The Brothers Howell

Episode 2: Late Night - Is This The Last Monologue?

• Michael Howell • Season 1 • Episode 2

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In this episode, Steve and Mike discuss the declining state of late night talk shows. They cover current hosts on major networks like Jimmy Fallon, Jimmy Kimmel, and Stephen Colbert, as well as lesser-known and streaming personalities such as Taylor Tomlinson and John Mulaney. The brothers reminisce about iconic hosts like Johnny Carson and David Letterman, noting how today's shows lack the same cultural impact. They highlight the generational disconnect and how younger audiences consume media differently, favoring platforms like YouTube and podcasts over traditional TV formats. The episode also touches on financial viability and the evolving landscape of media consumption.

Steve:

Hey, hey, it's the brothers. How, again, coming to you with our second episode we've got a lot to talk about today and my name is Steve and this is my brother, Mike. Mike. Mike. I keep it simple.

Mike:

I keep it simple.

Steve:

Today we're gonna be talking a little bit about talk shows, and frankly, we're gonna talk about the late night talk shows and why. They suck when they used to not suck.

Mike:

I, I thought we were gonna say, they're in a state of decline, but you really netted it out there.

Steve:

Yeah. State of decline suck. Potato. Potato.

Mike:

Well, I thought this was a pretty interesting topic and I know you have some things you want to get across here at the beginning. I'll follow your lead here, but I first, quite frankly, had to go look up. Who is still doing this and what format is it and where is it happening?

Steve:

Yes. You what? You basically found the three networks who I guess have been doing it for a long time, and then I've heard of'em.

Yes.

Steve:

Yeah. There's a, yeah. Some people still know the networks. They do still exist, even though they're, they're, they seem to be, become, becoming less important all the time. But then you got these offshoots too with all the several cable channels and all the streaming services. Everybody's got a. Got a talk show. Not that, not that they're getting a whole lot of read out of it, but they're there.

Mike:

Well, I, I wonder who is really the audience anymore, and we'll get into that, I'm sure. But yeah, of course. I, when I did my, I already knew about the networks, believe it or not, but I will tell you, I am the anti broadcast watcher if it's on broadcast tv. I just assume it sucks. To be honest with you,

Steve:

you're not alone. I think a lot of people see it the same way, and even as a, even as an old boomer like myself, I thought that I would never be able to get used to that. But I have even, I don't don't spend a whole lot of time with the networks anymore, and I never watched late night talk anymore, even though I did for a while. And I, I went back and revisited a little bit this past week to familiar. Rise myself. And yes, it does still suck as it did a few years ago, but there's, it's,

Mike:

it, well it's kind of funny you say that. So I look at like late night talk show,'cause it's one, I, I'm not quite a boomer, but I, I'm getting older and, I, I still work for 11, so how late do I wanna stay up and, and put time into this? And when I do, I look at what's out there and I'm like, wow, these guys are still doing it. They're my age,

Steve:

yeah. Well, you and I, we, we we're right on the line there. I'm the, I'm the last year of the Boomers and you are like the, the first couple of years of the Gen Xers, right?

Mike:

Yeah. Yep. That's correct. Happy to be, I guess it, I could be a boomer.

Steve:

Oh, I tell you what, I love you. Whenever, whenever, whenever somebody 30 sarcastically calls me a boomer, I just say thank you very much. Hey, goodness, I,

Mike:

usually like somebody 30 or younger calls people, boomer, they're wrong.'cause it's a Gen Xer. Yeah. So how do you want to start here?'cause I was thinking it might be interesting just to kinda list the more popular ones out there.

Steve:

Well, yeah, you got the big three, which are the networks. With with Jimmy Fallon on NBC and Jimmy Kimmel on a b, C, and I hate even saying his name, Stephen Colbert on CBS.

Mike:

Yeah, so I, I have some more comments about that later, but I, my research came up with a couple of, couple of ones that I. I kind of knew her there, but never vested any time in whatsoever. And quite frankly, maybe they're not doing anymore. But then you have the late later shows, so Yeah. After shows. Yeah. Yeah. There's like the, there's like Taylor Tomlinson. I don't know anything about that one. Yeah.

Steve:

I, I have not watched her. I, I've seen a, I've seen a couple of her teasers, so to speak, and, and she seems funny. I, I've, somebody told me that she was very funny. She does stand up, I think, but I guess a lot of'em do Anyway, but I have not watched the show yet. I understand it does pretty well for a network show.

Mike:

Yeah. And then you're, I mean, that's a very certain audience that's up that late, right. You either have like different work schedules or maybe, I can't imagine. It's gotta be a younger audience for that one because, that's the only people that stay up that late to have regular schedules.

Steve:

Yeah. And do they stay up that late or, or do they just stream it the next day or later on?

Mike:

Well, so that's a good point.'cause everything can be streamed now. I was kind of looking at it from a broadcast standpoint, right? Yeah. Because a lot. It's when I do the Saturday Night Live thing, I feel like I kind of missed it if I didn't watch it live. Even though we can talk about the decline of that in another show. Oh, we will. The other one so Seth Meyers, I think has one on NBC.

Steve:

Yeah, he's after Fallon and he's been doing it quite a while too. And he, and he's another SNL alumnus, like Fallon liked him on Saturday Night Live. Okay. Liked Fallon on Saturday Night Live. Okay. Do not care for either one of'em much as talk show hosts.

Mike:

I think would you think that and I, I'm trying to think of the order here. I think if we looked at just the broadcast stuff for now that we just talked about and you do the rankings, I think Jimmy Kimmel's the top one, isn't he?

Steve:

Is he?

Mike:

I think so. I think I, I'm pretty sure, I don't know if it's Jimmy Fallon or Jimmy Kimmel. I think it's Kimmel, but I need to, if I had to take a shot in the dark,

Steve:

I would've guessed Fallon. But you could be right.

Mike:

Yeah, me too. He seems more likable. Yeah.

Steve:

Yeah, he, and he's less, he's less offensive.

Mike:

And he's the youngest.

Steve:

Yeah. And he doesn't really even though people would like him to, he doesn't really take sides. Mm-hmm.

Mike:

That's a good point. Yeah. Colbert, I guess, fell to the third out of the broadcast TV slot, night slot that's in,

Steve:

if there. If there's any, if there's any God in Heaven, he'll continue to fall no matter how. If, if the, if the list is six long, he'll fall all the way to 45.

Mike:

Did he come from The Daily show, the Roven Reporter or something like that?

Steve:

Yeah. And was some show

Mike:

like that?

Steve:

Yeah. The, the Comedy Central Show.

Mike:

Yeah, the, that. I thought it was a daily show. I think it was.

Steve:

Yeah. Didn't like him there, don't like him. Now, I, the guy is, the guy is, is, is hateful and he's unfunny and he, he's not, he doesn't have any talent and, and he's just a stick in the mud. I, I, I can't stand even seeing him.

Mike:

Well, I guess we never, I don't feel too strong. Got it. Yeah, you're being very nebulous. I can't quite get where you're saying.

Steve:

He's, he's the one that, he's the one I would go to last, if at all.

Mike:

Okay. Do well. Okay. It's a good question. Do you go to any of them? Do you stream any of'em the next day?

Steve:

I, it's been a while. Here in the last week I have, I have watched little snippets here and there to prepare for this, but no, as a rule, no.

Mike:

I mean, I think Jimmy Fallon he's kind of a multi-talented guy, and maybe he inserts himself too much into the talent side of it. But you know, like when he does like the the wrapping thing and, he hold, he, he has a good relationship with who's the goodwill hunting guy. Matt Damon. Yeah. And they do that kind of stuff back. Actually, that's Kimmel, I'm wrong. That's Kimmel.

Steve:

Oh, that's right. Yeah,

Mike:

yeah. Yeah. Because Kimmel's always

Steve:

bumping Matt Damon.

Mike:

Yeah. Yeah.

Steve:

It's ongoing thing. Yeah.

Mike:

The, the little stuff like that that they do back and forth and, and, and it have those regular people that they fit well with. And I think Fallon's probably more a a Justin Timberlake or something like that for a singing thing is Fallon loves to sing.

Steve:

Yeah.

Mike:

And

Steve:

I give him a little credit. He's, he's talented. He's he can sing and play a little bit.

Mike:

Yeah, he's pretty, he's pretty good with that. But when he does stuff like that, I'll go, I'll go look. I think he did Fallon did something I thought was kind of cool. Did you see the little clip when he had, I think it was Green Day. And they were in the subway and it was just a band, I think they were in disguise and it was Green Day with Fallon singing with'em, and everybody just thought they were just some, whatever band in Subway in New York, which was kind of funny.

Steve:

Yeah, I could see where that would be kind of funny. Although if I'd known from a tease beforehand that the Green Day was gonna be on, that would've been another reason why I wouldn't have watched. That's just me.

Mike:

That's a whole nother thing. So I I, what was it? What, what's the festival that, the rock festival that's gone on for

Steve:

Lollapalooza, maybe.

Mike:

Lollapalooza. I thank you. That's what It's okay. Lalapalooza. And that was the. Yeah, that was actually Jane's Addiction Farewell Tour, and he put on this thing called Lollapalooza and brought bands with him on their Fair farewell tour. And then he, it became a thing he couldn't get out of. They wanted to do it every year.

Steve:

Oh, okay. I wasn't, it was interesting.

Mike:

That's a whole nother thing, but that, that's where I saw Green Day was kind of forced in by the label. Hey, you guys need to put these guys on,

Steve:

huh? Yeah, I was, I've never been a Green Day guy. But that's another, another thing.

Mike:

So what about these streaming ones? There's the streaming ones, like you said from, besides broadcast and I looked up a few of those. The main one being what you just said, where Colbert came from was a daily show with John

Steve:

Stewart, the Daily show. Yeah, that's that's John Stewart too, right? Is he back on there now?

Mike:

He does it on Mondays only. What's the greatest job in the world?

Steve:

Oh yeah, he's got a, he's got a banker's gig. Okay. Better than, I'll

Mike:

tell you, I started watching it again recently and it's, I know it's very liberal and left, but man, it is funny and especially Stewart, he's hilarious.

Steve:

Yeah. And that's the thing too. I don't mind, I don't mind laughing. I. It either side. I mean, you know where I come down on that. I'm not gonna get into that. Yeah. But I, I'll laugh at either side and that's all I want from these shows. I want them to be fair and balanced and poke at everybody and do it playfully, tongue in cheek. Okay. But a little playfully. Not with, not with a mean spirit or trying to cram down some kind of message down your throat.

Mike:

Yeah. Well daily show definitely crams a message down your throat. But it is funny as shit. There's other ones here though. So did you know David Letterman is still, he he's on Netflix doing my next guest.

Steve:

Yeah. That's not, that's not a daily though, is it? Or a nightly, is it?

Mike:

I don't know.

Steve:

I can't imagine him working that hard. He retired to get away from that. I.

Mike:

And does he still have that crazy beard? That was just terrible. He does,

Steve:

yes.

Mike:

That was just the stupidest looking thing I've ever seen in my life, to be honest with you.

Steve:

But he was, to me, he was the king. I mean, yes. The, the, the, the set that the generation a little before us are gonna say, Carson and I get that. He is, he's the one who mapped it all out really. But but Letterman was the go-to guy and I did stay up late to watch him, even though it hurt me at work the next day sometimes.

Mike:

Yeah. So that, and I think it's what we were going, it's probably part of the decline and maybe it's just a way things are now as far as how media gets consumed, but there wasn't, it was broadcast TV back then. Right. And yeah, we didn't have choices.

Steve:

Right.

Mike:

Yeah. In our, in our generation, we were younger and we stayed up and oh my god, you don't Ms. David Letterman if you were around Yeah. In any way, shape or form. You watch it'cause it was hilarious.

Steve:

Yeah, yeah. Well, Carson before that and Letterman were both appointment television, and everybody had, this was the age where people were, during Carson's era, people were bringing televisions into the bedroom for the first time and people went to sleep watching Carson, and then it kind of carried over to Letterman.

Mike:

And there was, Carson was, it wasn't quite Arjun or at least wasn't my generation. I don't think it was quite yours, boomer, but it was if you did have it on you, whenever I turned it on, I'm like, I was very thoroughly entertained by it.'cause he would've lost.

Steve:

Yeah. Yeah. Well, I can remember staying up to watch, watch Carson shared a lot of times really? Because there was no, if you were up late, there was no other choice. What were we, watch Nightline. Nightline was a pretty, pretty dull except during the Iranian hostage crisis, I guess. Oh, wow. Yeah, that's when it was, that's what they talked about every night on Nightline. And that was, that was Carson's chief adversary for a while. The biggest competition he had. But, but Carson I can remember, especially if it was, if you were watching the news, and we usually watch Channel four news here in dc the DC market, and you would get the tease to tell you who Carson had on that night, and that would determine whether or not I was going to bid at 1130 or, or staying up longer. Huh?

Mike:

Well, it's, so the, when was the hostage crisis? That was early eighties. Right. It was like 80, oh, late seventies. It was 79, 80 or something like that. Right? 79

Steve:

80. Yeah. Right in that era. Yeah,

Mike:

because I remember, yeah, just, just

Steve:

as, just as Reagan took office, it ended.

Mike:

I was pretty young, but I remember watching Fridays, I. Do you remember Fridays? It was like the abc, the equivalent? Yeah. Yeah, yeah. Michael Richards. Michael, yeah. Michael Richards on it. And I remember they, after the, the hostages came back and they did a kit where they like welcome'em to hostages home. And they had'em in a room. They gave'em all franks and beans. You're liking those Franks and Beans. Right.'Cause they're back in America. Yay. Thanks. I don't know why that sticks out. It seems You said that's the first thing I think of.

Steve:

Yeah.

Mike:

So what about bill Maher?

Steve:

I'm coming around to Bill Maher. I, I avoided him for, for a long time, for years actually. And I've been coming around to him recently because he has recently become more even handed. But the guy is the guy is. Bright and poignant. And I, I en, whenever I see him, I enjoy them.

Mike:

Is, is so you gotta have HBO to watch him though, huh?

Steve:

Yes, but there's one of the services I have streams it after the fact. Okay. I've watched it a few times there, so you

Mike:

can't get to it. And they also have John Oliver, I think.

Steve:

Yeah. The British guy. No, he's, he's not my cup of tea.

Mike:

Well there. That was a very nice pun. I like that.

Steve:

No Tree and Crum for

Mike:

John Oliver and I.

Steve:

No,

Mike:

you'll not be seeing him at four every day.

Steve:

No, but speaking of Britt's, I I do the guy that you like that you're probably coming to.

Mike:

Oh yeah. I'm gonna get there. It's, it's, hold him for one second. Okay. Because these other ones I'm not, I don't know him that well. So Bravo has Andy Cohen.

Steve:

Yeah, but he's kind of a, I see him once in a while because of the shows that Eileen Wat is my wife. He, he, he does this host bit where he has the whole cast on for Vanderpump Rules or one of these celebrity housewives shows or something like that. He, and he's, he's really tight with he's like best friends with Anderson Cooper, so he's always on the, on the new Year's Eve. Telecast with Anderson Cooper. I, he's okay. I mean, I, nothing special there.

Mike:

Okay. That, that sounds, it almost sounds like a very kind of like inner, like circle media thing if he's just ha if he's just interviewing cast of shows.

Steve:

Yeah. To, to his credit, he's carved out his own niche and he's, he does pretty well with it. He gets a lot of it. Okay.

Mike:

Yeah. That's fair. That's fair. And then the only other one I have here. Is John Mullaney? I don't, I'm not familiar with that one on that. He's

Steve:

kind of, Johnny, I have just become aware of him and, he was on, he hosted Saturday Night Live not too long ago, and I think that's where I got my first real dose of him. And he seems like a pretty funny guy, young guy. The one thing I did like about him, and you'll appreciate this, he was on the CBS Sunday Morning show, a few weeks back being interviewed. I watched that every Sunday morning.

Mike:

Okay.

Steve:

And they were interviewing him while he was shopping in a record store. And I noticed he had several records in his albums in his bag. He was toting around and the one on front was squeezes, RG Barge.

Mike:

Oh my God. That's awesome.

Steve:

Yeah, I

Mike:

thought that was a be Cool. Cool. I love Squeeze.

Steve:

And that's their best album too, I think.

Mike:

That is awesome. And it was an actual L lp.

Steve:

Yeah. Vinyl.

Mike:

Yep. I just had a LP story that you told me that I just relayed to somebody two days ago. And somebody was talking about how they liked the old record shops,

Steve:

Uhhuh

Mike:

and they, they were talking about an old record shop here in Denver, of course, that I'd never heard of way before my time living here. And I told them about. Kemp Mill and Penguin Feather. Mm-hmm. And Kemp Mill was the chain where, everybody goes and buys whatever records. And then Penguin Feather was the cool place to get your albums. And you were in line one time and a lady in front of you, I forgot exactly what they bought, but they bought something and that, and the checkout guy just, whatever and gets her moving on. And then. You came up there with your albums. He goes that other shit's like Kemp Mill. You can get that at Kemp Mill. This is good stuff.

Steve:

Nothing like a little taste. Yeah, those are the good old days. I spent a lot of time in both those shops.

Mike:

Yeah. Oh yeah.

Steve:

And of course Penguin Feather was also the, the local head shop where you could get all the stuff upstairs for your smoking weeds. It,

Mike:

it was the old house rickety and had all the wooden bins and everything like that. Yeah. With, with the guys. And when I was, I was pretty young. I'd check out there, I was scared.

Steve:

Yeah. Any, any crappy old house that became available, they would rent it out and put a, put a pigment feather in there.

Mike:

Yeah. That was awesome. I didn't appreciate it back then. Alright, so you talked about the other Brit that I like and, and it was really Tina that turned me onto to this'cause anything, Tina being my wife anything Brit she loves. Yeah. So I get that na name, all the dramas and everything like that, and the comedies, she's totally into that. And she turned me on to Graham Norton. Yeah. And I will tell you those shows, I don't watch it live by any means, and I, I, I very rarely stream a whole show, but I look at highlights all the time and it cracks me up the way he does that.

Steve:

He's a, he's very good. I haven't seen him as much as you have. I've, I've caught maybe a half a dozen of his shows, but I've enjoyed it every time. And I tell you what a show to be, he gets great guest and that's what you see circuit here.

Mike:

YI I've heard that it's because because I just'cause of comments from the guests while they're on there. They basically say you do this better than anybody. And, and yeah, I see that. Yeah. And it seems like what he does, the only thing I can see that's really different is, he didn't start with great guests probably. So the reason they want to go on there is'cause he gets all the guests on there and makes them all part of it. And they're all famous and they probably don't work together, or know each other that all that well. Yeah.

Steve:

Yeah. And you wouldn't even think of these two people in the room at the same time. But yet they're, they're like, they've known each other for years. They have a good time.

Mike:

They, they're, they have some wine. They sit there, they talk, and I mean, and date, they crack each other up. I've never seen anything like it.

Steve:

Yeah. And sometimes I get kind of tickled because sometimes it's like a really big star and then like a, a medium star, but they, they talk like two equals there and you would think they would never cross paths.

Mike:

Yeah.

Steve:

And that's what's so cool about it

Mike:

and Grant and what Graham does well is like that me, that medium star, I won't call mediocre'cause I, I think they're all pretty good. But, the he'll, he'll say, Hey, tell, tell that story about when blah, blah, blah. And and he sets them up. Yeah. So that everybody starts laughing and then they'll all weigh in.

Steve:

I know one episode I saw about a year ago actually had Jeff Goldblum on there. I forget who the other guests were, but it was a very entertaining show, and Jeff Goldblum dressed to the nines and he was promoting his new jazz album. And they had him actually play two numbers during the show on the piano, and I was just bowled over by that. You're not gonna get that on American Talk shows.

Mike:

I his jazz album. I can totally see him with jazz hands.

Steve:

It was good. I should, I, I forget what the album was. In fact, at, at that time I meant to go look for that album. I, and I forgot. I need to go back and check into that.

Mike:

He is one interesting guy.

Steve:

Yeah. Yeah. And that's the kind of guy that Graham Norton puts on the show all the time. He loves that. Yeah, I like that. And, and you just don't see him on the circuit here at all

Mike:

really anymore. I'm hesitant to bring this up'cause I can't remember the star's name, but he's actually British. I didn't know that until I saw him on that show. And he was the star of Sons of Anarchy. If you've ever seen that biker show,

Steve:

Ron Pearlman.

Mike:

No, no, no. He, Ron Pearlman was the president. This was the vice president, and he was really the star of it. The blonde-haired guy. Okay.

Steve:

You talking about that, his, was it his played his son?

Mike:

I don't think it was his son, was it? I don't think. Okay. I don't know. Yeah. But anyway. But he was on there and he's a pretty big star. He is been in a quite a few movies too., And I actually like him, but apparently not enough to know

his name. But

Mike:

he was on there and then Graham Norton brought, sometimes they'll just, he'll bring in somebody off screen to talk to him. And this guy that was off, off screen, he's hey, we got a big fan of yours, and he wants to ask you some questions. And he's sure. Absolutely. Did you live in this neighborhood? Yeah, I did. Did you go to the school? Yeah, I did. Then the star goes. Yeah. And actually, I remember I was. I, I was trying to date a girl there. I don't know if you knew her. And the guy goes, did you have a date with her to go to prom? And she canceled on you? He goes, yes. He goes, I was the guy she canceled for. It was me that she went with. Its crazy. It was awesome. And then he's are you kidding me? And it was just funny. He bought him out.

Steve:

I love that. I need to invest more time in watching that. Actually,

Mike:

man, I, I will tell you there's a lot of YouTube, like greatest hits and what have you. And I'm just entertaining the entire time.

Steve:

Yeah. Wow. Well, who get, who gets kinda lost in all this now is is Conan O'Brien.

Mike:

So he left, right,

Steve:

he got through so many times. I, I mean he, he should have ended up with, with the Tonight Show itself, and then he did have it for a short time and that's when Leno decided, nah, I'm coming outta retirement. And he came back on the air and pretty much kicked, kicked O'Brien to the curb. And that's when I think a b, C was just trying to venture into the market really to compete with NBC and CBS. And they should have nailed down Conan O'Brien right then and there. And I, yeah, I'll take Conan O'Brien over over Jimmy Kimmel any day.,

Mike:

I really didn't have an opinion on Conan O'Brien. He was just kind of coming in as I was kind of done with late night tv. And I just didn't see it at the beginning. Like he was just kind of, let's face it, he is a little bit goofy looking. I. Right.

Steve:

Yeah. Yeah.

Mike:

It, it, I mean it And

Steve:

he loses that too.

Mike:

Yeah. That's what I mean. It works for him. Yeah. Right. Yeah, it does. Yeah. And, and so I'm not holding that against him in any way. So it, I think it just without me really diving into his content and watching out, I didn't go outta my way to go watch,

Steve:

yeah. I, I thought he was pretty good. And I,, I think a B, C should have snagged him when he was available and made him the man, I think he's better than Kimmel. I liked Kimmel at first, but, and he was very, he was very even handed in the beginning and, he kind of took over from Letterman in the aspect that he, he got really great musical guests, which I, and that's really what would draw me to Kimmel if I saw a teaser with. With somebody that he was having as a musical guest that you would normally see or get a chance to watch, then that's what would make me tune in. But he himself, as time went on and the climate changed around the country, he just became more and more hateful. He's more Stephen Colbert now than he was Jimmy Kimmel in the beginning.

Mike:

Okay. I haven't watched him enough

Steve:

sometimes his monologues go right off the rail when he is scolding people.

Mike:

So do you think looking at all these shows and,'cause I, I think we can call every one of these, the kind of like late night show, right? That there truly is declining viewership.

Steve:

Yeah, I think the numbers would bear that out. And I think it makes sense because as you've mentioned, the streaming services and all the choices. Then you've got the, the constant availability and people not wanting to stay up. So they'll either, they'll either stream it later or they'll intend to and forget about it, but they won't stay up to watch it in real time. I know I won't anymore. Of course I'm getting older. Don't try

Mike:

to. Probably just what we did about Graham Norton is they'll go look for the, the good bits, right?

Steve:

Yeah, exactly. It's, it's kind of a dying thing. I don't expect it to last a whole lot longer, quite frankly. I, I think that the networks as they, they desperately need to find something, they'll start to make changes and the network talk shows as we're used to by tradition will probably disappear.

Mike:

Just some quick research I did, this is basically just based on, Wikipedia stuff. So it's not any heavy analytics unless somebody's feeding it that. So basically over the past five years, I'll just use Colbert as the example here, the audience has decreased by 32% over the past five years. Not surprising. He's, I think he's second. Yeah. Jimmy fall, from what I've seen, is fallen to third place. Colbert's second. Kimmel's first. That really surprises me. Really does.

Steve:

And the thing about Fallon too like I've said I liked him on Saturday Night Live. He was especially great with his, whatever he was doing, doing something with Horatio Sands. It was hysterical. In the late night talk show thing, even if I do start to watch him for a bit, I'll end up, I'll end up flipping to something else because he gets almost too silly. I think in some ways he's, yes, almost childish.

Mike:

Can't be. Yeah, probably. Yeah, I agree with you 100% on that. He's always been that he has that, that kind of what do you call it? And I'm doing the jazz hands here, but what do you call you? It kind of like, that show business gene in him. Yeah. That is always a performer that Yeah, he is

Steve:

truly always trying to be everything to everybody.

Mike:

Yeah. And and he's he's the vaudeville performer basically, right? Yeah.

Steve:

Yeah. That's, he is the modern day vaal performer. I think that's accurate.

Mike:

Yeah. And, and I think that takes away from son of sincerity and seriousness of, of things he, he would say or do, and it just gets silly sometimes.

Steve:

Yeah. And there, there's another guy who kind of got lost in all this and I think kind of got screwed too. He was the late show guy behind David Letterman on CBS, Craig Ferguson, ano another Brit. I thought he was fantastic and he, you shape went up to be the heir apparent to Letterman and then it kinda like the last minute it didn't happen. Letterman didn't promote him really for it. And Colbert got the slot. And that's when Craig Ferguson says he was, he was done doing, doing late night, but I think he was counting on that slot and when he didn't get it, he, he had kind of got fed up with the whole thing and we're also, forget about the other British guy. What's his name? Corden. James Corden.

Mike:

Yeah. Well, is he the, the cab karaoke, the car karaoke guy? Yeah. Yeah. The car karaoke guy. Yeah. Yeah, he, he was very

Steve:

hot for a while.

Mike:

That's very non-traditional how he got into that. And I never watched him do that. In fact, I didn't watch the karaoke thing all that much except maybe the Chili Peppers episode. But I never

Steve:

watched too much at all anyway.'cause that got to the point anyway, where I wasn't staying up that late anymore. But, the only thing I really did watch was his primetime, Paul McCartney special, where the whole show was about Paul McCartney. And of course, you know why I tuned into that.

Mike:

Yeah. But I think I saw a little bit of that. Yep.

Steve:

Yeah. But he was but he was incredibly popular for a short period of time.

Mike:

And it's funny you said that with the Paul McCartney thing, and it was it in a car. Was he doing a cab thing?

Steve:

Part of it, they went, they went over to to Liverpool and he actually was behind, he went to a pub in Liverpool and he was behind a curtain, and, and they, they pulled the curtain and Paul McCartney was performing to these people. They weren't expecting him to be there. And they walked to Paul's house, old house, what he grew up in, and the statues in Liverpool with the Beatles that he had never actually seen before. And then they did some carpool karaoke right there in Liverpool. Yeah, it was really good.

Mike:

And, and I gotta say, I love Sir McCartney. Seriously, how can you not? He's freaking awesome. But he has a little bit of that, that show, that show business gene in him too, that Yeah,

Steve:

he does, he's a hand,

Mike:

he's a

Steve:

ham. He's kind of an arrogant hand too, and I appreciate that about him.

Mike:

I, I've got a, well, it's not gonna matter. As they're doing a podcast, it's gonna show you all my Paul McCartney biographies that I got around me here.

Steve:

I got quite a few over here on this wall too.

Mike:

So there you did remind me of one thing there. What about, we didn't talk about Jay Leno.

Steve:

No. And I, I meant to, and, and that kind of says a lot about Leno himself because during the course of doing this, I kind of forgot him, is I used to do when he was on the air.

Mike:

Yeah, I, I always questioned how, he became the heir apparent to Carson, right? Because he would, he would fill in,

Steve:

well, it was supposed to be Letterman. There was a falling out there.

Mike:

Yeah. Yeah.

Steve:

And then it became Leno, and that's why there was a falling out. Yeah.

Mike:

So when he took over, it was, I, I always thought it was meh, yeah. And, the only thing I, I appreciate about him, I always heard that even though he did that every night, he went out and did standup every Friday and Saturday. Yeah,

Steve:

he's a hardworking dude. He was,

Mike:

he was the hardest working guy in chokers. He's still

Steve:

pretty work, pretty hardworking from what I understand. But yeah, he, he's he was kind of the safe play, and I think that's why they gave it to him over Letterman because Letterman was, or Leno was kind of a continuation. Of Carson appealing to the older set.

Mike:

Yeah, that must be exactly what it was. But

Steve:

Butman, so they tried to milk that as long as they could,

Mike:

but Letterman and Carson were great friends.

Steve:

They were very tight and, and I don't know exactly what happened there, but I know that that's what prompted Letterman to leave for, for CBS because he was, he was always. Believing that he was going to be the Tonight Show guy, and then it didn't happen and when he found out it wasn't gonna happen, he jumped ship as fast as he could.

Mike:

Well, it had to be a lot of money involved too,

Steve:

I'm sure. Yeah.

Mike:

And, and to his dying. It's all about the Benjamin, I was gonna say to his dying day, Letterman's still alive, but Letterman did nothing but talk great about Johnny Carson.

Steve:

Oh yeah. He, he adored

Mike:

him. Adored him. He thought he was the most class act he's ever met.

Steve:

Yeah. Yeah.

Mike:

So when we say the falling out was probably with the network, not with Carson, would, is that fair? Yeah,

Steve:

probably. I'm sure there was a lot involved there.

Mike:

Yeah. I think,

Steve:

I think what happened was it was the networks doing. But to, to Dave's disappointment, Carson really didn't do that much to intervene.

Mike:

So we talked about the declining viewership. I think we've talked about aging host, like the main ones. And I can't speak to some of the newer, streaming people'cause I don't know'em that well to be honest with you. But is the aging host and generational disconnect. A big problem.

Steve:

Yeah, I think so., I think generationally speaking, it really doesn't matter when these shows come on. I don't think that the, the, the younger generations really care for the packaging of this kind of thing.

Mike:

And that's where I was going. Not necessarily the time slots or anything like that,'cause they'll consume'em whenever. But is it just, if I have my genzer, my daughter and. And my sons are they just like, why would I ever listen to these old guys talk about anything and I'm never coming him Kinda like this podcast. Yeah. I think a

Steve:

lot of that because they, they look at it and go, okay, boomer, I, like I get sometimes, but I think it, it goes even deeper than that. I think you could insert younger guys that, that they could relate to, into these slots and they still wouldn't watch. I just, I think the packaging is just kind of tired and it moves too slow for them. They don't want it.

Mike:

I, I think you're right about that. I think the, the format's dead. Yeah. Right. And I think that's a big problem. And if they were to bring on these people that the younger generation did connect with and sit'em down for an interview, the people that they're trying to bring in that would be interested in that interview already know more. About that person because of their online content and influencing content, then Sure. Yeah. Them coming in that format to be interviewed.

Steve:

Yeah. Yeah. So yeah, they, they've already, they've already beat it to the punch. There's really no point to it.

Mike:

And, and I think that's where I was going there is this, there might not be a vehicle for this anymore.

Steve:

I think that's true. I kind of hit on it a little bit earlier. I think it is I think it's, it's definitely on a timer now. I don't believe that networks are gonna start in their own need to survive. They're gonna have to try and reinvent themselves, and I don't think that's gonna include late night talk shows.

Mike:

And that goes to my next point financial viability is probably a problem for these type of formatted shows. And having these highly paid host, right, right. Mm-hmm. And what it takes to do the production of that show. I think like these networks, even the streaming ones are finding it's not worth it.

Steve:

Yeah, I, I agree. I agree. I can even see the networks at some point, maybe one or two of them going back to a 1950s concept to where after the late news they put on some 10-year-old movie. Instead.

Mike:

Yeah. Well, they'll really draw'em in, in,

Steve:

yeah. Well, I mean, it it, it'll be a stop gapp thinking it'll be cheap. It'll just be filler

Mike:

or, or they'll just put a flag waving, and play the

Steve:

I don't know if you're gonna see the Blue Angels fly by at, at two o'clock in the morning with a sign off and a test pattern.

Mike:

We're not doing that anymore.

Steve:

I don't think so. I was thinking about those other day, there is a, there's something online somewhere. Maybe I saw it on YouTube. There is, there is a. One of those kind of cavalcade things of just all the different sign off. Test patterns from different local, local stations from around the country from the sixties and seventies. I found it pretty entertaining.

Mike:

Oh my God. Somebody thought somebody would find that entertaining, man. You somebody

Steve:

put that together. Yeah, they found me. They, they, they did it for me, I guess. I don't know. Wow. Because. Kind of made me nostalgic,

Mike:

nostalgic for cut the TV

Steve:

that I'd have to turn it off and I wasn't tired,

Mike:

nostalgic for I hope my parents don know I'm still up. It's time better for, there's a generation out there that has no idea what we're talking about.

Steve:

No, not at all.

Mike:

They used to only be broadcast TV, and they only started this time and they finished this time and everything in between was a test pattern on your tv. Yep.

Steve:

And once in a while you'd get lucky and you'd drift into a really cool UHF channel and watch it through the ant races. I.

Mike:

Yeah. And channels were, were not like click, click, click, click. You had this tuner knob that you tried to dial in frequency. Yeah, and it would wave back and forth

Steve:

in order to watch it with any continuity you had to keep your hand on that knob and keep it moving direction.

Mike:

The atmosphere's messing with me. I can't get the picture in.

Steve:

And I remember it was especially important to us on on New Year's Eve because really late at night on that Channel 45 outta Baltimore on UHF, they would play the the rock movies like help and the gimme shelter, the Old Stones Monterey documentary. Right. And we would just be so sucked into that, trying to keep that thing tuned in.'cause it was so cool. It was the only way to, it's

Mike:

awesome. Awesome. So what, what's our final. Our final piece here around late night talk shows.

Steve:

Well, it was, it was a good time and it's, it's something else that that history's gonna set the sun on and it, and maybe that's a good thing now because what we have now is, is pretty bad. And it's, it's, it's a lot of it other than, other than Fallon who's always Mr. Happy. It, a lot of it's very hateful and maybe it should go away.

Mike:

Well, that, that's fair. I get that. We certainly don't want the hateful piece. So the other thing is there something. That the new generation or generations can replace this with? Is there something that's taking place of like, where do I get, my, my interviewed understanding of interesting people?

Steve:

Well, I, I think we're already there with the, with the streaming services and the YouTube channel and stuff like that. It is short, sweet, and to the point. It doesn't take, it's not an hour long. It's not an hour and a half long. It's just as long as you want it to be in, in five minute doses and increments, and you can move on to the next thing.

Mike:

I think that's probably true. Would you say that podcasts are one of them?

Steve:

I hope podcasts are one of'em. Well,

Mike:

that's what we're doing here. So when I, when I asked, the powers that be behind the internet one of the things that came up, if you look at like a real, show that interviewed people the first thing came up was a Joe Rogan experience.

Steve:

Yeah. Yeah. And, and court. He's, he's kind of the father of of podcasting as well, and now YouTubing as well, I guess. So he kind of opened up that frontier for everybody. But he is kind of, narrow to a large degree. I don't, it's not as if Oh, yeah,

Mike:

very.

Steve:

Yeah. So there's an agenda

Mike:

there.

Steve:

So if somebody could kind of, catch what he's doing in, a, in a bottle and expand upon it, then they would, they would really have something. But I, I think, yeah, you're gonna have to do something along that line, but it's gonna have to touch a lot more bases than just the couple or three that Joe, that Joe focuses on.

Mike:

Sure. I mean, whatever, what he's doing works for him and I'll give him that and, well, he's doing what he

Steve:

likes and that's what podcasting's all about, isn't it?

Mike:

That's a great point. Yeah. And it is a very great. Very great point. There's another one I, I never heard of. It's called Call Her Daddy. Have you heard of that?

Steve:

That name sounds familiar, but I don't know what the first thing about it.

Mike:

It's a, it's I think it's a podcast and I'm not sure exactly what that's about. We can have people go research that and take a look and you can always reach out to us and let us know. So I think that kinda wraps up this episode.

Steve:

Yeah, I think we, I think we fulfilled our obligation.

Mike:

You think if there was a person that culminated the history of late night television, late night talk shows, do you think they'd be satisfied and happy with what we just did?

Steve:

Yeah, I think Johnny would be very happy with today's episode. They, they

Mike:

would say, it was complete. I'm not sure. I'm happy with it. Alright. So is that it for

Steve:

today?

Mike:

I think that's it.

Steve:

Okay. Well that's, that was great. I enjoyed that very much and I guess we'll be doing it again here very shortly. So stay tuned for episode number three.

Mike:

And we will talk about more absurdities and personal fronts, and we will tie it all together for you

Steve:

can't wait.