Conan will shift to a 30-minute "less structured" talk show format in 2019

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http://www.indiewire.com/2018/05/con...es-1201959876/

Conan O'Brien will continue to host his TBS talk show four nights a week, but the reduced workload will allow him to do more work outside the studio, including "Conan Without Borders" episodes that he has excelled at in recent years. The Conan makeover is part of TBS' long-term plan for the late-night host. “Since I inherited my Late Night show in 1993, TV has changed exponentially,” Conan said in a statement. “I’d like to think I have evolved with many of these changes, but now it’s time to take the next leap. A half-hour show will give me the time to do a higher percentage of the comedy in, and out, of the studio that I love and that seems to resonate in this new digital world. It’s still going to be me hosting a very silly show, but I want segments on my half-hour program to link to digital content, deepening the experience for my younger fans, and confusing my older ones.” ALSO: Conan's entire Late Night with Conan O’Brien NBC archives will soon be available on Team Coco -- including the Masturbating Bear.

Conan O'Brien on shrinking his talk show to 30 minutes "I’ve been pushing for this for a while"
Conan says his new show will still likely have a monologue and at least one celebrity guest, but he wanted to do "something that fits the modern landscape, that certainly fits the way I interact with my fans more. I was looking for something more lean and agile.” TBS and TNT president Kevin Reilly pointed out that the 30-minute show wouldn't necessarily mean less content. There will be more opportunity to do non-show things like an upcoming live tour with his Team Coco comedians and "Clueless Gamer" segments, as well as "Conan Without Borders." “It’s not going to be a whole new Conan with a shaved head and an eye patch and a falcon on his shoulder,” says Conan.

ALSO:

• Conan says doing "Conan Without Borders" inspired him to make the change: "At this stage in my career I’d like to do much more of the stuff I love and am passionate about"
  Conan briefly considered an hourlong weekly format, but he ultimately "felt more comfortable" with a daily 30 minutes
  Watch Conan and Bill Hader tackle God of War for "Clueless Gamer"

Conan O'Brien: "Doing half an hour could shock me into coming up with new stuff"
Citing the movie Die Hard, Conan says in a lengthy interview with Vulture that TBS was initially reluctant with his plan to downsize to 30-minute shows. "The truth is that the initial resistance to half an hour came from the business side," he says. "They didn’t want to stop selling an hour’s worth of ads. But we’re not going to be giving them less content. We might even be making more content and just putting more of it directly online." He adds: "There are parts of late night that feel very pro forma. At this stage in my career doing half an hour could shock me into coming up with new stuff." In a lengthy Die Hard analogy, Conan says that from his years of experience, he's learned that executives are committed to a plan, even when things change. "Sometimes my experience with executives is as if they’re Hans Gruber and the internet is Bruce Willis," he says says. The veteran host also discussed how he's gotten over The Tonight Show debacle, saying: "Without getting into specifics, there were a few people who I felt were not being good human beings. But I see that what happened was an inevitable clusterf*ck. I had a bad feeling the minute NBC said, 'You’re going to go do The Tonight Show but Jay’s also going to be on at 10 doing a Tonight Show before your Tonight Show.' It’s like when the Bachelor can’t decide: All three of us were not going to fit in that hot tub."

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Conan will cut music performances when switching to a 30-minute format in January
Music booker Roey Hershkovitz, who has worked for Conan O'Brien's various talk shows since 1999, will depart as part of the change. But he might work on music-related content that involves Conan's show and Team Coco digital platform.

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Conan O'Brien says goodbye to the one-hour format and his beloved house band after 25 years

Thursday was Conan's last one-hour edition of TBS' Conan before taking a break, going on tour and returning to a 30-minute, band-less talk show in January. Conan choked up as he paid an emotional tribute to his house band, which has been with him since his Late Night debut on Sept. 13, 1993. Originally called "The Max Weinberg 7," Conan's house band was rebranded as "Jimmy Vivino and the Basic Cable Band" upon Weinberg's departure when Conan moved to TBS in 2010. Guitarist and band leader Jimmy Vivino, Richie "LaBamba" Rosenberg, Jerry Vivino, Mark Pender, Scott Healey and Mike Merritt have been with Conan since Day One. Drummer James Wormworth, who subbed for Weinberg in the 1990s and 2000s when the E Street band drummer would go on tour with Bruce Springsteen, joined the band full-time on TBS. “Since we began this journey 25 years ago, my band has been a daily source of joy in my life. These remarkable musicians have given their talent, energy, enthusiasm and incredible showmanship for over 4,000 hours,” Conan said. “They have been with me through all of the incredible highs and lows of Late Night, The Tonight Show and these past eight years at TBS.” Even though Conan is taking a three-month break from his show, he has a lot on his plate, including the release of a website featuring digitally remastered episodes of his old Late Night shows. Earlier Thursday, Conan also announced he will be launching a podcast, Conan O’Brien Needs a Friend, in November. As previously announced, Conan will be embarking on an 18-city tour starting Nov. 2. He will also release another "Conan Without Borders" episode featuring his trip to Japan's Conan Town on Nov. 28. “I’m going to a half-hour so I can spend more time on the things I really love. I’m not talking about my wife and children – that ship sailed a long time ago,” he joked to his studio audience. “No, I’m talking about travel shows around the world; silly remote pieces; interviewing brilliant, distinct people. Really just focusing on the stuff that we love the most.”

[70s show watcher]

its not a bad idea the last time i watched his show awhile back he looked bored maybe this new format will refresh both him and the show itself

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Conan O'Brien's half-hour revamped talk show plans to shoot beyond its timeslot, edit it down and put the extra content online

Conan, in the midst of a cross-country tour, spoke about his plans to reduce a 44-minute show to 22 minutes in conversation with Jake Tapper at the New York Comedy Festival. “We’re still playing with it a lot because I’ve wanted the tour and this experience to inform it,” he said, noting that "shorter” doesn’t necessarily mean easier. “What I’d like to do is shoot the show a little longer than 30 minutes, have it be very loose and playful, put out the best version of the linear show, and put the rest out online, so they work off of each other.” He added: “Part of what we’re trying to do with this new shift is, you should be able to see what I’m up to pretty much 24 hours a day. And if we have something funny that we can comment on in the moment, that should be put out there at 3:00 in the afternoon. I don’t want to be killing time. Especially in a world where there’s 175 late-night shows, and people are experiencing them in a different way (online). I want the linear show to match what we experience digitally.”

ALSO:

• Conan will shy away from promoting his guests' projects so he can create moments during which viewers “can see me have fun"
  Don't expect Conan to be political on his revamped talk show
  What it's like watching Conan's new tour

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Conan O'Brien will drop the suit, tie and desk for his shorter late-night show

Conan O'Brien says "I decided to scare myself" with his new Conan format launching on Jan. 22. He'll not only break tradition by reducing each episode's airtime by half, but he'll also drop talk show conventions like the desk and a suit-wearing host. Conan says he wants to have a more intimate show that pulls the audience closer to him. "I wanted it to have a little bit of that compressed feeling, and I like having the audience right there. It feels less presentational in the old-school way," he tells The New York Times, adding: "I grew up revering the format, and then over time, you think, what’s feeling like it’s vestigial? I really don’t miss the desk. It started to feel like I’m doing someone’s taxes. None of my guests are wearing suits. I look fine in a suit, and I will wear a suit sometimes. If one of the Obamas stops by, or when Trump comes, as he inevitably will, I’ll wear a suit. The most successful things that we’ve ever done on YouTube are me wearing my Indiana Jones-as-archaeology teacher look. And people accept that." Conan also says watching other half-hour shows like Samantha Bee's Full Frontal and The Daily Show convinced that he's been padding his hourlong show for too long. When asked if the revamped show will set up his final act, Conan says: "I’m never going to have a better farewell show than I did on The Tonight Show I loved that show and so I feel, in a weird way, I had my farewell show. I did it. I died, and talked to my grandfather and saw the light and was called back. This concept that I must be the king of late night, I don’t even know what that means anymore. I don’t know who that is anymore. It’s an outmoded concept. I’ve come to realize that there’ll come a point where it’s just not even thought of as late night: 'Oh, you make that stuff that makes me laugh.'"

Half-hour Conan's first two weeks of guests revealed: The Good Place cast to visit for the second show

Conan O'Brien's revamped Conan will premiere a week from Tuesday with Tom Hanks, followed by The Good Place cast on Wednesday and Bill Hader on Thursday. The following week, Conan will welcome Tig Notaro, Gina Rodriguez, Pete Holmes, Matt LeBlanc and comedian Gary Gulman.

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Conan O'Brien's late-night revamp was underwhelming -- it's essentially the same show

"Same show, same Coco, same Andy, different set, no band, and all in just 21 minutes, not counting commercials. Now, for the quiz part of this review: What's missing?" asks Verne Gay. "What's missing, obviously, is what was supposed to be here. After a three-month sabbatical during which time Conan — on tour, or off on a mountain, pondering the future of late night — was supposed to come back with a dramatically revised model of this time-honored, threadworn TV format. While not explicitly stating as much as implicitly suggesting as much, fans were promised a New Coco for a New Era. That hasn't happened, at least with the first edition as evidence. Instead, Conan now feels like a lonely, underfunded outpost in the wilds of late night TV, where the other hosts venture out nightly with their artillery aimed squarely at the easiest target in the known universe." As Gay points out, Conan having Tom Hanks as his first guest is a throwback to his old show. "Hanks is always a good guest, but someone who always seems like the first guest on refurbished shows," says Gay. "'Always' is the problematic word here: Among his many talents, Hanks just feels like the peerless, perfect late night show guest. We know because we've seen him in this role before many times. So to add to the above list: Same guest."

ALSO:

• Conan revamp felt like a missed opportunity for true reinvention: It's the same show, only shorter
  The show might look different, but Conan is very much the same late-night host we’ve been watching for over 25 years
  If you believed the hype of a less-structured talk show for modern times, you're going to be disappointed
  Conan seemed reenergized by cutting out the fat of the one-hour late-night format
  Not all talk shows come out fully formed: Perhaps the revamped Conan is still evolving

Conan O'Brien's revamped talk show is addition by subtraction -- he just needs more actual additions

The first episode of TBS' Conan with the new format was packed with C-minus material. "But what makes the new Conan worth keeping an eye on," says Rob Harvilla, "is the classic and visceral tension between how seriously he takes the late-night format and how seriously he takes the idea of violently disrupting it." He adds that Conan's "brand is still strong, and the platonic ideal of that brand is still total chaos, and with less time to fill and less fealty than ever to pay to the way (Johnny) Carson used to do it, the new-look Conan will get better if and when it gets weirder." ALSO: Conan takes his horrified associate producer Jordan Schlansky to a meal at Olive Garden.

[Heenan Fan]

Conan was once great, but his TBS show jumped the shark the day Trump was elected potus.