Lorne Michaels has been assured that Jimmy Fallon and Seth Meyers' shows are safe

Michaels doesn't think Donald Trump's ongoing censorship campaign will touch him at NBC.

Lorne Michaels has been assured that Jimmy Fallon and Seth Meyers' shows are safe

Is late night television dying? Maybe, but not at NBC. In a rare interview with Puck‘s Matthew Belloni, Lorne Michaels professes himself “stunned” over the firing of Stephen Colbert and the end of The Late Show at CBS. But as the producer of The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon and Late Night With Seth Meyers, Michaels has been assured his shows are safe. “I think [Comcast C.E.O.] Brian Roberts—who I will be working for for the rest of my life, who I have very high admiration for—has integrity. But at the same time, everyone has [broadcast] licenses, everyone has… you know,” the Saturday Night Live boss says. “But I really don’t believe that we affect things.”

Something of a vague answer, but Michaels has been in the game too long to give away too much. (That’s why, we can assume, he rarely does press.) For instance, he won’t weigh in one way or another as to whether the Colbert firing was political. However, he observes that “there’s two audiences now”: “There’s the audience that is [watching on] TikTok and YouTube, and there’s a linear audience. Both Seth [Meyers] and [Stephen] Colbert are heirs to David Letterman. You know what I mean?” He explains. “Conan [O’Brien] as well. They’re going to be doing that [type of show], just as I’m still doing SNL, as if everybody’s watching that night. But Jimmy [Fallon] does a lot of stuff that you can watch all day.”

From his long-held, fortified fiefdom at NBC, Michaels isn’t concerned about any kind of political censorship from networks that are worried about President Donald Trump’s opinion. And that’s despite the fact that Trump has threatened Comcast over Meyers’ show and called Fallon a “moron.” Asked if he thought the president’s ire would affect his shows, Michaels shrugs it off, saying, “Whatever crimes Trump is committing, he’s doing it in broad daylight. There is absolutely nothing that the people who vote for him—or me—don’t know. You know what I mean? And he is a really powerful media figure. He knows how to hold an audience. That’s a very powerful thing, and I think it was always underestimated. His politics are obviously not my politics, but denouncing [him] doesn’t work.” 

That’s not exactly an answer to how Trump might affect political comedy, but again, Lorne Michaels typically plays things pretty close to the chest. He does share one revealing nugget, in connection to Colbert. He recalls the cancellation of The Smothers Brothers following their anti-Vietnam War sentiment as a “huge thing,” and formative to him personally. “I later asked Tommy [Smothers] to do [SNL], when I was planning the first six shows, and he said no,” Michaels says. “Later we talked about it, and he said, ‘I was still so angry.’ That was four years later. And I thought, Being a martyr is thrilling, and everyone’s cheering, and then it’s show business. It just goes on.” In other words, don’t expect Michaels to stick his neck out if Trump continues to remake the TV landscape in his image.

 
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