New York – In a TV season when NBC is starved for good news at night, Jay Leno is providing some.
His “Tonight Show” has widened its lead over chief rival David Letterman, a noteworthy achievement given CBS’ prime-
time dominance and NBC’s fading fortunes. The typical “Tonight” audience has increased by 4 percent this year to 5.6 million viewers, while the “Late Show” is down 5 percent, according to Nielsen Media Research.
NBC believes Leno – who’s planning to turn “Tonight” over to Conan O’Brien in 2009 – has more nimbly responded to the changing late-night landscape, where viewers have many more choices than Jay, Dave and the soon-to-be-gone Ted Koppel.
“Jay’s show is different every night,” said Mark Evanier, a veteran TV series writer who has his own entertainment Web log. “I find it a better party to be at.”
Leno has won consistently for a decade now, but during that time Letterman’s camp has complained it wasn’t a fair fight. For years, NBC was the stronger primetime network, and CBS said that meant more passive viewers kept sets tuned to NBC. CBS’ loss of pro football in the 1990s (the National Football League is back now) meant fewer opportunities to promote Letterman to young men.
To NBC executives, those always smelled more like excuses than explanations, particularly that those handicaps are gone.
“Obviously, we’re thrilled to see that,” said Rick Ludwin, who supervises late-night programming for NBC.
CBS said it’s too early to draw conclusions, that this year’s numbers are skewed by Letterman’s odd decision to take off the second week of the TV season. Letterman is averaging 4.1 million viewers this season; ABC’s “Nightline” and Jimmy Kimmel are also down in the ratings.
The ratings can’t be a heartening development for the people at “Late Show,” who have never quite believed that more Americans consciously choose Leno.
“Dave is definitely not the essential viewing that he was even two, three years ago,” said Aaron Barnhart, critic for the Kansas City Star and longtime expert on late-night TV.
Letterman is now a traditional, old-school television choice, said Barnhart, who, like many critics, is no fan of Leno’s.
Hipsters have turned elsewhere; the late-night show to get the most attention this season is Stephen Colbert’s send-up of a clueless cable television host on Comedy Central.
“I watch (Letterman), but I don’t TiVo it,” he said. “I don’t feel a sense of urgency around the show – that has shifted now to Jon Stewart’s show. Whether that’s fair or not, the fact is that it’s happened.”
Leno has tried to freshen his show with comic contributors.
“You have to continually say to viewers, ‘You haven’t seen this yet, you have to come back,”‘ Ludwin said.
“I think that Mr. Letterman’s greatness is an established fact,” Evanier said. “But he’s also kind of mined his bag of tricks as far as they can go … I like to watch them, but I can’t watch them every night.”
“Late Show” executive producer Rob Burnett cautions against counting Letterman out. “If CBS and NBC continue in their current models, Dave will beat Jay,” Burnett said, “and I also don’t think it matters. Dave’s place in talk show history is secure no matter what happens.”
