LNT: Year 2 (week 13)

It’s Conan’s last week in New York, so we’re not going to waste time ripping on monologues (It would have been Dave’s turn this week though.) and Carson. It’s the end of an era, and quite possibly more importantly, we’re going to be sans Conan until June. Not good times. This gives us a lot of time to reminisce, especially while we’re watching Jimmy Fallon nervously giggle through interviews with American Gladiators and whatever other detritus NBC foists on him. Conan right now gets stuck with plenty of garbage, what kind of slim pickings will Fallon have after Leno and Conan? Yeesh. Anyways, tt’s time to not just remember the good times, but to look forward to what the future can bring. Namely, more Norm since he lives in LA where Conan will be. Yes we can, indeed.

One last thing before we get to the listings, tune in Wednesday morning for a new feature you may want to check before you head off to buy comics.

Monday:

• The Tonight Show With Jay Leno - Kevin Bacon, Josh Tickell, Lily Allen
• The Late Show with David Letterman - Ellen Pompeo, Daytona 500 winner Matt Kenseth, Willie Nelson w/ Asleep at the Wheel
• Late Night with Conan O’Brien - Bob Saget, thenewno2
• The Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson - David Boreanaz, Philip Johnson, Zac Brown Band
• Jimmy Kimmel Live - Anne Hathaway, Jensen Ackles, Lenka
• Last Call with Carson Daly - Derek Luke, Puddle of Mudd

STEPHAN: Dave’s going to be energetic tonight. After whipping through Ellen Pompeo selling Old School 2: Now We’re a Law School, Dave gets to talk about racing cars with Matt Kenseth and finishes up with a performance by the Red Headed Stranger. It’s enough to make up for a pretty subpar Conan lineup. In fact, I’d almost recommend watching David Boreanaz on Craiggers instead. Boreanaz is a good interviewee, and he’s sure to say something interesting.

ERECH: Conan ramps it up to go out with a bang, but mostly peters out. Bog Saget into a band nobody has ever heard of? Most of this weeks schedule is in the TBA crowd, but I heard we might see Jerry Seinfeld and a few other surprises mixed in there too, so maybe we’ll get something good. On paper at least, pretty disappointing line-up for the final week of what is probably our favorite late night talk show on the books.

Leno has Lily Allen on tonight, too bad her new album sucks. Get an eyeful of her while you can, she’s gonna be off the radar in 6 months from now, bet. (or she’ll show her no-boobs some more and put out just 1 more album that absolutely nobody plays. then she’ll really be done for!)

Tuesday:

• The Tonight Show With Jay Leno - Jennifer Love Hewitt, Travis Astrana, Andrew Bird
• The Late Show with David Letterman - Bonnie Hunt, M. Ward
• Late Night with Conan O’Brien - Jason Sudeikis, TBA
• The Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson - Bill Maher, Chris Klein
• Jimmy Kimmel Live - Tyler Perry, Blues Traveler
• Last Call with Carson Daly - Stacy Peralta

ERECH: Dave and Bonnie Hunt get along like peas in a pod. I just had to check to make sure it wasn’t cancelled yet, but sadly it hasn’t been - Bonnie Hunt’s talkshow is pretty awful after all. Which is odd, because Bonnie is so great. Of course, the chips are stacked against her - it’s a daytime talkie and it’s syndicated too (which means her budget is like 6 dollars an eppie). Still, that’s no excuse for the rest of it being bad, and it is. But Dave’ll be good tonight, so watch that and pretend you didn’t just read this whole thing about her talk show.

Fergie has a weird show tonight. It’s not a secret around these parts that I’m not a fan of Maher, but man, scoring Chris Klein is a coup! I mean I can hardly wait for his latest movie, Street Fighter: The legend of Chun Li. This is the movie that 40 year old asian chick who plays Lana left Smallville for - no surprise she’s already back on the show by like the 2nd episode of the new season, yeah? Seriously, check out this trailer:

Seriously Hollywoods??

STEPHAN: Hey, that 40 year old Asian chick is ranked #1401 in Forbes’ Star Currency list (Hat tip to the folks over at the always great Defamer). Chris Klein is all the way up at 501 somehow. That pie humping movie must be big in India or something. It doesn’t really matter though because Floyd is back in the Zone. This’s going to be a good one.

Wednesday:

• The Tonight Show With Jay Leno - Charlie Sheen, Arianna Huffington, Lisa Hannigan
• The Late Show with David Letterman - Donald Trump, Antony and the Johnsons
• Late Night with Conan O’Brien - Nathan Lane, TBA
• The Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson - Wynonna, Peter Bart
• Jimmy Kimmel Live - Naomi Watts, Whitney Port, K’Naan
• Last Call with Carson Daly - Lykke Li

STEPHAN: I like Talk Show Guest Nathan Lane, but enough to really recommend him to other people? Probably not. Instead I’m going to take a second to tell everyone to record the SNL episode hosted by Lindsay Lohan with musical guest Usher. The E! Channel has been playing it a lot, probably because it’s right before Lindsay fell apart and half the sketches are about her great rack. Hidden within all that delightful rack humor (really, it’s the one universal humor) is a Debbie Downer sketch that goes masterfully off the rails. Debbie Downer is with a bunch of people at Disney World, and for some reason Jimmy Fallon and Horatio Sanz are seated across from each other at a table. So, of course, they’re both giggling incessantly right from the beginning of the sketch. Then Debbie blows a line, and the whole sketch falls apart. It’s fantastically entertaining, and I guarantee you won’t laugh harder at a woman declaring herself infertile anywhere else.

ERECH: I don’t care for any of these shows tonight, not a single one of them. Conan going out with Nathan Lane in the last week makes me think his show is getting cancelled, not that he’s TAKING OVER THE BIGGEST TENTPOLE FRANCHISE IN LATE NIGHT TELEVISION OF ALL TIME HISTORIES OF EVER!!! Man, what a wash.

To make up for my lack of recommendations for you to watch though, I’ll throw up this clip of another classic Conan moment, as chosen’d by me!

Thursday:

• The Tonight Show With Jay Leno - Dennis Miller, Freida Pinto, A.R. Rahman
• The Late Show with David Letterman - David Spade, David Sanborn with Sam Moore
• Late Night with Conan O’Brien - TBA
• The Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson - Paula Abdul, Carl Edwards
• Jimmy Kimmel Live - Rosie Perez, Danny McBride, Anya Marina
• Last Call with Carson Daly - Joey Fatone

ERECH: If Jimmy could get Rosie Perez to stick around on the couch during Danny McBride’s segment, I will totally watch it. That, my friends, is assured to be funny - but only IF.

And look at the winner Carson is rocking. Seriously, why are we talking about this guy? You guys aren’t watching, and we aren’t telling you to - what’s the point? Carson, you got 1 more week to get it together, or you’re gonna get ex-communicated, and that’s a promise you can take to the bank!

STEPHAN: Frieda Pinto is the lady in Slumdog Millionaire who just dumped her fiance because she’s in Slumdog Millionaire. One of us! One of us! Some quick googling says she’s got a degree in English Literature, so expect her entire segment to be her explaining Dennis Miller’s earlier quips to Jay.

Friday:

• The Tonight Show With Jay Leno - Meredith Vieira, Tom Papa, Chris Isaak
• The Late Show with David Letterman - Barbara Walters, Mike Birbiglia, Shemekia Copeland
• Late Night with Conan O’Brien - FINAL SHOW TBA
• The Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson - Rosie O’Donnell, the Knux
• Jimmy Kimmel Live - Dev Patel, Robin Roberts, Kinky
• Last Call with Carson Daly - TBA

STEPHAN: Birbigs! Barbara Walters into Birbigs is a pretty great way to get to Conan’s last show in New York. There almost has to be a Letterman appearance at some point, doesn’t there? I know he hates NBC, but he seems to have liked Conan well enough, and Late Night was his show first after all.

ERECH: Well that’s it, the last Conze. Sure, we’ll get some new laughs in a few months when he moves to L.A., but it won’t be the same. Not at all. I’m gonna have some booze tonight, and maybe cry, but I gotta say right now as I am typing this the only thing I can feel is just a bit of MEH. Make me care more Conan, because I should be one of the guys who cares the most!

And that’s the end of an era, isn’t it? Conan O’Brien showed up with the biggest “wait, who?” reaction we’ve seen since that one time Optimus Prime showed up at our Bar Mitzvah (hey, remember that time…). 16 years later, and he’s about to become the king of late night television (that is, once Dave hands over the crown officially), who would’a thunk it?

Late Night Thing asked all our readers to sum up their thoughts on the Conan O’Brien experience, and here are just a few of the ones that didn’t contain that many typo’s or misspellings.

SW in Illinois wrote:

Yeah gonna be sad to see him go. The tonight show isnt gonna be like his show at all i dont think.

Murray in Alabama wrote:

As happy as I am for my favorite writer/host to be getting the late night gig of a lifetime, I’m wondering how “family friendly” NBC will urge him to be? I hope this isn’t the last we’ll see of the Masturbating Bear and Co.

Whatever happens, I’m sure this week will be a sight to see. And to poop on.

Lettermanfan in NJ wrote:

I like Conan, but now watching him is going to happen less often. Letterman is still the king for me. Especially after his recent Blagjovich and Joquain Phoenix interviews.

Chris Plava in Los Angeles wrote:

I stopped watching it once the writers came back. I love Conan, but after watching him and the show while it had no writers, it just made the show seem a lot worse once they came back. No writers + Conan = GOLD!

Sammy the Spy in Alabama wrote:

I use to love Conan back in high school, but then Andy left and the show was never the same IMO. All the best to him though.

So there you have it. The message seems clear, at least from our limited polling numbers (who knew we had so many readers in Alabama too??) - Conan taking over The Tonight Show isn’t ringing anybody’s bell. Sure, NBC inadvertently made a smart play here. They kept Jay out of the 11:35 competition at Fox or ABC. They keep him happy, and eliminate their failing 10pm genre timeslots every night in one fell swoop (and will finally be able to compete against CSI Pawtucket and Old Guy Solves Old Crimes over at CBS too). AND, if Conan fails too miserably, they can maybe even switch it all back PRESTO-CHANGEO style by keeping Jay in their pocket, ready to leap. ALSO, the best part, if Jay’s 10pm show totally flops, his likelihood of having a successful show competing against Conan will be slim to none now as no other network will want him as badly in a year from now, and then NBC can get rid of him once and for all and completely take him off the network playing table (Jay and a cable or HBO show would be a better fit anyways is what we’re thinking).

We’re not saying NBC is smart enough to have come up with this strategy on purpose, but it’s going to work out in their favor for sure, no matter which way it goes. That doesn’t mean Conan needed to play along here though, not at all. But hey, what do we know?

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