Tagged As: Conan O'Brien, Jon Stewart, Late Show, Tonight Show, Jay Leno

I have been watching this final week with Conan O’Brien before he takes over for Jay Leno at the Tonight Show and was trying to find some great Youtube material for a post. Well, several hours later I came across perhaps the weirdest connection in late night, the Conan-Jon Stewart connection.

As we all know, or should know, Conan O’Brien took over for David Letterman on Late Night in 1993. Around the same time Jon Stewart had his own talk show on MTV. In 1994, Conan went on Stewart’s show and the results are 1990s-rific. The informal jeans, the leather jacket, and the flannel shirt, it was perhaps just too much. Who would know from this interview that these guys would become the kings of late night.

Years later Conan has hosted the Emmys while Stewart has hosted the Grammys. Conan has stayed with NBC and is set to take over the Tonight Show while Jon Stewart has stayed in cable, taking over the Daily Show. Conan has continually had the network second guess him, most recently by NBC giving Leno an hour show before the Tonight Show. Stewart has continually had everyone second guess him because of his insistence of staying on cable.

This fraternity of comedy has been expanded thanks to John Stewart siring Stephen Colbert as his Sir Lancelot with the Colbert Report. This is in stark contrast to the late night comedy in the wake of Johnny Carson’s retirement from the Tonight Show. While O’Brien, Stewart, and Colbert have carried out a “feud” for fun…

David Letterman and Jay Leno had a feud that was all too bitter in real life. There was an even more serious betrayal by a network and no montage with a Britney Spears track (thanks go out to pzamorette on Youtube for the clip).

Still it is sad to see Conan leave the studio in New York, where his buffoonery, his masturbating bears, his witless robots, and S&M Lincolns will have to stay while surely will have to change his show to play to a broader crowd an hour earlier in Los Angeles.