LAWRENCE, Kansas – Rumors began swirling today about the future of NBC late night. With an end to the 10 p.m. (9 p.m. CT) Jay Leno Show imminent, many people are wondering what will happen to new Tonight Show host Conan O’Brien.

It has been said many times over that those who do not learn from history are doomed to repeat it. Such is true of NBC.

The network that passed over David Letterman as Johnny Carson‘s successor for The Tonight Show in the early 1990s seems to have made a similar gaffe with Leno and O’Brien. Like former NBC Entertainment executive Warren Littlefield – made infamous by Bill Carter‘s book The Late Shift and a subsequent HBO movie of the same name, current entertainment chief Jeff Gaspin offered the 11:30 time slot to a seemingly hot commodity, O’Brien, in order to prevent losing him to a rival network.

Whereas Leno took late night ratings by storm following a pivotal interview with Hugh Grant in 1995, Conan O’Brien has never held such a stronghold over Letterman’s rival show. To make matters worse for O’Brien, NBC’s decision to retain Leno as host of his own prime time show made his symbolic bowing out from late night seem disingenuous at best.

Coupled with the Late Show‘s ratings dominance against its new competition, there’s reason to wonder whether O’Brien was the right man for the job.

But what really worries the network is that affiliates could lose faith. With Leno providing a weak lead-in to local news, affiliates are suffering lower ratings and ad revenue, and O’Brien is suffering from a weak local lead-in to The Tonight Show. Granted, the network is hardly bracing itself for the kind of affiliate exodus that CBS experienced after losing the NFL in 1994. But they can ill afford a mutiny.

And so the speculation begins about what NBC will do. While their upcoming Olympics coverage buys them time, something has got to give if they are going to retain all of their players. Reports that Leno could return to 11:30 can’t sit well with O’Brien, but what about the rest of NBC’s late night lineup. With Jimmy Fallon‘s getting more comfortable as host of Late Night and Carson Daly filling time with the less formal incarnation of Last Call, even giving Leno a half-hour show at 11:30 could cause a major disruption.

Many questions should be answered by the beginning of next week. But when the dust settles, can NBC make such a big change and still hang on to both hosts? The answer could be months in the making.

Update:

The New York Times‘ Bill Carter is now reporting that NBC plans to move Leno to the 11:35 p.m. time slot for a half-hour show, pushing O’Brien’s hour-long show to 12:05 a.m. and Jimmy Fallon’s to 1:05 a.m.

Filed under: Late Night TV, Opinion/Editorial, Television