Is Leno worth the money he is paid?

[2099net]

I've just read that Jay Leno has signed a contract for 5 years and will receive £50m (so I assume thats about $80m).

But he only gets an average audience of 6.2 million viewers. More shocking (for me at least) is Letterman (who I always assumed as the "king" of chat shows) gets an average of only 4.4 million viewers.

Now, I know America has more channels than the UK (although 48% of UK households now have access to over 50 tv channels) so competition between channels is more intense. But really, 6.2 million viewers in a population of 290m (source http://www.cia.gov/cia/publications/fac ... os/us.html ) - it's little more than a handful of the viewing public.

The UK we have a population of about 60m (source http://www.cia.gov/cia/publications/fac ... os/uk.html ) and yet we have perfectly good shows cancelled with viewing figures of 6 million because they're no pulling enough viewers!

So is Leno really worth the money he is paid? Is an American show considered a success if around 3 in every 100 watch it? Over here we have shows that 1 in 3 people watch!

[STASHONE]

Conan owns late night, hands down.

I dont even know why anyone bothers watching Leno, the only thing funny about him is his chin.

To go from Johnny Carson to that is blasphemous.

[2099net]

Didn't Conan upset the Canadian's STASH? Especially those living in Quebec!

[STASHONE]

haha Conan is hillarious..

I hardly watch any t.v. at all, ever, but I remember being in like 7th grade staying up late as hell just to watch Conan. Andy was one of the funniest people on the planet. The stuff they used to get into with each other was classic.

I remember back in 93-96 when he would get the worst guests. I think nipsy russell, jimmy walker, and abe bagoda were on the show every week. haha.

The funniest thing I ever saw on Conan was when he had just sat down at his desk to start talking about something when he hears a whale. He looks over to the stage and there's a giant cheesy-ass whale rolling around. He says "oh my god, a beached whale, this is terrible" the whale starts crying and keeps rolling around. Then some guy in the audience said something about how stupid whales are for getting beached and all of a sudden Gary Busey busts out of the whale costume, pulls out a revolver and shoots the guy. Conan comes over and says "ladies and gentlemen, Gary Busey!" They shake hands and Gary Busey walks off stage. He wasn't even a guest, he just did that skit. I laughed my ass of for the next hour.


Only John Stewart can touch that guy.

[karlsen]

Some time ago Fortune magazine wrote that Leno's Tonight Show earns NBC $100m per year, some 15% of its profits.

Since Leno began fronting the programme in 1992, he's made the company $1 billion. It is no wonder that they can pay him a little more to ensure that he stays

When you come to the paycheck I remember one of the cast in Friends said somehting great once when they were in a fight over the paycheck:

I know that I make more money then anybody deserves, but you have to remember that every Friends episode make so much money that if I don't get my fear share, the money just ends up in the studios pocket. I feel that I am entiteled to a sertain amount of what Friends make, even if that is a high number.

[2099net]

Here's where I got the viewing figures from:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/magazine/3592977.stm

The American chat-show host, Jay Leno, has signed a five-year contract worth more than £50m to continue fronting NBC's Tonight Show. His salary will still lag behind that of his rival David Letterman at CBS, despite Leno's superior audience rating of a daily 6.2 million, compared to Letterman's 4.4 million.

[karlsen]

Yes, I have read them myself and thats why I changed a little in my last post. I diged a little around myself and found the earnings for the show and that explains more of it. Read my last post again and you will se what I mean.

[2099net]

But how can the show make so much money if it only get's such a small percentage of the viewers each night? Do the advertisers really pay so much money for such little coverage? I can't do the maths, but it's what? Under 3%? Just over 3%?

We have shows on TV in the UK that get about 25-30% of the population - 20+ million people - watching and they don't bring in anything approaching that sort of money.

It sounds like madness to me!

[Luke]

Letterman gets paid even more for even less viewers, even with his reputation.

Leno is kind of "common man funny", but he's no Conan O'Brien. There's a good article in the New York Times today about Conan and other late night hosts. (http://www.nytimes.com/2004/04/04/arts/ ... 4CART.html - you have to register, but it's free)

Anyway, is anyone worth what they make in entertainment? I'd have to imagine so, or else they wouldn't be making that kind of money. Not a bad deal for them.

[goofystitch]

I don't like Jay Leno very much and only watch his show if somebody I am interested in is the guest. I love Conan and think Leno and Conac should switch time slots. Not only is Conan more funny in his interviews and opening monologues, but he also has those crazy characters that frequent, including mini Jay Leno!!! It dosen't get any better than Conan.

[wizzer]

i have more than 200 channels on my tv. and i don't watch any of them. my daughters watch cartoon network and nickelodeon- all day.

[Jack]

O'Brian is hilarious, and I agree that he is the funniest late night man of them all. On the other hand, very few jokes Jay Leno does do I laugh at - he's just entertaining. I think he's a little more appealing than O'Brian, he seems more down to earth, but I just don't consider him to be funny 95% of the time (Kevin Eubanks on the other hand should get his own show, I believe).

In the end, I don't think Jay deserves as much money as he does. But I could say that about a hundred other people in showbiz. At least he's enjoyable to watch.

[wizzer]

But how can the show make so much money if it only get's such a small percentage of the viewers each night? Do the advertisers really pay so much money for such little coverage? I can't do the maths, but it's what? Under 3%? Just over 3%?

We have shows on TV in the UK that get about 25-30% of the population - 20+ million people - watching and they don't bring in anything approaching that sort of money.

It sounds like madness to me!

to comment on this, i was listening to the sherwood schwartz commentary on the pilot episode of gilligans island and he said that back before cable when there was just the three major networks, the ratings had to be up at 30-40% just to get considered another season. he said now a days i think 12 - 14% was good enough to merit multiple seasons. i might be off on the numbers a bit but it's close.

[spencerhpaul]

its not madness, because the tonight show is the 2nd most profitable show for NBC, behind the today show.

[MickeyMousePal]

NBC just wants to keep Jay Leno on there network and not go somewhere else. Jay Leno is the King of Latenight anyways.

[Loomis]

So is Leno really worth the money he is paid? Is an American show considered a success if around 3 in every 100 watch it? Over here we have shows that 1 in 3 people watch!

Isn't funny at all. He opening monlogue goes on at least twice as long as Conan's (who at least has the good humour to laugh at his own failures), and his material is so obvious.

When a joke fails, he explains it until the audience doesn't care.
He will poke fun at Bush on one hand (who deserves it), but at the same time he will insult all the countries who regused to go to war (e.g. the French).

Bill Hicks used to do a famous riff on him, because at one time Leno was a great, cutting edge, underground comedian. Hicks used to really get stuck into him hocking Doritos and interviewing 15 year old soap stars. "So you got a car? You got a car? A girl? A girl?" He used to joke it was only a matter of time before Leno would blow his brains out on air, and the splatter would form the NBC peacock in the background - a company man until the end.

[pinkrenata]

Conan rocks my world!

[buffalobill]

To me Late Night TV died the night Bette Midler sang Johnny Carson off the air. NO ONE is worth that $, not AROD, not Cameron Diaz ($30 Mil per pic now) or any movie or tv actor, no CEO, nobody. BUT that being said if someone is willing to cut you a check for it I know I sure would accept it. You get what the market will bear. I like Letterman & Kilborn best, Leno is blah & just thinking about Conan makes me violently ill but comedy is subjective so he's been on a lot of years & must appeal to a lot of people. I just don't happen to be one of them.

The sad thing is in the end we pay all of the big $$$ all entertainers get. If it's a tv star, the advertisers pay more which of course gets passed on to the consumer. If it's a movie star well how do you like the prices of movies & concessions these days. If it's an athlete try to take a family to a game & pay for tickets, programs, food... without getting a 2nd mortgage on your house.

When athletes go on strike everybody says how overpaid they are & how they'll never go to a game again but every time they come back they set new attendance figures. It's sad but a fact of life that we probably will never be able to control.