Do You Hope Jay Leno Will Fail?

"Nothing against Jay, but there are a lot of people in the industry who hope this fails spectacularly." -- Shawn Ryan, creator of The Shield and executive producer of Lie to Me, in a massive Time magazine article on Jay Leno's effort to destroy one-third of primetime television with his new show.

As someone who watched every show on NBC's Thursday night 10 p.m. timeslot for decades -- from Hill Street Blues to L.A. Law to E.R. -- I would not be exceptionally heartbroken if Leno's show craters so badly that he's driven into hiding and his show is never spoken of again.

My hunch is that the bar's set so low for Leno that he'll be able to make a modest profit for the network, thus helping to push scripted network TV closer to its doom. The biggest obstacle he faces is hurting local newscasts in the following hour.

Television · 2023/06/01 · 0 COMMENTS · Link