Is late-night TV on the endangered record?
We’ve already seen a number of hosts go away the format: Desus and Mero, Trevor Noah, James Corden, Samantha Bee, Conan O’Brien and Hasan Minhaj rush to thoughts.
“The Tonight Present with Jimmy Fallon” simply shrank from 5 nights every week to 4. “Late Night time with Seth Meyers” can’t even afford a home band, a staple of the format.
Seth Meyers to Lose ‘Late Night time’ Band in Funds Cuts https://t.co/sDERldtc7M
— Selection (@Selection) June 12, 2024
“The Late Late Present” light to black following Corden’s 2023 exist, changed by a comic-themed sport present known as “After Midnight.” Even the host of “Jimmy Kimmel Dwell” predicted the format might be gone in a decade.
Now, Fortune Journal is sounding new alarms about late-night tv.
… advert income is vanishing. Within the first eight months of 2024, it fell 10 p.c, in accordance with media analytics agency Guideline, after an excellent greater drop final 12 months.
The publication reached out to Invoice Carter, the writer of “The Warfare for Late Night time,” to look at the present market. Carter has been following this slice of the leisure pie for many years. His views on the format shouldn’t be discounted.
He sounds lower than optimistic in regards to the format’s future.
“Late night time was as soon as a superb generator of revenue,” as a result of exhibits had been cheaper to provide than primetime fare and featured ample industrial time, defined Invoice Carter, the writer of a number of books on the subject.
“Earnings the exhibits present have shrunk towards non-existent.” [emphasis added]
Left unsaid within the Fortune article? The trendy late-night TV present, excluding “Gutfeld!” leans to the Left.
Onerous.
That chased numerous viewers away. “Not ‘good riddance’ however ‘riddance,’” is how far-left host Jimmy Kimmel put it.
RELATED: LATE-NIGHT TV JUST GOT EVEN MORE LIBERAL
The shift additionally diminished what’s left of late-night comedy to variations of “Clapter.” That’s the place comedians inform jokes that aren’t essentially humorous however align with the viewers’s worldview.
That’s primarily what Colbert and co. ship 4 nights every week. Extra just lately, Colbert and Kimmel took half in DNC fundraisers, obliterating any semblance of neutrality.
In the meantime, basic late-night comedy thrives on YouTube and podcasts. Adam Yenser’s “The Cancelled Information” presents a humorous riff on the basic monologue format.
Comedy podcasts provide extra impartial political satire together with movie star interviews that really feel uncooked and trustworthy. The standard late-night TV chat is simply the other.
Compelled. Temporary. Predictable. Stale.
The format could have a curious lifeline.
Leisure giants typically cling to content material for ideological functions. Living proof: It didn’t take a genius to see {that a} right-leaning late-night present would do effectively given the dearth of content material geared toward Pink State USA. But it took an present conservative platform, Fox Information, to offer us “Gutfeld!”
Comic Michael Loftus as soon as tried to pitch a more balanced late-night present. He stated TV executives recoiled on the notion.
Networks could swallow arduous and settle for potential losses from their late-night exhibits, figuring out the content material might change a number of hearts and minds. At the least that’s what they hope.