KCOP Takes a ‘Risky’ Path in Late-Night TV : Programming: Channel 13 sets 2 1/2 hours of first-run shows in a slot usually used for talk shows and syndicated reruns. The target audience--young adults.

“The Arsenio Hall Show” is history. But the late-night landscape on KCOP-TV Channel 13 is more “busy,” as the departed talk-show host liked to say, than ever.

KCOP has procured a 2 1/2-hour block of original, syndicated programming specifically designed as a late-night alternative to news, old sitcoms and the tried-and-true network talk shows.

“Nobody has ever done this before,” said Rick Feldman, KCOP’s general manager. “And first-run (programming) is very risky because it’s hit and miss, and you don’t know what is going to work and what isn’t. But if stations like mine didn’t take a risk, you’d just be getting all the same boring stuff you always get. Old episodes of ‘MASH’ and ‘Cheers’ are fine, but how many times do you want to see them?”

Beginning Monday at 10:30 p.m., immediately after the station’s half-hour newscast, Channel 13 will fill the void left by “Arsenio” with four daily news, comedy and talk programs aimed at young adults.

“If you look at our station, except for the 6 to 8 p.m. block, we have become more and more first-run original programming in every part (of the day), so it makes sense to stay that way in late night too,” Feldman said. “And when these shows--’Last Call,’ ‘The Newz’ and ‘The Jon Stewart Show’--turned up, they fit the profile of my station, which is very few older people and lots of young adults.”

“Last Call,” produced by former NBC guru Brandon Tartikoff and airing at 10:30 p.m., is described by Feldman as a “younger, humorous ‘McLaughlin Group,’ ” discussing, debating and dissin’ the news and personalities of the day. Hosted by Brianne Leary, former star of the TV series “CHiPs” and a free-lance journalist, the show features a group of youngish, hip-ish panelists sitting around and mostly making light of issues from the world of politics, business, culture and sports.

“They will do serious topics, but it’s not just 20 minutes on Bob Dole versus George Mitchell,” Feldman said. “They will also do some of the more bizarre stories that exist in the real world.”

“The Newz,” following at 11, is probably the riskiest venture because it will attempt to create a half-hour of topical sketch comedy, a la “Saturday Night Live” and “In Living Color,” on a daily rather than weekly basis. Featuring an ensemble cast of stand-up comics and improvisational actors and a team of writers grounded in the Harvard Lampoon, the show will spoof the day’s news events and include recurring characters such as Andy and Abby, a couple of combative columnists dispensing advice on relationships.

“Premier Story,” at 11:30 p.m., has been airing on KCOP since June and is the only one of the new late-night programs that won’t lean heavily toward the comedic. Feldman admits that it might be out of place sandwiched between comedy and commentary on either side, but the catch is that the program--essentially a tabloid news magazine modeled after “A Current Affair”--is produced by Chris Craft, which owns KCOP.

“We’re going to baby it a little bit,” Feldman admitted, refusing to move it to the 10:30 slot after the news because the station has already spent a good deal of money promoting its place at 11:30 p.m.

“The Jon Stewart Show,” airing at midnight, is Paramount’s replacement for “Arsenio Hall,” a one-hour talk show aimed at a younger crowd than the Letterman-Leno competition. Strictly black T-shirts and Doc Martens, Stewart is a guy who looks like he’s never worn a suit and tie in his life--certainly not on MTV, where his show got its start. His routine is expected to be the same: a monologue, interviews with guests both famous and offbeat, and performances by bands that are likely to be considered edgier and more obscure than those invited to the other shows.

Feldman knows that some of these programs aren’t going to click, but he said that using first-run programming is less of a financial burden than what stations have done in the past: buying off-network sitcoms or movie packages for millions of dollars and then running them over and over to make them pay off.

“And that is boring and it’s a lot riskier financially, and I just don’t want to play that game anymore,” Feldman said. “You can spend millions for, let’s say, ‘Who’s the Boss?,’ and you have hundreds of episodes, and what if people don’t want to see them anymore? If first-run doesn’t work, you drop it and go on to something else. But if it does work, then you have a franchise, a huge hit like ‘Ricki Lake’ turned out to be.”

* JEFF WALD’S TURN

KCOP’s news chief defends show with “the news people who stand up.” F9