The Tonight Show with Conan O'Brien
Encyclopedia
The Tonight Show with Conan O'Brien is an American
late-night talk show
that featured Conan O'Brien as host from June 1, 2009 to January 22, 2010 as part of NBC's long-running Tonight Show franchise
. The program's host, Conan O'Brien
, previously hosted NBC's Late Night with Conan O'Brien
, which followed The Tonight Show with Jay Leno
for 16 years, until O'Brien's brief succession over Leno.
Many members of the Late Night cast and crew made the transition to The Tonight Show. The Max Weinberg 7, the house band from O'Brien's Late Night, served as the house band under the new name, Max Weinberg and The Tonight Show Band. Andy Richter
returned to the show as announcer, and also began resuming his role as sidekick, shortly before the show's conclusion. The opening and closing theme song from Late Night was also carried over to Tonight, in a slightly altered form.
In January 2010, after the show had been on the air for seven months, it was announced that NBC was intending to move
Jay Leno
from primetime back to his original timeslot at 11:35 p.m., with O'Brien's show starting shortly after midnight. In response to the announcement, O'Brien released a press statement saying that he would not continue as host of The Tonight Show if it was moved to any time after midnight to accommodate The Jay Leno Show
. He feared it would ruin the long and rich tradition of The Tonight Show
. It had been on after the late local newscasts from the beginning. After two weeks of negotiations, NBC announced that they had paid $45 million to buy out
O'Brien's contract, ending both his tenure as host as well as his relationship with NBC after 22 years.
Conan O'Brien's final Tonight Show was broadcast on January 22, 2010, with Jay Leno officially resuming his role as host on March 1, 2010, immediately following the conclusion of the 2010 Winter Olympics
. To date, it is the shortest running version of The Tonight Show. It later received four Primetime Emmy nominations, including Outstanding Variety, Music or Comedy Series
, the first time The Tonight Show has received a nomination for this particular award since 2003.
used, as well as elements established by O'Brien during his tenure on Late Night. The first segment included a monologue by O'Brien, sometimes accompanied by altered news clips, or several brief comedy sketches. Most episodes also included a second segment, immediately after the monologue, with a full comedy sketch. An interview with either one or two guests followed, as well as a musical or comedy performance.
After the last performance segment, O'Brien walks on camera to thank the performers, and bids farewell to the audience, before recommending watching Late Night with Jimmy Fallon
. For the first six shows, the credits ran in the right half of a split screen, a former NBC standard that Late Night continued to use long after the network abandoned it. After episode seven, NBC's current practice of running credits at the bottom third of the screen was employed. The Conaco
and Universal Media Studios production tags are then shown in full-screen.
Tracker", where an excited announcer reads mundane "tweets" by celebrities such as Ashton Kutcher
, Miley Cyrus
, and Dennis Haysbert
. Sketches from Late Night reintroduced include "In the Year 2000" as "In the Year 3000", with Richter once again assisting Conan on the sketch, and "Celebrity Surveys". Popular Late Night character Triumph, the Insult Comic Dog
appeared on Tonight for the first time on June 19, 2009, serving as correspondent for the Bonnaroo Music Festival
in Tennessee. Another favorite character from Conan's old show, the Masturbating Bear, was also reintroduced on January 20, 2010, on Conan's third-to-last show. O'Brien originally retired the Masturbating Bear at the end of his Late Night run due to concerns about its inappropriateness in the 11:30 time slot. Late Night character The Interrupter made his first appearance on The Tonight Show on September 3, 2009.
's "Free Bird
".
in Universal City, California
, a stage that was specifically built and constructed for O'Brien's version of The Tonight Show. The studio was previously used for Jack Benny's
television show
. This was the first time since before May 1972, when Johnny Carson served as host, that the show was not shot in Burbank, California
.
As with a majority of television shows produced and broadcast by NBC Universal, the show was shot in 16:9 aspect ratio
, with a 4:3 center-cut, and broadcast in 1080i
high definition
. O'Brien's entire tenure on the show is the only version of The Tonight Show to be recorded, taped, and broadcast exclusively in high definition.
Unlike Leno's Tonight Show, the studio audience was several feet removed from the stage, in a similar fashion to Carson's original set. Leno retained Carson's original configuration (and set design) until he changed studios in 1995.
The stage layout was opposite of the structure used on Late Night. Where Studio 6A was arranged with the house band on the far left, followed by the performance area and then the interview set, the house band was moved to the right of the performance stage on Tonight, with the interview set now on the far left.
NBC is converting Stage 1 into offices and broadcast studios for the Los Angeles bureau of NBC News and local affiliate KNBC.http://articles.latimes.com/2010/nov/03/business/la-fi-nbc-studios-20101103
, after a seventeen year run. This was accompanied by reports that Jay Leno had told Jeff Zucker
, the President of NBC Entertainment, News & Cable Group, of his plans to retire that same year. Leno immediately explained on his show the following night that in having Conan take over the show, and announcing it years before the transition would take place, that he wanted to avoid the hardship that he had experienced in the dispute over retiring Johnny Carson's hosting duties between him and David Letterman
in 1992. Further commenting about the announcement, Leno made it clear that Conan was "certainly the most deserving person for the job." However, in 2008, while Leno was beginning to bring his show to a close, it was announced that Leno had changed his mind about retiring and would instead host a new prime-time variety show
on NBC. The Jay Leno Show
aired weeknights at 10:00 p.m. from September 14, 2009, until the show's cancellation on February 9, 2010.
, in addition to a musical performance of the song "Got Some
" by guest Pearl Jam
.
The show's opening began with a nod to The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson
, beginning with the classic "Laramie Peacock" logo used during the 1960s and 1970s, and the announcement that "the following program is brought to you in living color, on NBC", a slogan that would be readopted by NBC soon after.
In the cold open, O'Brien was shown preparing to host his first episode of The Tonight Show, going over a list of things that need to be done, but realizing he was still in New York and had forgotten to move to Los Angeles. After trying, and failing, to catch a taxi cab, Conan ran across the country through such places as Amish Country
, Wrigley Field
in Chicago
, the Gateway Arch
in St. Louis, the Teton Range
, Las Vegas
and the deserts of Arizona
before arriving at Universal Studios Hollywood
to host the show.
Upon arrival, Conan realized he left the keys to the new studio in New York and then drove a bulldozer through the door and wall of the studio to get in. The Cheap Trick
song "Surrender
" was played over this sketch.
Other filmed sketches in the first episode included a trip through the streets of Los Angeles on the Universal Studios tram
, a ride through Hollywood with Conan behind the wheel of his 1992 Ford Taurus SHO
, and a short gag showing Conan in the back row of a Los Angeles Lakers
playoff game at Staples Center
.
, who had died earlier in the day. Memorable clips from McMahon's tenure as Johnny Carson
's sidekick were shown, with O'Brien and Andy Richter also paying tribute to McMahon, and bidding him a final farewell.
On September 23, 2009, during his opening monologue, O'Brien told a very brief joke about Newark, and a supposed health care program for the city's citizens that would involve Newark giving them a bus ticket out of the city. Newark mayor Cory Booker
responded in a satirical YouTube video calling for O'Brien to apologize, and that Conan would be banned from ever entering Newark Liberty International Airport
until doing so. Conan responded by further making fun of Newark, however, saying the only way he could get to Newark now would be like everyone else, "through a series of poor decisions." He also called out Cory Booker to come on the show to air out their grievances, deciding to then ban Booker from Burbank airport, adding later that he had absolutely no power to do so. Booker subsequently banned Conan from the state of New Jersey
as well as all the sister cities of Newark. In response, O'Brien read a letter on air from Elizabeth, New Jersey
mayor Chris Bollwage, declaring that he will temporarily rename Terminal A of Newark Liberty (which lies in Elizabeth) the Conan O'Brien Terminal. Conan continued, saying he had created a "geographic toilet seat" around Newark. The mayors of Bayonne
, East Orange
, Kearny
, Jersey City
, and Elizabeth
have publicly sided with Conan O'Brien. He ended this by saying, "Your move, Mayor Booker." The feud was unofficially ended when Secretary of State Hillary Clinton called for it to end during a prepared comedy bit, telling Booker to "chalk it up" to Conan. The following week Conan announced that Cory Booker would be a guest on the October 16, 2009 show to mend the feud. That night, O'Brien and his wife donated $50,000 to the Newark Now Organization, and NBC Universal matched Conan's donation to total a $100,000 gift. Booker also admitted that he is a big Conan fan and often tapes shows to watch the next day or watches them on the website Hulu
.
On September 25, 2009, O'Brien suffered from a mild concussion after he slipped and hit his head while running a race, as part of a comedy sketch, with guest Teri Hatcher
. He was examined at a hospital and released the same day. A rerun was aired that night, but O'Brien returned to work the following Monday and poked fun at the incident, before showing a clip of the occurrence in its entirety. Though the episode never aired due to its incompletion, Hatcher was not asked to return for another interview. Second guest Seth MacFarlane
and musical guest Rodrigo y Gabriela
returned the next week, however.
's Late Show with David Letterman
and ABC
's Nightline combined, with a 7.1 rating and a 17 audience share. In comparison, the final show with Leno averaged an 8.8 rating in metered-market households. During the rest of O'Brien's premiere week, ratings dropped each day, from a 5.0 on Tuesday to a 3.5 on Friday, though the latter still exceeded that evening's 2.7 rating for Late Show.
On June 9, 2009, Late Show had rated better than The Tonight Show with a 3.4 rating to 2.9 rating. It was the first time in over eight months that Letterman rated better than his NBC counterpart. Tonight would end up winning week two, however, with O'Brien garnering more than 850,000 viewers than Late Show with David Letterman in the 18–49 demographic, plus more than 650,000 viewers in the 18–34 demographic and more than 550,000 in the 25–54 demographic.
The week before the death of Michael Jackson
saw Letterman attract a larger audience than O'Brien, with The Tonight Show audience measuring as the smallest in the franchise's history, "3.3 million viewers, about two million fewer than Jay Leno's average as host." The following week, O'Brien's total viewership was even lower, averaging 2.8 million; among viewers 25-to-54, he tied with Letterman, the first time O'Brien failed to win that demographic since he had become host. However, The New York Times noted that the coverage of Jackson's death had placed Nightline ahead of both Letterman and O'Brien that week. By the week ending August 7, repeats of The Late Show were also beating O'Brien, albeit with the thinnest of margins—the repeats got a 2.1/6 household rating and 2.95 million total viewers, vs. The Tonight Show's 2.0/5 rating and 2.94 million viewers; both were beaten that week by Nightline's 3.25 million.
Although there are concerns that O'Brien's greatest strength, the "young men" demographic, can be more easily reached "on Web sites and cable channels like Comedy Central
and Spike", advertisers and network executives alike point out that the first real test would come in September 2009. Pulitzer Prize-winning
critic Tom Shales
also pointed out in August 2009 that O'Brien was "in much better shape than Leno was at the beginning." O'Brien's strength was also strong among low income inner city
viewers, and had always beaten Letterman by a large margin among that demographic. O' Brien also received very high ratings over Letterman among African American
and Hispanic
viewers, which was very unusual for a white host. Prior to Conan's tenure African American and Hispanic viewers were usually split among Leno and Letterman.
By November 2009, two months after the premiere of The Jay Leno Show
in September, ratings for The Tonight Show were down "roughly two million viewers a night year-to-year" from when Leno hosted the program. Though cheaper to produce than the scripted dramas it replaced, Leno's new primetime talk show generated fewer lead-in viewers for local news programs, causing a domino effect
on ratings for The Tonight Show and Late Night with Jimmy Fallon
.
On January 12, 2010, in response to the controversy of the late-night schedule change, O'Brien's ratings grew to 1.7 rating/7 share among adults 18–49, up 40 percent from the previous day. On Thursday, January 14, 2010, Conan garnered a 1.9 rating. His last show garnered his best ratings with a 4.8 rating with adults 18–49 and 40 percent better than the 3.4 rating with adults 18–49 Jay Leno got in his last show on May 29, 2009.
To this day, the Tonight Show has never achieved a 4.8 rating again.
between February 15 and February 26; a final decision about the programming changes was made by NBC on January 10. O'Brien's contract stipulated that NBC could move the show back to 12:05 a.m. without penalty (a clause put in primarily to accommodate sports preemptions), leaving him with no apparent recourse other than resignation.
On January 10, NBC confirmed they would move Jay Leno out of primetime on February 12, and intended to move him to late-night as soon as possible. TMZ
reported that O'Brien was given no advance notice of the change, and that NBC offered two choices: the hour-long 12:05am time slot, or the option to leave the network. If O'Brien did choose to leave, Leno would likely regain the Tonight Show title as well as the full 11:35pm to 12:35am time slot. Another possibility was that NBC could pay O'Brien to refrain from working for another network, remain off-air, then have him resume as host once Leno retires. The day after the change was announced, The New York Times
spoke with an anonymous FOX
executive, who said that the company feels O'Brien "would be a great fit for Fox." ABC
had stated they feel no need to add O'Brien to their late night schedule, which already contains Nightline and Jimmy Kimmel Live!.
On January 12, O'Brien issued a press release that stated he would not continue with the NBC program if it moves to a 12:05am time slot, saying, "I believe that delaying The Tonight Show into the next day to accommodate another comedy program will seriously damage what I consider to be the greatest franchise in the history of broadcasting. The Tonight Show at 12:05 simply isn't the Tonight Show. Also, if I accept this move I will be knocking the Late Night show, which I inherited from David Letterman and passed on to Jimmy Fallon, out of its long-held time slot. That would hurt the other NBC franchise that I love, and it would be unfair to Jimmy." In the same statement, O'Brien pointed out the lack of support from the network and lead-in prime time ratings: "It was my mistaken belief that, like my predecessor, I would have the benefit of some time and, just as important, some degree of ratings support from the prime-time schedule. Building a lasting audience at 11:30 is impossible without both."
On January 15, All Headline News
reported that NBC
intended to keep Conan off the air completely for three and a half years, without pay, unless he agreed to NBC's terms. Insiders for both NBC and O'Brien reportedly dismissed the notion as "ludicrous": "He has two and a half years left on his deal. How would they even do that?" NBC Universal
chief Jeff Zucker
made the threat with the belief that O'Brien's contract contained a clause that allowed the network to bench him for an additional one year after his contract expires. An insider on O'Brien's side claimed that NBC would be in breach of an addendum to the contract if The Tonight Show was moved to a later time slot.
The New York Times
reported online support was overwhelmingly in favor of O'Brien; in the days following the switch announcement, 88% of related Twitter
posts expressed support for O'Brien. Tens of thousands of Facebook
posts were made siding with O'Brien, and thousands joined various "Team Conan" or "I'm with Coco" groups. Dozens of celebrities expressed support for O'Brien, including Roger Ebert
, Tom Hanks
, Rosie O'Donnell
, Jim Gaffigan
, Paul F. Tompkins
, Doug Benson
, Ahmir "?uestlove" Thompson
, Alyssa Milano
, Chris Parnell
, Jimmy Kimmel
, Jeff Garlin
, and Ricky Gervais
. Actor and comedian Patton Oswalt
expressly backed O'Brien, saying, "Comedians who don't like Jay Leno now, and I'm one of them, we're not like, 'Jay Leno sucks'; it's that we're so hurt and disappointed that one of the best comedians of our generation... willfully has shut the switch off."
In a 2010 issue of TV Guide
, the timeslot dispute ranked #1 on a list of TV's biggest "blunders".
The network confirmed that Leno would officially resume as host of The Tonight Show on March 1, 2010, following the 2010 Winter Olympics coverage on NBC. Reruns of episodes from O'Brien's time continued to air until the beginning of NBC's coverage of the Olympics in February 2010.
, Quentin Tarantino
, Robin Williams
and Adam Sandler
. Musical guests for the final week included Spoon
and Barry Manilow
. The guests for the final episode were Tom Hanks
, Will Ferrell
, and musical guest Neil Young
. Ferrell bookended the show by being O'Brien's first and last guest. Tom Hanks was the final interview of both O'Brien's Tonight Show and David Letterman's Late Night.
In addition, a number of other unannounced celebrities "dropped by" during various segments of the show. On January 13, Jack McBrayer
appeared briefly in character as NBC page
Kenneth Parcell
from 30 Rock
. He interrupted O'Brien's monologue while giving a guided tour around the studio, quipping, "NBC spent more time building this studio than using it." On January 19, Norm Macdonald
walked onstage with a large congratulatory gift basket
he had procrastinated on giving O'Brien since June. He read aloud from the greeting card
, "Congratulations Conan on finally securing your place as permanent host of The Tonight Show. That's something they can never take away from you." Ed Helms
appeared on January 20, performing "Stu's Song" from The Hangover
with altered lyrics that remarked upon O'Brien's current troubles. Ben Stiller
and Paul Reubens
(in character as Pee-wee Herman
) made brief unannounced stops on the January 21 show. On the last show, Steve Carell
made a cameo appearance as an NBC employee conducting O'Brien's exit interview.
The January 20 episode included a comedic bit in which O'Brien unveiled a Bugatti Veyron
dressed as a mouse, while the song "(I Can't Get No) Satisfaction
" by The Rolling Stones
played in the background. O'Brien claimed that the car and music licensing fees ("not to mention the rights to re-air this clip on the Internet") would cost NBC $1.5 million. It was later revealed that the car was on loan from the Petersen Automotive Museum
. The segment was subsequently cut from Internet versions of the episode that were uploaded to Hulu and NBC.com, presumably so the network could avoid paying the licensing fees required for the Rolling Stones song.
The "expensive" comedy bit continued on January 21, featuring 2009 Kentucky Derby
winner Mine That Bird
wearing a mink
Snuggie watching restricted Super Bowl
footage, which O'Brien claimed cost NBC $4.8 million. The final episode upped the ante further with a purported $65 million sketch, featuring a credit card-purchased fossil skeleton of a ground sloth from the Smithsonian Institution
spraying Beluga caviar
through a hose onto an original Picasso
painting. In response to the Internet community's outcry over the expense of these sketches, O'Brien explained that the segments were a joke.
The televised airing extended into January 23, which coincidentally marked the five-year anniversary of Johnny Carson
's death. Before introducing the final segment, a performance of "Free Bird", O'Brien gave a statement to the viewers and audience, which included a personal thank you to NBC (the first time he expressed gratitude to the network since the controversy began) and his devoted fanbase:
The final episode featured a reel of highlights from the show's short run, ending with the words, "To Be Continued.", indicating that he will be on another network
. When introduced, Tom Hanks brought out two glasses of "scotch", later revealed to be cream soda
. Neil Young performed an acoustic version of his song "Long May You Run
", and the show ended with Will Ferrell dressed as Ronnie Van Zant
playing the cowbell in a nod to his famous role in the More cowbell
sketch, Ferrell's pregnant wife Viveca Paulin
, Billy Gibbons
, Ben Harper
, Beck
, O'Brien himself, and Max Weinberg and The Tonight Show Band performing "Free Bird
".
. Gather.com
reported that NBC intends to scrub all O'Brien-related Tonight Show and Late Night clips from YouTube
in the near future, making it incredibly difficult to find any videos of Conan's history with The Tonight Show other than his farewell speech, among other clips. Time magazine criticized the network for pulling the videos, noting that Hulu currently streams many less popular NBC series, such as Knight Rider
, Kings
, Crusoe, and Surface. It is not known whether the removal of the videos was part of the settlement O'Brien and NBC reached in January or a unilateral action on NBC's part.
In February 2010, NBC took O'Brien's official website offline, and removed all mentions of the former host from NBC.com. Around the same time, HornyManatee.com, a URL launched by O'Brien's Late Night show as part of a sketch, began redirecting to NBC.com. In early February 2010, O'Brien's face in the 30 Rockefeller Plaza
mural was replaced by Jay Leno's likeness. The NBC "Tonight Show Experience" website which originally featured media on all of the past hosts was also removed of all content. Every search result in O'Brien's name on NBC.com only produced links to the 30 Rock
episode "Tracy Does Conan
" - in which O'Brien guest stars - and the farewells to O'Brien during the episode of Late Night with Jimmy Fallon
which aired after O'Brien's last Tonight Show.
Critics have also called into question promotions broadcast in early March 2010 for an upcoming appearance by former vice-presidential candidate Sarah Palin
on Leno's Tonight Show in which it was claimed that she had never made a late-night talk show appearance before—despite her appearing on the Conan O'Brien Tonight Show on December 11, 2009. Nikki Finke, a blogger for the Deadline Hollywood website, cited this as more evidence of NBC attempting to erase any remnants of the O'Brien era.
Sarah Palin
also appeared on The Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson
and Jimmy Kimmel Live!, but neither of those appearances were interviews.
One O'Brien reference that NBC didn't filter out was in the April 1, 2010 episode of The Marriage Ref
, with Late Night host Jimmy Fallon on the panel. While watching a clip of a married couple arguing about the husband's odd marionette collection, Fallon pointed out two marionettes in the background that resembled him and Conan (to which the mentioning of his name received great applause), saying the husband owned the "NBC Late Night Marionette" collection. O'Brien was also mentioned on the first season finale of the NBC show Community
, when the character "Starburns" yelled out that NBC should "bring back Conan."
, guitarist Slash
performed the song "By the Sword
" with Andrew Stockdale
, lead singer of Wolfmother
, the first single from Slash's self-titled debut solo album. During the performance, there were very few close-ups of Slash. TMZ
reported that this was because Slash was wearing a pin depicting Mike Mitchell
's "I'm With Coco" poster during the performance, which they illustrated with a closeup still showing the pin.
On the May 5, 2010 episode of The Tonight Show with Jay Leno, a gag involving Times Square bombing suspect Faisal Shahzad
's fictional Facebook
page mentioned "Team Coco" under his Favorites section, becoming one of the first jabs at O'Brien (though not mentioned out loud) by Leno.
On the June 8, 2010 episode, comedian Chris Rock
made an appearance. During the interview, he made a few subtle references to O'Brien's stint as host and went on to call Leno a "bad, bad man."
On the June 10, 2010 episode, guest Denis Leary
stated that he had created a Twitter
account because he heard Conan O'Brien got one. Leno mentioned that he also has a Twitter account. The comment and the question were not present in clips of the interview on the NBC website.
On the July 8, 2010 episode, immediately after the 2010 Emmy nominations were announced, Leno indirectly referred to The Tonight Show under O'Brien by quipping that the good news was that The Tonight Show had been nominated for four Emmys. The bad news was that none of them were his. On the July 9 episode, Jay showed an altered tape of him interviewing LeBron James
. When Leno asked James if he had chosen a team, James held up a poster reading "Team CoCo", to which Leno said, "Well, he did get four nominations."
; The comparison was made by most media outlets that neither Jay Leno's version of Tonight nor The Jay Leno Show, both of which were also submitted for consideration, received a nomination in the category. The comparison is made noteworthy due to NBC favoring Leno in the turnover rather than the simple fact of nomination as Jay Leno has never previously been nominated for writing and only been nominated for Outstanding Variety, Music or Comedy once before in 1995.
Other 2010 Primetime Emmy nominations include Outstanding Art Direction in a Variety, Music, or Nonfiction Programming, Outstanding Directing for a Variety, Music, or Comedy Series and Outstanding Writing for a Variety, Music, or Comedy Series.
The writing and directing categories in which O'Brien's Tonight Show was nominated have been cut from the Emmy broadcast do to a deal that the Emmys reached with the WGA and DGA last year to alternate between the writing and directing awards for Variety, Music, or Comedy Series and Variety, Music, or Comedy Specials. These have been moved to the Creative Emmys broadcast, however fans have been mounting a campaign to get at least the writing award for series back on the prime time Emmys broadcast.
At the Creative Arts Emmys, The Tonight Show failed to win any of the three awards they were up for that night. The Tonight Show also failed to win the Emmy for Outstanding Variety, Music or Comedy Series, losing to The Daily Show.
Television in the United States
Television is one of the major mass media of the United States. Ninety-nine percent of American households have at least one television and the majority of households have more than one...
late-night talk show
Late-night talk show
In American television, the late-night talk show is a specific kind of comedy-oriented talk and variety show that airs late at night. Characteristics of the genre include topical monologues in which the host makes fun of the day's news, comedy sketches, celebrity interviews, and musical performances...
that featured Conan O'Brien as host from June 1, 2009 to January 22, 2010 as part of NBC's long-running Tonight Show franchise
The Tonight Show
The Tonight Show is an American late-night talk show that has aired on NBC since 1954. It is the longest currently running regularly scheduled entertainment program in the United States, and the third longest-running show on NBC, after Meet the Press and Today.The Tonight Show has been hosted by...
. The program's host, Conan O'Brien
Conan O'Brien
Conan Christopher O'Brien is an American television host, comedian, writer, producer and performer. Since November 2010 he has hosted Conan, a late-night talk show that airs on the American cable television station TBS....
, previously hosted NBC's Late Night with Conan O'Brien
Late Night with Conan O'Brien
Late Night with Conan O'Brien is an American late-night talk show hosted by Conan O'Brien that aired 2,725 episodes on NBC between 1993 and 2009. The show featured varied comedic material, celebrity interviews, and musical and comedy performances. Late Night aired weeknights at 12:37 am...
, which followed The Tonight Show with Jay Leno
The Tonight Show with Jay Leno
The Tonight Show with Jay Leno is an American late-night talk show hosted by Jay Leno that initially aired from May 25, 1992 to May 29, 2009, and resumed production on March 1, 2010. The fourth incarnation of the Tonight Show franchise made its debut on May 25, 1992, three days following Johnny...
for 16 years, until O'Brien's brief succession over Leno.
Many members of the Late Night cast and crew made the transition to The Tonight Show. The Max Weinberg 7, the house band from O'Brien's Late Night, served as the house band under the new name, Max Weinberg and The Tonight Show Band. Andy Richter
Andy Richter
Paul Andrew "Andy" Richter is an American actor, writer, comedian, and late night talk show announcer. He is best known for his role as the sidekick of Conan O'Brien on each of the host's programs: Late Night and The Tonight Show on NBC, and Conan on TBS...
returned to the show as announcer, and also began resuming his role as sidekick, shortly before the show's conclusion. The opening and closing theme song from Late Night was also carried over to Tonight, in a slightly altered form.
In January 2010, after the show had been on the air for seven months, it was announced that NBC was intending to move
2010 Tonight Show conflict
In early 2010, American television network NBC and two of its late-night talk show hosts, Conan O'Brien and Jay Leno, engaged in a media and public relations conflict over the host and airtime of The Tonight Show, the network's long-running late night program...
Jay Leno
Jay Leno
James Douglas Muir "Jay" Leno is an American stand-up comedian and television host.From 1992 to 2009, Leno was the host of NBC's The Tonight Show with Jay Leno. Beginning in September 2009, Leno started a primetime talk show, titled The Jay Leno Show, which aired weeknights at 10:00 p.m. ,...
from primetime back to his original timeslot at 11:35 p.m., with O'Brien's show starting shortly after midnight. In response to the announcement, O'Brien released a press statement saying that he would not continue as host of The Tonight Show if it was moved to any time after midnight to accommodate The Jay Leno Show
The Jay Leno Show
The Jay Leno Show is an American comedy show created by and starring Jay Leno, that aired from September 14, 2009 to February 9, 2010 on NBC following the May 29, 2009 conclusion of Leno's first tenure as host of The Tonight Show...
. He feared it would ruin the long and rich tradition of The Tonight Show
The Tonight Show
The Tonight Show is an American late-night talk show that has aired on NBC since 1954. It is the longest currently running regularly scheduled entertainment program in the United States, and the third longest-running show on NBC, after Meet the Press and Today.The Tonight Show has been hosted by...
. It had been on after the late local newscasts from the beginning. After two weeks of negotiations, NBC announced that they had paid $45 million to buy out
Buyout
A buyout, in finance, is an investment transaction by which the ownership equity of a company, or a majority share of the stock of the company is acquired. The acquiror thereby "buys out" control of the target company....
O'Brien's contract, ending both his tenure as host as well as his relationship with NBC after 22 years.
Conan O'Brien's final Tonight Show was broadcast on January 22, 2010, with Jay Leno officially resuming his role as host on March 1, 2010, immediately following the conclusion of the 2010 Winter Olympics
2010 Winter Olympics
The 2010 Winter Olympics, officially the XXI Olympic Winter Games or the 21st Winter Olympics, were a major international multi-sport event held from February 12–28, 2010, in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada, with some events held in the suburbs of Richmond, West Vancouver and the University...
. To date, it is the shortest running version of The Tonight Show. It later received four Primetime Emmy nominations, including Outstanding Variety, Music or Comedy Series
Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Variety, Music Or Comedy Series
The Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Variety, Music Or Comedy Series is a category in the Primetime Emmy Awards. It is awarded annually to the best variety show or similarly formatted program of the year....
, the first time The Tonight Show has received a nomination for this particular award since 2003.
Format
The show followed the established six-piece format previous host Jay LenoJay Leno
James Douglas Muir "Jay" Leno is an American stand-up comedian and television host.From 1992 to 2009, Leno was the host of NBC's The Tonight Show with Jay Leno. Beginning in September 2009, Leno started a primetime talk show, titled The Jay Leno Show, which aired weeknights at 10:00 p.m. ,...
used, as well as elements established by O'Brien during his tenure on Late Night. The first segment included a monologue by O'Brien, sometimes accompanied by altered news clips, or several brief comedy sketches. Most episodes also included a second segment, immediately after the monologue, with a full comedy sketch. An interview with either one or two guests followed, as well as a musical or comedy performance.
After the last performance segment, O'Brien walks on camera to thank the performers, and bids farewell to the audience, before recommending watching Late Night with Jimmy Fallon
Late Night with Jimmy Fallon
Late Night with Jimmy Fallon is an American late-night talk show hosted by Jimmy Fallon on NBC. The show premiered on March 2, 2009, as the third incarnation of the Late Night franchise originated by David Letterman....
. For the first six shows, the credits ran in the right half of a split screen, a former NBC standard that Late Night continued to use long after the network abandoned it. After episode seven, NBC's current practice of running credits at the bottom third of the screen was employed. The Conaco
Conaco
Conaco is the television production firm owned by entertainer Conan O'Brien. It has produced programs primarily for NBCUniversal, including O'Brien's Late Night and Tonight shows. David Kissinger, former NBCU executive and the son of Henry Kissinger, has been president since 2005.Conaco's first...
and Universal Media Studios production tags are then shown in full-screen.
Sketches and comedy bits
New sketches included O'Brien posing for the paparazzi, known as "Conan's Tabloid Moment", and "TwitterTwitter
Twitter is an online social networking and microblogging service that enables its users to send and read text-based posts of up to 140 characters, informally known as "tweets".Twitter was created in March 2006 by Jack Dorsey and launched that July...
Tracker", where an excited announcer reads mundane "tweets" by celebrities such as Ashton Kutcher
Ashton Kutcher
Christopher Ashton Kutcher , best known as Ashton Kutcher, is an American actor, producer, former fashion model and comedian, best known for his portrayal of Michael Kelso in the Fox sitcom That '70s Show...
, Miley Cyrus
Miley Cyrus
Miley Ray Cyrus is an American actress and pop singer-songwriter. She achieved wide fame for her role as Miley Stewart/Hannah Montana on the Disney Channel sitcom Hannah Montana....
, and Dennis Haysbert
Dennis Haysbert
Dennis Dexter Haysbert is an American film and television actor. He is known for portraying baseball player Pedro Cerrano in the Major League film trilogy, President David Palmer on the American television series 24, and Sergeant Major Jonas Blane on the drama series The Unit, as well as his work...
. Sketches from Late Night reintroduced include "In the Year 2000" as "In the Year 3000", with Richter once again assisting Conan on the sketch, and "Celebrity Surveys". Popular Late Night character Triumph, the Insult Comic Dog
Triumph, the Insult Comic Dog
Triumph, the Insult Comic Dog is a character puppet best known for mocking celebrities. Triumph was identified in the early appearances as a Yugoslavian Mountain Hound, hence his distinct Eastern European accent . As his name indicates, Triumph's comedic style is almost exclusively insult comedy...
appeared on Tonight for the first time on June 19, 2009, serving as correspondent for the Bonnaroo Music Festival
Bonnaroo Music Festival
The Bonnaroo Music and Arts Festival is an annual four day music festival created and produced by Superfly Productions and AC Entertainment, held at Great Stage Park on a 700-acre farm in Manchester, Tennessee. It hosted its tenth annual event June 9–12, 2011...
in Tennessee. Another favorite character from Conan's old show, the Masturbating Bear, was also reintroduced on January 20, 2010, on Conan's third-to-last show. O'Brien originally retired the Masturbating Bear at the end of his Late Night run due to concerns about its inappropriateness in the 11:30 time slot. Late Night character The Interrupter made his first appearance on The Tonight Show on September 3, 2009.
Musical/comedy guests
As is the format on other late night talk shows, the last segment typically featured a performance by either a musical guest or a stand-up comedian, preceding the closing credits to the show. An avid guitar player, O'Brien has been given many guitars as gifts from several musical guests and on occasion, featured himself on acoustic guitar in a comedy sketch. He also played electric guitar during the final episode's cover performance of Lynyrd SkynyrdLynyrd Skynyrd
Lynyrd Skynyrd is an American rock band prominent in spreading Southern Rock during the 1970s.Originally formed as the "Noble Five" in Jacksonville, Florida, in 1964, the band rose to worldwide recognition on the basis of its driving live performances and signature tune, Freebird...
's "Free Bird
Free Bird
"Free Bird" is a song by the American southern rock band Lynyrd Skynyrd...
".
Production
The Tonight Show with Conan O'Brien originated from Stage 1 at Universal StudiosUniversal Studios
Universal Pictures , a subsidiary of NBCUniversal, is one of the six major movie studios....
in Universal City, California
Universal City, California
Universal City is a community in the San Fernando Valley region of Los Angeles County, California, that encompasses the 415 acre property of Universal Studios...
, a stage that was specifically built and constructed for O'Brien's version of The Tonight Show. The studio was previously used for Jack Benny's
Jack Benny
Jack Benny was an American comedian, vaudevillian, and actor for radio, television, and film...
television show
The Jack Benny Program
The Jack Benny Program, starring Jack Benny, is a radio-TV comedy series that ran for more than three decades and is generally regarded as a high-water mark in 20th-century American comedy.-Cast:*Jack Benny - Himself...
. This was the first time since before May 1972, when Johnny Carson served as host, that the show was not shot in Burbank, California
Burbank, California
Burbank is a city in Los Angeles County in Southern California, United States, north of downtown Los Angeles. The estimated population in 2010 was 103,340....
.
As with a majority of television shows produced and broadcast by NBC Universal, the show was shot in 16:9 aspect ratio
Aspect ratio (image)
The aspect ratio of an image is the ratio of the width of the image to its height, expressed as two numbers separated by a colon. That is, for an x:y aspect ratio, no matter how big or small the image is, if the width is divided into x units of equal length and the height is measured using this...
, with a 4:3 center-cut, and broadcast in 1080i
1080i
1080i is the shorthand name for a high-definition television mode. The i means interlaced video; 1080i differs from 1080p, in which the p stands for progressive scan. The term 1080i assumes a widescreen aspect ratio of 16:9, implying a frame size of 1920×1080 pixels...
high definition
High-definition television
High-definition television is video that has resolution substantially higher than that of traditional television systems . HDTV has one or two million pixels per frame, roughly five times that of SD...
. O'Brien's entire tenure on the show is the only version of The Tonight Show to be recorded, taped, and broadcast exclusively in high definition.
Unlike Leno's Tonight Show, the studio audience was several feet removed from the stage, in a similar fashion to Carson's original set. Leno retained Carson's original configuration (and set design) until he changed studios in 1995.
The stage layout was opposite of the structure used on Late Night. Where Studio 6A was arranged with the house band on the far left, followed by the performance area and then the interview set, the house band was moved to the right of the performance stage on Tonight, with the interview set now on the far left.
NBC is converting Stage 1 into offices and broadcast studios for the Los Angeles bureau of NBC News and local affiliate KNBC.http://articles.latimes.com/2010/nov/03/business/la-fi-nbc-studios-20101103
History
In a high profile announcement by NBC on September 27, 2004, it was officially declared that Conan O'Brien would take over as host of The Tonight Show in 2009, replacing Jay LenoJay Leno
James Douglas Muir "Jay" Leno is an American stand-up comedian and television host.From 1992 to 2009, Leno was the host of NBC's The Tonight Show with Jay Leno. Beginning in September 2009, Leno started a primetime talk show, titled The Jay Leno Show, which aired weeknights at 10:00 p.m. ,...
, after a seventeen year run. This was accompanied by reports that Jay Leno had told Jeff Zucker
Jeff Zucker
Jeffrey "Jeff" Zucker is an American television executive and former President and CEO of NBCUniversal.-Personal life:Zucker was born to Jewish-American parents in Homestead, Florida, near Miami. His father was a cardiologist, and his mother, Arlene, was a school teacher...
, the President of NBC Entertainment, News & Cable Group, of his plans to retire that same year. Leno immediately explained on his show the following night that in having Conan take over the show, and announcing it years before the transition would take place, that he wanted to avoid the hardship that he had experienced in the dispute over retiring Johnny Carson's hosting duties between him and David Letterman
David Letterman
David Michael Letterman is an American television host and comedian. He hosts the late night television talk show, Late Show with David Letterman, broadcast on CBS. Letterman has been a fixture on late night television since the 1982 debut of Late Night with David Letterman on NBC...
in 1992. Further commenting about the announcement, Leno made it clear that Conan was "certainly the most deserving person for the job." However, in 2008, while Leno was beginning to bring his show to a close, it was announced that Leno had changed his mind about retiring and would instead host a new prime-time variety show
Variety show
A variety show, also known as variety arts or variety entertainment, is an entertainment made up of a variety of acts, especially musical performances and sketch comedy, and normally introduced by a compère or host. Other types of acts include magic, animal and circus acts, acrobatics, juggling...
on NBC. The Jay Leno Show
The Jay Leno Show
The Jay Leno Show is an American comedy show created by and starring Jay Leno, that aired from September 14, 2009 to February 9, 2010 on NBC following the May 29, 2009 conclusion of Leno's first tenure as host of The Tonight Show...
aired weeknights at 10:00 p.m. from September 14, 2009, until the show's cancellation on February 9, 2010.
The first show
The guests for Conan O'Brien's first week as host were announced on May 22, 2009, with the first episode of The Tonight Show with Conan O'Brien including actor and comedian Will FerrellWill Ferrell
John William "Will" Ferrell is an American comedian, impressionist, actor, and writer. Ferrell first established himself in the late 1990s as a cast member on the NBC sketch comedy show Saturday Night Live, and has subsequently starred in the comedy films Old School, Elf, Anchorman, Talladega...
, in addition to a musical performance of the song "Got Some
Backspacer
Backspacer is the ninth studio album by the American alternative rock band Pearl Jam, released on September 20, 2009. Pearl Jam began work for the follow-up to its previous album—2006's Pearl Jam—in early 2008. In 2009, the band began to build on instrumental and demo tracks written...
" by guest Pearl Jam
Pearl Jam
Pearl Jam is an American rock band that formed in Seattle, Washington, in 1990. Since its inception, the band's line-up has included Eddie Vedder , Jeff Ament , Stone Gossard , and Mike McCready...
.
The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson
The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson is a talk show hosted by Johnny Carson under the Tonight Show franchise from 1962 to 1992. It originally aired during late-night....
, beginning with the classic "Laramie Peacock" logo used during the 1960s and 1970s, and the announcement that "the following program is brought to you in living color, on NBC", a slogan that would be readopted by NBC soon after.
In the cold open, O'Brien was shown preparing to host his first episode of The Tonight Show, going over a list of things that need to be done, but realizing he was still in New York and had forgotten to move to Los Angeles. After trying, and failing, to catch a taxi cab, Conan ran across the country through such places as Amish Country
Pennsylvania Dutch Country
Pennsylvania Dutch Country refers to an area of southeastern Pennsylvania, United States that by the American Revolution had a high percentage of Pennsylvania Dutch inhabitants. Religiously, there was a large portion of Lutherans. There were also German Reformed, Moravian, Amish, Mennonite and...
, Wrigley Field
Wrigley Field
Wrigley Field is a baseball stadium in Chicago, Illinois, United States that has served as the home ballpark of the Chicago Cubs since 1916. It was built in 1914 as Weeghman Park for the Chicago Federal League baseball team, the Chicago Whales...
in Chicago
Chicago
Chicago is the largest city in the US state of Illinois. With nearly 2.7 million residents, it is the most populous city in the Midwestern United States and the third most populous in the US, after New York City and Los Angeles...
, the Gateway Arch
Gateway Arch
The Gateway Arch, or Gateway to the West, is an arch that is the centerpiece of the Jefferson National Expansion Memorial in St. Louis, Missouri. It was built as a monument to the westward expansion of the United States...
in St. Louis, the Teton Range
Teton Range
The Teton Range is a mountain range of the Rocky Mountains in North America. A north-south range, it is on the Wyoming side of the state's border with Idaho, just south of Yellowstone National Park. Most of the range is in Grand Teton National Park....
, Las Vegas
Las Vegas, Nevada
Las Vegas is the most populous city in the U.S. state of Nevada and is also the county seat of Clark County, Nevada. Las Vegas is an internationally renowned major resort city for gambling, shopping, and fine dining. The city bills itself as The Entertainment Capital of the World, and is famous...
and the deserts of Arizona
Arizona
Arizona ; is a state located in the southwestern region of the United States. It is also part of the western United States and the mountain west. The capital and largest city is Phoenix...
before arriving at Universal Studios Hollywood
Universal Studios Hollywood
Universal Studios Hollywood is a movie studio and theme park in the unincorporated Universal City community of Los Angeles County, California, United States. It is one of the oldest and most famous Hollywood movie studios still in use...
to host the show.
Upon arrival, Conan realized he left the keys to the new studio in New York and then drove a bulldozer through the door and wall of the studio to get in. The Cheap Trick
Cheap Trick
Cheap Trick is an American rock band from Rockford, Illinois, formed in 1973. The band consists of members Robin Zander , Rick Nielsen , Tom Petersson , and Bun E...
song "Surrender
Surrender (Cheap Trick song)
"Surrender" is a single by Cheap Trick released in June 1978 from the album Heaven Tonight. It was the first Cheap Trick single to enter the Billboard Hot 100 chart, peaking at number 62...
" was played over this sketch.
Other filmed sketches in the first episode included a trip through the streets of Los Angeles on the Universal Studios tram
Trackless train
A trackless train is a road-going articulated vehicle used for the transport of passengers, comprising a driving vehicle pulling one or more carriages connected by drawbar couplings, in the manner of a road going railway train.-Terminology:Trackless train or land train...
, a ride through Hollywood with Conan behind the wheel of his 1992 Ford Taurus SHO
Ford Taurus SHO
The Ford Taurus SHO is a full-size performance sedan based on the Ford Taurus that was originally produced by the Ford Motor Company from 1989 until 1999. It returned in 2009 for the 2010 model year....
, and a short gag showing Conan in the back row of a Los Angeles Lakers
Los Angeles Lakers
The Los Angeles Lakers are an American professional basketball team based in Los Angeles, California. They play in the Pacific Division of the Western Conference in the National Basketball Association...
playoff game at Staples Center
Staples Center
Staples Center is a multi-purpose sports arena in Downtown Los Angeles. Adjacent to the L.A. Live development, it is located next to the Los Angeles Convention Center complex along Figueroa Street. Opening on October 17, 1999, it is one of the major sporting facilities in the Greater Los Angeles...
.
Other notable episodes
On June 23, 2009, the show's first segment ended with a tribute to former Tonight Show announcer and sidekick Ed McMahonEd McMahon
Edward Peter "Ed" McMahon, Jr. was an American comedian, game show host and announcer. He is most famous for his work on television as Johnny Carson's sidekick and announcer on The Tonight Show from 1962 to 1992. He also hosted the original version of the talent show Star Search from 1983 to 1995...
, who had died earlier in the day. Memorable clips from McMahon's tenure as Johnny Carson
Johnny Carson
John William "Johnny" Carson was an American television host and comedian, known as host of The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson for 30 years . Carson received six Emmy Awards including the Governor Award and a 1985 Peabody Award; he was inducted into the Television Academy Hall of Fame in 1987...
's sidekick were shown, with O'Brien and Andy Richter also paying tribute to McMahon, and bidding him a final farewell.
On September 23, 2009, during his opening monologue, O'Brien told a very brief joke about Newark, and a supposed health care program for the city's citizens that would involve Newark giving them a bus ticket out of the city. Newark mayor Cory Booker
Cory Booker
Cory Anthony Booker is the Mayor of Newark, New Jersey. He is a member of the Democratic Party. Booker is a former Newark City Councilman...
responded in a satirical YouTube video calling for O'Brien to apologize, and that Conan would be banned from ever entering Newark Liberty International Airport
Newark Liberty International Airport
Newark Liberty International Airport , first named Newark Metropolitan Airport and later Newark International Airport, is an international airport within the city limits of both Newark and Elizabeth, New Jersey, United States...
until doing so. Conan responded by further making fun of Newark, however, saying the only way he could get to Newark now would be like everyone else, "through a series of poor decisions." He also called out Cory Booker to come on the show to air out their grievances, deciding to then ban Booker from Burbank airport, adding later that he had absolutely no power to do so. Booker subsequently banned Conan from the state of New Jersey
New Jersey
New Jersey is a state in the Northeastern and Middle Atlantic regions of the United States. , its population was 8,791,894. It is bordered on the north and east by the state of New York, on the southeast and south by the Atlantic Ocean, on the west by Pennsylvania and on the southwest by Delaware...
as well as all the sister cities of Newark. In response, O'Brien read a letter on air from Elizabeth, New Jersey
Elizabeth, New Jersey
Elizabeth is a city in Union County, New Jersey, United States. As of the 2010 United States Census, the city had a total population of 124,969, retaining its ranking as New Jersey's fourth largest city with an increase of 4,401 residents from its 2000 Census population of 120,568...
mayor Chris Bollwage, declaring that he will temporarily rename Terminal A of Newark Liberty (which lies in Elizabeth) the Conan O'Brien Terminal. Conan continued, saying he had created a "geographic toilet seat" around Newark. The mayors of Bayonne
Bayonne, New Jersey
Bayonne is a city in Hudson County, New Jersey, United States. Located in the Gateway Region, Bayonne is a peninsula that is situated between Newark Bay to the west, the Kill van Kull to the south, and New York Bay to the east...
, East Orange
East Orange, New Jersey
East Orange is a city in Essex County, New Jersey, United States. As of the 2010 United States Census the city's population 64,270, making it the state's 20th largest municipality, having dropped 5,554 residents from its population of 69,824 in the 2000 Census, when it was the state's 14th most...
, Kearny
Kearny, New Jersey
Kearny is a town in Hudson County, New Jersey, United States. It was named after Civil War general Philip Kearny. As of the United States 2010 Census, the town population was 40,684. The town is a suburb of the nearby city of Newark....
, Jersey City
Jersey City, New Jersey
Jersey City is the seat of Hudson County, New Jersey, United States.Part of the New York metropolitan area, Jersey City lies between the Hudson River and Upper New York Bay across from Lower Manhattan and the Hackensack River and Newark Bay...
, and Elizabeth
Elizabeth, New Jersey
Elizabeth is a city in Union County, New Jersey, United States. As of the 2010 United States Census, the city had a total population of 124,969, retaining its ranking as New Jersey's fourth largest city with an increase of 4,401 residents from its 2000 Census population of 120,568...
have publicly sided with Conan O'Brien. He ended this by saying, "Your move, Mayor Booker." The feud was unofficially ended when Secretary of State Hillary Clinton called for it to end during a prepared comedy bit, telling Booker to "chalk it up" to Conan. The following week Conan announced that Cory Booker would be a guest on the October 16, 2009 show to mend the feud. That night, O'Brien and his wife donated $50,000 to the Newark Now Organization, and NBC Universal matched Conan's donation to total a $100,000 gift. Booker also admitted that he is a big Conan fan and often tapes shows to watch the next day or watches them on the website Hulu
Hulu
Hulu is a website and over-the-top subscription service offering ad-supported on-demand streaming video of TV shows, movies, webisodes and other new media, trailers, clips, and behind-the-scenes footage from NBC, Fox, ABC, and Obstacle on October 20th 2011 Nickelodeon and CBS and many other...
.
On September 25, 2009, O'Brien suffered from a mild concussion after he slipped and hit his head while running a race, as part of a comedy sketch, with guest Teri Hatcher
Teri Hatcher
Teri Lynn Hatcher is an American actress, writer, and presenter. She is known for her television roles as Susan Mayer on the ABC comedy-drama series Desperate Housewives, and Lois Lane on the ABC comedy-drama series Lois & Clark: The New Adventures of Superman...
. He was examined at a hospital and released the same day. A rerun was aired that night, but O'Brien returned to work the following Monday and poked fun at the incident, before showing a clip of the occurrence in its entirety. Though the episode never aired due to its incompletion, Hatcher was not asked to return for another interview. Second guest Seth MacFarlane
Seth MacFarlane
Seth Woodbury MacFarlane is an American animator, writer, comedian, producer, actor, singer, voice actor, and director best known for creating the animated sitcoms Family Guy, American Dad! and The Cleveland Show, for which he also voices many of the shows' various characters.A native of Kent,...
and musical guest Rodrigo y Gabriela
Rodrigo y Gabriela
Rodrigo y Gabriela , also known as "El Rodri y La Gabi", are a Mexican musical duo who specialize in playing fast, rhythmic acoustic guitars...
returned the next week, however.
Ratings
Highly promoted prior to its premiere on the late night scene, ratings for the debut episode were higher than both CBSCBS
CBS Broadcasting Inc. is a major US commercial broadcasting television network, which started as a radio network. The name is derived from the initials of the network's former name, Columbia Broadcasting System. The network is sometimes referred to as the "Eye Network" in reference to the shape of...
's Late Show with David Letterman
Late Show with David Letterman
Late Show with David Letterman is a U.S. late-night talk show hosted by David Letterman on CBS. The show debuted on August 30, 1993, and is produced by Letterman's production company, Worldwide Pants Incorporated. The show's music director and band-leader of the house band, the CBS Orchestra, is...
and ABC
American Broadcasting Company
The American Broadcasting Company is an American commercial broadcasting television network. Created in 1943 from the former NBC Blue radio network, ABC is owned by The Walt Disney Company and is part of Disney-ABC Television Group. Its first broadcast on television was in 1948...
's Nightline combined, with a 7.1 rating and a 17 audience share. In comparison, the final show with Leno averaged an 8.8 rating in metered-market households. During the rest of O'Brien's premiere week, ratings dropped each day, from a 5.0 on Tuesday to a 3.5 on Friday, though the latter still exceeded that evening's 2.7 rating for Late Show.
On June 9, 2009, Late Show had rated better than The Tonight Show with a 3.4 rating to 2.9 rating. It was the first time in over eight months that Letterman rated better than his NBC counterpart. Tonight would end up winning week two, however, with O'Brien garnering more than 850,000 viewers than Late Show with David Letterman in the 18–49 demographic, plus more than 650,000 viewers in the 18–34 demographic and more than 550,000 in the 25–54 demographic.
The week before the death of Michael Jackson
Death of Michael Jackson
On June 25, 2009, American singer Michael Jackson died of acute propofol intoxication after he suffered a respiratory arrest at his home in the Holmby Hills neighborhood in Los Angeles. His personal physician, Conrad Murray, said he found Jackson in his room, not breathing, but with a faint pulse,...
saw Letterman attract a larger audience than O'Brien, with The Tonight Show audience measuring as the smallest in the franchise's history, "3.3 million viewers, about two million fewer than Jay Leno's average as host." The following week, O'Brien's total viewership was even lower, averaging 2.8 million; among viewers 25-to-54, he tied with Letterman, the first time O'Brien failed to win that demographic since he had become host. However, The New York Times noted that the coverage of Jackson's death had placed Nightline ahead of both Letterman and O'Brien that week. By the week ending August 7, repeats of The Late Show were also beating O'Brien, albeit with the thinnest of margins—the repeats got a 2.1/6 household rating and 2.95 million total viewers, vs. The Tonight Show's 2.0/5 rating and 2.94 million viewers; both were beaten that week by Nightline's 3.25 million.
Although there are concerns that O'Brien's greatest strength, the "young men" demographic, can be more easily reached "on Web sites and cable channels like Comedy Central
Comedy Central
Comedy Central is an American cable television and satellite television channel that carries comedy programming, both original and syndicated....
and Spike", advertisers and network executives alike point out that the first real test would come in September 2009. Pulitzer Prize-winning
1988 Pulitzer Prize
-Journalism:-Letters and Drama:...
critic Tom Shales
Tom Shales
Thomas William "Tom" Shales is an American critic of television programming and operations. He is best known as TV critic for The Washington Post; in 1988, Shales received the Pulitzer Prize...
also pointed out in August 2009 that O'Brien was "in much better shape than Leno was at the beginning." O'Brien's strength was also strong among low income inner city
Inner city
The inner city is the central area of a major city or metropolis. In the United States, Canada, United Kingdom and Ireland, the term is often applied to the lower-income residential districts in the city centre and nearby areas...
viewers, and had always beaten Letterman by a large margin among that demographic. O' Brien also received very high ratings over Letterman among African American
African American
African Americans are citizens or residents of the United States who have at least partial ancestry from any of the native populations of Sub-Saharan Africa and are the direct descendants of enslaved Africans within the boundaries of the present United States...
and Hispanic
Hispanic
Hispanic is a term that originally denoted a relationship to Hispania, which is to say the Iberian Peninsula: Andorra, Gibraltar, Portugal and Spain. During the Modern Era, Hispanic sometimes takes on a more limited meaning, particularly in the United States, where the term means a person of ...
viewers, which was very unusual for a white host. Prior to Conan's tenure African American and Hispanic viewers were usually split among Leno and Letterman.
By November 2009, two months after the premiere of The Jay Leno Show
The Jay Leno Show
The Jay Leno Show is an American comedy show created by and starring Jay Leno, that aired from September 14, 2009 to February 9, 2010 on NBC following the May 29, 2009 conclusion of Leno's first tenure as host of The Tonight Show...
in September, ratings for The Tonight Show were down "roughly two million viewers a night year-to-year" from when Leno hosted the program. Though cheaper to produce than the scripted dramas it replaced, Leno's new primetime talk show generated fewer lead-in viewers for local news programs, causing a domino effect
Domino effect
The domino effect is a chain reaction that occurs when a small change causes a similar change nearby, which then will cause another similar change, and so on in linear sequence. The term is best known as a mechanical effect, and is used as an analogy to a falling row of dominoes...
on ratings for The Tonight Show and Late Night with Jimmy Fallon
Late Night with Jimmy Fallon
Late Night with Jimmy Fallon is an American late-night talk show hosted by Jimmy Fallon on NBC. The show premiered on March 2, 2009, as the third incarnation of the Late Night franchise originated by David Letterman....
.
On January 12, 2010, in response to the controversy of the late-night schedule change, O'Brien's ratings grew to 1.7 rating/7 share among adults 18–49, up 40 percent from the previous day. On Thursday, January 14, 2010, Conan garnered a 1.9 rating. His last show garnered his best ratings with a 4.8 rating with adults 18–49 and 40 percent better than the 3.4 rating with adults 18–49 Jay Leno got in his last show on May 29, 2009.
To this day, the Tonight Show has never achieved a 4.8 rating again.
Dispute over timeslot and host
On January 7, 2010, multiple media outlets reported that beginning March 1, 2010, Jay Leno would move from his 10pm weeknight time slot to 11:35pm, due to a combination of pressure from affiliates and both Leno's and O'Brien's poor ratings. The plan would have Leno's show shortened from an hour to 30 minutes. All NBC late night programming would be preempted by the 2010 Winter Olympics2010 Winter Olympics
The 2010 Winter Olympics, officially the XXI Olympic Winter Games or the 21st Winter Olympics, were a major international multi-sport event held from February 12–28, 2010, in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada, with some events held in the suburbs of Richmond, West Vancouver and the University...
between February 15 and February 26; a final decision about the programming changes was made by NBC on January 10. O'Brien's contract stipulated that NBC could move the show back to 12:05 a.m. without penalty (a clause put in primarily to accommodate sports preemptions), leaving him with no apparent recourse other than resignation.
On January 10, NBC confirmed they would move Jay Leno out of primetime on February 12, and intended to move him to late-night as soon as possible. TMZ
TMZ.com
TMZ.com is a celebrity news website that debuted on November 8, 2005. It was a collaboration between America Online and Telepictures Productions, a division of Warner Bros., until Time Warner divested AOL in 2009. However, it is still affiliated with AOL News and has the AOL News logo affixed in...
reported that O'Brien was given no advance notice of the change, and that NBC offered two choices: the hour-long 12:05am time slot, or the option to leave the network. If O'Brien did choose to leave, Leno would likely regain the Tonight Show title as well as the full 11:35pm to 12:35am time slot. Another possibility was that NBC could pay O'Brien to refrain from working for another network, remain off-air, then have him resume as host once Leno retires. The day after the change was announced, The New York Times
The New York Times
The New York Times is an American daily newspaper founded and continuously published in New York City since 1851. The New York Times has won 106 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any news organization...
spoke with an anonymous FOX
Fox Broadcasting Company
Fox Broadcasting Company, commonly referred to as Fox Network or simply Fox , is an American commercial broadcasting television network owned by Fox Entertainment Group, part of Rupert Murdoch's News Corporation. Launched on October 9, 1986, Fox was the highest-rated broadcast network in the...
executive, who said that the company feels O'Brien "would be a great fit for Fox." ABC
American Broadcasting Company
The American Broadcasting Company is an American commercial broadcasting television network. Created in 1943 from the former NBC Blue radio network, ABC is owned by The Walt Disney Company and is part of Disney-ABC Television Group. Its first broadcast on television was in 1948...
had stated they feel no need to add O'Brien to their late night schedule, which already contains Nightline and Jimmy Kimmel Live!.
On January 12, O'Brien issued a press release that stated he would not continue with the NBC program if it moves to a 12:05am time slot, saying, "I believe that delaying The Tonight Show into the next day to accommodate another comedy program will seriously damage what I consider to be the greatest franchise in the history of broadcasting. The Tonight Show at 12:05 simply isn't the Tonight Show. Also, if I accept this move I will be knocking the Late Night show, which I inherited from David Letterman and passed on to Jimmy Fallon, out of its long-held time slot. That would hurt the other NBC franchise that I love, and it would be unfair to Jimmy." In the same statement, O'Brien pointed out the lack of support from the network and lead-in prime time ratings: "It was my mistaken belief that, like my predecessor, I would have the benefit of some time and, just as important, some degree of ratings support from the prime-time schedule. Building a lasting audience at 11:30 is impossible without both."
On January 15, All Headline News
All Headline News
All Headline News is a United States based news agency or wire service. Launched in 2003 it has grown to become a major worldwide online news wire service, providing news and other content, to websites, digital signage, and other publishers who pay a fee for the service.The company's daily news...
reported that NBC
NBC
The National Broadcasting Company is an American commercial broadcasting television network and former radio network headquartered in the GE Building in New York City's Rockefeller Center with additional major offices near Los Angeles and in Chicago...
intended to keep Conan off the air completely for three and a half years, without pay, unless he agreed to NBC's terms. Insiders for both NBC and O'Brien reportedly dismissed the notion as "ludicrous": "He has two and a half years left on his deal. How would they even do that?" NBC Universal
NBC Universal
NBCUniversal Media, LLC is a media and entertainment company engaged in the production and marketing of entertainment, news, and information products and services to a global customer base...
chief Jeff Zucker
Jeff Zucker
Jeffrey "Jeff" Zucker is an American television executive and former President and CEO of NBCUniversal.-Personal life:Zucker was born to Jewish-American parents in Homestead, Florida, near Miami. His father was a cardiologist, and his mother, Arlene, was a school teacher...
made the threat with the belief that O'Brien's contract contained a clause that allowed the network to bench him for an additional one year after his contract expires. An insider on O'Brien's side claimed that NBC would be in breach of an addendum to the contract if The Tonight Show was moved to a later time slot.
The New York Times
The New York Times
The New York Times is an American daily newspaper founded and continuously published in New York City since 1851. The New York Times has won 106 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any news organization...
reported online support was overwhelmingly in favor of O'Brien; in the days following the switch announcement, 88% of related Twitter
Twitter
Twitter is an online social networking and microblogging service that enables its users to send and read text-based posts of up to 140 characters, informally known as "tweets".Twitter was created in March 2006 by Jack Dorsey and launched that July...
posts expressed support for O'Brien. Tens of thousands of Facebook
Facebook
Facebook is a social networking service and website launched in February 2004, operated and privately owned by Facebook, Inc. , Facebook has more than 800 million active users. Users must register before using the site, after which they may create a personal profile, add other users as...
posts were made siding with O'Brien, and thousands joined various "Team Conan" or "I'm with Coco" groups. Dozens of celebrities expressed support for O'Brien, including Roger Ebert
Roger Ebert
Roger Joseph Ebert is an American film critic and screenwriter. He is the first film critic to win a Pulitzer Prize for Criticism.Ebert is known for his film review column and for the television programs Sneak Previews, At the Movies with Gene Siskel and Roger Ebert, and Siskel and Ebert and The...
, Tom Hanks
Tom Hanks
Thomas Jeffrey "Tom" Hanks is an American actor, producer, writer, and director. Hanks worked in television and family-friendly comedies, gaining wide notice in 1988's Big, before achieving success as a dramatic actor in several notable roles, including Andrew Beckett in Philadelphia, the title...
, Rosie O'Donnell
Rosie O'Donnell
Roseann "Rosie" O'Donnell is an American stand-up comedian, actress, author and television personality. She has also been a magazine editor and continues to be a celebrity blogger, LGBT rights activist, television producer and collaborative partner in the LGBT family vacation company R Family...
, Jim Gaffigan
Jim Gaffigan
James Christopher "Jim" Gaffigan is an American stand-up comedian and actor.-Early life:Gaffigan was born in Chesterton, Indiana and attended La Lumiere School in La Porte, Indiana. He is the youngest of six children and often jokes about growing up in a large family. He attended one year at...
, Paul F. Tompkins
Paul F. Tompkins
Paul Francis Tompkins , best known as Paul F. Tompkins, is an American actor and comedian.-Life and career:Tompkins was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania to a receptionist mother and railway worker father. He started out in stand-up comedy in 1986 at The Comedy Works, Philadelphia, PA, where he...
, Doug Benson
Doug Benson
Douglas Steven "Doug" Benson is an American stand-up comedian and actor who has appeared on Comedy Central Presents, Best Week Ever and was a contestant on Last Comic Standing in the show's fifth season....
, Ahmir "?uestlove" Thompson
?uestlove
Ahmir Khalib Thompson known professionally as ?uestlove or Questlove , is an American drummer, DJ, music journalist and record producer...
, Alyssa Milano
Alyssa Milano
Alyssa Jayne Milano is an American actress and former singer, known for her childhood role as Samantha Micelli in the sitcom Who's the Boss? and an eight-year stint as Phoebe Halliwell on the series Charmed. She was also a series regular on the original Melrose Place portraying the role of...
, Chris Parnell
Chris Parnell
Thomas Christopher "Chris" Parnell is an American comic actor best known as a cast member on Saturday Night Live from 1998–2006 and currently for his recurring role as Dr. Leo Spaceman on NBC's Emmy Award-winning comedy series 30 Rock. Parnell also voices Cyril Figgis on the FX animated comedy...
, Jimmy Kimmel
Jimmy Kimmel
James Christian "Jimmy" Kimmel is an American television host and comedian. He is the host of Jimmy Kimmel Live!, a late-night talk show that airs on ABC. Prior to that, Kimmel was best known as the co-host of Comedy Central's The Man Show and Win Ben Stein's Money...
, Jeff Garlin
Jeff Garlin
Jeffrey "Jeff" Garlin is an American stand-up comedian, actor, producer, voice artist, director, writer and author, best known for his role as Jeff Greene on the HBO show Curb Your Enthusiasm...
, and Ricky Gervais
Ricky Gervais
Ricky Dene Gervais is an English comedian, actor, director, radio presenter, producer, musician, and writer.Gervais achieved mainstream fame with his television series The Office and the subsequent series Extras, both of which he co-wrote and co-directed with friend and frequent collaborator...
. Actor and comedian Patton Oswalt
Patton Oswalt
Patton Oswalt is an American stand-up comedian, writer, actor and voice actor. He is best known for portraying Spencer Olchin in the popular sitcom The King of Queens, voicing Remy from the film Ratatouille and Thrasher from the Cartoon Network original series Robotomy.-Early life:Oswalt was born...
expressly backed O'Brien, saying, "Comedians who don't like Jay Leno now, and I'm one of them, we're not like, 'Jay Leno sucks'; it's that we're so hurt and disappointed that one of the best comedians of our generation... willfully has shut the switch off."
In a 2010 issue of TV Guide
TV Guide
TV Guide is a weekly American magazine with listings of TV shows.In addition to TV listings, the publication features television-related news, celebrity interviews, gossip and film reviews and crossword puzzles...
, the timeslot dispute ranked #1 on a list of TV's biggest "blunders".
Settlement with NBC and O'Brien's departure
After two weeks of negotiations, on January 21, 2010, it was officially announced that Conan O'Brien had signed a $45 million deal to leave NBC altogether, ending a partnership that lasted 22 years. The Wall Street Journal reports that O'Brien will receive about $32 million, executive producer Jeff Ross will receive $4.5 million, with the rest of the staff receiving around $7.5 million. The deal does not, however, contain the previously rumored "mitigation clause", in which NBC would be able to keep some of the severance pay after O'Brien finds a new program. It also stipulates that O'Brien may freely return to television as early as September 1, 2010 on another network.The network confirmed that Leno would officially resume as host of The Tonight Show on March 1, 2010, following the 2010 Winter Olympics coverage on NBC. Reruns of episodes from O'Brien's time continued to air until the beginning of NBC's coverage of the Olympics in February 2010.
Final week of shows
Once it was made public that January 22 would likely be O'Brien's last Tonight Show episode, a number of big name guests were booked, including Martin ScorseseMartin Scorsese
Martin Charles Scorsese is an American film director, screenwriter, producer, actor, and film historian. In 1990 he founded The Film Foundation, a nonprofit organization dedicated to film preservation, and in 2007 he founded the World Cinema Foundation...
, Quentin Tarantino
Quentin Tarantino
Quentin Jerome Tarantino is an American film director, screenwriter, producer, cinematographer and actor. In the early 1990s, he began his career as an independent filmmaker with films employing nonlinear storylines and the aestheticization of violence...
, Robin Williams
Robin Williams
Robin McLaurin Williams is an American actor and comedian. Rising to fame with his role as the alien Mork in the TV series Mork and Mindy, and later stand-up comedy work, Williams has performed in many feature films since 1980. He won the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor for his performance...
and Adam Sandler
Adam Sandler
Adam Richard Sandler is an American actor, comedian, screenwriter, musician, and film producer.After becoming a Saturday Night Live cast member, Sandler went on to star in several Hollywood feature films that grossed over $100 million at the box office...
. Musical guests for the final week included Spoon
Spoon (band)
Spoon is an American rock band formed in Austin, Texas. The band is composed of Britt Daniel ; Jim Eno ; Rob Pope and Eric Harvey .-History:...
and Barry Manilow
Barry Manilow
Barry Manilow is an American singer-songwriter, musician, arranger, producer, conductor, and performer, best known for such recordings as "Could It Be Magic", "Mandy", "Can't Smile Without You", and "Copacabana ."...
. The guests for the final episode were Tom Hanks
Tom Hanks
Thomas Jeffrey "Tom" Hanks is an American actor, producer, writer, and director. Hanks worked in television and family-friendly comedies, gaining wide notice in 1988's Big, before achieving success as a dramatic actor in several notable roles, including Andrew Beckett in Philadelphia, the title...
, Will Ferrell
Will Ferrell
John William "Will" Ferrell is an American comedian, impressionist, actor, and writer. Ferrell first established himself in the late 1990s as a cast member on the NBC sketch comedy show Saturday Night Live, and has subsequently starred in the comedy films Old School, Elf, Anchorman, Talladega...
, and musical guest Neil Young
Neil Young
Neil Percival Young, OC, OM is a Canadian singer-songwriter who is widely regarded as one of the most influential musicians of his generation...
. Ferrell bookended the show by being O'Brien's first and last guest. Tom Hanks was the final interview of both O'Brien's Tonight Show and David Letterman's Late Night.
In addition, a number of other unannounced celebrities "dropped by" during various segments of the show. On January 13, Jack McBrayer
Jack McBrayer
Jack McBrayer is an American actor and comedian. He gained national exposure for his characters on "Late Night with Conan O'Brien"...
appeared briefly in character as NBC page
NBC page
An NBC page is a person usually in his or her early twenties working in various departments of the NBC television network during a one-year period as a training ground for careers in television broadcasting and entertainment...
Kenneth Parcell
Kenneth Parcell
Kenneth Ellen Parcell is a fictional character in the comedy television series 30 Rock. He is portrayed by actor Jack McBrayer and first appeared on television in the 30 Rock episode "Pilot" on October 10, 2006...
from 30 Rock
30 Rock
30 Rock is an American television comedy series created by Tina Fey that airs on NBC. The series is loosely based on Fey's experiences as head writer for Saturday Night Live...
. He interrupted O'Brien's monologue while giving a guided tour around the studio, quipping, "NBC spent more time building this studio than using it." On January 19, Norm Macdonald
Norm MacDonald
Norman Gene "Norm" Macdonald is a Canadian stand-up comedian, writer and actor. He is best known for his five seasons as a cast member on Saturday Night Live, which included anchoring Weekend Update for three years...
walked onstage with a large congratulatory gift basket
Gift basket
A gift basket, or fruit basket is typically a gift delivered to the recipient at their home or workplace. A variety of gift baskets exist: some contain fruit; while others might contain dry or canned foods such as tea, crackers and jam; or the basket might include a combination of fruit and dried...
he had procrastinated on giving O'Brien since June. He read aloud from the greeting card
Greeting card
A greeting card is an illustrated, folded card featuring an expression of friendship or other sentiment. Although greeting cards are usually given on special occasions such as birthdays, Christmas or other holidays, they are also sent to convey thanks or express other feeling. Greeting cards,...
, "Congratulations Conan on finally securing your place as permanent host of The Tonight Show. That's something they can never take away from you." Ed Helms
Ed Helms
Edward Paul "Ed" Helms is an American actor and comedian known for his work as a correspondent on The Daily Show with Jon Stewart, as Andy Bernard on the US version of the sitcom/mockumentary The Office and for his role as Dr. Stu Price in The Hangover films.- Early life :Helms was born and raised...
appeared on January 20, performing "Stu's Song" from The Hangover
The Hangover (film)
The Hangover is a 2009 American comedy film directed by Todd Phillips and written by Jon Lucas and Scott Moore. The film stars Bradley Cooper, Ed Helms, Zach Galifianakis, Heather Graham, Justin Bartha and Jeffrey Tambor...
with altered lyrics that remarked upon O'Brien's current troubles. Ben Stiller
Ben Stiller
Benjamin Edward "Ben" Stiller is an American comedian, actor, writer, film director, and producer. He is the son of veteran comedians and actors Jerry Stiller and Anne Meara....
and Paul Reubens
Paul Reubens
Paul Reubens is an American actor, writer, film producer, and comedian, best known for his character Pee-wee Herman. Reubens joined the Los Angeles troupe The Groundlings in the 1970s and started his career as an improvisational comedian and stage actor...
(in character as Pee-wee Herman
Pee-wee Herman
Pee-wee Herman is a comic fictional character created and portrayed by American comedian Paul Reubens. He is best known for his two television series and film series during the 1980s. The childlike Pee-wee Herman character developed as a stage act that quickly led to an HBO special in 1981...
) made brief unannounced stops on the January 21 show. On the last show, Steve Carell
Steve Carell
Steven John "Steve" Carell is an American comedian, actor, voice artist, producer, writer, and director. Although Carell is notable for his role on The Daily Show with Jon Stewart, he found greater fame in the late 2000s for playing Michael Scott on The Office...
made a cameo appearance as an NBC employee conducting O'Brien's exit interview.
The January 20 episode included a comedic bit in which O'Brien unveiled a Bugatti Veyron
Bugatti Veyron
The Bugatti Veyron EB 16.4 is a mid-engined grand touring car. The Super Sport version is the fastest road-legal production car in the world, with a top speed of . The original version has a top speed of...
dressed as a mouse, while the song "(I Can't Get No) Satisfaction
(I Can't Get No) Satisfaction
" Satisfaction" is a song by the English rock band The Rolling Stones, released in 1965. It was written by Mick Jagger and Keith Richards and produced by Andrew Loog Oldham. Richards's throwaway three-note guitar riff — intended to be replaced by horns — opens and drives the song...
" by The Rolling Stones
The Rolling Stones
The Rolling Stones are an English rock band, formed in London in April 1962 by Brian Jones , Ian Stewart , Mick Jagger , and Keith Richards . Bassist Bill Wyman and drummer Charlie Watts completed the early line-up...
played in the background. O'Brien claimed that the car and music licensing fees ("not to mention the rights to re-air this clip on the Internet") would cost NBC $1.5 million. It was later revealed that the car was on loan from the Petersen Automotive Museum
Petersen Automotive Museum
The Petersen Automotive Museum is located on Wilshire Boulevard along Museum Row in the Miracle Mile neighborhood of Los Angeles. One of the world's largest automotive museums, the Petersen Automotive Museum is a non profit organization specializing in the education and history of the...
. The segment was subsequently cut from Internet versions of the episode that were uploaded to Hulu and NBC.com, presumably so the network could avoid paying the licensing fees required for the Rolling Stones song.
The "expensive" comedy bit continued on January 21, featuring 2009 Kentucky Derby
2009 Kentucky Derby
The 2009 Kentucky Derby was the 135th running of the Kentucky Derby. The value of the race was $2,177,000 in stakes. The race was sponsored by Yum! Brands and hence officially was called Kentucky Derby Presented by Yum! Brands. The race took place on May 2, 2009, and was televised in the United...
winner Mine That Bird
Mine That Bird
Mine That Bird is a retired American racehorse. He is best known for being one of only nine geldings to win the Kentucky Derby, and the second gelding to win the race since 1929...
wearing a mink
Mink
There are two living species referred to as "mink": the European Mink and the American Mink. The extinct Sea Mink is related to the American Mink, but was much larger. All three species are dark-colored, semi-aquatic, carnivorous mammals of the family Mustelidae, which also includes the weasels and...
Snuggie watching restricted Super Bowl
Super Bowl
The Super Bowl is the championship game of the National Football League , the highest level of professional American football in the United States, culminating a season that begins in the late summer of the previous calendar year. The Super Bowl uses Roman numerals to identify each game, rather...
footage, which O'Brien claimed cost NBC $4.8 million. The final episode upped the ante further with a purported $65 million sketch, featuring a credit card-purchased fossil skeleton of a ground sloth from the Smithsonian Institution
Smithsonian Institution
The Smithsonian Institution is an educational and research institute and associated museum complex, administered and funded by the government of the United States and by funds from its endowment, contributions, and profits from its retail operations, concessions, licensing activities, and magazines...
spraying Beluga caviar
Beluga caviar
Beluga caviar is caviar consisting of the roe of the beluga sturgeon Huso huso. It is found primarily in the Caspian Sea, the world’s largest salt-water lake, which is bordered by Iran and the former Soviet socialist republics of Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Russia, and Turkmenistan. It can also be...
through a hose onto an original Picasso
Pablo Picasso
Pablo Diego José Francisco de Paula Juan Nepomuceno María de los Remedios Cipriano de la Santísima Trinidad Ruiz y Picasso known as Pablo Ruiz Picasso was a Spanish expatriate painter, sculptor, printmaker, ceramicist, and stage designer, one of the greatest and most influential artists of the...
painting. In response to the Internet community's outcry over the expense of these sketches, O'Brien explained that the segments were a joke.
The televised airing extended into January 23, which coincidentally marked the five-year anniversary of Johnny Carson
Johnny Carson
John William "Johnny" Carson was an American television host and comedian, known as host of The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson for 30 years . Carson received six Emmy Awards including the Governor Award and a 1985 Peabody Award; he was inducted into the Television Academy Hall of Fame in 1987...
's death. Before introducing the final segment, a performance of "Free Bird", O'Brien gave a statement to the viewers and audience, which included a personal thank you to NBC (the first time he expressed gratitude to the network since the controversy began) and his devoted fanbase:
The final episode featured a reel of highlights from the show's short run, ending with the words, "To Be Continued.", indicating that he will be on another network
TBS (TV channel)
TBS , stylized in the logo as tbs, is an American cable television channel owned by Time Warner that shows a variety of programming, with a focus on comedy. TBS was originally known as WTCG, a UHF terrestrial television station that broadcast from Atlanta, Georgia, during the late 1970s...
. When introduced, Tom Hanks brought out two glasses of "scotch", later revealed to be cream soda
Cream soda
Cream soda is a sweet carbonated soft drink, often flavored with vanilla.-History and development:A recipe for cream soda—written by E.M. Sheldon and published in Michigan Farmer in 1852—called for water, cream of tartar, Epsom salts, sugar, tartaric acid, egg, and milk, to be mixed together, then...
. Neil Young performed an acoustic version of his song "Long May You Run
Long May You Run
-Side two:-Personnel:* Neil Young – vocals, guitars, piano, harmonica, synthesizer* Stephen Stills – vocals, guitar, piano* Jerry Aiello – organ, piano* George "Chocolate" Perry – bass, backing vocals...
", and the show ended with Will Ferrell dressed as Ronnie Van Zant
Ronnie Van Zant
Ronald Wayne "Ronnie" Van Zant was an American lead vocalist, primary lyricist, and a founding member of the Southern rock band Lynyrd Skynyrd...
playing the cowbell in a nod to his famous role in the More cowbell
More Cowbell
"More cowbell" is an American pop culture catchphrase originally derived from an April 8, 2000, Saturday Night Live comedy sketch which fictionalized the recording of the song " The Reaper" by Blue Öyster Cult...
sketch, Ferrell's pregnant wife Viveca Paulin
Viveca Paulin
Viveca Paulin is a Swedish actress, born in Askim, Gothenburg Municipality, Sweden, who married American comedic actor Will Ferrell in August 2000. She attended Pomona College, graduating in 1991. The couple have three sons, Magnus Paulin Ferrell, born March 7, 2004, Mattias Paulin Ferrell, born...
, Billy Gibbons
Billy Gibbons
William Frederick "Billy" Gibbons is an American musician, actor and car customizer, best known as the guitarist of the Texas blues-rock band ZZ Top. He is also the lead singer and composer for many of the band's songs. Gibbons is known for playing his Gretsch Billy Bo guitar and his famous 1959...
, Ben Harper
Ben Harper
Benjamin Chase "Ben" Harper is an American singer-songwriter and musician. Harper plays an eclectic mix of blues, folk, soul, reggae and rock music and is known for his guitar-playing skills, vocals, live performances and activism. Harper's fan base spans several continents...
, Beck
Beck
Beck Hansen is an American musician, singer-songwriter and multi-instrumentalist, known by the stage name Beck...
, O'Brien himself, and Max Weinberg and The Tonight Show Band performing "Free Bird
Free Bird
"Free Bird" is a song by the American southern rock band Lynyrd Skynyrd...
".
Content removal controversy
Roughly two weeks after O'Brien's final episode (repeats of previous shows, however, continued to appear until February 11, just before the network's coverage of the 2010 Winter Olympics), NBC began removing all videos of The Tonight Show with Conan O'Brien from its website, as well as from the streaming video site HuluHulu
Hulu is a website and over-the-top subscription service offering ad-supported on-demand streaming video of TV shows, movies, webisodes and other new media, trailers, clips, and behind-the-scenes footage from NBC, Fox, ABC, and Obstacle on October 20th 2011 Nickelodeon and CBS and many other...
. Gather.com
Gather.com
Gather or Gather.com is a social networking website designed to encourage interaction by discussion of various social, political and cultural topics. Its headquarters are in Boston, Massachusetts...
reported that NBC intends to scrub all O'Brien-related Tonight Show and Late Night clips from YouTube
YouTube
YouTube is a video-sharing website, created by three former PayPal employees in February 2005, on which users can upload, view and share videos....
in the near future, making it incredibly difficult to find any videos of Conan's history with The Tonight Show other than his farewell speech, among other clips. Time magazine criticized the network for pulling the videos, noting that Hulu currently streams many less popular NBC series, such as Knight Rider
Knight Rider (2008 TV series)
Knight Rider was a 2008 series that follows the 1982 TV series of the same title and the 2008 television movie. The series stars Justin Bruening as Mike Traceur, the estranged son of Michael Knight. The series also stars Deanna Russo as Sarah Graiman, Traceur's former girlfriend and love interest....
, Kings
Kings (U.S. TV series)
Kings is an American television drama series which aired on NBC. The series' narrative is loosely based on the Biblical story of King David, but set in a kingdom that culturally and technologically resembles the present-day United States....
, Crusoe, and Surface. It is not known whether the removal of the videos was part of the settlement O'Brien and NBC reached in January or a unilateral action on NBC's part.
In February 2010, NBC took O'Brien's official website offline, and removed all mentions of the former host from NBC.com. Around the same time, HornyManatee.com, a URL launched by O'Brien's Late Night show as part of a sketch, began redirecting to NBC.com. In early February 2010, O'Brien's face in the 30 Rockefeller Plaza
Rockefeller Center
Rockefeller Center is a complex of 19 commercial buildings covering between 48th and 51st streets in New York City, United States. Built by the Rockefeller family, it is located in the center of Midtown Manhattan, spanning the area between Fifth Avenue and Sixth Avenue. It was declared a National...
mural was replaced by Jay Leno's likeness. The NBC "Tonight Show Experience" website which originally featured media on all of the past hosts was also removed of all content. Every search result in O'Brien's name on NBC.com only produced links to the 30 Rock
30 Rock
30 Rock is an American television comedy series created by Tina Fey that airs on NBC. The series is loosely based on Fey's experiences as head writer for Saturday Night Live...
episode "Tracy Does Conan
Tracy Does Conan
"Tracy Does Conan" is the seventh episode of NBC's first season of 30 Rock. It was written by the series' creator and executive producer, Tina Fey and it was directed by one of the season's supervising producers, Adam Bernstein. It first aired on December 7, 2006 in the United States and November...
" - in which O'Brien guest stars - and the farewells to O'Brien during the episode of Late Night with Jimmy Fallon
Late Night with Jimmy Fallon
Late Night with Jimmy Fallon is an American late-night talk show hosted by Jimmy Fallon on NBC. The show premiered on March 2, 2009, as the third incarnation of the Late Night franchise originated by David Letterman....
which aired after O'Brien's last Tonight Show.
Critics have also called into question promotions broadcast in early March 2010 for an upcoming appearance by former vice-presidential candidate Sarah Palin
Sarah Palin
Sarah Louise Palin is an American politician, commentator and author. As the Republican Party nominee for Vice President in the 2008 presidential election, she was the first Alaskan on the national ticket of a major party and first Republican woman nominated for the vice-presidency.She was...
on Leno's Tonight Show in which it was claimed that she had never made a late-night talk show appearance before—despite her appearing on the Conan O'Brien Tonight Show on December 11, 2009. Nikki Finke, a blogger for the Deadline Hollywood website, cited this as more evidence of NBC attempting to erase any remnants of the O'Brien era.
Sarah Palin
Sarah Palin
Sarah Louise Palin is an American politician, commentator and author. As the Republican Party nominee for Vice President in the 2008 presidential election, she was the first Alaskan on the national ticket of a major party and first Republican woman nominated for the vice-presidency.She was...
also appeared on The Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson
The Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson
The Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson is a Peabody Award-winning American late-night talk show hosted by Scottish American comedian Craig Ferguson. Ferguson, the third regular host of the Late Late Show franchise, follows Late Show with David Letterman in the CBS late-night lineup...
and Jimmy Kimmel Live!, but neither of those appearances were interviews.
One O'Brien reference that NBC didn't filter out was in the April 1, 2010 episode of The Marriage Ref
The Marriage Ref
The Marriage Ref is a TV reality show and panel game hosted by comedian Tom Papa and produced by Jerry Seinfeld, in which a rotating group of celebrities decides the winners of real-life marital disputes. The show premiered on NBC on Sunday, February 28, 2010 on the final night of the Olympics...
, with Late Night host Jimmy Fallon on the panel. While watching a clip of a married couple arguing about the husband's odd marionette collection, Fallon pointed out two marionettes in the background that resembled him and Conan (to which the mentioning of his name received great applause), saying the husband owned the "NBC Late Night Marionette" collection. O'Brien was also mentioned on the first season finale of the NBC show Community
Community (TV series)
Community is an American television comedy series created by Dan Harmon that airs on NBC. The series is about a group of students at a community college in the fictional locale of Greendale, Colorado. The series heavily uses meta-humor and pop culture references, often parodying film and television...
, when the character "Starburns" yelled out that NBC should "bring back Conan."
Mentioning of O'Brien on Leno's Tonight Show
On the April 6, 2010 episode of The Tonight Show with Jay LenoThe Tonight Show with Jay Leno
The Tonight Show with Jay Leno is an American late-night talk show hosted by Jay Leno that initially aired from May 25, 1992 to May 29, 2009, and resumed production on March 1, 2010. The fourth incarnation of the Tonight Show franchise made its debut on May 25, 1992, three days following Johnny...
, guitarist Slash
Slash (musician)
Saul Hudson , known by his stage name Slash, is a British-American musician and songwriter. He is best known as the former lead guitarist of the American hard rock band Guns N' Roses, with whom he achieved worldwide success in the late 1980s and early 1990s. During his later years with Guns N'...
performed the song "By the Sword
By the Sword (song)
"By the Sword" is the first official single from the album Slash by current Velvet Revolver and former Guns N' Roses lead guitarist Slash. It features Andrew Stockdale of Wolfmother on vocals and was released as a digital single on March 16, 2010. It was released in the UK on March 28, 2010...
" with Andrew Stockdale
Andrew Stockdale
Andrew James Stockdale is an Australian hard rock musician, he is the lead singer, lead guitarist and the only mainstay member of the rock band, Wolfmother which formed in 2000. In 2007, alongside his Wolfmother band mates, he won 'Songwriter of the Year' at the APRA Awards...
, lead singer of Wolfmother
Wolfmother
Wolfmother is an Australian rock band from Erskineville, Sydney. Formed in 2000, the group was originally a trio composed of vocalist and guitarist Andrew Stockdale, bassist and keyboardist Chris Ross and drummer Myles Heskett. Wolfmother released their self-titled debut album in October 2005,...
, the first single from Slash's self-titled debut solo album. During the performance, there were very few close-ups of Slash. TMZ
TMZ.com
TMZ.com is a celebrity news website that debuted on November 8, 2005. It was a collaboration between America Online and Telepictures Productions, a division of Warner Bros., until Time Warner divested AOL in 2009. However, it is still affiliated with AOL News and has the AOL News logo affixed in...
reported that this was because Slash was wearing a pin depicting Mike Mitchell
Mike Mitchell (artist)
Mike Mitchell is an American artist known for his pop surrealism and for leading the online grassroots movement in supporting Conan O'Brien during the 2010 Tonight Show conflict. He designed the "I'm with Coco" poster, which was based on a photo, that went viral on the internet in January 2010...
's "I'm With Coco" poster during the performance, which they illustrated with a closeup still showing the pin.
On the May 5, 2010 episode of The Tonight Show with Jay Leno, a gag involving Times Square bombing suspect Faisal Shahzad
Faisal Shahzad
Faisal Shahzad is a Pakistani American who attempted the May 1, 2010, Times Square car bombing. On , 2010, in Federal District Court in Manhattan he confessed to 10 counts arising from the bombing attempt...
's fictional Facebook
Facebook
Facebook is a social networking service and website launched in February 2004, operated and privately owned by Facebook, Inc. , Facebook has more than 800 million active users. Users must register before using the site, after which they may create a personal profile, add other users as...
page mentioned "Team Coco" under his Favorites section, becoming one of the first jabs at O'Brien (though not mentioned out loud) by Leno.
On the June 8, 2010 episode, comedian Chris Rock
Chris Rock
Christopher Julius "Chris" Rock III is an American comedian, actor, screenwriter, television producer, film producer and director. He was voted in the US as the 5th greatest stand-up comedian of all time by Comedy Central...
made an appearance. During the interview, he made a few subtle references to O'Brien's stint as host and went on to call Leno a "bad, bad man."
On the June 10, 2010 episode, guest Denis Leary
Denis Leary
Denis Colin Leary is an Irish-American actor, comedian, writer and director. Leary is known for his biting, fast paced comedic style and chain smoking...
stated that he had created a Twitter
Twitter
Twitter is an online social networking and microblogging service that enables its users to send and read text-based posts of up to 140 characters, informally known as "tweets".Twitter was created in March 2006 by Jack Dorsey and launched that July...
account because he heard Conan O'Brien got one. Leno mentioned that he also has a Twitter account. The comment and the question were not present in clips of the interview on the NBC website.
On the July 8, 2010 episode, immediately after the 2010 Emmy nominations were announced, Leno indirectly referred to The Tonight Show under O'Brien by quipping that the good news was that The Tonight Show had been nominated for four Emmys. The bad news was that none of them were his. On the July 9 episode, Jay showed an altered tape of him interviewing LeBron James
LeBron James
LeBron Raymone James is an American professional basketball player for the Miami Heat of the National Basketball Association . Nicknamed "King James", he was a three-time "Mr. Basketball" of Ohio in high school, and was highly promoted in the national media as a future NBA superstar while a...
. When Leno asked James if he had chosen a team, James held up a poster reading "Team CoCo", to which Leno said, "Well, he did get four nominations."
2010 Primetime Emmy nominations
On July 8, 2010, The Tonight Show with Conan O'Brien was nominated for a Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Variety, Music or Comedy SeriesPrimetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Variety, Music Or Comedy Series
The Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Variety, Music Or Comedy Series is a category in the Primetime Emmy Awards. It is awarded annually to the best variety show or similarly formatted program of the year....
; The comparison was made by most media outlets that neither Jay Leno's version of Tonight nor The Jay Leno Show, both of which were also submitted for consideration, received a nomination in the category. The comparison is made noteworthy due to NBC favoring Leno in the turnover rather than the simple fact of nomination as Jay Leno has never previously been nominated for writing and only been nominated for Outstanding Variety, Music or Comedy once before in 1995.
Other 2010 Primetime Emmy nominations include Outstanding Art Direction in a Variety, Music, or Nonfiction Programming, Outstanding Directing for a Variety, Music, or Comedy Series and Outstanding Writing for a Variety, Music, or Comedy Series.
The writing and directing categories in which O'Brien's Tonight Show was nominated have been cut from the Emmy broadcast do to a deal that the Emmys reached with the WGA and DGA last year to alternate between the writing and directing awards for Variety, Music, or Comedy Series and Variety, Music, or Comedy Specials. These have been moved to the Creative Emmys broadcast, however fans have been mounting a campaign to get at least the writing award for series back on the prime time Emmys broadcast.
At the Creative Arts Emmys, The Tonight Show failed to win any of the three awards they were up for that night. The Tonight Show also failed to win the Emmy for Outstanding Variety, Music or Comedy Series, losing to The Daily Show.
Awards and nominations
| Year | Award | Organization | Work | Notes | Category | Recipients | Result |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2010 | Emmy Award Emmy Award An Emmy Award, often referred to simply as the Emmy, is a television production award, similar in nature to the Peabody Awards but more focused on entertainment, and is considered the television equivalent to the Academy Awards and the Grammy Awards .A majority of Emmys are presented in various... |
Academy of Television Arts & Sciences | The Tonight Show with Conan O'Brien | Episode #1.1 | Outstanding Art Direction for Variety, Music or Nonfiction Programming | John Shaffner, Joe Stewart, Christopher Goumas, NBC NBC The National Broadcasting Company is an American commercial broadcasting television network and former radio network headquartered in the GE Building in New York City's Rockefeller Center with additional major offices near Los Angeles and in Chicago... |
Nominated |
| Outstanding Variety, Music or Comedy Series | NBC | Nominated | |||||
| Episode #1.46 | Outstanding Directing for a Variety, Music or Comedy Series | Allan Kartun | Nominated | ||||
| Outstanding Writing for a Variety, Music or Comedy Series | Mike Sweeney, Conan O'Brien, Chris Albers, Jose Arroyo, Deon Cole, Josh Comers, Dan Cronin, Kevin Dorff, Andres Du Bouchet, Michael Gordon, Berkley Johnson, Brian Kiley, Rob Kutner, Todd Levin, Brian McCann, Guy Nicolucci, Matt O'Brien, Andy Richter, Brian Stack, Andrew Weinberg, NBC | Nominated | |||||
| WGA Award | Writers Guild of America Writers Guild of America The Writers Guild of America is a generic term referring to the joint efforts of two different US labor unions:* The Writers Guild of America, East , representing TV and film writers East of the Mississippi.... |
Comedy/Variety - (Including Talk) Series | Mike Sweeney, Chris Albers, Jose Arroyo, Josh Comers, Dan Cronin, Kevin Dorff, Andres du Bouchet, Michael Gordon, Berkley Johnson, Brian Kiley, Rob Kutner, Todd Levin, Brian McCann, Guy Nicolucci, Conan O'Brien, Matt O'Brien, Andy Richter, Brian Stack, Andrew Weinberg | Nominated |