Summary
NBC Universal Television Entertainment chairman Jeff Gaspin opened a press conference here Sunday morning with a confirmation that Leno's foray into the 9 p.m. timeslot will come to an end because The Jay Leno Show "did not meet (NBC's) affiliates' needs."
"I would have liked nothing more than to give this a 52-week try," said Gaspin. "But starting in November, the affiliates started calling and saying, 'Wow, the impact on our local news has been more than we expected.' ... And at the end of November, they started saying, 'It's not really getting any better.' In some cases, they had the No. 1 newscast, and now it was No. 3; in other cases, they had lost a larger percentage than they thought they would. We were in constant dialogue with the affiliates, talking about the 52-week concept and waiting to see how this would do. ... And toward the middle of December, they made it very clear that they were going to start to get more vocal about their displeasure, and were even starting to talk about the possibility of pre-emption. And it was then that I realized that this was just not going to go well.""I don't think it's wrong to take chances," he said. "I think you have to take chances; sometimes they work, sometimes they don't. We might have been too early on this one. Maybe there's a little more life left for us to mine (with scripted programs at 9 p.m.). I hope so, because I'm going back to basics."See the full content of this document
Extract
It's True: Leno's Prime-Time Foray's Over
NBC confirms shuffle of the talk shows with move back to later time slot
PASADENA -- Well, it's official -- Jay is walking ... right out of prime time and back into the 10:35 p.m. timeslot he inhabited for 17 years as host of The Tonight Show.NBC Universal Television Entertainment ...See the full content of this document
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