In the middle of this whole late night NBC mess, Conan O’Brien released a statement today, addressing the issue. I guess I shouldn’t be surprised that he was classy, funny, and strong with his words.
With the line, “for 17 years, I’ve been getting paid to do what I love most and, in a world with real problems, I’ve been absurdly lucky”, we realize that Conan understands that overall, this is a pretty silly thing for the media to be concentrating on. After all, we are talking about the controversy surrounding men who tell jokes for a living and who are already millionaires several times over. In light of the recent events in Haiti, it makes the situation seem even sillier. The media, however, loves this type of stuff.
Having said that, it’s amazing to see the majority of the public’s support behind Conan. From the “team conan” tweets to “I’m with Coco!“, it appears at least with the Internet, Conan has everyone’s sympathy. I am a bit surprised though that there does appear to be some support for Jay Leno though. I’ve read several things online where people have voiced their support for Leno. I guess anyone can have fans, even if you don’t have a sense of shame.
Among the small community of late night talk show hosts though, it’s clear that almost everyone is rooting for Conan. You can bet Letterman is in Conan’s camp, after all, he got screwed the same way almost 20 years ago. Jimmy Fallon owes his show to Conan. What about Kimmel? Watch this clip. He did his entire show like that.