So it’s lunch time at the Press Tour ABC day. ABC President, Entertainment Group, Stephen McPherson, made his several announcements, including the Season Two pick up of The Middle, Modern Family and Cougar Town, and his comment on the whole Jay Leno/Tonight Show with Conan O’Brien debacle.
Then an hour or so later, it breaks that Conan O’Brien has issued a statement that he will not do The Tonight Show if NBC moves it to 12:05 a.m. And there is no equivocation in the statement as published on the New York Times website.
Kinda throws McPherson’s statement of love for his late-night comedian Jimmy Kimmel into an interesting light. It could be that McPherson already knew about Conan’s statement before the 10 a.m. (PT) press conference, but it would be interesting to know.
Again, as parents, why do we care? Well, who you’re going to root for in the current late night war has a lot to do with who you perceive to be more family-friendly – although by the time your kids are old enough to stay up for these shows, they’re probably old enough to watch them.
Also, the jockeying and brinksmanship is kind of fun to watch, too. This is the kind of dealmaking that goes on in corporations all the time and it’s rare that the public gets to see it. There may be some life lessons in what happens.
Finally, it helps us to see what TV executives are thinking about – not a bad thing to know when you’re considering what you’re going to watch.
Anne Louise Bannon
Your Family Viewer
