Matt Kuhns writes…
If CBS has a replacement lined up, is that something that can effectively remain secret in this day and age? I know nothing about such deals; do they only need to involve a small number of people?
Sure. When the deal was made for Conan to take over for Jay, that was kept secret for a while. It was even kept secret from Jay for a few weeks. Then once Jay was told, it was kept secret for several months. Leno and NBC would have preferred for it to be kept secret for a few years but as a condition of signing on, O'Brien's team insisted that it be announced earlier than that.
I'm getting a lot of messages from people asking, "What about Chelsea Handler?" Or "What about Jerry Seinfeld?" or other names. I suspect it won't be someone over the age of 50. (Seinfeld is 59. Stephen Colbert at 49 would just make the cut.) This is not just because they want someone who can appeal to younger viewers but because they want someone who could conceivably be there for twenty years.
I also suspect that if CBS made up a list of contenders, now or months ago, it would include a lot of people who'd never done a talk show before. Most of the speculation is centering around folks who have — Handler, O'Brien, DeGeneres, etc. — but getting someone who's proven they can do it is only one way a network approaches something like this. They can also go the other way. When they needed someone to replace Letterman on NBC at 12:35, they picked a comedy writer with almost no on-camera experience…someone no one could have predicted. And when they needed a host to replace that guy, they went with a Saturday Night Live cast member…someone few would have predicted. (When they needed someone to replace that SNL cast member, they went with another SNL cast member but by that time, that was a precedent.) Craig Ferguson came out of left field, too. So did Jimmy Kimmel in a way.
11:35 might require a little more experience than 12:35 but there's also the drawback to someone who had their own talk show before. If they're available, that show ended for a reason.
In the meantime, this whole discussion of who'll replace Letterman is starting to sound like CNN taking five minutes of actual news on that missing plane and turning it into 24/7 coverage with silly speculation. It's not going to be Ellen DeGeneres. She already has a hit talk show that reaches more people and pays her more than Dave. It's not going to be Jimmy Kimmel. He also has a good job. It's not going to be Conan. Think how stupid CBS would look if they took on a guy NBC paid $40 million to get rid of and then failed with him. It's not going to be Howard Stern. He's 60 and he's Howard Stern. It's not going to be Leno and I'd be real surprised — "shocked" would be the word — if it's Chelsea.
My prediction: If they can make a deal with Colbert, it'll be Colbert. If they can't make a deal with Colbert, it'll be someone who isn't being mentioned at all at the moment.
But hey, what about Jon Stewart? I dunno. Maybe it's because I'm so perfectly happy to have him right where he is, I don't want to think it might be him. I'm guessing that if they can't make deal with Colbert, they can't make a deal with Stewart. Jon would do a great job but that would mean dismantling his whole little empire over at Comedy Central. My sense is it would not be a step up for him. It would take him sideways and, if he succeeded at CBS in that slightly-later time slot, that would lock him in to do only that for the next ten years. He couldn't take time off to direct a movie or do much of anything else.
I'm going to stop thinking and writing about this until something actually happens. I'm starting to sound like CNN treating speculation as more newsworthy than it is…