Monthly Archives: January 2010

I get a few messages a week asking me about The Garfield Show, a new series which claims me as one of its producers…and I also write a lot of episodes and voice-direct 'em all.

The show is seen all over the world…and in America and a few other countries, it's on Cartoon Network. Initially, they would run one episode in the morning and rerun it in the afternoon. The morning airing has been doing okay in the ratings. The afternoon airing has been doing so well that they now run two half-hours there each day…and neither is a rerun of the morning show. They've also added us to the Saturday and Sunday lineups, although we're not airing at all over the forthcoming Martin Luther King Day weekend.

We did a first season of 26 episodes and they're now all in rotation there. I have no idea why some episodes seem to air every 72 hours and others turn up about once every three months. Divisions of Time-Warner work in mysterious ways.

We're currently in production on a second season of 26 more half-hours. Just when they'll be completed is another thing about which I have no idea. We just recorded voice tracks for episodes 9 and 10 of this batch…so it'll be a while. I'm told a DVD release may be announced one of these days, as well. And I think that covers everything folks are asking me. Hope you catch an episode or two and that you like what you catch.

TMZ is claiming that Leno has signed a deal to host an hour-long Tonight Show for the next year. Daily Beast is claiming that a settlement has been negotiated on O'Brien's NBC contract and that he'll receive a huge check and the right to go elsewhere. Even if these stories aren't true at the moment, they probably will be.

Apparently, Conan's pretty mad at NBC about how this has all turned out…and NBC is pretty mad at him. This afternoon at the Television Critics Association Press Tour in Pasadena, Dick Ebersol went out to deliver the NBC spin, which is that Conan just plain failed and was stubbornly refusing to fix what he [Ebersol] thought was wrong with the show.

For what it's worth, I think the ratings O'Brien was getting were lower than can be explained by weak lead-ins, lack of support, just getting his bearings, etc. There was something fundamental about his Tonight Show that wasn't connecting with viewers…but I still think he should have been given more time. Conan's a talented guy with a sharp support team and it's far from inconceivable that he could have turned things around. (One question that may or may not be answered: Jeff Zucker's getting about 98% of the heat for this decision. Did he really make it or was it a demand from affiliates who looked at the mess NBC had at 10 PM, looked at how much of Leno's audience Conan had lost, and said, "Fix this now…or else!"?)

Anyway, we seem to be down to the point where Leno, O'Brien, Letterman and Kimmel are all hurling cheapshots, some enormously childish but funny. Is it just me or is there something odd about Conan and Dave accusing Jay of shoving aside the guy hosting The Tonight Show to get his job? Seems to me both of those guys have at least attempted that at one time or another.

I've been plugging a relief organization called Operation USA. Over the years, I've donated a lot of loot to causes and then found out that only about 30% of what I gave was actually going to feed the hungry or heal the sick, and 70% was going for administrative expenses or so the head of the organization could drive a Bentley to fund-raising events. When I met the folks behind Operation USA, I was impressed with…well, with how shabby their offices were, for one thing. And I was impressed with them. I then called someone I knew who was with a government agency that monitors charities to make sure they use at least some of your donations for their attended purpose. I asked about Operation USA and my friend there said, "Oh, they're one of the best! They do so much good."

That was enough for me but I'm happy to have corroboration. Corey Klemow (thanks, Corey) found this site which checks up on charities and tells you where their money goes. The listing for Operation USA says they're everything I always believed.

The Golden Globe Awards are this Sunday. I may actually watch for what I think will be the first time because Ricky Gervais is hosting and he seems to have the right attitude for the thing, which is not to take it seriously. My friend Bob Elisberg will be glad to tell you why this ceremony and the trophies it bestows aren't good for much more than citing in ads.

The Washington Times says that Barack Obama is doing a better job than George W. Bush did at trimming government spending. That's right: The Washington Times, a right-wing newspaper, said this. Of course, the two men were dealing with different Congresses and other factors…but the Washington Times is one of the main advocates of the belief that all Democrats are drunken sailors when it comes to the nation's wallet.

Fred Kaplan on U.S. relations with North Korea, which is just another one of the many places causing us trouble these days.

During the Nixon administration, White House aides discussed how they might bring Frank Sinatra into their camp as an ally of the President.

I vaguely recall reading in some book of a golf game that was arranged at one point with Nixon, Sinatra, Bob Hope and a fourth person. Apparently, the night before, Sinatra called Nixon's aides and asked if the golf carts would hold two people or four. He was told they held two, and that there would be two carts. Sinatra announced that he would ride with the President and that he would be furious — might even leave — if Hope rode with Nixon. The White House then checked with Hope who demanded he ride with Nixon.

Emergency meetings were held at the White House since no one wanted to piss off either Sinatra or Hope. They finally settled it by making the foursome into a sixsome, inviting along Vice-President Agnew and someone else, and getting a third cart…so Agnew rode with Nixon. Neither Hope nor Sinatra could take umbrage at that. One of the few things that administration did right.

The news out of Haiti is, of course, horrible. I don't have to tell you how horrible. What I can tell you is that if you feel motivated to donate money, you couldn't put that money to better use than to send it to the folks at Operation USA. Years ago, I worked on or around some charities and telethons, and saw how much of what they collected went to paying their fund-raisers, decorating their offices, etc. I know a couple of the folks who run Operation USA and they don't do any of that. The cash you give them goes just where you'd want it to go. So give them some.

An article that I wrote a year or three ago about Animation Writing is reprinted in the currently-on-sale issue of Written By, which is the kinda-fancy magazine published by the Writers Guild of America, West. The piece is not available online but if it ever is, I'll let you know.

Geoff Cameron writes to ask a question a lot of people are asking me…

Thank you for all your insights on the NBC late night situation but you haven't included the thing I most wanted to read, which is what would you do? If the network hired you to solve it, what would you do as the best solution?

I'd have an hour show on at 11:35 every evening in that slot. It would be called The Tonight Show. And then I'd pick one guy to host it and I'd stick with him for a long time, longer than seven months. Conan's show has been underperforming and I don't think it's just because of his lead-in. Still, he's right that they're giving up a little too quickly on him. In any case, I'd have an hour Tonight Show at 11:35 and then I'd have an hour of Late Night at 12:35.

I don't think I'd keep Jimmy Fallon on the latter. He's had over ten months and while there's something very likeable about the guy, I don't like his show and I don't see that America does, either. I wouldn't rush to replace him but I think I'd keep an eye out for someone who might fare better in that slot.

As for The Tonight Show, I'd pick Leno or O'Brien, commit to that person and stick with them for a while. You can't really set a fixed period because if a show plunges in ratings and becomes unprofitable, you may need to dump it sooner as opposed to later. But I'd commit to sticking with one or the other for at least the next year, providing the ratings didn't slip below some specified doomsday number. And then I'd try to make a deal to keep the other guy somewhere in "the NBC family" but I'd be prepared for him to walk and go elsewhere.

So which one would I pick, Jay or Conan? Tell you the truth, I haven't been all that impressed with either one for the last year or two. I liked them both a lot at one point but that point was in the past. Conan, I think, is trying way too hard to be the life of the party to the point of not letting anyone else on the premises be funny. (One encouraging move in the right direction is that they now have Andy Richter on the couch.) Jay, I think, is way too reliant on guest correspondents — not one of whom has caught on — and is too eager to finish the show, jump on a plane and go to Vegas and do his act at the Mirage. Both I think are relying too much on routines that have been done too many times.

I also think both shows (and Letterman's and what I've seen of Fallon's and Kimmel's) suffer from what I always think is wrong with talk shows, which is the general lack of spontaneity. Craig Ferguson has a little more than the others but he also doesn't do a lot more than mime to records and sit around and talk with guests. Every one of the other shows operates on the premise that there must never be a moment where the host doesn't know exactly what's going to happen next and he usually has to have a prepared line, whether he chooses to use it or not. He must know pretty much what each guest is going to say. If there's a demonstration, like if they're going to cook something, it has to be rehearsed. If anyone is going to go into a situation where the unpredictable could happen (say, to an event outside the studio), then you write as much of the segment in advance as is possible and you tape it in advance so you can edit it down to the required slickness. I think all these hosts are capable of handling situations where the unexpected can happen. They just don't do it very often.

One of the appeals of Johnny Carson was that he wasn't afraid to be on the spot. Some of the alleged spontaneity on his show was, of course, a sham. The guests were pre-interviewed and there was some loose rehearsal if Johnny did a bit away from the desk…but there was more presumption that the host could wing it and be funny…and if he fell on his ass, fine. That would be funny, too. We need more of that.

Picking one or the other, Jay or Conan, is a tough call. What I'd do is go to Jay and offer him a deal that would give him back The Tonight Show for at least two years (assuming a minimum rating) on the following conditions: He has to give up all or most stand-up gigs outside of Los Angeles. Instead, he should spend that time honing the monologues and taping his own damn remote segments instead of sending Ross the Intern or someone else we didn't tune in to watch. He has to dump segments like the Photo Booth, which he's not in, and some he is in like when they go to the Oakwood Apartments and talk residents into dressing up funny. Mr. Carson had a good instinct for when a bit was getting laughs from the studio audience but had worn out its welcome with the folks at home…and all of today's late night shows need to cultivate that.

So I'd offer Jay that deal and if he didn't agree, I'd go offer it to Conan. And like I said, I'd try to keep the other guy with the network in some capacity but I'd be prepared for him to go elsewhere. If it comes down to Leno on NBC at 11:30 and O'Brien on Fox at 11, I'd wager on Jay, especially if he doesn't come back and do the exact same show he was doing before.

No, it's not a perfect solution to the problem…and NBC isn't going to come up with one, either. It's a problem that shouldn't have happened. Someone (they say it's Jeff Zucker) had the idea a few years ago that by 2009, America would be tired of Leno and ready to welcome Conan onto The Tonight Show. Ergo, they could offer Tonight to Conan to keep him from going to another network then.

It didn't play out that way. As the date for the handoff drew nearer, it became obvious that Jay was, if anything, going up in the ratings and Conan was going down. So that was a bad call…one that Zucker may have made because he figured it would preserve the old late night configuration a few more years and that he'd be gone by the time it could possibly backfire. Well, he's still there (as of today, at least) and it's backfired…and by trying to keep both guys, they made things worse. They should cut their losses and give The Tonight Show to the person they think should host The Tonight Show instead of trying to divide the baby and give one guy the start time and the other guy, the name of the series.

That's what I'd do. And you know? It's fun to say things like this when you're not on the hot seat, no money is riding on your decision and you really can't ever be proven wrong. Let's see what the folks at NBC (who don't have that luxury) decide.