Seth Meyers kicked off upfronts week with a dig at NBCUniversal competitor Paramount, whose fate hangs in the balance amid a potential sale.
“Not to brag, a very good day for me — I found $20 on the street this morning,” Meyers told advertisers in New York City on Monday morning. “Long story short, I’m one of the two finalists for Paramount.”
As the NBCUniversal presentation started off the week in Radio City Music Hall, which Meyers joked makes NBCU executives feel better about the state of TV since “it could be worse — we [could] be in radio”, Meyers also quipped about where Fox News might have set up shop for its presentation.
“If you’re looking for the Fox News upfront, that’s happening outside a lower Manhattan courtroom,” the late-night host joked, referencing Donald Trump’s ongoing trial over hush money paid to adult film actress Stormy Daniels.
Speaking directly to advertisers, Meyers noted it must be a “great time” to be in the advertisers’ seats during upfronts for both traditional entertainment brands and streamers — including Netflix’s first in-person upfront and Amazon’s inaugural presentation — saying “it must feel so gratifying that eventually everyone comes back to advertising.”
“Remember when streamers told you, ‘we’re going to do television in new way, so I’m afraid we won’t be needing your little commercials anymore,'” Meyers said. “Cut to a few years later, every episode of ‘Shogun’ is interrupted by ‘whopper, whopper, double whopper.'”
Meyers found a way to sneak in a few more roasts as he presented, including one aimed at former NBCUniversal advertising chief Linda Yaccarino, who left the company a year ago to become the CEO of Elon Musk’s X (formerly Twitter).
“NBC is launching a new adventure competition series called ‘Destination X,’ … or as it was originally titled, ‘The Linda Yaccarino Story,'” Meyers said.
As Meyers moved into announcements for Bravo programming — including a second season order for “Vanderpump Rules” spin-off series “The Valley” — he took aim at “Vanderpump Rules” star Tom Sandoval, who was embroiled in a cheating scandal during the show’s 10th season, joking, “[Bravo has] also picked up something from Tom Sandoval and are waiting to learn if it’s contagious.”
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