Sunday, November 07, 2010

"The War for Late Night" Book Excerpt

Man, I do like me some good book excerpt. In this case, "The Unsocial Network" in Vanity Fair was taken from the Bill Carter book "The War for Late Night: When Leno Went Early and Television Went Crazy."

The piece (and book it's taken from) is all about the Shakespearean drama played out in early 2010 between Conan O'Brien, NBC and Jay Leno. Background is that NBC gave The Tonight Show (which always aired at 11:30 after the local news) to Conan, then inserted Jay Leno in the 10:00 hour prior to the news. Totally outside the tradition of putting an hour long drama in that time slot, NBC considered the move one that would cut costs, keep Jay in their stable and basically make themselves look brilliant.

When the newly created Jay Leno Show received horrible ratings (and The Tonight Show lagged from where it was previously), things started to get interesting... this being where the Vanity Fair excerpt picks up. Conan had nothing in his contract preventing the move NBC wanted to make so what ensued was a fascinating conflict between the players involved. Lots of financial ramifications, but what struck me from the piece was the human conflict and people's reactions.

To this end, the Vanity Fair excerpt makes reference to the Conan O'Brien authored statement that pretty much closed the door on him staying at NBC. Struck me as a well written and from the heart missive by a guy whose career in front of the camera began with him as a writer.

I can't speak for the entire book at this point, but definitely recommend the excerpt (and Conan's statement) as being worth a read.