In an article that's mostly about the current advertising situation in late night TV (the anecdotal advertising info I tend to completely discount, public advertising information like this is hard draw conclusions from), comes some season to date comparisons for NBC's late night ratings (which we don't get from our regular sources):
O'Brien is down 22% among 18-49 viewers for the first four weeks of the season; "Late Night with Jimmy Fallon" is down 16% in 18-49 viewers
That's a big problem for NBC. A very big problem. Summer results I was willing to overlook, but the early fall trend spells disaster for NBC.
I continue to maintain that the problem with the Tonight Show ratings isn't that Jay Leno's at 10pm, it's that he's not at 11:30pm. Conan has allowed Letterman to completely close the gap with the Tonight Show and while anything can happen in the future, the current situation after 11:30 is a bad one for NBC.
I agree with you. Leno isn’t the problem with Conan’s “Tonight.” Conan was struggling even before Jay’s show premiered.
Yikes.
I wonder, at this point, is it even a viable option to put Leno back at 11:35 and let Conan walk?
Regardless, I’m sure NBC will be patient – although the pace at which NBC plunged at 11:35pm is quite jaw-dropping….late night viewing patterns usually move at a glacial pace.
The Tonight Show doesn’t have a young hip look and stlye to it anymore. Starting off with the “Big Band Sound” doesn’t give way to a younger demographic which is what the advertisers are wanting. The Core viewers are older and have alreaady been bored with Leno earlier, fell asleep during the late news and are ready to head off to bed when Conan gets ready to perform.
Anon, I agree that it’s highly unlikely that NBC makes any changes this season, but I think its inaction is more do to limited alternatives than “patience”
They could attempt to clone Carson.
Is it unreasonable to say that the older people in the house control the remote? I would suggest sometimes you need the older demo to get at the young viewer. There’s too much narrowing in today. Carson appealed to young and old. How about we throw some names out of possible hosts with broader appeal?
I can’t think of someone for the Tonight Show right now, but here’s a different example.
Let’s stop going to obnoxious Ryan Seacrest to host event shows. Mario Lopez has much broader appeal. (watch out Mario. Ryan may do a Tanya Harding on you. You’re definitely a threat).
Seth MacFarlane for Tonight Show.
So, in effect, if NBC believed it would rake in more profit by airing Leno at 10 instead of scripted series, they have probably raked in no such thing once you factor in the loss they’re incurring with both Conan and Fallon. The Leno move, then, has turned into a no-win situation. Oh, well, back to the scripted series drawing board, I guess.
I do think the Leno thing has had SOME effect. It has to make a difference when your lead in has very low ratings/viewers. I know that’s not the ONLY problem though. I love Conan though and I hope they can work it out so he can stay on the show.
Remember years ago when Letterman complained to CBS about the weak 11 p.m. prime time shows? That isn’t the case for CBS now. But having strong 11 p.m. shows didn’t help Letterman much. NBC’s decisions and Sarah Palin helped Letterman.
Catherine – Dave and his former interns also helped his ratings! Nothing like a good scandal, just ask Leno following his interview with Hugh Grant over 10 years ago.
I watch Conan every night. Love the show!
I watch Leno nearly every night at 10pm. To me, it feels like it’s 11:35, and I’m asleep by 10:30.
Bad for ratings, but I’m very well rested!
I love Conan and always have, we grew up watching him.
He doesn’t seem happy where he is and I think that has a lot to do with it, I think he really misses NY and it’s reflected on the show. I hope you gets out of his funk, I’m still a loyal viewer regardless.
I haven’t watched the new Tonight Show since Conan’s first week; it’s just a train wreck. And I haven’t watched Fallon since the first show (yes, I didn’t give it a chance– you have to give your in-laws a chance, you have to give your daughter’s skeazy boyfriend a chance, I don’t have to give late night TV a chance). It’s turned me into a hardcore Craig Ferguson watcher (he’s surprisingly awesome, I had no idea).
I hope NBC is making many bajillions of dollars from this new arrangement, because otherwise, it still looks like one of the great bonehead moves in TV.
NBC is in huge trouble.
NBC only has its Today Show and Nightly to point to as winners (Sunday night football as well, but that would do fine on any network and I haven’t calculated the rights cost versus revenue stream).
NBC has now officially lost the ‘late night leader’ status and it lost the primetime competitor status long ago.
Meredith, Matt and Brian must all feel pretty comfy. If I were them, I’d ask for more $. Maybe they don’t deserve it but NBC can’t risk even the most minor of changes to those shows.
Conan is a bad interviewer, he seems to make people more nervous than at ease. Also he isn’t funny. I don’t like Dave so I stay up and watch Craig Ferguson. My husband and even my Mom (note wide age difference of 27 years apart) both do not like Conan – which is not from my influence but their own take on his show. Husband didn’t know about Craig Ferguson until I started watching and now he is hooked. So in our house it’s Leno at 10 and Ferguson for late night.
Having Leno on at 10 doesn’t affect Conan since his ratings were already down before Leno started. Now, I’m not sure which situation is worse for NBC, the current one, or letting Leno go and then showing up on ABC. I think Leno on ABC would have been worse and would easily have destroyed The Tonight Show.
Have to admit that I am not much of a Late Night viewer. It’s when I tend to catch up on DVR, or watch sports or a late night DVD if I cannot sleep. But I have been DVRing Craig Ferguson and have become addicted to him, which is a coincidence since he’s a reformed addict himself.
Not sure if he’d work with the earlier audiences, but it’s amazing how funny he can be night after night. Like to see someone give him a shot earlier in the evening, because how much worse can you do right now over at NBC?
When you compare what Ferguson is doing to what Conan is now doing (as opposed to what Conan used to at 12:30), it seems pretty apparent that NBC has stuck a muzzle on Conan in order to try and appeal to everyone, which never, ever works. Jay’s viewers obviously don’t like Conan, and Conan’s old viewers are obviously disappointed in the New Conan.
When you pick a host, you have to let them do what they do, then see if people watch. If they don’t, then you replace him. Dumbing the host down, however, never seems to work. If they wanted another Jay, then they should have hired another Jay. Asking Conan to be Jay was crazy from the start.
Oh, but I forgot, this is NBC we are talking about—the home of crazy and futile.
By the way, I did watch Fallon for only the second time the night Monty Python was on, and I must say I was staggered by how totally inept Fallon was. Not funny, and completely unable to conduct anything resembling an interview. It was painful to watch. No wonder he failing hard. NBC is probably looking for someone to replace him even as I type this.
The three shows are so overtly political they make NBC look like the democrat party’s entertainment arm. leno and Conan were always obvious in their preferences but this season Conan and Fallon seem to revel in their disdain for “misaligned” people in a way that must turn off even apolitical people. Jay appeared to keep a sense or relative fairness but his show is anything but “big tent” anymore. He had Rush Limbaugh on… and after that it’s been leftist after leftist.
Who enjoys politics before going to bed? Soon they’ll only have msnbc’s audience left.