The Jonathan Ross Show

I absolutely HATE Graham Norton's format. I often watch chat shows for one or two guests, so when Norton has a big A-lister I have no interest in, and a comedian I like is stuck at the end saying nothing, it's a lot more of a pain to watch. I'd rather do what I do with Chatty Man and record it, then fast forward to the guests I want to watch.

I remember when Ant and Dec were on the show, and they got the prestigious place on the sofa nearest to Graham. But most of the show was spent talking to the guy from Breaking Bad. The Graham Norton Show seems too focused on getting big names than actually getting guests who are fun to watch. Look at when Madonna was on...

It's a shame because I loved Graham's Channel 4 shows, and I like him as a person. But the format of the show is annoying.

I wonder if there's an appetite for a nightly late night talk show like in the USA?

Channel 4 already tried it with Norton.

No - shop at bid going off the air proved that.

The format doesn't really work over here in Europe.

A few UK channels have tried it with the most famous being The Jack Dee Show when Channel 5 first started, but they just don't work and people soon lose interest. Even RTL4/5 tried it and although it was partial success people soon lost interest and t became weekly for a while.

Wrong Jack. Jack Docherty.

Thanks for correcting me

BTW what is Jack Docherty doing nowadays?

Who had that daily 7pm show?

Daily 7pm show- do you mean
Wogan??

Wasn't Wogan aired about three times a week?

Presumably the reference is to Chris Moyles and then Christian O'Connell who did a daily show at 7pm on Channel Five a decade ago, produced by Chris Evans, which flopped massively. Wogan was indeed on three nights a week.

The piece mentions Ross' suggestion that guests prefer to go on Norton because they're more "protected" as they're interviewed together, but that is such a ridiculous comment given Ross tells everyone they're brilliant anyway. The format of this show is all over the place, the green room is a daft idea and if they're just going to constantly cut between that and the studio, why not just have them on set all the time anyway? I much prefer the Norton format, you get to know the guests better by seeing how they interact, I love it when they have big American stars alongside British comedians. Indeed this series has been a bit weak because there have been too many shows where the guests are all from the same film, so you don't get the reactions (and there have been too many all-male line-ups).

The other problem with Ross' show is that Ross is just a crap interviewer. I don't mean because he doesn't ask serious questions, he's not interviewing Robert Mugabe, and it is a comedy show. I mean because he asks stupid questions that lead to endless comedy cul-de-sacs and clearly doesn't care less about half the people he interviews. Used to be the same on the Beeb, there would be one big guest and the other two would just get the shortest shrift imaginable. There was an episode where Sean Lock and Kylie were on the same show, and Ross' questions to Lock were just "Have you met Kylie? Isn't Kylie sexy? What's your favourite Kylie song?" and so endlessly on. Same with David Mitchell and Davina. "Have you met Davina? Do you watch Big Brother? Would you go on Big Brother?" All the bloody time.

It might make more sense if Ross did a series of one-on-one interviews, which would save us the can't-be-arsed interviews that make up half his show. I'm guessing the Top-Gear-with-films show he was piloting ages ago isn't happening, then?

Johnny Vaughan had a late night show on BBC Three when it launched I believe (or maybe it launch earlier on BBC Choice). It didn't really work.

One of the main reasons we won't get late night over here is the money. US late night hosts get tens of millions to work five nights a week. It's a really big part of the TV industry there, whereas over here anything after News at Ten is seen as the graveyard shift.

We would never spend that sort of money on a show that gets only 2-3 million viewers.