At Long Last, Conan's NBC Exit Interview
Why didn’t Steve Kroft ask Conan O’Brien about George Lopez? Yes, I know Lopez - a congenial team player, by all accounts - has said that he is completely on-aboard with O’Brien’s upcoming TBS show pushing Lopez Tonight to midnight. But it’s still a relevant question, given that O’Brien negotiated a lucrative $30 million-plus exit agreement with NBC rather than have The Tonight Show with Conan O’Brien move to 12:05 a.m.
The George-is-cool-with-getting-shunted-to-midnight spin also smacks of, well, spin. And Kroft works for one of the last television news programs that actually takes its interview subjects to task; you’d think he’d ask.
So Kroft’s interview with O’Brien, promoted since the middle of last week, felt like the exit interview O’Brien never got to have with the executives at NBC who concluded that Jay Leno’s milquetoast jokes appealed better to flyover-state viewers than O’Brien’s absurdist, esoteric comedy.
For O’Brien, the whole episode still smarts.
“I went through some stuff. And I got very depressed at times. It was like a marriage breaking up suddenly, violently, quickly,” he said. “And I was just trying to figure out what happened.”
But his Legally Prohibited From Being Funny On Television comedy tour has been therapeutic.
“When we started putting this tour together, I started to feel better almost immediately,” O’Brien told Kroft. “And there is almost no better antidote to what I’ve just been through than to do this every night.”
The 60 Minutes segment also included the 2009 video of Jay Leno toeing the company line and welcoming O’Brien to The Tonight Show.
“I just want to say: I couldn’t be happier - you were the only choice - you were the perfect choice - you have been an absolute gentleman in private and in the press,” Leno said to O’Brien.
Since Leno was not interviewed for the 60 Minutes piece, Kroft tried to channel him, saying: “…Jay Leno thinks you got screwed. Jay Leno thinks he got screwed.”
“How did he get screwed again? Explain that part to me,” said O’Brien laughing. “I’m sorry. Jay’s got The Tonight Show. I have a beard and an inflatable bat. And I’m touring city to city. Who can say who won and who lost? I’m laughing because crying would be sad.”
The only time during the course of the interview that O’Brien seemed to visibly bristle was when Kroft confronted him with NBC Universal chief Jeff Zucker’s assertions that O’Brien’s Tonight Show was losing money. O’Brien was taking a sip from his water during the exchange.
“I don’t see how that’s, I honestly don’t see how that’s possible,” he said, holding his water glass aloft. “It’s really not possible. It isn’t possible.”
O’Brien told Korft he has not heard from Leno or Zucker in the wake of the late-night debacle, which is not terribly surprising given the rancor that engulfed the situation. But O’Brien basically grew up at NBC. And he went to Harvard with Zucker. And at one point he confessed, “At some point I’m sure I’m going to bump into these people. And, you know, I’m not sure we’re going to have our arms around each other and drinking beer and singing old Irish fight songs. But, you know, this is going to sound crazy. I do wish these people well.”
Kroft reminded him that Zucker said publicly that “viewers voted” with their remotes - and largely rejected O’Brien.
“Can I take back what I just said,” asked O’Brien.
Elaine commented:
It's a shame that people so often post without knowing little, if any, of the facts. It was Leno's show that was underperforming, not Conan's. It was Leno's show that was causing the affiliates to rebel, Leno's show that was losing the valuable viewers and completely denying both the local news and then The Tonight Show any sort of lead-in, every single weekday.
The fact that NBC tried to force Conan to move The Tonight Show back, thereby accommodating Leno's utter failure at the vaulted prime time show was because NBC would have had to pay Leno roughly 150 million dollars to release him from his contract, rather than the 32.5 mill. to release Conan.
Conan left The Tonight Show, not because he's some sort of spoiled brat, but because unlike Leno he respects the legacy of Johnny Carson and The Tonight Show and refused to partake in a move that would move The Tonight Show literally into the next day. Leno, on the other hand, was fully on board to wreck the franchise he supposedly loves.
Despite all of this, and the way Jeff Zucker has tried to spin the story, and the way that Jay Leno has run off to cry to Oprah and Jay Behar, and ESPECIALLY the way they've both flat-out lied in their retelling, Conan has been nothing but class throughout this entire debacle.
Next time, try to understand the facts before commenting, fellow posters.
Annie commented:
What is painfully apparent about O'Brien is that despite his high I.Q. his emotional maturity is that of an adolescent which may serve him well with his comedy but is a definite stumbling block in coping with real life. As soon as he felt that he wasn't getting the love from the powers that be he wanted out and pouts all the way to the bank.
"Earth to Conan...Earth to Conan". When an employee under performs bosses don't love you up in response. No doubt the the NBC execs were under the gun to fix the late night situation with the Comcast merger coming down the pike. And no doubt they needed a quick fix and couldn't wait "x" number of years for Conan to catch on if ever.
R.Ml Barp commented:
I agree with the Crister. Letterman must review a Carson tape a day or more so he can try to get the hand jestures down and the messing with his clothes down to the exact actions that were from Carson's natural reactions. Leno is the closest to being a real replacement for Carson he does not review the Carson tape daily. An then there was Conan, just a writer that should stay a writer and save his $15 Mil Net and whistle a fancy tune and perform in front of a giant mirror. Maybe he could join Letterman doing a two man show to a mirror - trying to be funny and saying everything bad about a country they can. Let them go to Iraq or Iran and do a show and belittle the Goverment, they would loose all the teeth and their heads.
The Crisster commented:
Leno, Letterman, and especially Conan. Three blind mice with no respect for anything but their own egos, and certainly none of them a pimple on the ass of Johnny Carson.