On a cold February night in 2004, Conan O’Brien and his executive producer brought their publicist to Bemelmans Bar at the Carlyle Hotel to share the exciting news that O’Brien had been offered a new job — host of the late night institution, “The Tonight Show.”
But there was one problem. Jay Leno, the current “Tonight Show” host, didn’t know that O’Brien had been handed his job.
So Conan came up with a secret password. Whenever they wanted to discuss the situation around the office, instead of saying “The Tonight Show,” they would call it “Anderson Cooper 360.”
Veteran journalist Bill Carter details the vicious recent battle over “The Tonight Show,” showing how Leno was hardly the devious schemer he was made out to be, and how O’Brien was not always the angelic innocent the media portrayed, as he and his team aggressively pursued the show at every opportunity.
O’Brien’s agent, Ari Emanuel — brother of Rahm, and the inspiration for Jeremy Piven’s Ari Gold character on “Entourage” — was pressuring NBC to give O’Brien “The Tonight Show” back in 2003.
Carter notes how O’Brien’s team always held Leno in contempt for failing to “innovate,” and displayed an arrogant incredulity at how NBC wouldn’t just hand the show to O’Brien, despite Leno having been the ratings leader for almost a decade.
When O’Brien was finally given Leno’s job (with a five-year waiting period), Leno was “broken-hearted.” He played the loyal soldier on the outside, but in private conversations, he couldn’t understand why he was being fired despite his success.
By 2008, though, the network’s chief executive, Jeff Zucker, was growing nervous, as O’Brien showed no signs of adapting his show for a mainstream audience.
When NBC executive Dick Ebersol later spoke with O’Brien and his producer about how even Johnny Carson had recognized the need to appeal to midwestern audiences, O’Brien emphasized that he would do the show his way, and that was that.
Meanwhile, it was looking like Leno would wind up competing with O’Brien at ABC. NBC’s solution was, famously, offering him “The Jay Leno Show,” which would air every night at 10 p.m.
“The Jay Leno Show” was ill-defined and sloppily handled from the outset. Nervous affiliates were allowed a say in the show’s structure, requesting that comedy bits such as “Headlines,” which Leno traditionally did after the monologue, be placed at the end of the show to lead into their 11 p.m. newscasts. This moved derailed Leno’s comedic rhythm, and spiraled the show toward creative disaster.
While that show floundered, Conan’s “Tonight Show” was making NBC queasy. In their eyes, both his humor and booking strategy, remained niche. When David Letterman found himself embroiled in scandal following a joke about Sarah Palin’s daughters. Zucker begged O’Brien to book Palin as a guest, but Conan refused, making the case that it would seem opportunistic.
Ratings for both shows were tanking, and affiliates, concerned about declining newscast ratings, threatened revolt. NBC decided to move Leno back to 11:35 — but only for half hour — then bump Conan’s “Tonight Show’ to 12:05.
O’Brien revoluted. He emphasized how he had been made promises and rejected other offers, and blamed his own bad ratings solely on his low rated lead-in. Throughout negotiations, O’Brien even asked NBC executives several times what Leno “had” on them.
In an emotional outpouring to his team, O’Brien laid out his “People of Earth” manifesto, where he expressed why he felt he would destroy “The Tonight Show” by doing it at 12:05. The manifesto gained O’Brien immense public and internal support, but while it all but declared his resignation — actually doing so would have been a breach of his contract — his lawyers were telling NBC that he would still do the show at 12:05.
While NBC still hoped that O’Brien’s mind could be changed about 12:05, one low-blow joke ended that. O’Brien talked during his monologue about what a dream hosting “The Tonight Show” had been, and advised any kids watching that, “you can do anything you want in life — unless Jay Leno wants to do it, too.”
After hearing this, Leno, fuming, called an NBC executive and said, “Why the f – – – am I giving up a half hour for this guy?”
That joke clinched it for several NBC executives, and thoughts of finding a way to retain O’Brien quickly evaporated.
In the end, Leno returned to “The Tonight Show,” and O’Brien received a $45 million payout before signing a new deal for a show on TBS that debuts Nov. 8, the same day Carter’s book hits stores.
But even with a new life on the horizon, O’Brien seems plagued by what might have been.
Even after the TBS deal was signed, O’Brien has suffered sleepless nights, lying in bed awake in deep contemplation, and finding himself suddenly uttering the phrase, “What the f – – – happened?”
The War For Late Night
When Leno Went Early and Television Went Crazy
by Bill Carter
Viking