Ellen DeGeneres would be an ideal choice, according to Mary Murphy, a senior lecturer at the University of Southern California’s Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism. Tina Fey and Amy Poehler would be good candidates, too, former NBC chief Bob Wright said yesterday on Bloomberg TV.
Letterman’s exit and the naming of a successor will complete a generational shift in late-night TV and give CBS the opportunity to make even bigger changes if the network is willing to gamble. It’s been more than 30 years since Joan Rivers became Johnny Carson’s regular guest host. Her efforts to start a competing show on Fox in the late 1980s faltered.
“The bold move is choosing a woman,” said Murphy, a former news producer on “Entertainment Tonight,” a syndicated show. “You put Tina, Amy, or Ellen in that position and it would be extraordinary. It’s an era where people are saying, ‘Not just one more guy sitting behind a desk.’”
With CBS Corp.’s entertainment division led by a woman, Nina Tassler, there’s a greater likelihood the network will consider a female comedian, Murphy said.
Crossing Line
“They are going to have to think very, very carefully,” Murphy said. “It would have to be a woman who could be risky but not cross the line for a mass audience.”Letterman, 66, announced his retirement at the taping of his show this week in New York. He has been host of “The Late Show With David Letterman” on New York-based CBS since 1993. “Late Night With David Letterman” ran on NBC starting in 1982.
Together, the two series will add up to 33 years and make Letterman the longest-serving host in late-night TV, exceeding Johnny Carson’s 30 years at “The Tonight Show” on NBC.
“He is such a figure in the industry,” said Wright, who ran NBC for 20 years. “It is not going to be simple to pick a replacement.”
