Conan Holds His Own

from The New York Post ..

By Maxine Shen

CONAN O'Brien got off to a respectable start on his first day as the new host of "The Tonight Show with Conan O'Brien."

Nearly twice the usual "Tonight Show" audience tuned in to NBC to watch O'Brien's skit-filled debut on Monday, according to preliminary data gathered from major cities. (Final ratings numbers won't be available until next week.)

The ratings boost spilled over to "Late Night with Jimmy Fallon," who also attracted more viewers than usual for his Monday night show.

Despite trouncing timeslot rivals CBS' "Late Show with David Letterman" and ABC's "Nightline," O'Brien wasn't able to beat vacating "Tonight Show" host Jay Leno's exit show last Friday. Leno's final show drew slightly more than twice the audience that his previous daily shows got over the years, according to preliminary results.

Meanwhile, NBC announced that Sept. 14 will be the official start date for the comedian's primetime talk show, "The Jay Leno Show."

This will give Leno a full week's head start on the rest of the primetime fall schedule, which begins on Sept. 21.

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