The Disregard of Conan O'Brien

I’m not going to lie- I love Conan. I generally find Leno to care less about fine tuning his craft of comedy, and rather relying on using the stupidity of others (bits like Jay-Walking), to provide cheap, easy laughs. Conan is willing to go out and risk to try something new- even if it occasionally means a failed bit. I’m pretty sure Leno (and his writers) have used the same handful of Joke templates to create his monologue for the past 10 years. I could probably write on and on about how much I like Conan over Leno- but that’s called an opinion, and every persons opinion is different.

Conan and Jay appeal to two very different audiences. Conan generally has the “Internet Generation” as well as the east coast on his side- While Leno generally has the Baby Boomers and middle America. Two entirely different people, with two entirely different comedic styles- appealing to two very different audiences.

The reason why Conan is getting screwed, is not because he’s funnier than Leno, or has a more lucrative ratings market- It’s because Conan O’Brien was set up to fail on The Tonight Show from the start.

Let's look at 3 key differences between Leno's tenure, and Conan's tenure on the Tonight Show:

• Carson to Leno: Five years leading up to the transition, Leno was a “permanent” guest host on Carson's show. Hosting nearly every Monday from 1987-1992. Giving the Carson crowd time to get know to Jay Leno. Even though it might of not been NBC's "Five Year Plan" at the time, the Tonight Show Audience was prepared for what Leno was bringing to the show.

• Leno to Conan: In 2004 as an effort to keep the Conan at NBC, they promise O'Brien the Tonight Show chair in 2009 (five years), Leno agrees. In that time there was almost no introduction to the “Tonight Show” audience to Conan.

Next:

• Leno, even though he was a weekly fixture for five years on the legendary Tonight Show starring Johnny Carson- he still trailed CBS’ David Letterman(who was starting a new franchise, on a new network, on a new time-slot) for about 3 years in the television ratings. I'll even say- who knows how long it would have taken Leno to get decent ratings if Hugh Grant didn't have a prostitution incident and/or OJ Simpson didn't happen.

• Conan, after spending time building his fan-base on his “Late Night” show - had to change some of his comedic styling to fit the 11:35 time slot- he was allowed seven months, before NBC decided he was a “failure" and gave up on him.

Next:

• During Leno’s successful run as “Tonight Show” host NBC was the strongest network on TV- Supporting him with shows such as: Seinfeld, Cheers, Friends, ER, Frasier, Will & Grace.. and into the 00’s with shows such as “The West Wing.”

• During Conan’s seven month stint as “Tonight Show” host- he was hardly backed by the network at all- A network that had been the last place in ratings for a few years now, gave Conan absolutely no lead-in support. Also, they hardly put any effort into promoting O’Brien at all… they’ve used the exact same promo bit commercial for nearly his whole tenure... which tells me NBC didn't really care about O'Brien in the first place. Those feelings were solidified further when the network decided to give Jay Leno his own prime-time show that was almost identical to his former Tonight Show one.

There are a few “bad-guys” here- but the lack of support that NBC gave Conan is the ultimate issue. In a culture that demands instant gratification, NBC was not patient enough to let people get to know Conan's style and quirks- thus creating a new fan-base to join the already strong one he had from his Late Night show. Who knows what will happen- but if Conan moves to FOX or another network, and is successful, we could possibly see the end of “The Tonight Show” dynasty.