Late Night Television

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flyonthewall2983
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Re: Late Night Television

#251 Post by flyonthewall2983 » Wed Feb 11, 2015 6:35 am


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Andre Jurieu
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Re: Late Night Television

#252 Post by Andre Jurieu » Wed Feb 11, 2015 1:29 pm

mfunk9786 wrote:Sad, though? Fifteen years of success ending with everyone and their mother willing to essentially turn their network over to you at the snap of your fingers doesn't seem very sad to me. Stewart is in the amazing position to be able to experiment with anything he wants for the next few years... He's beaten the system and there's thousands of episodes to prove it.
Agreed. I'm actually impressed that Stewart knew when to walk away. As I've stated before, while the show is still good, Stewart has really looked weary and exhausted in the past couple years, and his growing frustration has been apparent. It's going to be interesting to watch how the show evolves from this point, because the timing of the decision really places Comedy Central in an difficult position, with the most likely candidates (Colbert & Oliver) already having moved onto more appealing projects/circumstances within the past year. Jessica Williams seems like the easiest choice among the current staff, but I have a feeling she might be sorting through better offers. I actually thought Bassem Youssef's recent appearance on the show was a way for the producers to test the waters with him and see if the audience responded to his delivery.

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Drucker
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Re: Late Night Television

#253 Post by Drucker » Wed Feb 11, 2015 5:00 pm

I would predict a bigger name gets to host though I'm not sure who (Lewis Black? Could he do it?) A bit of a blessing in disguise, but all of the best people on the show generally seem to get snapped up and given other offers. Jessica Williams is amazing, but I'd be shocked if someone so young/inexperienced is given a late-night gig (Colbert, Kimmel, Ferguson...all had TV experience under their belts, no matter how cult!) Look how long it took Larry Wilmore!

I honestly stopped watching the show a while ago. I don't think it's funny. It kind of got to be the same thing every night. As I've said elsewhere, it's basically a better, truer version of the nightly news. It's not particularly funny, unfortunately, these days though. And Stewart's attempts to claim that the show was just a comedy are not backed-up by his unevenness. He let certain politicians get away with bullshit, but went after people like Jim Cramer and Sebelius with true journalistic integrity and tenacity. What made him decide what was worthy of a freakout versus what was worthy of letting someone get away with bullshit?

My big hope is that Comedy Central is patient. Larry Wilmore's show is hit and miss thus far, but he'll get better and more comfortable in front of the camera. Just please don't pull a Conan-style fuckup and bail at the first sign of ratings trouble!

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dx23
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Re: Late Night Television

#254 Post by dx23 » Thu Feb 12, 2015 11:17 pm

mfunk9786 wrote:Sad, though? Fifteen years of success ending with everyone and their mother willing to essentially turn their network over to you at the snap of your fingers doesn't seem very sad to me. Stewart is in the amazing position to be able to experiment with anything he wants for the next few years. Beats the Larry Sanders version that was having Larry's guests shuffled around when he filled in as guest host. He's beaten the system and there's thousands of episodes to prove it.
Well, although everything you said is true, it still sad that he's leaving as he has become a fixture on many people's TV, including mine. I'm one that get the current news from him as his show is far more accurate than CNN, NBC and FOX combined. He's played an essential role in the political discourse in this country.

As for a replacement, I vote for Patton Oswalt as he is an intelligent, eloquent and seasoned comedian who can improvise and fill the role very close to what Stewart has done for the past 17 years.

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dx23
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Re: Late Night Television

#255 Post by dx23 » Fri Feb 13, 2015 12:34 am

Anyone knows why there are no new shows of the Daily and Nightly show tonight. Did they decide to go on a break on Wednesday?


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Re: Late Night Television

#257 Post by Numero Trois » Sun May 17, 2015 2:47 pm

I had the idea that Letterman's old morning show was him in a Kate Couric / Matt Lauer type of environment. But judging from these great clips, it was very much a direct precursor to Late Nite:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6p0sr2BejUk" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OVivLFz8f1k" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

http://www.esquire.com/entertainment/tv ... ning-show/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

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hearthesilence
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Re: Late Night Television

#258 Post by hearthesilence » Sun May 17, 2015 4:45 pm

I used to be a huge Letterman fan, and it was easier catching his show when I was in a different time zone and he came on an hour earlier. I haven't tuned into late night television for a long time due to the "later" East Coast broadcast times and other factors. (Viral YouTube videos of the best bits made it even easier to skip them too.) But I've seen a handful of these farewell shows - Seinfeld, John Mellencamp, Howard Stern/Don Rickles, Julia Roberts, George Clooney/Tom Waits - and they're as good as one can hope from someone who's grown into an elder statesman. Looking forward to the rest.

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Re: Late Night Television

#259 Post by flyonthewall2983 » Wed May 20, 2015 11:55 am



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hearthesilence
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Re: Late Night Television

#261 Post by hearthesilence » Wed May 20, 2015 4:33 pm

Last night's show was anticlimactic, especially compared to the slew of excellent shows that preceded it. Outside of Murray's big entrance (and exit), a lot of it was kind of on autopilot.

As for Dylan, I wasn't expecting great things from his performance - not surprisingly, instead of pulling out something special, he just stuck with a song from his new covers album (albeit an appropriate one) - but when he wasn't singing, he looked pretty confused. The guy's well past 70, so I shouldn't be surprised to see him a bit like my own grandfather in his lost moments, but it can throw you if you're used to seeing the guy rock out with fun and abandon.

Still, if Letterman goes for a low-key approach (think Carson's last show, a great, classy farewell), he could go out on a high note. They've already announced the Foo Fighters, but if it's mostly just Dave with the audience, it could be great - one thing that's actually gotten better over the years is his ability to just talk casually and unscripted with his viewers. Somewhere during his CBS run, it was like the Jack Paar side of him had finally blossomed, long after he developed the Carson and Steve Allen sides of his talents - he can be surprisingly open and poignant as well as funny in this context.

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lacritfan
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Re: Late Night Television

#262 Post by lacritfan » Thu May 21, 2015 6:35 pm

It's impossible to fit 33 years of Letterman (since the clips started from his day time show) into an hour long show (which stretched into 80 minutes, there must be a lot of pissed people who DVR'd it). It did feel a little uneven that they showed the entire Dave-as-Taco-Bell-employee sketch and then did basically a flip book of images during the Foo Fighters song but what can you do? They did have a behind-the-scenes segment with the crew and then ended with full end credits with pictures of the crew so that was an appropriate ending. Friday's show had the usually snarky Norm MacDonald actually choking and tearing up for the first time (that I've ever seen).

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Re: Late Night Television

#263 Post by Numero Trois » Fri May 22, 2015 5:14 pm

hearthesilence wrote:As for Dylan, I wasn't expecting great things from his performance - not surprisingly, instead of pulling out something special, he just stuck with a song from his new covers album (albeit an appropriate one) - but when he wasn't singing, he looked pretty confused. The guy's well past 70, so I shouldn't be surprised to see him a bit like my own grandfather in his lost moments, but it can throw you if you're used to seeing the guy rock out with fun and abandon.
Speaking of abandon, here's the backstory behind his first appearance on the show in 1984. A surprisingly strong performance, at that.

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hearthesilence
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Re: Late Night Television

#264 Post by hearthesilence » Sat May 23, 2015 12:02 pm

In the past decade or two, Letterman's show seem to rest more on his strength as an interviewer and storyteller, with the latter being a particular new development - his post-monologue chats were usually brief or nonexistent in his earlier days, but it became common for him to talk casually off-the-cuff for an extended period of time. I think 80% of the Letterman bits I've seen in the past 8 years came out of these off-the-cuff talks - anything else I'd catch online would usually be an interview, and this was a big change from Late Night, when most of the highlights were comedy bits prepared for the show.

Some critics have compared the tone of his latter day shows to that of Carson's Tonight Show predecessor Jack Paar, which made me wonder if Dave ever had him on the show?

He did, at least on Late Night. Great interview, Paar mentions Scorsese's The King of Comedy and talks at great length about Orson Welles' Mercury broadcast, and how that led to a measure of skepticism when news broke out about Pearl Harbor. (Both happened while he was working in radio in Cleveland.) He tops it off by telling the audience that "of all the young people around today, I like [Dave] the best."

Between this and Carson's obvious approval of Dave, it makes Leno's underhanded moves seem all the more like a shitty spoiler for what should have been. (Check out Carson's first appearance on Late Night in 1985 - it's implied that Letterman would be the natural successor, even just three years into Late Night, and you can see Carson's implicit approval throughout the interview, especially at the end.)

Forgot to mention, that final show was indeed a high note. Monologue was very uneven, but the rest was near perfect.

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Polybius
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Re: Late Night Television

#265 Post by Polybius » Sun May 24, 2015 5:53 am

hearthesilence wrote:Some critics have compared the tone of his latter day shows to that of Carson's Tonight Show predecessor Jack Paar, which made me wonder if Dave ever had him on the show?

He did, at least on Late Night. Great interview, Paar mentions Scorsese's The King of Comedy and talks at great length about Orson Welles' Mercury broadcast, and how that led to a measure of skepticism when news broke out about Pearl Harbor. (Both happened while he was working in radio in Cleveland.) He tops it off by telling the audience that "of all the young people around today, I like [Dave] the best."
My mom, who loved Parr and (especially) Carson, really liked that appearance.
Between this and Carson's obvious approval of Dave, it makes Leno's underhanded moves seem all the more like a shitty spoiler for what should have been.
I'd like to think the SNL sketch with Jeff Daniels playing Leno accurately summed up Carson's private opinion of him.

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Donald Brown
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Re: Late Night Television

#266 Post by Donald Brown » Wed Jul 01, 2015 8:59 pm

Colbert hijacked a public access show in Podunk, Michigan.

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Jeff
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Re: Late Night Television

#267 Post by Jeff » Thu Jul 16, 2015 1:27 am

Donald Brown wrote:Colbert hijacked a public access show in Podunk, Michigan.
Between that, and this bit released today, I feel like Colbert has alleviated any concerns I had about him hosting out of character. I wouldn't mind seeing him do the entire Late Show from this cubicle.

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dx23
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Re: Late Night Television

#268 Post by dx23 » Fri Aug 07, 2015 12:16 am

Truly sad tonight as Jon Stewart end his run. He truly change late-night TV and there is going to be a huge void left. John Oliver is doing a great job on Sundays and Wilmore is coming to his own but their shows are too specialized. I've been watching the Daily Show since the Kilborn days but when Jon Stewart took over it was when I really started paying attention to all the bullshit going on in US politics. Watching him became part of my daily ritual and there will certainly be a void in my household now that he's not going to be on.

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knives
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Re: Late Night Television

#269 Post by knives » Fri Aug 07, 2015 12:41 am

Though he has a replacement who seems not to be Leno-esque so fingers crossed on that.

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Highway 61
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Re: Late Night Television

#270 Post by Highway 61 » Wed Sep 09, 2015 5:09 am

So I can't be the only one who thought Colbert's first show was a complete disappointment, can I? He's going to waste his remarkable talent if he doesn't break out of the format of conventional monologues and interviews.

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hearthesilence
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Re: Late Night Television

#271 Post by hearthesilence » Wed Sep 09, 2015 9:11 am

That's the problem with the format (at least in that time slot on a major network), it ain't ever going to change, and everyone who takes the seat will get reeled in. Happened with Conan, and expected it to happen with Colbert. The best you could do is just tailor your talents to it, and I think Letterman's first two years at CBS is the best example of this, when he was actually trying to knock it out of the park just to show NBC what they had lost. Great stuff, but when you watch it side-by-side with Late Night with David Letterman, it's clear The Late Show was tailored to a more mainstream audience - a bit more conventional and more ingratiating, for starters.

I only saw the first 30 minutes on the way in to work, but it seemed fine for what he's dealing with.

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mfunk9786
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Re: Late Night Television

#272 Post by mfunk9786 » Wed Sep 09, 2015 9:44 am

It's a really bad idea to judge a late night show that's aired something like 200 times a year based on its first effort.

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hearthesilence
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Re: Late Night Television

#273 Post by hearthesilence » Wed Sep 09, 2015 10:11 am

Yeah, that's a given, but it's still the show that sets the tone, one that that took nine months to prep. Regardless of whether it turns out to be a bad, good or simply an average night in terms of material, we're just commenting on the direction they've staked out.

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Re: Late Night Television

#274 Post by pzadvance » Wed Sep 09, 2015 5:26 pm

There were moments of disappointingly obligatory talk show fare-- the monologue, some parts of the Clooney conversation, but overall I think a lot of the Colbert Report DNA remained intact. I'm really liking his balanced choice of guests so far, too. I remain cautiously optimistic that he won't fall prey to the format and will remain the opinionated, intelligent, and goofy Colbert I know and love.

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starmanof51
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Re: Late Night Television

#275 Post by starmanof51 » Wed Sep 09, 2015 5:44 pm

Did you ever see Jon Stewart's first day on the Daily Show? It looked like almost a public access show (which is to say, the Kilbourne set was still in play), and Jon looked like a hostage reading his kidnapper's demands

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