The Late Shift 2010: NBC Shuffles Late Night?

A big bomb hit the web today with rumors of a big shakeup on NBC's late night roster. Would Leno be dropped, or replace Conan? Well, apparently one great thing about the internet is that rumors travel fast and NBC was quick to dispel the disinformation. That is, if the New York Times is on your list of reliable sources. Here's the scoop, and it's weird.

Today:
Leno at 10:00 PM
Conan at 11:35 PM
Fallon at 12:35 AM
Carson Daly at 1:05 AM

Soon:
Leno at 11:35 PM
Conan at 12:05 AM
Fallon at 1:05 AM
Carson Daly...???

So basically, Leno gets his old slot back, Conan goes on later than now (but earlier than before), and Fallon and Carson Daly get pretty hosed. Will America stand for what might be about a sold hour of monologue and desk jokes each night?

Stuff You Probably Missed: Fallon Edition Mark II

Every now and then we post some of the best bits from Late Night with Jimmy Fallon, which you are likely not watching. Which is a shame, because in the last 9 months Fallon's show has turned into a worthy successor to Late Night with Conan O'Brien.

Anyway, here are some of the best recent bits:

Seriously, it's good stuff.

This Week in Late Night: Post-Post-Letterman Edition

Everybody's on TV this week, making the rounds throughout the late night suit-and-tie circuit. This week's big winner is clearly Jimmy Fallon, although the battle between Regis Philbin and Larry David on Live! might be well worth seeing tomorrow. Set your DVRs, productive and employed people!

THE TONIGHT SHOW WITH CONAN O'BRIEN
10.5 Kevin Nealon
10.7 Jason Bateman

LATE NIGHT WITH JIMMY FALLON
10.5 Kristen Wiig
10.6 Lewis Black, They Might Be Giants
10.7 Chevy Chase
10.9 Martin Short

LAST CALL WITH CARSON DALY
10.5 Seth Green
10.9 Glenn Howerton

THE LATE SHOW WITH DAVID LETTERMAN
10.5 Steve Martin
10.9 Jon Hamm, Andy Kindler

JIMMY KIMMEL LIVE
10.5 David Alan Grier
10.7 Joel McHale

THE JAY LENO SHOW
10.7 Wanda Sykes
10.8 Jack Black

THE DAILY SHOW WITH JON STEWART
10.5 Sarah Vowell

TELEVISION FOR THE UNEMPLOYED

THE VIEW
10.6 Steve Martin, David Alan Grier
10.7 Chris Rock

LIVE WITH REGIS AND KELLY
10.6 Larry David
10.7 Chevy Chase

THE ELLEN DEGENERES SHOW
10.5 Julia Louis-Dreyfus, Jason Schwartzman
10.7 Kevin Nealon
10.9 Jason Bateman

This Week in Late Night: Get Ready to Stifle your Vomit

So the fall TV season is in full swing and that means pretty much everyone is on; Letterman obviously scored the biggest guest of the week – he’s got the President on tonight (although if we’re going by girth, Leno has Rush Limbaugh on Thursday, if you want to tune in to what might be the least watchable hour of television ever broadcast)

(Seriously, Rush fucking Limbaugh on the Jay Leno Show? Can anyone name something worse than this?)

(Fucking Leno!)

Also, an update: we’re not listing Chelsea Handler’s comics anymore because it’s a rotating panel of comedians and every week it’s pretty much the same 20 people or so.

Anyway, let’s get to it.

LETTERMAN

9.24 Craig Ferguson

CONAN

9.21 Ricky Gervais

9.22 Lisa Lampanelli

9.23 Martin Short

9.24 Joel McHale

9.25 Seth MacFarlane

FERGUSON

9.24 Jason Schwartzman

9.25 Ted Danson

FALLON

9.22 Seth Meyers

9.23 Amy Poehler

9.24 Anthony Anderson

9.25 Kevin Smith

LENO

9.22 Pee Wee Herman, Amy Poehler

9.23 Vince Vaughn

This Week in Late Night: The Beginning of the End

So this week NBC’s giant potentially disastrous experiment begins, with Jay Leno and his oh-so-mayonnaise brand of comedy premiering in a cozy 10pm nightly spot, competing with, oh, every major primetime drama that airs during the week and potentially sapping both viewers and guests away from Conan and Jimmy Fallon.

There are a handful of reports out there from test show tapings and it all sounds like it’s going to be about as much fun as a stale loaf of Wonder bread, but we’ll be watching tonight to see just how blandtastic it is. At least Jerry Seinfeld is on.

To counter the Leno invasion, not only is Louis CK on Conan, this week is also the Glorious Return of Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert, and to make it even sweeter, Stewart has Ricky Gervais on this Thursday. So maybe that’ll wash the Leno taste out of your mouth.

CONAN

9.15 Ted Danson

9.17 Louis CK

FALLON

9.15 Anna Faris, Alan Cumming

9.18 Danny DeVito

STEWART

9.16 Ricky Gervais

KIMMEL

9.15 ‘Special Appearance’ Joel McHale

LENO

9.14 Jerry Seinfeld

9.16 Robin Williams

TELEVISION FOR THE UNEMPLOYED

THE VIEW

9.17 Joel McHale

9.18 Kathy Griffin

REGIS

9.18 Ricky Gervais

This Week in Late Night: The Final Moments Before the Lenopocalypse

Surprisingly, even though it’s Labor Day week, pretty much everything is on this week (although we are still Daily Show and Colbert-free, which continues to suck).

Next Monday brings the first installment of NBC’s dreaded Jay Leno Show, which threatens to rip the very fabric of Late Night apart, resulting in a singular anomaly that will swallow the entire talk show circuit whole, leaving only the drifting corpses of Ellen Degeneres and Kelly Ripa behind in its terrible wake. We can only hope some last-minute act of bravery on behalf of some selfless NBC executive will stop this impending apocalypse.

LETTERMAN

9.7 Tracy Morgan, Leslie Mann

CONAN

9.8 Richard Lewis

9.11 Bill Hader

FERGUSON

9.8 Neil Patrick Harris

9.11 Drew Carey, Mindy Kaling

FALLON

9.11 Russell Brand

KIMMEL

9.8 Jeff Ross

9.9 Kathy Griffin

CHELSEA LATELY

9.7 Sarah Colonna

9.8 Josh Wolf, Renee Gauthier, Kevin Hart

9.9 John Caparulo, Donnell Rawlings, Arden Myrin

9.11 Brad Wollack, Loni Love, Scott Henry

This Week in Late Night: Toxic Links Edition

After the seemingly endless doldrums of August, pretty much everything is finally back on the air. Norm Macdonald is on Conan tonight, which is always, always a good thing. Mike Judge’s new comedy Extract premieres this weekend, so naturally there are a handful of promotional appearances for that.

Oh, and this is Week One of the Great Three Week Daily Show + Colbert Blackout. A nation mourns and finds something else on TV between 11 and 12pm.

Also, do not click on any of the links I’ve dropped in here. You will regret all of them. ALL OF THEM

LETTERMAN

8.31 Howie Mandel

9.1 Jeremy Piven

9.3 Billy Crystal

9.4 Neil Patrick Harris

CONAN

8.31 Norm Macdonald

FERGUSON

9.3 Ron Livingston

FALLON

9.2 John Leguizamo

9.3 Jason Bateman

KIMMEL

9.1 Patton Oswalt

CHELSEA LATELY

8.31 Rex Lee, Josh Wolf, Gina Yashere, Chris Franjola

9.1 Jen Kirkman, Ben Gleib, John Caparulo

9.2 Heather McDonald, Jo Koy

9.3 Bryan Callen, Natasha Leggero

This Week in Late Night: Tumbleweeds and Crickets Edition

The dog days of summer continue with yet another super-light week. At least Conan’s back on; Fallon and Ferguson both have another week off.

The highlight of the week is likely Robin Williams and Bobcat Goldthwait on Kimmel this Wednesday, promoting their awesome movie World’s Greatest Dad, which if you have not seen you must see.

LETTERMAN

8.25 Eugene Levy
8.26 Jim Parsons
8.28 Artie Lange

CONAN

8.24 Bill Maher

KIMMEL

8.26 Robin Williams, Bobcat Goldthwait
8.28 BJ Novak

CHELSEA LATELY

8.24 Bryan Callen, Mo Mandel
8.25 Chris Franjola, Dan Levy
8.26 The Sklar Brothers, Gary Valentine
8.27 Kevin Nealon, Brad Wollack, Ross Matthews, Jeff Wild

Aaaaaand since it’s such a light week, you should be sure to amuse yourself with this particularly fantastic episode of Adult Swim’s Fat Guy Stuck In Internet, featuring Matt Besser and Timmy from Whitest Kids U Know.

This Week in Late Night: The Mike Meyers Apocalypse

The Inglorious Basterds promotional juggernaut is in full swing this week, which means most of that film’s gigantic cast is all over late night. Or they would be, if there were any talk shows this week that weren’t on hiatus. It also means Mike Meyers, inexplicably part of the cast, will be rearing his head on Letterman. If you’re in the audience for that taping, please be sure to bring a copy of The Love Guru with you and fling it at him as hard as you can.

So, since nearly everything is in repeats – Conan, Fallon, Ferguson, Kimmel (and The View) – and our listings are incredibly short, this week in addition to our short-ass listings, we’re also gonna have Jimmy Fallon Appreciation Station, wherein we’ll post a bunch of the surprisingly funny bits you probably didn’t catch because you don’t watch Fallon.

LETTERMAN

8.19 Mike Meyers

8.21 Patton Oswalt

STEWART

8.17 David Cross

CHELSEA LATELY

8.17 Jamie Klaer, John Caparulo

8.18 Josh Wolf, Heather McDonald, Michael Kosta

8.19 Jo Koy, Kevin Hart, Whitney Cummings

8.20 TJ Miller, George Wallace, Natasha Leggero

8.21 Brad Wollack, Tony Rock, Sarah Colonna

JIMMY FALLON APPRECIATION STATION

It’s still kind of vogue to hate on Jimmy Fallon, but as a regular viewer of his underrated late night show, I figured I’d share a handful of clips you’ve probably missed as a reminder that the show is really not as bad as your friends who don’t watch it but complain about it anyway are saying.

With that last clip I submit there is simply not enough Obama - Bubble Bobble humor on late night TV, and so I salute this show.

This Week in Late Night: There Is No God Edition

ALERT! Robin Williams is on Conan this week! And Carrot Top is on Ferguson!!!

Set your DVRs and cross your fingers that he’ll follow his cowboy voice with his gay voice and then shift into his Indian convenience store clerk voice! SO WACKY!

Then set your funny bone to “stunned” when Carrot Top takes the stage on Craig Ferguson!!
Will there be props? YES! Will there be creepy over-developed muscles? HECK YES!!

Seriously though it’s a pretty light week for late night. Letterman’s off, as is Kimmel.

Conan
8.12 BJ Novak
8.13 ROBIN WILLIAMS!! The moment you’ve been waiting for!!
8.14 Demetri Martin

Ferguson
8.10 C-C-C-CARROT TOP!!!

Fallon
8.13 Seth Green, Avenue Q
8.14 Neal Brennan

Tavis Smiley (this is on PBS, just in case you’ve never heard of it, and you haven’t)
8.10 Jay Leno

Chelsea Lately
8.10 Jen Kirkman
8.11 Tony Rock
8.12 Chris Franjola
8.13 Arden Miryn, Matt Braunger

This Week in Late Night: Piven Edition

The Funny People junket train finally ends this week, which means we’ll get the last talk show appearances by the Apatow crew until the next movie rolls around. The Goods comes out next week though, which means between this week and next we’re going to probably see a whole lot of Jeremy Piven.

CONAN
8.4 Jeremy Piven
8.6 Ed Helms

FERGUSON
8.7 Don Rickles

FALLON
8.3 Marlon Wayans, Judd Apatow
8.5 Chris Kattan
8.6 Jeremy Piven, Greg Giraldo
8.7 Ken Jeong

KIMMEL
8.6 Doug Benson

CHELSEA LATELY
8.3 The Sklar Brothers
8.4 John Caparulo
8.5 Chris Hardwick

This Week in Late Night (Plus Mid-Afternoon)

Our Weekly Comedy lists were getting too damn long, so we've spun off the Late Night listings into their own post. You can plan out your week of talk shows much easier this way!

This week, the Funny People promotional train keeps on rollin', so there are a ton of appearances by the film's cast. Also, Judd Apatow is on Inside the Actors Studio tonight, so keep an eye out for that on Bravo.

Letterman
7.30 – Adam Sandler

Conan
7.28 – Steve Zahn, Jimmy Carr
7.29 – Rainn Wilson

Ferguson
7.28 – Johnny Galecki

Fallon
7.29 – Leslie Mann
7.30 – Tim Meadows
7.31 – Adam Sandler

Stewart
7.28 – Spinal Tap
7.30 – Judd Apatow

Kimmel
7.28 – Leslie Mann
7.29 – Jonah Hill
7.30 – Seth Rogen

Chelsea Handler
7.29 – Chris Kattan
7.30 – Greg Proops
7.31 – Jen Kirkman (repeat, but catch it if you missed it last week)

TELEVISION FOR THE UNEMPLOYED

If you're out of work, you have time to catch all the banal daytime talk shows too! Here's what's up this week.

The View
7.30 – Judd Apatow, Seth Rogen

Regis & Kelly
7.28 – Jonah Hill
7.31 – Adam Sandler

A Surprisingly Dense Week in Comedy

IN THEATERS

Bruno – It’s almost impossible to tell if this thing is going to be funny or not. The trailers are kinda weak and Cohen’s in-character promotional appearances have been pretty flat, consisting mostly of him doing the voice, wearing revealing clothing and referring to his balls using various Austrian-sounding words. Not only that, but everyone in America is pretty well aware that there are a lot of ridiculous hateful homophobes who live here and an entire “documentary” (early reviews suggest that big chunks of the movie feel very staged) pointing that out using an obnoxious famewhore as the central character just doesn’t sound so great.

Regardless, expect our full review on Friday.

I Love You, Beth Cooper – Heroes’ Hayden Panettiere stars in this “shocking” teen comedy that for some reason they’re opening opposite another “shocking” comedy that has appeal to teenagers. It was directed by Chris Colombus, who you may remember as the director of such classics as Home Alone II: Lost in New York, Harry Potter and the First Two Shitty Adaptations, and Rent: The Unbearable Experience. So yeah.

Humpday – One of the best reviewed film festival movies this year, Humpday is opening on one or two screens this weekend; basically, two dudes at a party get involved in a drunken game of one-upsmanship and wind up agreeing to be in a porn together. Pretty simple premise, and apparently the film is really funny. When it opens wide in a few weeks I’ll check it out.

CD

Todd Glass: Thin Pig – According to iTunes, Todd Glass’s new album comes out on Tuesday, July 7th. Apparently there is no physical release, so if you want it, you’ve gotta get it digitally. Glass is a favorite around here, mostly due to his involvement on the not-to-be-missed Comedy and Everything Else podcast, but his standup is pretty great too, so consider this your Must Purchase of the week.

Here’s a quick sample of Glass’s material (NSFW):



DVD

Mystery Science Theater 3000 XV – Nothing in this latest set will set the world on fire; In fact, some of these are downright bad episodes, like The Robot vs. The Aztec Mummy, which is one of the worst season one episodes. Also included are The Girl in Lovers Lane, Zombie Nightmare, and the highlight of the set, Racket Girls (with the short Are You Ready for Marriage?). Worth picking up for the last two, but the first two should’ve probably been included in other sets as "the bad one" with three other, better episodes.

Reno 911 Season 6 – The one guy who watches Reno 911 and still finds it hilarious after 7 years or so is fuckin’ thrilled that this is coming out tomorrow. The rest of us will continue the relationship we’ve had with Reno 911 over the years, which consists primarily of remarking on how many used copies there seem to be at every media store in the country.

Grumpy Old Men (Bluray) – Here’s a brilliant idea: let’s release a movie that only appeals to old people on a medium old people do not know exists.

Kath & Kim Season One – Whereas Reno 911 has probably at least one person looking forward to the release of a new season box set tomorrow, it can be said with absolute certainty that the number of people looking forward to the release of the widely hated and generally unwatchable sitcom Kath & Kim Season One is somehow mathematically less than zero.

Young and Handsome: A Night with Jeff Garlin – Shout! Factory is releasing Jeff Garlin’s first hourlong stand-up special on DVD. Based on the clips on Amazon, he’s doing some fairly stale material (sample: “My wife is a hardass! I sure am fat! Man, I hate mowing the lawn!”) but Garlin is a reliably funny guy on Curb Your Enthusiasm and his little-seen movie, I Want Someone to Eat Cheese With, was decent, so maybe the clips are misleading. Consider it a rental.

LATE NIGHT

The Great Late Night Drought of ’09 is finally over and most everything is back on save for Fallon. Our nights are no longer sad and empty.

Letterman:

7/7: Sacha Baron Cohen, Joel McHale – Sit through Sacha Baron Cohen ripping his pants off and saying “ishm” over and over again while waiting for McHale to come out and promote his new sitcom.

7/10: Rainn Wilson, Larry Miller – Rainn Wilson is promoting a bunch of different projects, and Larry Miller is probably going to talk about his new show on ABC Family, which is an hourlong dramedy based on the movie 10 Things I Hate About You, which I haven’t seen but I guarantee you he plays a prickly teacher of some variety.

Conan:

7/8 Bob Newhart, Al Madrigal – I’m pretty sure Conan invited Bob Newhart on just to make it all the clearer that Al Madrigal is a hack.

Ferguson:

7/8 Michael Ian Black

7/10 Ray Romano

Also, Margaret Cho is on The View on 7/9, if you’re interested in having your penis detach itself from your body and start a protest line outside your apartment.

OTHER:

For Los Angeles area comedy nerds, I Love Movies with Doug Benson is taping tomorrow before Comedy Death Ray at the Upright Citizens Brigade theater. CDR has folks like Demetri Martin & Paul Scheer, plus love-him-or-hate-him Daily Show correspondent Wyatt Cenac. Presale tickets are sold out but there is a standby line so there’s still hope.

A Slow Week for Funny

Well, I scoured Amazon and sifted through the DVR and it looks like it's a pretty slow week in the world of comedy.

DVD:

There are really only two significant releases this week that are advertised as comedies, although neither of which seems particularly deserving of the title: Confessions of a Shopaholic, starring Amy Adams Isla Fisher, and The Pink Panther 2: The Sequel Nobody Fucking Asked For, starring Steve "paycheck" Martin. Like I said, slow week.


CD:

The only new comedy album out today is an album called Half Breed by comedian Al Madrigal. I listened to the samples on Amazon and it's pretty standard race humor. Not worth your time.

LATE NIGHT:

There are a few bright spots in this week's late night offerings; tonight, Larry David will be on The Daily Show promoting Whatever Works, which will doubtlessly challenge Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen for box office supremacy this weekend. David was on The Tonight Show last week, looking a lot more like an old man than he ever did on Curb Your Enthusiasm.

Speaking of The Tonight Show, on Friday, Sacha Baron Cohen is showing up in character as Bruno. It'll either be hilarious or boring and predictable, and frankly, the trailers plus muted reaction to the Bruno film so far point to the latter rather than the former. But hey, maybe it'll turn out brilliant. Who knows?