by Carter, Bill
“When are we going to talk about late night?” Welch blurted out.
No one at NBC had missed the implications of David Letterman’s quick, impressive success in the ratings over at CBS. He was beating the “Tonight” show like a drum, night after night after night. The early results of the competition seemed definitive, with Letterman especially dominating the younger viewers that mattered most in television. NBC wasn’t even bothering to try to contradict the conclusions being drawn in the press anymore: that Dave was already established as late-night’s leading man. The recognition of that was so widespread that the subject wasn’t even being discussed formally inside NBC.
Except by Jack Welch. He wanted the issue addressed. Put on the spot, Warren Littlefield, a stand-up guy himself in the face of direct confrontation, jumped to respond to Welch’s challenge. “We can talk about late night anytime you want, Jack,” Warren said.
Jack wanted to discuss it right then and there. He had something he wanted to say; he had made his own evaluation of what had transpired, and it was time to get it off his chest.
“All I want to say about the late-night situation is this,” Welch said. “Ebersol, Rohrbeck, and—” Welch hesitated for the briefest moment before continuing, “—Wright were right. And Warren, you and Agoglia and—” again the slightest pause “—Welch were wrong.”
The group of executives on each coast knew that Jack Welch was putting the question of who was responsible for the decision to choose Jay Leno over David Letterman out on the table to ensure it did not fester inside NBC. By including himself on the wrong side of the decision, he softened the blow for Littlefield and Agoglia, the executives most exposed on the firing line for choosing Jay over Dave. Welch didn’t deal in recriminations; he wasn’t that type of corporate executive. Nor was he going to play games with the facts. The decision had been made. It looked as if those who had backed David Letterman had been correct in their assessment that he was a stronger television star than Jay Leno. It was time for NBC to acknowledge that truth and move on.
As Welch later put it: “Letterman has clearly been a success. Jay is doing well, but it really isn’t sampling anymore.”
With the last comment Welch was echoing Warren Littlefield’s own realistic assessment as the ratings settled into a normal pattern and Letterman regularly won the nightly competition—despite his 30 percent handicap in clearances. Warren had looked at the numbers for the first ten weeks of competition and said that Dave’s edge couldn’t be dismissed by NBC anymore as merely an indication that the audience was trying him out.
Welch said the real decision to pick Leno over Letterman had been made back in 1991, not in January 1993, during the last-minute reconsideration. “It was a decision made more than two years ago,” Welch said. “NBC made it. Obviously we’d be a lot happier if the ratings were reversed. But they’re not.”
As he had said in the meeting in Boca Raton, Welch himself had come down on the side of loyalty—and loyalty was Jay. “The decision we made, which was a commitment to Jay, we kept. Then we moved forward. And I supported that totally. So I’m part of that support system. I was part of that decision.”
Like others at NBC, Welch had questioned whether Letterman would be able to alter his style to adapt to the earlier time period. That question had been answered very quickly; Letterman had fine-tuned the act perfectly. His CBS show, virtually every NBC executive conceded, was being executed brilliantly.
Bob Wright was among the least surprised. “Dave has come out and done basically what I thought he would do,” Wright said. “Maybe to the surprise of some other people—not as much of a surprise to me.” Like Welch and most of the other NBC executives, Wright remained supportive of Jay. He didn’t want to say anything to undercut the network’s effort to prop up the “Tonight” franchise as best it could. But Wright’s close friends knew that as the Letterman show took off, sweeping up the best ratings in late night, all the best comments in the press, and the best part of the late-night advertising budgets, Bob had twinges of regret that he hadn’t gone all the way with his own instincts, which told him that Letterman’s was a one-of-a-kind talent. Some of Bob’s friends heard his wife, Suzanne, get on him after the fact, telling him that he should have trusted his gut, because it really was just as good as anyone’s on his programming staff.
Wright knew what Letterman’s ascension would mean: the end of NBC’s monopoly hold over late night and a sizable chunk of the profits it had generated. Putting as bright a face on it as he could, Wright concluded that the “Tonight” show could still make good money for the network—less money, but still good money. “That’s not an intolerable situation,” Wright said. “So our ego is hurt right now and maybe our pocketbook is lighter by some, but it’s not destroyed.”
Of course, everything that was coming out of NBC’s pocketbook was flowing directly into CBS’s, a development that galled Wright and the other NBC executives. As Littlefield saw it, CBS, which had never successfully developed anything in late night, had finally managed to establish a winner—purely out of the impossible circumstances NBC found itself in. Only by raiding NBC’s late-night talent, Littlefield said, had somebody else finally broken through the NBC late-night dominance.
CBS wasn’t quibbling about where David Letterman came from. All the network’s executives cared about was having him, and all he brought to the network. Letterman provided instant dividends. Even with his massive contract and the expenditures on the Ed Sullivan Theater, a total figure that exceeded $50 million, CBS figured to make some profits, perhaps $10 million, in Letterman’s first year.
The 4.1 rating that CBS guaranteed was so quickly eclipsed that within two months the network began releasing the commercials it had held in reserve for March and April to see if it would be forced to offer make-goods for any ratings shortfall. Advertisers got the message right away: Letterman was a late-night phenomenon. He was bringing in younger viewers in numbers the time period hadn’t seen since Carson’s greatest days. More than that, he was attracting the hardest viewers for advertisers to reach; Light television viewers, those who watched little or nothing regularly, were changing their habits to catch Dave.
Few shows anywhere on television had such an attractive audience makeup; high-income viewers, highly educated viewers, young men, young women, decision makers, homemakers. Young women, who were expected to be the hardest group for Letterman to reach, were actually his largest single constituency, beating even young men, who had always been his core audience. Advertisers began to line up at Letterman’s door like groupies, trying to buy their way into the sold-out show. Some movie companies, quickly recognizing that the profile of Letterman’s audience was almost a mirror of the main moviegoing audience, offered to double CBS’s established price of $30,000 for a thirty-second commercial, if the network would move some existing sponsors out and free up the time. CBS resisted that temptation, but did free up the make-good time to try to satisfy the movie companies. Other products, such as athletic shoes and jeans, beer and automobiles, bought time in CBS’s late night for the first time. Anheuser-Busch used buys in the Letterman show to help launch a new product line, Iced Bud.
Some of the sponsors buying into Letterman were new clients for CBS; they bought nothing in CBS’s prime-time lineup because its audience profile was so much older. Letterman was the ultimate rainmaker for CBS; new business was flying in the door. CBS’s only regret: It had badly undersold Letterman’s first season. The network could have charged 20 percent, even 30 percent, more and still sold out all the time in the show.
But that was the upside that loomed in the future. CBS realized shortly into the first season that its real opportunity to cash in on Letterman’s success would come the following summer, when it could walk into a hothouse seller’s market, offering jacked-up prices that would still find plenty of willing buyers. And if CBS could find the right 12:30 host to follow Letterman, someone who could effectively challenge the still-green Conan, the potential wa
s there for CBS to be the network thinking about a time period worth $50 million to $70 million a year in profits—not NBC. The transfer of funds was about to follow the transfer of power in late night.
The events of 1993 in late-night television inevitably conjured up the royal metaphor that had always been attached to Johnny Carson’s reign over the “Tonight” show: When Johnny, the King of Late Night, stepped down, he took off his crown and left it on the stage to be claimed by the next great late-night talent. Jay Leno had a year and a half to pick up that crown and put it on his head. He had to survive chaotic upheaval and even a threat from within his own camp. That he did both was a testament to his resiliency and his indefatigable willingness to keep on going forward. But a year and half later, the crown still eluded Jay’s grasp.
And then David Letterman came along, finally freed to seek the crown himself. Within a month, he had picked it up, carried it off, and fixed it firmly on his head.
For Jay Leno, it was back to the familiar struggle to prove himself. He had seen David Letterman pass him twice—first when Dave zoomed past him in the comedy clubs to rapid television stardom, a move that Jay trumped by leapfrogging Dave to get the “Tonight” show; and then when Dave, with no tradition of late night at his network and a far weaker lineup of stations, cruised on by to take the leadership in late night away from Jay.
A gentle, decent guy, though a far more complicated person than ever came across on television, Leno responded the only way he knew how: He worked harder. Jay worked his phones again to the press, the advertisers, and the NBC affiliates. He reminded them all that no matter what Dave was doing, Jay was still doing well.
And he was. His ratings were off, but not drastically. The makeup of his audience had gotten older, but there were still enough advertisers buying time to ensure NBC would have a business. The quick demise of Chevy Chase had made more people aware of just how hard it was to find a host who could do a comedy/talk show five nights a week, forty-plus weeks a year. The critics in the press didn’t give him the credit he deserved, but Jay could clearly do it. He was one of the few performers alive who could put a solid, late-night show on every night. He just couldn’t do it as well as one other guy.
Jay wasn’t the late-night leader anymore. The ratings, the almighty numbers that Jay had lived by, churned out the standings night after night, week after week—and every week that Dave won set a new record for the weeks that NBC’s “Tonight” show wasn’t in first place.
Inside the show, talk started early in the fall that it might be time to accept status as the second-best show in late night—or maybe even third-best, because ABC’s “Nightline” was having a big year and beating the “Tonight” show consistently and even Letterman occasionally. Through the end of the year, Jay himself didn’t accept that conclusion, and continued to express confidence that as time went on things would even out. “I always said it would take months and months before we really knew anything,” Jay said.
NBC’s view, as expressed by Warren Littlefield, was that the show still needed work. Warren and his head of late-night programs, Rick Ludwin, advanced several ideas, including one that Jay needed to add “comedy correspondents” to the show, other comics who could go to the scene of some goofy event and report back and interact with Jay. “I believe Jay has to go to the next level,” Warren said. “There are a number of things he does well and a number of things that can and will progress. We have an action plan on all of them. Helen has been gone over a year. All the wounds have mended. We want more out of the show.”
In November, Jay relented and accepted the need to add a head writer on the show. Reluctant as always to hurt anyone’s feelings, he tried to assure his holdover staff that they were not being slighted. Jay elevated one writer, Joe Medeiros, to be co–head writer with the new guy, Joe Toplyn. Toplyn, a talented and well-regarded writer out of the Harvard club, had solid credits—he began his career writing for David Letterman.
The addition of Toplyn, the introduction of “comedy correspondents,” Warren’s “action plan”—all reflected NBC’s unflagging commitment to Jay. But they also reflected the network’s conclusion that eighteen months into his tenure on the “Tonight” show, Jay Leno’s role as host was a work in progress.
More than just his doubters inside NBC were surprised at how adeptly David Letterman had changed his act to fit the earlier time period. As the weeks went on and Letterman turned in classy show after classy show, even members of his own staff marveled at his skill in modifying his comedy just enough to broaden out his audience base. He was managing to welcome viewers who might not have warmed to the quirkier style of his early years on “Late Night.” Yet he was not alienating those who had come to view him as a subversive, nonmainstream comic. He had become the wisest wise guy on television.
“Dave never discussed with any of us how he was going to change the show,” Robert Morton said. “That was all Dave. His instincts are incredible.”
One major difference in the new Dave was simply his peace of mind. Twice within the first three months of the show, Letterman called staff meetings, an almost unheard-of development. The purpose was mainly to give everyone encouragement, and to thank them for their efforts. At the second meeting Dave told the staff that this was the happiest time of his life.
“On the 12:30 show I never managed to control Dave,” Peter Lassally said. “Because Dave is Dave. And Dave was angry a lot of the time. During the three months that we were off, something happened to Dave, without, I think, our doing anything to him. Morty and I both felt there was a change in Dave. Some of the anger and frustration began to disappear.”
The nightly monologue, which Lassally felt Dave used to throw away on the old show because he never committed himself to doing it well, suddenly became important enough to Dave that he went out and sold it, night after night. “I mean, he committed to it,” Lassally said. “He had never committed to it before. And now he would just do a joke, stand there, and receive the laugh with a big, warm grin on his face. Well, that’s something I have not seen him do before. Boy, did that excite me. I mean, like a real performer, a confident performer putting it out there. That thrilled me.”
Morton said the transfer to CBS had worked a form of liberation on Letterman. “I think he felt underappreciated at NBC for all those years. And I think there was resentment that he was going out and doing his very best effort and doing good, strong shows, and the network didn’t even give a damn about him. And I think now he realizes he’s at a network where they really give a damn about him. And it’s very enjoyable. It makes doing the daily shows that much easier when you’re appreciated.”
Letterman even allowed himself to admit it was a kick finally to be on at 11:30. “It really is, it’s fun,” he said. “I was always worried about it. I thought, well, you know, especially when I was trying to rationalize not getting the ‘Tonight’ show, I thought, well maybe this is my lot. Maybe 12:30 is about all I can do. But now I just think: Why were we on at 12:30 all those years?”
Many times in his last several years at NBC, Letterman would finish a show and ask Morton what could possibly be wrong with that show, why it couldn’t play at 11:30 just as well as the thing? these other guys, like Jay and Arsenio, were doing. “I remember one time,” Letterman said, “when we were talking about something we had done, and Morty said, ‘Look at the guys who are on at 11:30.’ And he mentioned all the guys and I said, ‘Yeah, why can’t I be on at 11:30 if these guys are on at 11:30?’”
Letterman had been a ballplayer hitting close to .400 year after year who was being kept unjustly down on the farm, never allowed to go to the show so he could prove what he could do. All Letterman wanted was the chance to get to the majors, to 11:30. When the time came for NBC to decide who got that chance, it picked Jay Leno.
And so the successor to Johnny Carson packed up his office, his talent, and his vision and walked out of NBC forever, taking with him the last great franchise in the network television business
: late night.
POSTSCRIPT: SHOWDOWN IN MIDTOWN
If he had been a man who traded in metaphors, Jay Leno might have thought deeply about what had been happening to him and the “Tonight” show in that fall of 1994 as he rode in the elevator surging up more than sixty floors above Rockefeller Plaza.
He was on the rise; he could feel it. For the first sustained period of time since David Letterman had taken late night by storm at CBS, Leno had momentum. His numbers were up. So was his confidence.
For months, Jay had been telling his staff that Dave was vulnerable in the very area Letterman was always credited as being superior: comedy. Jay checked out Dave’s nightly monologue and found it increasingly spare of jokes. He also detected that Letterman’s comedy bits after the monologue were more and more often comedy stunts: Call the phone on the corner and talk some passerby into coming into the theater. Do some goofy bit with Mujibur and Sirajul, the two Bangladeshi souvenir peddlers up the street from Dave’s theater. Send out some guy in a bear suit to see if he could get a free hot dog from a street vendor.
“Where are the jokes?” Jay asked his friends. “I just don’t see the great comedy writing.”
In contrast, Jay had kept up his astonishing nightly joke quotient—16, 18, 20 jokes per monologue, always on the issues of the day: politics, Hollywood scandals, the hot story from the tabloids. “We’re always the most quoted show,” he pointed out proudly to the press. And he was convinced he was adding the bite and edge to the jokes that he had been criticized for leaving out when he first took over the show two years earlier.
From the beginning Jay had been willing to wade into the tricky waters of the O.J. Simpson murder case. He reasoned that the details of the case itself might be too sensitive for humor, but the insane media circus that surrounded it was surely fair game. He marveled at Letterman’s refusal to acknowledge the case even existed. Here was a story that the public was obsessed with and Dave was still telling jokes about Ted Kennedy dropping his pants. Letterman was obviously steering clear of the entire issue, presumably on the advice of his executive producer, Peter Lassally. When radio shock jock Howard Stern appeared as a guest with Letterman that summer, he pressured Dave into explaining why he wasn’t doing jokes on the O.J. trial. Letterman said he found it a hard subject to joke about.