Observer » Late Night

Jimmy Kimmel Cancels Brooklyn Show

Kara Bloomgarden-Smoke — Mon, 29 Oct 2012 14:30:54 -0400

Hurricane Sandy is doing more than just canceling your plans, it is also wrecking late night tv. Jimmy Kimmel had planned to host a week of shows out of BAM's Harvey theatre in downtown Brooklyn. But alas, tonight's show was called off, the Times reports.

Part of the problem was the logistics of getting a live studio audience when the subways, tunnels and bridges close and people are being urged to stay home.

Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert both cancelled Monday night shows. David Letterman and Jimmy Fallon are both scheduled for the show to go on (as of this afternoon), although Letterman moved up the time of the taping to 3:30. Decisions about tomorrow's shows haven't yet been made.

Looks like we may have to resort to Netflix tomorrow--assuming we still have power.

Tom Hanks Slams Full House (Video)

Drew Grant — Wed, 24 Oct 2012 16:38:53 -0400

Slam Hank. (YouTube)

Tom Hanks is continuing what can only be described as an "apology tour" after blowing up ABC's spot with a big F-bomb on Good Morning America while promoting Cloud Atlas last week. First he showed up on Saturday Night Live for two segments, and last night he appeared on Late Night With Jimmy Fallon to perform some slam poetry about Full House. No, we don't know why, either.

http://youtu.be/rfWIuymme50

Fun questions to ask yourself: Did Tom Hanks ever watch Full House? Which character do you think he most related to? Is he friends with John Stamos in real life? Is Tom Hanks "hip" enough to make pop culture references that are only funny to kids born around 1984-1988? Etc.

Jimmy Kimmel Now Leading Leno and Letterman in Late Night

Daniel D'Addario — Thu, 17 May 2012 12:55:42 -0400

Strange news from the late-night wars as a third army is now mounting legitimate competition to Jay Leno and David Letterman. Jimmy Kimmel's Jimmy Kimmel Live on ABC is beating Mr. Leno's NBC Tonight Show, the traditional late-night leader, by four percent of viewers in the valuable 18-49 demographic; Mr. Kimmel's second half (his show airs at midnight, unlike Mr. Leno's and Mr. Letterman's at 11:35) beats The Late Late Show With Craig Ferguson by 48% in that demographic. Mr. Kimmel has recently hosted the ABC upfront presentation and the White House Correspondents' Dinner, and is to host the Emmys this fall. He gained particular notoriety for his scathing takedown of Jay Leno during the older host's struggle to return to The Tonight Show in early 2010.

NBC has lost ground in the morning recently to ABC; their slipping in late-night may leave them without a single one of their areas of traditional dominance intact.

Conan Floundering on TBS

Daniel D'Addario — Thu, 18 Aug 2011 14:29:07 -0400

Conan O'Brien's reign as TBS's late-night host is more turbulent than the cable net might have expected, reports the Wall Street Journal. During Mr. O'Brien's season on the air, TBS's viewership among the 18-to-49 key demographic has fallen 11 percent and the network canceled its other late-night show, George Lopez's Lopez Tonight. Mr. O'Brien's troubles now--as in the ratings falterings during the protracted struggle with NBC ending in his ouster from The Tonight Show--are perceived as leading from his "niche appeal." His sense of humor is perhaps less accessible than Comedy Central's political-humor bloc or Tonight and The Late Show, or even the comedy reruns for which Comedy Central was long known; his niche location on the dial (other keystones of TBS's programming are Tyler Perry's sitcoms, hardly a match for Conan viewers) and niche humor seem to compound one another into a perfect storm of nicheyness.

ddaddario@observer.com :: @DPD_

Craig Ferguson, Meet Cornel West

Daniel D'Addario — Wed, 02 Feb 2011 18:01:54 -0400

Tonight, while Jimmy Fallon reads Tweets, Craig Ferguson will kick off Black History Month with guests Cornel West and George Clinton. The Late Late Show host has always placed great emphasis on his immigrant status, and the show is intended -- at least in part -- as a sort of civics lesson on race in America, for anyone still awake.

The episode would never be aired at 11:35 -- neither West nor Clinton has a film to promote -- and could well be a titanic bore. But after Conan O'Brien's new show on TBS seemed to promise a shaking-up of the old form, and immediately returned to the celebrity-and-musical-guest template, it's nice to see something new on late night (aside from the aforementioned Tweet-reading). Or, more properly, something old: what's Ferguson, at least tonight, but Dick Cavett, who interviewed the likes of Norman Mailer and Gore Vidal on his late night show?

But does this mean Cornel West is our Gore Vidal?

ddaddario@observer.com :: @DPD_

Jimmy Fallon's Creative Process is Crowd-Sourcing

Daniel D'Addario — Mon, 31 Jan 2011 21:55:15 -0400

Everyone's had to make sacrifices in These Economic Times. Jimmy Fallon's? He's not writing his own jokes. Boston's TVnext conference asked Fallon to submit to an interview about social media, a request Fallon parried by providing a YouTube video of his day "relative to social media," as his publicist's response to TVnext read.

So what is that day like? It begins when Fallon conceives of a hashtag he finds funny. Readers tweet in their own jokes, which Fallon reads on the air in a funny voice. One user-generated gag indicates eagerness to lose "185 pounds" -- referring to dumping a significant other (did the lyrics of "Hold It Against Me" not fit in 140 characters?). A writer happily discusses the method, and engages Fallon in debates about which tweets are best to read on air. Hope he enjoys the job for the next few months, before he's replaced by midwestern teenagers with iPhones!

In the video, Fallon asks his audience if they're on Twitter, and a few scattered and not-particularly enthusiastic cheers ring out. Fallon's video answers one question -- how does he choose which hashtags to read on air? The ones that make him laugh! -- but raises so many more. Who are these people doing Fallon's writing for him, for free? And who is bothering to watch Late Night, when one doesn't have to stay up late to read one's own Twitter timeline?

ddaddario@observer.com :: @DPD_

Conan O’Brien Leads Late Night Pack With TBS Premiere

Hunter Walker — Tue, 09 Nov 2010 19:14:50 -0400

Last night, Conan O'Brien returned to late night TV for the first time since his acrimonious departure from NBC in January. The debut episode of his new TBS show, "Conan," was a hit with higher ratings than Jay Leno's "Tonight Show," Dave Letterman's "Late Show," "The Daily Show," and "The Colbert Report."

Approximately 4.15 million viewers tuned in for O'brien's inaugural TBS broadcast, 3.28 million of whom were in the adults 18-49 demographic that is the gold standard for television advertisers. Last night's episode of the "Tonight Show" was O'Brien's closest competition with about 3.45 million viewers. Letterman drew an audience of 3.39 million. "The Daily Show" and "The Colbert Report" earned an average of 1.1 million viewers apiece.

After his break with NBC, O'Brien was contractually prohibited from appearing on television until this month. But he managed to build a huge following during his exile from the airwaves by playing up his martyr status with a live concert tour and savvy use of social media. O'Brien joined Twitter in February and has since accumulated over 1.8 million followers on the social networking site.

O'Brien's premiere ratings are exactly what TBS was hoping for when they signed him to a five-year contract that was reportedly worth at least $10 million. In a statement on the ratings for "Conan," Turner Entertainment Networks President Steve Koonin called O'Brien's premiere performance "extraordinary."

"Conan’s audience has been very vocal online, and he clearly made a smooth transition from Twitter to TBS,” Koonin said.

The question now is how much of his impressive debut audience O'Brien will be able to retain now that the long-running saga of his exit from NBC has truly come to an end. TBS will probably be happy if he's able to hold on to at least half of the viewers who watched the premiere.