The Conan O’Brien – Jay Leno brawl of 2010 has been front-page fodder for weeks, culminating in last night’s final show for Conan, which saw Tom Hanks walk on stage to the Beatle’s “Lovely Rita” (a tribute to his wife, Rita Wilson), allegedly costing NBC a cool half-million dollars.
The scorned O’Brien has been reaping vengeance on the fickle network for weeks now, having his band play expensive walk-out songs (Adam Sandler’s walk on stage was scored by “Satisfaction”), and also showing NFL highlights, which came at an exorbitant cost to NBC. O’Brien also cracked jokes aimed at NBC execs and at one point, engaged in a prolonged belly laugh with his sidekick Andy Richter after telling the audience about the huge financial loss NBC has taken over the Olympics.
However, on last night’s show, the mood was less bitter.
“Between my time at Saturday Night Live, The Late Night Show, and my brief run here on The Tonight Show, I have worked with NBC for over 20 years,” O’Brien said. ”Yes, we have our differences right now and yes, we’re going to go our separate ways. But this company has been my home for most of my adult life. I am enormously proud of the work we have done together, and I want to thank NBC for making it all possible.”
Conan also thanked his fans before performing “Free Bird” with Will Ferrell.
Since The Tonight Show tug-of-war has become public, O’Brien’s ratings have soared and he ironically has become the “it” man of late night and he is now reportedly being wooed by the likes of MTV, Comedy Central, TNT and Fox. Although he lost The Tonight Show to Leno, O’Brien may just break out as the winner of this fiasco, walking away with a cool $32.5 million settlement and a better reputation. Jay Leno, on the other hand, has been cast as the villain in this late night soap opera. Before the debut of the Jay Leno Show, NBC bombarded the airways with $10 million worth of Leno advertising, touting the proclamation that he would “change the face of comedy” - hardly a claim he could live up to. How he would go about this, they never said, but the over-the-top hype may have had a hand in dooming his short-lived show. In March, Leno will have the near-impossible task of taking back The Tonight Show. With O’Brien gone, the Leno backlash may just kill what’s left of it.
Think you have the inside track on what network O’Brien will jump to in September? Sports Interaction has all your Conan O’Brien odds in our entertainment betting section. Will Conan move to Fox, Comedy Central or even Al Jazzera? Yup, we’ve got odds on all of it.
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