It's Arsenioooooooooo... in Fall 2013

[1069_KIFR]

As I remember, yes Arsenio was chipping away at Carsons ratings. SNL even did a skit where Dana Carvey As Johnny and Phil Hartman as Ed McMahin, had Arsenio on as a guest. Dana says, "Ed it says here that Arsenio has a hipper show" Ed famously says, "YES!" Carvey as Carson says, "I DID NOT KNOW THAT!"

Back to subject, I recall that when CBS brought on Letterman, that pretty much spelled the end to Arsenio.

[landtuna]

Carson was losing audience because he was on vacation more often than on the show.

[nomadcowatbk]

...check the books - Arsenio changed late night.

Agreed -- he took away some of Johnny Carson's audience and was even a threat to Jay Leno after Johnny stepped down, to a point where Jay's manager, Helen Kushnick, would ban guests to appear on The Tonight Show if they appeared on Arsenio. But once Kushnick was fired and David Letterman moved to CBS, that's when viewers started to migrate back to the networks, leading to Arsenio's 1994 cancellation.

A related issue with Letterman, there were several stations carrying Arsenio that were CBS affiliates.  Many of those affiliates decided to carry Letterman.  Chevy Chase showed up around the same time and a large number of Fox affiliates dropped Arsenio.  If those two events hadn't happened Arsenio might've survived.     

Some of those Fox stations kept Arsenio when Chevy Chase appeared, but they pushed Arsenio after Chevy Chase and didn't move Arsenio back when Chevy Chase was cancelled

[nomadcowatbk]

Carson was losing audience because he was on vacation more often than on the show.

Any more than Letterman and Leno go on vacation? Carson had guest hosts, Leno and Letterman show reruns

[nomadcowatbk]

Why not bring back The Magic Hour?

[landtuna]

Carson was losing audience because he was on vacation more often than on the show.

Any more than Letterman and Leno go on vacation? Carson had guest hosts, Leno and Letterman show reruns

I don't see anything in the news these days about Leno or Letterman being gone from their respective shows but back in the day there was a lot of negative press about Carson being gone more and more as time went by.  Yes he did have guest hosts but I'm guessing the general population didn't like Joan Rivers any more than I did. 

[WMC2006]

Was today the 20-year anniversary of then-candidate Bill Clinton's game-changing/sax playing appearance?

Yup

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VTkUeb6zQFA

[nomadcowatbk]

Carson was losing audience because he was on vacation more often than on the show.

Any more than Letterman and Leno go on vacation? Carson had guest hosts, Leno and Letterman show reruns

I don't see anything in the news these days about Leno or Letterman being gone from their respective shows but back in the day there was a lot of negative press about Carson being gone more and more as time went by.  Yes he did have guest hosts but I'm guessing the general population didn't like Joan Rivers any more than I did. 

no one complains about Letterman's Friday summer reruns

[nomadcowatbk]

Was today the 20-year anniversary of then-candidate Bill Clinton's game-changing/sax playing appearance?

Yup

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VTkUeb6zQFA

What instruments do Romney or Obama play?

[radiojomo]

A few problems that may cause this project to be short term:

1. These top market Tribune stations have a 1 hr. news cast before the 11PM hour. I'm sure an hour of news as the lead-in is much worse than having a 30-35 min. news block that may inhibit Arsenio's ratings.
2. Chances are that the costs of the show will be high if Arsenio goes for the traditional set up with a full staff of writers, an announcer, a house band, etc. If ratings expectations aren't met, don't be surprised if the project is ended because of a financial issue.
3. His talk show competition is VERY fierce across the board at 11. You have Conan, Chelsea Lately, The Daily Show, Adult Swim, What What Happens. He also bleeds into 11:30 where you have Leno, Letterman and Colbert. Arsenio had a great run in the 90's because he was the only youth oriented alternative to Carson at the time. Now he'll have quite the competition.

Here's my tip to his producers: Focus Arsenio to be the URBAN alternative to a talk show. For a while in the 90's during his run, his show started becoming unfocused to what his objective was to the game, being that urban voice in the late night game. Bring that back.