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It came in with promotions on the cat food aisle at Vons supermarkets, and it goes out with its tail between its legs. The Jay Leno Show finale is tonight with guests Ashton Kutcher (Valentine’s Day) and Gabourey Sidibe (Precious) and “10 at 10″ with NBC Winter Olympcs host Bob Costas via satellite from Vancouver. The fact is Jay can’t get out of 10 PM primetime fast enough to satisfy the beleaguered NBC affiliates who threatened to mutiny and preempt his show. That’s what started NBC’s late night re-shuffle in the first place.
NBC will use the Olympics starting Friday to heavily promote Jay’s March 1st return to The Tonight Show . In the meantime, the Leno Show set will get a makeover, and I’ve heard that a desk was picked for the host’s return before the ink was even dry on his latest contract. There’s also a mean-spirited rumor being emailed that NBC has packed the first week Leno is back with an audience consisting mainly of paid extras from Central Casting who will cheer and laugh extra wildly. Ouch!
Editor-in-Chief Nikki Finke - tip her here.
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Will John Melendez be back as the announcer, or has Jay managed to finally squeeze him totally out?
John was hired as a writer…
The rumor that they’re “casting” the audience is believable considering all the bad blood he’s created, but now he’s got a new problem, and it’s with his guests. He used to avoid booking people he thought might replace him, now he’s also got to screen them for those who might call him on his toadyism for NBC.
An NBC source told me that Leno’s audience has been 70-100 short every day for the past month. Keep an eye on how they curtain off the back portions of the studio.
If true, that’s probably a first. And very telling.
I’m kinda sad that all this publicity is gonna get Jay viewers in March. I just watched that HBO movie The Late Shift and it’s scary how many things got forewarned from what Jay did to Letterman in 93. The Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon 2015?
….and nobody under the age of 50 cares! Thats the real headline folks.
March 1, 2010 Jay Leno Returns As King Of Late Night – Save The Date!
And by the way, I’m in my late 30′s and never watched Conan. He’s not funny and was poorly suited for The Tonight Show. That’s why NBC made him an offer he could refuse and knew he would.
What is it with the anti-50 sentiments? Probably a bunch of 20-somethings who are still living off their 50-something parents and are happy to spend Mom and Dads’ money while they spam the Internet with anti-Jay Leno comments.
………and since the over 50 viewers are his audience, who cares about the under 50. they go to comedy central anyway. they sure weren’t showing up with big numbers for Conan
Kutcher on Leno’s last show? Hmmm, if ever there was time for a Punk’d revival…
Good riddance.
Seems appropriate for a fake host on a fake show. Why not just add a laugh track, too?
All this Leno hating is ridiculous. Like his show; don’t like his show. But casting him as some late night Darth Vader is absurd. The only villain in this whole piece is Zucker who lacked the courage to stand by his decision of five years ago and let Conan go and see Leno compete against Conan on another network. (I think we all agree what needs to happen to Zucker– the only disagreement is how and when). I fail to see what Leno did wrong. NBC moved him from one time period to another to another. So what?
Conan turned down the revised gig because he did not want to follow Leno. He made his decision and knew the possible consequences and obviously was willing to live with it. That was HIS decision, not Leno’s. Enough already with the Leno hate train.
Before the usual smart aleck’s start up: no I am not Leno; no I do not work for Leno; no, I am not even a regular viewer of Leno; no I was not hired by Leno or NBC or his people; yes, I am a GE shareholder.
Leno is a villain to many in hollywood (and subject to “all this Leno hating”) because had he succeeded in his little experiment with NBC, other networks would have followed and it’d mean even more lost work for writers of scripted programming who are unfortunate enough to live in a time where the amount of work available is shrinking daily. No one MADE him take that route, and he obviously didn’t care how it would affect the industry. As a shareholder, surely you realize people form their opinions based on how it affects *them* personally. This blog is read by many writers, and so people on here already hated him, the fact that the perception is he “stole” Conan’s job just gives them one more reason.
But Leno didn’t really want the 10PM slot. He wanted to leave the network, but they wouldn’t let him work on TV for a long time & Leno is a workaholic. Plus NBC would have a huge lump sum payoff to him if he left, way bigger than the Conan payoff!
NBC had no real scripted programs for the 10PM slot because Zucker & his even dumber underlings had canceled good shows like “Life” & wouldn’t pick up “Pushing Daisies” from ABC because NBC doesn’t believe in other nets flops, even when it’s the net’s fault for the flop.
So they figured they could get two years to rebuild scripted, but Zucker being incompetent, they couldn’t do it.
Like Hawk114, I find the Leno hatred out of control, it’s become an internet meme.
Just absurd!
Couldn’t agree more!
I went to see “The Jay Leno Show” in December, before the controversy hit. The audience was instructed to stand up applauding when Jay came out and the front rows were told to run up and shake Jay’s hand.
I went to see “The Tonight Show With Conan O’Brien” on January 13, when Conan’s tenure was shaky. The warm-up comic said that he wanted enthusiasm and energy, and flashed the APPLAUSE sign so we would know the cue, but refrained from giving specific instructions.
When Conan walked on stage, there was a spontaneous standing ovation and chant of “Co-nan! Co-nan!”
If NBC fills the audiencw with paid performers… I wouldn’t be surprised, They don’t want people standing up and heckling.
Tod, EVERY talk show does something like this to pump up the audience, this isn’t new.
“Rumor”? Think about it. How many Jay haters will angle their way in and do everything they can to disrupt the show?
It’s a necessary move security-wise but just another in a long line of embarrassments for Jay Leno.
The Chin’s legacy is sealing itself…
Can’t you just copy all the anti-Leno posts from the 5,000 other threads about the Leno/Conan/NBC fiasco and paste them here? Leno sucks, Zucker sucks, NBC sucks, Conan rules….we get it already.
I look forward to seeing what kind of ratings Jay Leno will get on his return.
“There’s also a mean-spirited rumor being emailed that NBC has packed the first week Leno is back with an audience consisting mainly of paid extras from Central Casting who will cheer and laugh extra wildly. Ouch!”
I totally believe this, because when I was in college a few years back I did some paid extra work, and some of that included being a paid “laugher” on certain bad shows which shall remain nameless. So yeah, it happens all the time, and considering how many people in Los Angeles hate Leno now, of course they’re going to have to pay people to pretend to like him.
Name names!
Calm down, Senator McCarthy.
Jay’s return to the “Tonight Show” will get heavy curiosity viewing the first couple of weeks.
The real test will come in mid-March.
I agree; however, I say it will be early/mid-April.
Jay said before that 10 is the new 11:30. But then again, he is dyslexic.
he’ll end up taking it back eventually…
The reason for “casting” the audience is because there has been a movement in the young “I’m With Coco” circle to acquire tickets to the “new” Tonight Show and simply sit in the audience and not laugh or even crack a smile. No protests, no signs… simply silence.
I actually think those hucksters might’ve pushed NBC to go with “casting” the audience, which is still a win for the anti-Leno crowd as far as I’m concerned. If it’s true, it’s gonna get reported and make NBC/Leno look even more desperate.
Personally, I believe in the power of Parental Controls on my Time Warner box. It’s protected me from Jay Leno for years (and more recently Jimmy Fallon). When that black screen rolls up and asks me to enter my code, I know it’s kept me from seeing something unholy.
I’m a Conan fan who is not thrilled with Jay Leno but can empathize with his decision to jump at a chance to host the Tonight Show again. That wasn’t a saintly or sensitive thing to do, but Hollywood is not known as a haven for sensitive saints.
But this story shows why, at a practical level, this transition was handled so badly.
The whole point of comedy is to build up balloons of tension and then to poke holes in them, to show those damn balloons who’s boss.
But, even if Leno jokes some about what happened, he’s going to end up filling his studio with balloons of tension that he may not even legally be allowed to pop.
Too bad. My cat loved it.
It will flow like this…he’ll get some viewers in the first few weeks but after that, it’s all downhill from there. And if NBC honetsly thinks Fallon can fill those shoes when it’s his time to take over )that is, if he’s still even with the network considering that crapfest of a show he’s currently hosting), NBC late night is dead on arrival. Can someone at GE or Comcast just fire Jeff Zucker already!
All of this Leno hating will seem childish, in 6 months when he’s back kicking Letterman’s ass in the ratings, just like he did for 17 years. But then again Conan’s audience consisted manly of kids, who watched the first month and the last few weeks typical of the younger generation, and you can’t run a network that way.
Won’t happen. A poll on TVGuide.com today reveals that 70% of Leno’s old Tonight Show viewers won’t be back “because of what he did to Conan.”
Yeah, sure, it may do well, briefly, out of the gate. The primetime show got 17 million viewers the first night and look how that worked out.
Fact is, the disdain for Leno runs deep throughout the nation. And when will Zucker be fired already? Please?
C’mon Jammin Jim… do you think a poll, if it is a poll, really matters. Once Leno returns I can promise you his audience will follow because they’re a bunch of lazy lemmings and they’ll recreate their patterns without even knowing they’re doing it. I am so glad this is finally over… at least until Kevin Reilly announces the new Conan show on Fox.
Dave Letterman is funnier anyway.
His writers can mop the floor with those hacks at Leno’s show.
The catfood aisle promo picture is priceless.
The JL experiment was devised by Zucker to fight off being ousted post-merger. “..but look at all the money I saved the network!” His greatest weakness is thinking like an assistant instead of the boss.
TV Guide has an online site? And polls? How encompassing could that be?
The disdain that “runs deep throughout the nation” (as if the nation has nothing else occupying its citizens) will easily be changed just as Americans change their minds daily on cheating husbands, child molestors and murderers.
It won’t be a story soon enough. Oh wait, it already isn’t.
What’s this? A trickle of support for Leno? Where have I seen this before? Oh, yeah, shortly before the primetime show got underway. Y
Sure, this won’t be a story forever. But if even one-quarter of Leno’s already shrinking audience (4.5 million viewers his last year on Tonight) were Conan supporters and don’t return, Jay’s finished.