In a video released on YouTube, Conan O’Brien announced the name of his new show would simply be “Conan”. During the announcement, he scribbled the name on a blank white sheet of paper and revealed it to the world. O’Brien admitted to spending absurd amounts of money on market research only to realize that regardless to the name of the show, people will ultimately call it the “Conan” show as they have in the past.
According to the TBS press release, O’Brien says, “I’m just using ‘Conan’ and dropping the ‘O’Brien’ because I want to get away from the whole Irish thing.” O’Brien began talks with TBS several months ago after a call from one of TBS’s other late night hosts, George Lopez. After conversations and contract negations, O’Brien said this of his career, “In three months I’ve gone from network television to Twitter to performing live in theaters, and now I’m headed to basic cable. My plan is working perfectly.”
O’Brien, 47, was nominated for an Emmy award for his brief stretch as Tonight Show host after replacing long time host Jay Leno. NBC in an attempt to recapture viewers in certain time slots, moved Jay Leno to an earlier slot, but found it to be a bad decision on their part.
The network then decided to return Leno to his original time slot and move O’Brien to a post midnight time slot. O’Brien viewed the networks’ offer as unacceptable and a breach of contract. He parted ways with his home network after more than 15 years with a settlement package worth well over $40 million.
“Conan” will air on TBS on November 8 at 11p.m.