC to plenty of biting sarcasm on his show, but perhaps the funniest joke came on Tuesday, when he said that even though NBC is reportedly muzzling him, “nobody said anything about speaking in Spanish.” O’Brien went on to say in the romance language, “NBC is run by brainless sons of goats who eat money and crap trouble.” 5. Jay Leno weighed in on the controversy from the stage of his show on Jan. 16, saying “I’m getting beat up in the press … you know it’s bad when Tiger Woods calls to offer PR advice.” Then he added, “Even Dave Letterman is taking shots at me, usually he’s just taking shots at interns.” That last one, of course, was a reference to Letterman’s admitted sexual liaisons with members of his staff. With zingers like that, things got ugly fast in this latest full contact flare-up in late night television. What would Johnny Carson think?

Don’t mess with the Mouse, Adam

(Writing and reporting by Corinne Heller)

Adam Lambert? Not for Disney.

Appearances by glam rocker Adam Lambert on two additional shows broadcast on the ABC network have been canceled following complaints to the Disney-owned station.

ABC had also canceled an appearance by Lambert on its “Good Morning America” news program a day after he performed at the live American Music Awards November telecast on ABC in November, during which he kissed a male keyboardist and simulated oral sex and other racy acts.

Sarah Silverman, Jimmy Kimmel together again — on TV.

(Reporting and Writing by Alex Dobuzinskis)

Comedians Sarah Silverman and Jimmy Kimmel had an entertaining television reunion Thursday, as she appeared on his talk show more than three months after they announced their breakup, and the two went over some old memories. 

It started off like a conversation from any on-again, off-again relationship – awkward.
    
“What have you been up to? Everything good?” Kimmel said.
    
“Yeah, everything’s been great. Really, really great. And you’re good?” Silverman said.