Commentary

Better Late Than Never: 'Letterman' Finally Makes Some News, But It's More Ho-Hum Than Hi-Oh!

by Joe Mandese , June 10, 2009

When I began covering media nearly 30 years ago, TV was my beat, and I loved the medium. Still do. I just don't cover it as much, and so I'm not as in touch on what's going on as "TV Watch" regular Wayne Friedman, or our colleague David Goetzl, two of the best reporters covering the medium today. So I get a kick when Wayne is on holiday, and David and I get to alternate as fill-ins while he's away. It gives an excuse to stick my nose back into TV land, and see how my colleagues are spinning the news about the business of television.

Ah, but where to start. I guess I'll start in the early '90s when I was still covering the TV beat for Advertising Age, and had to opportunity to break one of the most important stories of my career: the news that David Letterman was officially leaving his home base at NBC. I knew at the time that it was an important story, but the reaction to it surprised even me. The next day, the TV columnist for the Detroit Daily News published a story whose lead read: "Joe Mandese, I don't know you, but right now I don't like you very much."

But enough about me. There's a reason for retelling this personal anecdote, because one of the big stories circulating around TV land over the past couple of days is the fact that David Letterman has struck a new deal that will keep him at CBS for at least another couple of years. The thing is, it's not that big a story, and I'm not sure why.

Letterman is still one of the true television icons, a personality who transcends the tube, and is someone we can all relate to, even in this age of Twitter and YouTube. In fact, Letterman's clips regularly are among the most viewed videos served by YouTube. So I'm struggling to understand why the story hasn't gotten more play. Okay, so he's not bolting out the door the way he left 30 Rock 16 years ago, and there's obviously less drama attendant to a guy staying put, especially as the late-night royalty swirl around him: Leno moving to prime time, and Conan O'Brien cozying up next to Letterman's timeslot. Yes, there's been a lot of action on the late-night dial, but if anything, I'd have thought it would have made Letterman's new deal bigger news among journalists who cover television. But it's not. And I can prove it.

Type the keyword terms "David Letterman," and then follow up and do the same for "Jay Leno" and "Conan O'Brien" on Google News. When I did that this morning, I found Letterman was an also-ran, trailing both Leno and O'Brien by significant margins:

Google News Indexes (Past 30 Days)

Jay Leno 8,173

Conan O'Brien 6,186

David Letterman 5,061

Dubious? Do the same with Yahoo News and you'll get different absolute results, but essentially a similar pattern: Leno (3,206 story references); O'Brien (2,574) and Letterman (2,415).

What does this mean for anyone aside from media news junkies like me, or the broadcast network publicity departments? I'm not sure, but I do think it's some kind of reflection of our pop culture, at least as it's reflected back at us via the media. When Letterman left NBC in 1993 to join CBS, the story was sustaining front page news. It even led to a popular book by New York Times TV reporter Bill Carter, which was subsequently turned into a made-for-TV movie by HBO.

This time around, Carter's coverage in the Times seemed somewhat circumspect, following the news, which was originally broken by The Hollywood Reporter.

"The most significant parts of the new deal," Carter wrote, is that the 62-year-old late-night talk-show host will be getting less money per episode in his new contract than his current one. Not exactly the stuff that best-sellers, or HBO movies, are made of. But maybe someone will post a YouTube video about it? A few tweets, at least? Perhaps I'm being unfair about the magnitude of news coverage surrounding Letterman's new CBS deal. But let me offer another perspective. Let me contrast it with news of another show -- Matt Groening's "Futurama," which just struck a deal for 26 new episodes on Comedy Central.

Futurama's deal, as of this morning, had generated essentially as much coverage (300 story references) as stories specifically discussing Letterman's new CBS deal (320 articles) indexed by Google News.

Or, as Entertainment Weekly proclaimed in its coverage about the "Futurama" deal, "Holy Bender Bending Rodríguez!"

2 comments about "Better Late Than Never: 'Letterman' Finally Makes Some News, But It's More Ho-Hum Than Hi-Oh! ".

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Douglas Ferguson from College of Charleston, June 10, 2009 at 4:31 p.m.
Maybe Letterman doesn't capture a wide audience because of his meanness. I'm sure you know: His jokes have a nasty edge to them. Great for a coarse NY audience but not well-liked in the Heartland. Example? Last night he called Sarin Palin a slut in his top-10 list. Another example? Last night he joked that Palin's daughter was "knocked up" by A-Rod during the seventh inning stretch. Yes, humor is cruel, but Dave relishes mean-spirited humor and always has. It has to cost him a couple ratings points.
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Rob Frydlewicz from DentsuAegis, June 10, 2009 at 5:23 p.m.

I think that when the "Colbert Report" began airing opposite "Letterman" at 11:30 a number of years ago its fresher edginess blunted the appeal of Letterman's trademark snarkiness.