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Now that NBC has made it clear it plans to put Jay Leno at 11:35 p.m., the odds are 50/50 at best that Conan O'Brien will decide to stay at NBC, a person familiar with the O'Brien's camp thinking said.
O'Brien and his team are taking the weekend to mull their options and to recover from the shock of the last 72 hours. While Team Conan always knew there was a chance moving to "The Tonight Show" would not work out, nobody expected NBC to abandon O'Brien so quickly and completely.
While it's possible there could be a decision early during the coming week, most insiders around Hollywood believe O'Brien isn't going to rush a decision.
O'Brien and his representatives -- including WME and manager Gavin Polone -- have so far maintained a strict radio silence about Late Night Crisis 2010. But it's probably safe to assume that O'Brien was left utterly stunned and angered by recent events.
The challenge now: getting beyond those emotions and figuring out what's best for O'Brien and the hundreds of loyal staffers on his show, including longtime executive producer Jeff Ross.
As for the options in front of him, a source close to the O'Brien camp said that while NBC has not explicitly said Leno will be moving to 11:35, the network has made it clear that's the plan -- and left O'Brien's reps with the impression that, if forced to choose between O'Brien and Leno, it would choose Leno.
Now, O'Brien has to decide whether to accept NBC's clear betrayal of trust and stay with the network at 12:05 a.m., find a home elsewhere (including possibly a cable network) or simply leave late-night altogether while figuring out his next career move.
That last option is seen as highly unlikely by industry insiders. Whether O'Brien decides to move or stay could well depend on what other offers, or overtures, come his way in the next few days -- and whether NBC decides to make its shabby treatment of O'Brien complete by trying to enforce a non-compete clause in his deal.
Fox has made it clear it likes O'Brien but, at least for now, is playing it a bit coy about its intentions. ABC has expressed support for current host Jimmy Kimmel, but it'd be foolish to completely take the network out of the running.
Industry insiders also believe other networks -- maybe TBS or FX? -- might be interested in O'Brien, but there's no word of any firm overtures being made.
Team Conan might also do well to consider the fact that the TV landscape is expected to change even more dramatically over the next five years than it already has recently. The whole concept of "timeslots" could soon be irrelevant as TVs with built-in Internet apps -- a big hit at last week's CES -- make viewing on-demand the order of the day.
