In the "News that even Helen Keller could have predicted" department (side note, Helen and I share a June 27 birthday. I love that. However, I also share it with Khloe Kardashian, so you win some, lose some.), Jay Leno is kind of failing.
After 4 months back on the Tonight Show, Jay's ratings are even lower than Conan O'Brien's were during his Tonight Show tenure. After starting off strong back in March, viewership has dipped 20 percent, and Nightline now beats both his and David Letterman's numbers.
Apparently, Jay's desperate attempts to be painted as the clueless victim didn't go over so well with people. Or, people have lost their taste for Jay's stale comedy after all these years.
I'll let Conan express my feelings for me:
It's so ridiculous. NBC "punished" Jay by putting him back in his coveted late-night spot, and in the processed, punished Conan for garnering lower ratings than Jay, who is now failing. Now, he's doing even worse, NBC still has to shell out money for 10 p.m. weekday shows and they have yet another fantastic story from a public relations perspective. I bet they're thrilled.
As the above article points out, NBC kept Jay and his team because he would have been more expensive to buy out than Conan. However, Jay's show is much more expensive to maintain than Conan's was and would have been had he stayed at NBC. Now, since decreased ad revenue is likely going to result from this, they're still losing big time, and have foolishly severed all ties with such a strong network icon, all because they impulsively acted out of panic in late 2009 as a result of their own stupid decisions.
Since I love some schadenfreude, especially when NBC is the one experiencing the misfortune, I'm writing this entry with a big grin on my face. I used to be neutral towards Jay and his team, but this whole debacle and his smarmy attitude after it (such as when he claimed that Conan ruined the Tonight Show franchise) has resulted in my reveling in his failure. If there's anyone I feel bad for in this, it's Jimmy Fallon and his show, which has vastly improved since last year. His ratings are suffering as well, and I think Jay is partially to blame.
Is that immature? Yes, probably. Should I feel bad for Conan since he's still a multi-millionaire? Probably not. But that's not the point. This whole incident came from an unfair and illogical decision from a tired network, and it still baffles and annoys me. In television, if your show fails miserably, as Jay's prime time show did, it's canceled, not rewarded with a better spot, that's just the way it should go, and didn't in this case.
I haven't watched the Tonight Show since Conan's last rerun aired in February. It's going to be tough not to watch Thursday, when Steve Carell and Jane Lynch are on the same show, but I won't, out of principle (one that is semi-irrational, considering I'm sadly not a Nielsen household, but still).
Are you the same way, or have you gone back to the Tonight Show?
