Letterman's Replacement

Quote: Evenbob

40% of the country are solid Right, they won't
watch. Another big % leans Right. It's going to
be a tough row to hoe to get good advertisers.

Ha! Because David Letterman's ratings were dependent upon all those conservatives who just loved David Letterman? Seriously, Republicans never watched Letterman, so CBS isn't concerned if Colbert loses that demographic; it was already lost. It's not like Sean Hannity resigns and Keith Olbermann takes his timeslot. It's more like Bill Maher resigns and Keith Olbermann takes his timeslot.

For the sake of arguement let's suppose that Colbert bombs and ratings plummet, you really think CBS would fire him in just 6 weeks? CBS would probably spend several months attempting to salvage their investment with ratings gimmicks before abandoning him. Jeez, even NBC gave Conan a full 30 weeks before they showed him the door. Conan's severence package was a whopping $45 million, and I assure you that all the lawyers who represented Colbert (and CBS) knew this before the contract was drafted. With $30 or $40 million at stake, they'll give him way more than 6 weeks to turn things around.

Quote: reno

Seriously, Republicans never watched Letterman, .

Sure they do, even I watch him occasionally. He
leans to the Left, but he doesn't harp on it.
He has a lightening wit and is very clever off
the cuff.

I have never seen more than 5min of Colbert,
I find him cloying and obnoxious. Yes, he's
an 'act', and a bad one. Every time I see him,
it's like he's saying exactly the same stuff as
last time, in exactly the same way. And I always
say to myself 'people think this garbage is
funny?'

I chose this at random. I find none of it funny.
It's a guy doing scripted comedy in an overbearing
manner. All of Colbert's stuff looks like this.
He may say it's an act, but 85% of it is who he
really is. It's like PeeWee Herman. Sure Paul
Reubens created PeeWee, but it's a lot of who
he is too. When you do another persona for
years, the two become part of each other.

Quote: Evenbob

Sure they do, even I watch him occasionally.

Even after all the mean things he said about Governor Palin's underage daughter? An attack on Sarah Palin is an attack on America, you RINO.

I watch a clip like this and I wonder why conservatives are so outraged that Letterman's replacement is a liberal. (Yikes, read the comments section under that video.)

A liberal replaces a liberal. No biggie. The ratings will be fine.

Quote: reno

A liberal replaces a liberal. No biggie. The ratings will be fine.

Expect a drop-off at first. Same as when Carson went, the people who liked the old guy will tire of staying up late or else switch channels because ESPN is better than breaking in a new host to their life. Over time they will probably come back. Probably.

When Carson left Leno had the problem that Letterman had a built-in fan base that followed him because they liked him better than Leno. Letterman was always "edgier" than Leno. But after Leno landed Rob Lowe for a guest slot he took the lead and never looked back. Leno was more mainstream and mainstream has and always will win the ratings race over "edgier" things. Might not be the slice and dice demo you want, but it will win.

There seems to be little else to book at the 11:35 slot. Nightline has passed the time it was relevant. Networks need cheap shows that get a decent audience. Guests on the Leno show get what, $250 each or whatever the Actor's Guild minimum is now?

Was watching Colbert on Letterman tonight, then decided to look up Carson on Letterman.

Talk show trivia:

Quote:

A number of years ago there was a comedian NBC wanted to keep in the fold as a possible replacement for Johnny Carson when he retired. So they gave this comedian a six episode order for a sitcom. They hated the resulting episodes so much they kept the show on the shelf for a year. Finally, they decided to just burn it off and air the show.

That show was "Seinfeld".

here

Quote: rxwine

Talk show trivia:

There was actually 5 episodes in the first season. They only made the pilot and aired it (without Julia Louis-Dreyfus or even the character of Elaine). The waitress at the cafe was supposed to be the female lead. JLD's first sitcom, "Day by Day" had just ended a few weeks before the pilot aired.

NBC kept the show off the air for a year because the pilot received poor ratings, but one executive pushed to have 4 more episodes made (perhaps the smallest series order in TV history).



Jerry Seinfeld had been on Johnny Carson only twice, so I seriously wonder that they wanted to keep him in the fold as a potential replacement.

NBC's sitcoms in 1987-88 were The Cosby Show, A Different World, Cheers, Night Court, The Facts of Life, 227, The Golden Girls, Amen, ALF, Valerie's Family, Our House, Family Ties, My Two Dads, and the previously mentioned Day by Day with Julia Louis Dreyfuss.

Seinfeld was given his own hour long comedy special that year.

I watched Seinfeld like everybody did. I thought
the show was George and Kramer, and Seinfeld
was an irritating 3rd. I found out later that the
real star was the genius of Larry David. Go
figure..

I am a huge "late night" fan. I've been watching Letterman since about 1986, both on NBC and CBS. I've been to five of his tapings, the most recent one a couple of months ago.

First off, of all of the late night hosts (current), he is the best interviewer. When he gets a news person on or a celebrity he actually likes, he asks excellent questions, listens, applies a sense of humour, and is very intelligent.

Letterman was an independent pretty much until a few years into the Iraq war when he turned to the left, probably coinciding with when he became a father and saw how the GOP under Bush was treating Veterans (his production company has productions on Veteran issues on PBS) and ignored Climate Change (something he strongly believes in). But if you watch his latest shows, he doesn't particularly like this administration either. Like many, I lost some respect for him when he got into the sex scandal with one of his employees, but he handled it with grace. He apologized for the Palin remarks as well, on air, and likely spent a couple of hours screaming at the writers who got the joke onto Tony Mendez's cue cards.

Craig Ferguson is extremely funny too, but he does not cater to women and certainly not older people (who, like it or not, is a large part of the late night demographic). His entertainment is fairly juvenile for 12:35am and his interviewing style won't attract celebrities at 11:35 who are there to pitch their sh*t, which he didn't allow on his show and frankly didn't care. The skeleton and the horse work perfectly for 12:35, not at 11:35, and he would get creamed by Fallon.

Viacom and CBS are closely related, both controlled by Summer Redstone, and CBS controls Viacom's operations to this day. Les Moonvez is quite familiar with the work of Stewart and Colbert and it's no surprise that he used someone from the Viacom family to take Dave's spot. Another factor is that the ownership of both shows, Late Night and the Late Late Show will be taken over by CBS, whereas before, Dave's Company, WorldWide Pants, had ownership.

Stewart's show is far too politically bent to the left for him to be considered for Late Night, but he is a better interviewer than Colbert, but Colbert has been trying to get better at his interviewing skills.

Colbert will not be bringing his character to Late Night, and I suspect if anything, his persona has been holding him back. He does better with younger viewers and women over Ferguson and Stewart. Just because we don't know much at Colbert doesn't mean that the executives at CBS doesn't. And my wife is a staunch republican, and will watch Colbert any day over Stewart and Letterman.

It should be interesting times come next spring.

The Graham Norton Show S10E06 Jessica Biel, Sarah Millican, James Cordon, Bradley Cooper



James Corden to Replace Craig Ferguson as Host of ‘The Late Late Show’ on CBS. He is really cute on this British talk show.

He guest starred on Doctor Who a few years ago