In all of the breathless coverage of the impending writers’ strike that I’ve been reading the past few weeks, there has been much hand-wringing over the fate of movies; talks of script stockpiling, rushed production and actors taking any job they could get their hands on abound. On the TV front, every script order or full-season pick up has had the underlying feeling of “OMG we need to show something during sweeps!” What few articles have mentioned and I haven’t even thought of until today, is the fact that late night as we know it could change drastically.
If the strike happens tonight at midnight, the fates of shows like Late Night with David Letterman, The Tonight Show with Jay Leno, The Daily Show with John Stewart and The Colbert Report are up in the air. Since all of these shows tackle current happenings in news and pop culture, the host’s monologues are often written the day of taping. The heavy lifting, of course, is not done by the hosts, but by a team of writers who craft not only opening monologues, but any sketches or video pieces that may air. Conan’s masturbating bear didn’t just show up at 30 Rock one day with a satchel full of diapers, but sprang forth from the fertile mind of a staff writer.
According to Variety, the late night shows have a few ways in which they can react to the strike. They could do away with the scripted monologues, replace them with an impromptu chat and devote more air time to interviews and/or musical guests, but the more likely scenario is that the shows will simply go dark. Many of the hosts, including David Letterman and Jay Leno, are WGA members themselves; so technically, they’ll be on strike as well. The last time the WGA threatened to strike, in 2001, Leno was quoted as saying, "I'm a union member, and I'll do whatever my union wants me to do."
While the writer’s union may want Leno and the other hosts to stay off the air for the duration of the strike, they may not get their wish. The longer the shows stay dark, the more likely layoffs become, for the production staff especially. In the interest of saving jobs (and let’s face it—making money), producers are likely to bring the shows back in some capacity. Whether an unscripted format will be a refreshing change or just mind-numbingly boring remains to be seen, but if the strike happens, it will be a while before late night’s landscape returns to normal.
