Welcome to the Last Night Show from The Comedy Channel
Good to see that The Comedy Channel’s repertoire includes irony.
It put out a programming announcement today on the return of Jay Leno to The Tonight Show.
Followers of US late night TV wars (and who isn’t?) will already be aware that Leno gave up the show to take an earlier slot, which then flopped in the ratings.
However new host Conan O’Brien resisted a move to switch The Tonight Show from it’s traditional 11.35pm slot to after midnight to make room for a later Leno show. As a result O’Brien left NBC, and Leno returned to the Tonight Show, which remained in its vital 11.35pm slot.
As O’Brien put it at the time: “I believe that delaying The Tonight Show into the next day to accommodate another comedy program will seriously damage what I consider to be the greatest franchise in the history of broadcasting. The Tonight Show at 12:05 simply isn’t the Tonight Show.”
Not so in Australia, apparently. According to today’s press release from the Comedy Channel in Australia (and forgive them their shouty cpaital letters): “THE TONIGHT SHOW WITH JAY LENO premieres in Australia exclusively on THE COMEDY CHANNEL weeknights at 12.00am midnight from Wednesday night March 3, 2010.”
O’Brien would be spinning in his grave. If he was dead.
Hope Leno crashes and burns when he returns to the Tonight Show….Conan was good!
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