Leno officially steals 'Tonight Show' from Conan O'Brien
NBC said Thursday it has reached a $45 million deal with
Conan OBrien for his exit from the
Tonight Show, allowing
Jay Leno to return to the late-night program he hosted for 17 years.
Under the deal, which came less than eight months after OBrien took the reins from
Leno, OBrien will get more than $33 million, NBC said. The rest will go to his 200-strong staff in severance.
Compensation for OBriens staff and crew was the final hurdle in negotiations. OBrien was said to have been dug in on the issue out of concern for the workers, while NBC said this week that it had already agreed to pay millions of dollars to compensate every one of them and deemed it a public relations ploy.
On Wednesday nights show, speaking of a push to get a severance deal for his staff from NBC, OBrien joked, At first they thought
I was gullible. They said the staff would be taken to a big farm, where theyd be allowed to run free forever
.
OBriens final show will be Friday, with
Tom Hanks scheduled to appear as well as
Will Ferrell — his first guest as
Tonight host last June.
Reruns of Tonight with OBrien had already been scheduled for next week. It was unclear how NBC will fill the two-week gap after that, before beginning its
Olympics coverage.
Leno will return to Tonight on March 1
.
In the end,
Conan was appreciative of the steps NBC made to take care of his staff and crew, and decided to supplement the severance they were getting out of his own pocket, his manager,
Gavin Polone, told
The Wall Street Journal. Now he just wants to get back on the air as quickly as possible.
OBrien will be free to start another TV job after Sept. 1, NBC said in its statement, released Thursday, which confirmed that under terms of an agreement that was signed earlier today, NBC and OBrien will settle their contractual obligations and the network will release OBrien from his contract.
There has been much speculation on where he might go next.
ABC (which airs
Nightline and
Jimmy Kimmel Live!) has said it wasnt interested, while Fox, which lacks a network late-night show, expressed appreciation for his show — but nothing more.
Comedy Central has also been mentioned.
A spokesman for OBrien said he would be unavailable for comment.