Tonight is Conan O’Brien’s last night on The Tonight Show and he exits with a $45-million parachute. Meanwhile, Jay Leno and David Letterman have renewed their long quiet feud. Letterman:
I’m telling jokes and making fun of Jay Leno over and over and over, relentlessly, mercilessly simply for one reason. I’m really enjoying it.
Leno:
Letterman has been hammering me every night. You know the best way to get Letterman to ignore you? Marry him. He will not bother you. He won’t look you in the eye.
The real losers? NBC. They screwed up late night on NBC back in 1992 when they bypassed Letterman for Leno as host of The Tonight Show. Letterman skipped to CBS but Leno won the subsequent ratings war. This time, NBC loses O’Brien and $45-million.