Use of Beatles' 'Lovely Rita' on Conan O'Brien's last 'Tonight Show' cost NBC $500k

Questlove: Use of Beatles' 'Lovely Rita' on Conan O'Brien's last 'Tonight Show' cost NBC $500k

http://www.nydailynews.com/gossip/20..._cost_nbc.html

Conan O'Brien spared a few kind words for NBC during his last episode of the "Tonight Show" - but he spared no expense when it came to music.

One of his final guests, Tom Hanks, entered the studio to the tune of The Beatles' "Lovely Rita," which may have cost the network half a million dollars.

Questlove, drummer for the band The Roots, tuned in to the episode and tweeted "yo i hate spoiling but i will have you know that walk on song we just heard was half a milli. i know cause i got the list rate at nbc."

The musician tweets on good authority, as The Roots are the house band for NBC's "Late Night With Jimmy Fallon."

"anytime you use the beatles on tv that will cost you dearly," he later added.

"Lovely Rita" was played in honor of Hanks' wife, Rita Wilson. It wasn't O'Brien's only recent splurge: on Wednesday night, he rolled out a $1.5 million Bugatti Veyron in mouse ears as The Rolling Stones' "Satisfaction" - also a pricey song - played in the background.

"For the rest of the week, we're going to introduce new comedy bits that aren't so much funny as they are crazy expensive," he said. "There it is, the most expensive car in the world … dressed as a mouse."

O'Brien, who is being dumped by the network in favor of his "Tonight Show" predecessor Jay Leno, is scooping up some cash for himself and his staff, too, with a severance package of $45 million.

I'm pretty sure they also played Tomorrow Never Knows the week before. Team COCO!

Wow! Always nice to turn on the TV and hear some Beatles tunes in the background, but I had no idea it cost that much for a couple seconds played once...

They also played "Martha My Dear" a few days earlier. I love the music sabotage Max Weinberg and his band played on NBC.

It didn't cost half a million- that was just sour grapes. NBC have a flat rate they pay per week or per month and the TOTAL for a whole week's music is probably not even close to that figure. IF they had played the WHOLE of The Beatles' recording of Lovely Rita, they would have had to pay about $60,000. The house band played 20 seconds- just a few dollars.

not sure if this is true but I hear(Conan) He is a huge beatles fan and even collects bootlegs..

Plainly the man has good taste in music and appreciates haute couture.

Originally Posted by twovirgins

not sure if this is true but I hear(Conan) He is a huge beatles fan and even collects bootlegs..

Yes, he is. He said so to Ringo when he was on Late Night. He mentioned being a big Beatles fan and when on to talk about knowing all the little facts about them. It was something along the lines of "I know so much about you, like I know on this date in 1968 you had a good bagel and stuff" Not to mention he was in the Rutles sequel

But I was wondering why they played that song for Tom Hanks. I didnt know he had a wife named Rita.