Is Co Co (Partially) Biting the Hand that Feeds Him?

The entire debacle over who should host The Tonight Show is getting a little out of hand. In 2004, when NBC made the announcement that Conan O'Brien would be taking over for Jay Leno on The Tonight Show, it seemed like an odd but reasonable change. Conan had been a host on Late Night for years and it seemed alright for him to try his hand at it. His humor is completely different from Leno's: its acerbic, witty and irreverent. It packs a punch. Leno's style, on the other hand, is much more basic. More silly. More plain. Most importantly of all, though, it's more "American" (whatever that may mean).

In fact, Leno' routine landed him in top late night spot for over a decade. In the recent switch, O'Brien's ratings have sometimes pulled this world-famous show down to 3rd place (behind David Letterman and Nightline) in its seven month run. For the businessmen at NBC, this signifies epic failure. If someone doesn't deliver immediately, he gets the axe whether he's is humiliated or not. It's all about the Benjamins, baby.

In truth, I think NBC has made everyone involved in this switch look bad: Co Co's frustrated, Leno looks guilty and they look avaricious. Their insistence on nothing but immediate perfection really speaks to their insecurity as a network. They were too anxious to wait for any kind of turn around in Co Co's performance and didn't trust that the American audience at the 11:30 timeslot would ever be smart enough to catch the biting humor of his show.

All these things aside, I think that Conan could've handled his reaction to this mess a bit better. I got into a discussion with my brother (who's incredibly brilliant and overwhelmingly stubborn) about whether his behavior is "appropriate." If someone stripped me of my show and made me out to look like I couldn't deliver, I'd be enfuriated, too. I'd express my frustrations to the people around me or just release a public statement that encapsulated my how I felt to a mass audience.

It is inappropriate, though, to use the platform of his show that NBC is still providing him with to lash out at the network. On his show the other night, he said "My contract says I can't say anything negative about NBC. But I can sing it....MORONS, INCOMPETENT MORONS!!!" Now, I get that he's hurt and has been wronged. It's a little more difficult to understand why he's using time out of his show to critique a station which is about to pay him the remaining $30-40 million of his contract.

No, I didn't stutter: 30-40 million dollars! That is more money than 99% of people in America will ever touch. In a time with an unemployment rate of around 10% (the highest it's been in recent decades), it's in poor taste to try to tear down a company when he's been so fortunate both to have a job like his and to be rewarded so handsomely for it (even while leaving it). Are Americans really going to root for a rich guy complaining about his mistreatment when they know how greatly he'll be compensated for his losses?

I think many people have too much on their minds to really sympathize with what Co Co's facing. As a fellow comedian Katt Williams once said, "You are not supposed to be at the gas station making life decisions. You just at the pump asking 'Did I eat today? I can't get no half a tank'" which is all too real. Many Americans are struggling daily with all kinds of things: expensive gas, expensive healthcare, relatives being blown up in a pointless expensive war and a general time of unease. This is not a time of America the Superpower but rather America the Struggling Giant.

With all of these especially difficult situations going on, I think it's a little insulting for a talk show host who's been so blessed to enjoy a fruitful career to be so openly hostile towards his network. Is this really a problem we should be concerned with or is it just a time to listen to Co Co's woes? He was wronged, but instead of exiting in a dignified way, he has now stooped to NBC's level by acting in a reckless fashion. I understand his will to fight back but I think it's always more honorable to pull yourself together and to use your show time to entertain people rather than to focus on your own professional drama.

He even had the option of just moving his show to midnight but now he's walked away entirely, leaving all the people of his staff who've uprooted their lives to move from the East Coast to the West Coast with him out of a jobs, as well. He's causing a lot more chaos and crisis for the people around him but in the face of all that he's still focused on himself....and, don't forget, he's gonna have the benefit of a 30 million dollar unemployment check. Not too shabby.

The reason this whole situation fascinates me is because it speaks so much to American power dynamics and issues of masculinity. Men seem to be so heavily defined by their careers that even when they are lucky enough to receive enormous financial benefits from their work, they're never satisfied.Conan will find some other place to work and he'll be able to bounce back....which may not be true of many Americans watching (or not watching) his show. There's obviously a disconnect between the embarrassment he's suffering and the actual crises that Americans face on a regular basis.

Maybe Co Co's just a little too out of touch and that's the reason for his recent demise. Or maybe (let me be frank although it hurts cause I really enjoy him as a comedian) he's the golden example of the term "sore loser"? Whatever the case may be, I still have to ask Conan to try to be the bigger person and if he can't, I guess I'll just have to ask him "what's up with that?"

Lookin Like a FOOL with Your Pants on the Ground

Mr. Larry Platt is too real for America. I really respect truth speakers and he is a wise one for sure! On American Idol last night at the end of an hour and half long show, "General" Larry Platt stepped in front of the judges and presented them with a predicament: what were they gonna make of this geriatric entertainer? Sure enough, Larry brought something deeply amazing to the table. He reminded hoodlum-looking boys to pull up their pants. It is not, nor has ever been cute for a male to have his pants sagging down to his ankles. Larry put it all out on there when he proclaimed, "Pants on the ground. Pants on the ground. Lookin like a FOOL with your pants on the ground." My goodness.

When Larry first busted out with these lyrics I went into cardiac arrest and I laughed until I ached...and then I ached until I cried. Finally, someone had called out to the men of the world and reminded them that their beauty didn't lie in their ability to wear sagging pants. That instead of looking like hot mess productions, they could look fine without all of that.

Better yet, he was completely earnest. He had this soft, raspy voice and was even kind enough to ask the judges' permission to sing by saying "Ok, you ready?" We weren't ready but Larry came on through for us anyway. He said, "With the gold in yo mouth, hat turned sideways, pants hit the ground, call yourself a cool cat, lookin like a FOOOOOL walkin downtown with your pants on the ground. GET YO PANTS OFF THE GROUND!!!!" As if that wasn't enough he continued by dropping what he had down to the ground in a split formation. I can't do a split. I'm 19. He's 62. How does he do it? I think it's because he's a passionate man with a whole lot of fire within him. And because he has great genes.

In reality I'm not surprised that someone like him could offer this wake-up call to Americans. Who else but a man wearing sunglasses indoors and a black pride sweatbands could deliver this kind of deliciousness? The zaniness of his movements and his presentation speak volumes but the message itself is so real that it's painfully humorous. He's right. Get your pants off the ground. We all deserve to look respectable and Mr. Larry hit the nail on the head. Now every time I encounter people with this style, I can envision his words and feel justified asking myself "what's up with that?"

Hair Care and a Case of the Crazies

In early 2008 I was flipping through some channels and landed on my feel good favorite, TLC. There was an innocent show about this couple with two sets of multiples. Forget their ridiculous amount of children and the fact that they insisted on having all six embryos carried to full term after having twins....I was more interested in the anomaly of how quarter Asian children could look more Asian than their half Asian dad. The show was John and Kate plus 8, of course.

I became a hardcore fan and was especially fond of their little boy with glasses. There is nothing, I repeat NOTHING, more adorable than a toddler with over-sized glasses. I'm just saying. Anyway, I watched the show over and over again much to the displeasure of my family. My father would always comment that John and Kate seemed so unhappy as a couple but I never took it to heart. They were strong and they were gonna get through all this. In truth I didn't actually know what would happen to them but it was fun at the time to pretend that I did.

I really took the show as a harmless bit of fluff. Flash forward to the summer of 2009 when the show and the lives of the couple in it exploded onto the front pages of magazines and headlines. Kate was on every show possible lamenting her crumbling marriage. John was running around wearing some suurrrriously unattractive t-shirts, smoking some cancer-sticks and chilling with questionable characters of the female race. It became a phenomenon (like so many others in our country) to watch the train wreck that is their lives. I even got into it a bit at first. I kept feeling sorry for Kate and for the way people were calling her a bad mother, even a monster. If there is one thing that troubles me (and trust me, there are PLENTY of things on this list), it is the way women are often portrayed as villains as soon as they show a bit of assertiveness. I thought she was being treated poorly and that this was another example of the way people are quick to jump on women as being evil and manipulative while they merely chastise men for being playboys.

Cut to January 6, 2010 (aka today) when I get a newsflash on my MSN account that Kate Gosselin is 'Starting Over' with a new look. Now, part of me hates myself for clicking the link in the first place but the other part of me thinks it's damn ridiculous that there is even a story about this woman's image. First of all, let's take the headline at face-value. Why does a woman's decision to change her hair mean that she has successfully restarted her life? Doesn't it just mean that she went to a hair salon? Am I missing something?

And second of all (but more importantly), what happened to the adorable Plus 8? You know, the ones who seem wholly Asian despite their genetic makeup? I'll tell you what happened: they fell into the background as their parents got wrapped up in their "fame." As I looked to the link to see what the latest installment of the story is, I realized that what was once a simple guilty pleasure has now turned into a large scale, pointless soap opera. So Kate got some new extensions and looks like ridiculous on the cover of People magazine. What can I do about it? Nothing. Absolutely nothing.

While there is personal responsibility when it comes to choosing which "news" we want to hear about, I do find it ridiculous that this story is on the same page as a story about the Nigerian man who has been indicted for attempting to blow up a plane in the U.S. Why does everyone get a platform to be a part of the "news"? Whether someone sleeps with Tiger Woods (see older post), exploits his/her children for TV and magazine opportunities or tries to terrorize a post 9/11 nation, she or he will get to make headlines. Everything that happens in our country (whether it's truly news-worthy/ important or not) is turned into a spectacle for our viewing pleasure. Have we lost the ability to separate junk from actual news? Is Kate's weave really as important as planned terror attacks on our soil? What's up with that?