As we predicted here, Conan O'Brien is planning to do his last Late Night broadcast six months before he takes over The Tonight Show so he can have a vacation and lots of prep time. He'll tentatively close out the 12:35 show on Dec. 31, 2008 and then the handover of power will probably be timed to coincide somehow with the "sweeps" rating period.
Oh — and before I forget, I wanted to mention this: For some time now, David Letterman has put in a four-day week. On Thursdays, they would tape two shows, one to air on Friday. They've just changed, and now the Friday show is being taped the previous Monday — which means that throughout the election season, Dave's Friday shows will have to be largely devoid of current events. He's already taped the show that will run this Friday, following the Thursday night presidential debate.
The move may seem necessary for Dave's health or staff fatigue or some other reason, but I think it's also a step in the wrong direction. Audiences in this Internet/cable news age are becoming more demanding of immediacy. Once upon a time, J. Carson could air one rerun a week (plus another on the weekend), and eight whole weeks of reruns per year…and those reruns were generally a year old. In today's late night market, that would be suicide. Dave and Jay air reruns sparingly and rarely reach back more than six or so weeks for them. Eventually, I'll predict, even that won't be enough. One of these days, someone's going to do a talk show which will not only be done live but will do away with prepared conversational points. It will also attempt stunts and bits that just might not work, and it'll be up to the host to keep things afloat. If they get the right host, that will become the new Gold Standard for late night TV.
(By the way: If all this seems trivial…well, it is. It's just my way of not getting a headache by trying to figure out the presidential election. Hmm…maybe Dave has the right idea…)