Late Night Wars | The Dawn of Tonight | 2

Business Wars

Wondery

History, Business, David Brown, Management

4.6 • 13.2K Ratings

🗓️ 3 March 2021

⏱️ 28 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

The late night saga begins in the uncharted wilderness of after-hours programming. In the early 1950s, an era when television broadcasting literally stops at 11:00 p.m., NBC dares to push the envelope with something called the Tonight Show. It works.

It seems insane, but American audiences are ready to stay up--and advertisers are ready to spend big money to reach that audience. In the wake of Tonight’s success, CBS and ABC are left in the dust. But they’re determined to grab a slice of that valuable late night pie as the war begins for ownership of the midnight hour.

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Transcript

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0:00.0	Hey, prime members, you can listen to business wars at free on Amazon Music.
0:04.6	Download the app today.
0:07.0	It's 1953, New York City, NBC headquarters at 30 Rockefeller Center.
0:25.8	At Weaver, NBC's president of programming, looks down the boardroom table through a thick
0:30.6	haze of cigarette smoke.
0:32.7	A dozen network executives stare back at him with frowns and arched eyebrows.
0:37.8	I'm telling you, gentlemen, late night programming is the new frontier.
0:41.7	There are huge profits to be made.
0:44.1	NBC can be the pioneer and make that time slot our own.
0:48.7	NBC hired Weaver away from rival network CBS in 1949.
0:53.9	He's a visionary thinker who understands the commercial and creative possibilities he's
0:58.3	helping to define in this new medium television.
1:02.8	But to these executives, the idea he's pitching is almost unthinkable.
1:07.6	This is nine years before Johnny Carson's show becomes a late night fixture.
1:12.2	Those hours after prime time are still a no-man's land.
1:16.1	It would be nuts to park network money there.
1:19.8	Late night programming.
1:21.5	Local news ends at 11.
1:23.2	After that, it's the national anthem and a test pattern until sunrise.
1:27.2	We need to keep pushing.
1:28.6	Look, I came up with a today show, right?
1:31.8	It's two in great numbers in the morning, just like I predicted.
	...

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