Late Night Chaos Continues: All Hosts Go Hard with Hate for NBC
The day after Co Co said No No to moving his time slot, Gawker.TV covered all of the late night shows to make sure not a single quip or sly remark escaped our radar. And tonight, nobody held back.
I. The Tonight Show With Conan O'Brien
Updated: 12:15 AM
Conan opened his monologue by reminding all the kids out there who have big dreams that "You can do anything, as long as Jay Leno doesn't want to do it, too." He followed that with a little Leno bounce 'n honk. Then he reminded world that 83% of voters in a TV Guide poll want him to stay at 11:35.
Conan rehashed the politician overdubbing bit, using Hugo Chavez, Francois Fillon, the Pope, and Gordon Brown.
Most notably, NBC will:
- Move the Winter Olympics to the summer, but still call them the Winter Olympics.
- Replace the flags on the giant slalom course with breached NBC contracts.
- Reserve the right to cancel ski jumps mid-jump.
- Move bronze up to Gold's place, Silver stays where it is, and add a new medal for fourth place called the "NBC."
Then Kenneth the Page from 30 Rock sauntered in and explained to his tour group that they were in "the former home of the Tonight Show with Conan O'Brien."
When Conan tried to kick him off, Kenneth reminded Conan he was on the 5 o'clock tour. If they changed the time of the 5 o'clock tour, it wouldn't be the same.
It just wouldn't be the same, would it?
Updated: 12:45 AM
To introduce Ricky Gervais, Conan said, "on Sunday, you can see him hosting the Golden Globe awards on a network that will remain nameless" — only to be interrupted by NBC's trademark xylophone.
Ricky did his plugs early in the interview, just in case the show got cancelled before he had the chance. After the plugs, Ricky asked Conan what he was going to do, since he had "no discernible skills."
Later in the interview, Ricky wondered if the show was even going out, presuming they were "probably doing reruns of Leno or something." Conan kicked it to commercial, saying there was a 70% chance he'd be back after the break.
Ricky expressed concern about Conan. Conan said, "It's all good." Ricky asked, "Who cares if it isn't? What can they do, fucking fire you?" The two then proceeded to "go mental" by plugging Ricky's new animated show.
II. The Jay Leno Show
Updated 10:00 PM
Leno brought out the big guns tonight...kinda.
The Bad Boy of Late Night called NBC "America's Most Dysfunctional TV Family" and then attempted to react to Jimmy Kimmel's virtuoso impersonation last night by mentioning the fact that they have different hair colors.
Comedy Gold? The jury's out.
Later, he interrupted his monologue by kicking it to the "late local news." Tonya, the faux-anchor says "an NFL player suffers his seventeenth concussion and is forced to become an NBC executive. We have all the details."
Updated: 12:00 AM
III.The Late Show With David Letterman
So Dave devoted the better part of his monologue to rip Jay and NBC once again. He asked what NBC is going to fill the five hours of priometime space every week in lieu of Jay's absence. His answer? YouTube cat videos! The funny thing is, Jay Leno ran an ENTIRE SEGMENT of YouTube viral videos on his show tonight. So I guess he's not that far off.
One of the more astute observations he made: "When Johhny Carson quit, he quit." He also took the opportunity to take yet another low-blow at Carson Daly. Poor Carson. He's really turned into the red-headed stepchild in this whole debacle.
Dave then went on to examine "Jay Leno: The Early Years," where he sabotaged a production of Peter Pan. He then examined Jay's other plans in the works, including taking over Arsenio Hall's show, and then have a show broadcast from Merv Griffin's grave.
However, Letterman tried to be constructive, too. In between rants about Jeff Zucker, he proposed inviting Leno, Conan, Fallon, and Carson onto his show. And they will not leave the theater until everybody has a show.
And here's the "Top 10 Messages on Jeff Zucker's Voicemail." He spends a good two minutes ripping Zucker before he gets to the Top 10. If you want to just see the Top 10, skip to the 50 second mark.
Updated: 1:05 AM
IV. Late Night with Jimmy Fallon
Fallon jumped right in at the head of the show
Jimmy then addressed the "Late Night craziness," saying he was "happy to have a job." He was equanimous and gave props where props were due (to both Conan and Leno).
Updated: 12:30 AM
V. Jimmy Kimmel Live!
So Kimmel came out as Jimmy Kimmel tonight. We're a little disappointed. We were really hoping he would've done Carson Daly. He addressed his Leno transformation from last night, and actually revealed that Leno's people called him to have him on Leno's show.
Updated: 12:57 AM
VI. The Late Late Show With Craig Ferguson
Tonight, Ferguson stuck with what he knows best: puppets. The first shot in his cold open was a stick puppet of Jeff Zucker trying to recruit him to go onto NBC. After that, he admitted at how fed up he is with the whole situation.
Updated: 2:05 AM
VII. Last Call with Carson Daly
Carson didn't say a thing. Big surprise.
9:00 PM It Begins
Letterman started things off early tonight, with a video wherein he attacks the "bungling machinations of the idiots at the NBC executive level" with a story about the "pinheads, nitwits, twits, knuckledraggers, and mouthbreathers" in charge.
This post will be updated as the night continues, so stay tuned!