A REAL LATE NIGHT CHANGING OF THE GUARD

About six weeks ago, the news that Craig Kilborn was leaving his CBS Late, Late Show post smacked the entertainment world across the fact like a feather. Really, nobody cared, and plenty were probably quite happy. But today’s news is different. NBC announced, and Jay Leno apparently will as well on tonight’s Tonight Show, that in 2009 Conan O’Brien will replace Leno as host of the late-night institution. This is an absolutely brilliant move on the part of the executives at NBC, and that’s a statement I don’t make lightly.

It’s hard to believe that the battle for the Tonight Show between Leno and Letterman took place well-over a decade ago. Leno has already hosted The Tonight Show since 1992, and by 2009 he will have been at it 17 years. NBC was getting very concerned that O’Brien was going to jump ship, either to Fox, ABC, syndication or cable. There was even speculation that he could take his show to CBS in the post-Letterman slot and become the heir apparent to Dave. Whatever the rumors, O’Brien right now is probably the most valuable member of NBC’s late-night lineup. His show is the strongest comically of all four late night talkies, and unlike when Leno and Letterman were competing for the NBC slot, there is not another known late-night presence who could fill either 11:30 slot like Conan can. The closest possible commodity would be Jon Stewart, but he just re-upped with Comedy Central through the 2008 elections, and while a Stewart-O’Brien face-off in 2009 or 2010 (with the former replacing Letterman) would be interesting, I wonder if Stewart has any real interest in returning to that kind of late-night grind. The pressure on Comedy Central could never be as much as on CBS. I certainly don’t know what’s inside Stewart’s mind for the future — my 5 second handshake and non-personalized book signature at Border’s last week notwithstanding — but I think he’s had enough ups-and-downs and likes his current gig enough that he wouldn’t necessarily jump at the evil world of late-night.

But now NBC has the upper hand at dominance in the late night wars, as they are, for the next two-plus decades. Sure, another talent could come along out of nowhere — just like O’Brien did — but that person will have to win away the loyal following who have been watching Conan for the past-10 years and still do so almost every night.

Good on you NBC. You did something right.