Top Ten reasons to watch Dave? Ten stars a week that Leno and other hosts can’t touch. Letterman dumps Trump for Robin to press advantage

HOLLYWOOD, CA. (Hollywood Today) 12/31/2007 – Donald Trump has been bumped for Robin Williams by David Letterman. Although it was heralded that Trump would be Letterman’s first guest on his return show, Dave has bigger fish to fry as his WGA deal gives him access to stars Leno and Conan can’t touch.

Letterman’s primary guest on his second show, Thursday, will be satirist Bill Maher — who is also a show writer and assumedly a WGA member. Trump’s promo for the celebrity edition of “The Apprentice” will have to wait until Friday night to be seen.

It’s smart for Letterman and his savvy producers to go with Williams, to emphasize their sudden advantage. Williams is an A-lister, comedian and a member of the Screen Actor’s Guild. It is likely the conversation will touch on the strike which has kept late night dark and in reruns for more than two months. Williams’s appearance is a signal to the rest of Hollywood that it is safe to visit with Dave.

Williams would not be appearing if Letterman’s company, Worldwide Pants, had not struck a deal with the Writers Guild of America late last week that allows the union writers to return to work. Worldwide Pants deal is what the WGA says it was about to propose to the AMPTP when talks suddenly broke off on Friday, Dec. 7, a day that continues to live in infamy in Hollywood.

Letterman has an advantage for now. SAG actors legally can go on NBC’s late night money machine, “The Tonight Show starring Jay Leno,” but the clear signal is that it isn’t the right thing to do, and it will not endear you with your own union, the Screen Actors Guild. So as of noon on New Year’s Eve, NBC’s head of PR said they had no guests to announce for Leno’s return show on Wednesday outside of former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee, a Republican running for president or the rest of the week.

SAG’s activist President Alan Rosenberg said Monday: “Screen Actors Guild members will be happy to appear on the ‘Late Show’ with David Letterman and the ‘Late Late Show’ with Craig Ferguson with union writers at work and without having to cross picket lines.”

If Letterman is able to book all the top actors, and Leno can’t, that could shift the late night ratings in strange ways, and once new patterns are set, it could cause long term damage to “The Tonight Show,” which has been number one in ratings with rare exceptions for years. This will give Letterman a huge boost, and bring some viewers back to sample his show who may have gone elsewhere in the past.

It could also be a major boost for The Late, Late Show Starring Craig Ferguson,” which will also have access to many stars who otherwise might have gone to a competing show that is now subject to WGA picketing. Ultimately this could be even more helpful to the little known Ferguson than to Letterman, giving his show new access to talent and likely a wider audience, at least for a while.

Although Jay Leno has been very supportive of writers up until now, and really was not in control of the overall situation in the way Letterman was as owner of his show, it remains to be seen how much this tars The Tonight Show. Leno is a natural wit which will help but the WGA says it will be watching, looking for places where it is obvious something has been written in advance. That could lead to fines or sanctions against Leno, who is a WGA member. Leno has said he is crossing his own guilds picket line in order to save the jobs of the show’s staff of about 100 people.

That still makes Leno a scab in the eyes of hard core union supporters, so just stars will gravitate to Letterman, so might many sophisticated and industry viewers. You would think that would put pressure on NBC but not so much. The network is part of the global conglomerate General Electric, under the same ownership as Universal Studios, The USA cable network and other properties.

The show with Trump scheduled for Monday (today) is expected to shoot as scheduled, but not air until Friday. Letterman will then do a second show today with Robin Williams to air on Wednesday.

Leno isn’t the only one that the WGA will be watching to see if there are violations. Also on NBC, the “Late Show With Conan O’Brien” will be under scrutiny, as O’Brien is also a WGA member. On ABC, the Jimmy Kimmel Show will return without writers. Perhaps most challenging of all is the return on Comedy Central of The Daily Show with Jon Stewart and The Colbert Report, both of which contained a lot of scripted bits until now.

Some suggest the producers on late night shows still being struck will take for striking writers — writing introductions, and creating questions and comic premises for on the street interviews. When asked about that on KPCC’s Patt Morrison Show on Monday, “M.A.S.H” creator Larry Gelbart said that “thinking a producer can write the show is absurd.” Gelbart predicted star-writers like Leno, O’Brien and Kimmel are about to cross a “minefield.”

This article was first published on Hollywood Today on December 31, 2007. By Alex Ben Block