Day: December 10, 2008

The morning after NBC made it official, we all need to put the announcement of Jay Leno moving from late-night into primetime in 2009 into perspective. First, realize and recognize that while Leno's fall 2009 show will air weeknights at 10 p.m. on the East and West coasts, he'll actually be on at 9 p.m. in the Central and Mountain time zones! When Leno told the press yesterday that 10:30 was the new 11:30 for many folks, he could have and should have said that for all of middle America, that long has been the case. Instead, when I heard Leno tell NBC Universal sibling show Access Hollywood (their studios are literally across the hallway from Leno's studio in Burbank) that “11:30 seems really late to most people,” what I heard translated as most people = old people?! That Leno asked NBC to do research (focus groups, anyone?) and found that his audience wanted to see him earlier, that only bolsters this circumstantial claim that Leno's ratings will fall outside the 18-49 demo. Ah, ratings. In the just completed November sweeps season, Leno's Tonight Show averaged 4.9 million viewers (though only 1.7 million fell within the 18-49 age bracket), for a 1.3 rating and 5 share. How does that compare to NBC's current programming in that hour? Last Thursday, Dec. 5, ER finished third for NBC with 8.2 million...