It looks like Fox Television is trying to snag Conan O'Brien who is getting the boot from the coveted 11:35pm timeslot by NBC to put Jay Leno back in his old spot. The problem is how will O'Brien remove the shackles of his contract with NBC? Suppoedly he will continue as host of "The Tonight Show", but at what hour will it be aired? Conan's contract doesn't say what time he goes on.
It all smacks of desperation on the Network's part, as they are desperately trying to staunch the outflow of ad revenue. Both sides don't want this to become a legal matter (sounds like veiled threats, don't it?), and want the matter fixed in-house.
If O'Brien does jump to Fox, NBC could insist that he not be allowed to start a show for as long as a year, for cometitive reasons. It sounds like they want to keep Conan on a short leash, and doing what the network wants and he had better like it too! Another sore point is that NBC claims that now that O'Brien has hosted the Tonight Show, they are not liable to pay a $45 million penalty to O'Brien due if he never hosted the show.
Conan's getting elbowed aside. It's like "We gave ya a shot and it didn't work out, so buh-bye" if he doesn't like the new terms they've blindsided him with. Shoddy and petty treatment for someone who has worked hard for years to have his employer just remove O'Brien like this.
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