By Bill Carter, 2010

ISBN 067002208X

When NBC decided to move Jay Leno into prime time to make room for Conan O'Brien to host the Tonight show -- a job he had been promised five years earlier -- skeptics anticipated a train wreck for the ages. It took, in fact, only a few months for the dire predictions to come true. Leno's show, panned by critics, dragged down the ratings -- and the profits -- of NBC's affiliates, while ratings for Conan's new Tonight show plummeted to the lowest levels in history.

Conan's collapse, meanwhile, opened an unexpected door of opportunity for rival David Letterman. What followed was a boisterous, angry, frequently hilarious public battle that had millions of astonished viewers glued to their sets.

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