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Do Not Feel Sorry For Conan O’Brien

by Steve Krakauer | 10:17 am, January 22nd, 2010

» 4 comments

Conan O’Brien signs off The Tonight Show forever tonight, and judging from last night’s show, the tone has gotten more sentimental.

Conan’s show has been at the top of its game recently, and it’s true he really got screwed by NBC. But don’t feel sorry for Conan O’Brien.

He’s a brilliant comedian, whose Tonight Show was consistently haunted by the Jaywalking ghost of Jay Leno. It was never really a fair shot – with Leno at 10pmET, it dragged down the ratings of all NBC stations and provided a handicapped lead-in for Conan. His numbers weren’t bad – they were lower in total viewers but beating CBS’ Late Show in the key demos – but seven months was not nearly enough time to accurately judge his hosting abilities. It was a different story with Leno. His awful numbers highlighted a mistake by NBC executives to test a new programming strategy, a lack of patience by money-shedding affiliates and mainly a failure by Leno to distinguish his show as anything but his Tonight Show an hour-and-a-half earlier.

But there’s a difference between acknowledging all this, or even being fully “Team Conan,” and feeling sorry or feeling bad for Conan. This is a man who will walk away with more than 30 million dollars to not work – and likely not work for less than a year. Then he’ll be back making more money, at FOX or Comedy Central or somewhere. Feeling sad still?

Another point for those who feel bad for Conan is that hosting the Tonight Show was a ‘dream’ of his since he was a boy, something he alluded to in his statement that got the ball rolling for his exit. How many times does someone losing his or her dream job make us feel sad? Obviously, it’s a different situation – he’s a celebrity, people feel like they know him after welcoming him into their homes for 17 years. If you got a chance to spend seven months doing your absolute dream job, only to lose it (albeit unfairly), maybe you’d be a little pissed off. But what if they paid you three years severance, and nine months or so later you got a chance to do a job that is actually very similar to your dream job, and have the opportunity to make even more money? Sounds like a good deal.

>>> NEXT PAGE: What does the country, and world, think of the ‘wasting NBC’s money’ sketch?

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Conan O'Brien, Jay Leno, late night, Late-Night Wars, NBC, The Tonight Show

Rachel Sklar

Hey Peacock Tie! I agree with your point about how throwing around vast sums of money seems irresponsible right now vis a vis Haiti, the economy, etc etc. There’s just two points here I want to make:

(1) This isn’t about NBC and Leno spoiling a dream. This is about appalling behavior. I don’t think people feel sorry for Conan because he is being deprived of a dream necessarily, or because he will now eat only at soup kitchens. But everyone can relate to being totally screwed by the boss. Everyone can relate to being totally knifed by a co-worker. Everyone can relate to being part of an organization and having that identification and investment, and then being rudely shoved out. Everyone can relate to being rejected. The fact that it played out so publicly, that it repeated history from almost two decades ago, that it happened over such a short period of time (were there ANY attempts to brainstorm out creative solutions?) and involved so many egos made it like crack to watch, But these are pretty visceral reactions here – pride, anger, a sense of fairness. There’s a difference between not winning and being humiliated and bullied and shivved into losing.

(2) I’ve been watching these shows for mentions of Haiti, for the use of these giant platforms to raise awareness and money. I wish Conan had used some of that money for the mouse-car to send air-drops of food to Haiti, though of course it’s not so simple. Conan did, however, repeatedly push StillerStrong.com, with all proceeds to Haiti relief. I don’t recall seeing any such call to good works from Leno (I could have missed it, though, since I have not watched all of each show this week, though I’ve tried). I do think that it bears noting that as well as you saying, let’s put things in perspective, O’Brien said that too.

But I agree – there’s other stuff in the world and I’m relieved that this is winding down because it’s totally messing with my late-night TV habits. I miss my Jon Stewart and Charlie Rose.
http://www.sailrabbits.com Magister

Another point which may be lost on some is that it’s the Tonight Show that we’re talking about. It’s quite possibly the most revered institution in television history and I can’t even think of what might come second, perhaps the CBS Evening News or Today, but the Tonight Show is in a class by itself. One doesn’t even have to watch it, for them to respect it.

A while back, you did one one of those “Kill, marry…” things on the podcast and you pitted the sale of NBC, up against the shuttering of Vanity Fair and something involving Conde Nast. I pointed out in the comments that NBC would have further reaching ramifications because every little town in America has an NBC affiliate and though I didn’t say it at the time, but we all grew-up watching their programming.

As for the Haiti thing, I realize it’s a popular meme in blog comments, but though Conan’s “money-wasters” are a faked joke, there’s really not much of a legal way for him to channel the funds to Haiti relief and though I may sound callous, but it’s not like there isn’t another natural disaster that kills thousands every few months.

Heck, last night I bought the family a couple of DiGiournos. Oftentimes, we order out for pizza on the nights that everyone has an odd schedule, but I had twenty minutes and wanted extra-extra pepperoni on mine. There’s no doubt that I could afford the thirty bucks for takeout, but I opted for the ten dollar solution and though I’m a regular contributer to the Red Cross, I’m not going to send the change from last night’s dinner to Wycliff Jean.
http://www.sailrabbits.com Magister

OK – So, I’m just adding this for the sake of snark and I really hope it doesn’t bury my valid point about the Tonight Show being a revered institution that’s much larger than any single host, but…

The other night I needed some Woolite, but I didn’t feel like going into a big store and instead I popped into a Dollar General, where I was only given a generic option. Now, I could send the two dollars that I saved to Anne Meara’s kid, but then I wouldn’t have it, the next time there’s massive flooding in Bangladesh.
http://www.facebook.com/people/Dave-Bruce/1407671449 Dave

I definitely don’t feel sorry for Conan. As the article notes, he’s walking away with millions of dollars, he’s free to go create his own new show, and he’s got more sympathy, attention, and free publicity than any performer could ask for.

“But everyone can relate to being totally screwed by the boss…”
I don’t see much similarity between “everyone” and an entertainer in a volatile business who gets paid an enormous severance package for being screwed by the boss.

Comparing Conan to the average Joe who gets shafted at work is like comparing a mega-million-dollar baseball player on strike to the truck driver walking the picket line, simply because they are both “union workers.” Conan won’t be standing on the unemployment line or eating cat food.

TV shows are routinely cancelled, retooled, changed to a different time, etc., and performers replaced, to suit ratings or network heads’ desires. Is there any network TV actor, comedian, producer, writer, etc. who *hasn’t* been screwed, backstabbed, etc.? It’s probably the same in many other media businesses.

As far as Conan being deprived of his “dream” job, I agree with Mr. Krakauer- hard to relate to. Hey, when I was a kid I wanted to be an astronaut and my sister wanted to raise unicorns, but things just didn’t work out!

Which raises another question: I’ve heard many longtime Conan fans say his Tonight Show wasn’t as good as his previous work later in the evening, maybe because he was making his act less edgy to appeal to a more mainstream audience than he’s used to. So although the Tonight Show was his dream job, maybe it wasn’t the ideal job for him. And he can’t blame his sagging ratings on Leno alone.

The fact that Conan may be mentioning a Haiti charity more than Leno doesn’t seem relevant to me. Every performer does what he feels is best. Other performers may be giving more money than Conan, but just not talking about it as much.

If Conan is really interested in Haiti, too bad he didn’t have all those people at his midtown rally send e-mails to legislators, or collect money from passersby to Haitian relief, or something like that. Would have done some real good, and wouldn’t have put a dent in the multi-million $ severance package everybody knew he would get.

Off to get some store-brand cat food for dinner…(OK, not really!)