These are interesting times for Jay Leno. Sure, he’s always been an odd-looking, charmless, unfunny man.
But people liked him. Now, though, thanks to the palaver over NBC and The Tonight Show, that’s all switched around. Because he’s seen, rightly or wrongly, as the man who forced Conan O’Brien off the air, Jay Leno has emerged as the villain of the piece – a reputation not helped by the fact that he looks like the sort of person who’d sneak into your house and night and stab you through the eyeball with his chin.
Anyway, in a last-ditch attempt to win the public over again, Jay Leno has appeared on Oprah to say that he’d like to talk to Conan O’Brien soon. That’s more or less what he said, anyway – what he said was a bit more whiny and annoying. And unfunny, too. Don’t forget unfunny.
We’re now four days into this new post-Conan wilderness and, for the most part, things have reverted back to normal. David Letterman is still griping about anything that happens to pop into his mind, Craig Ferguson is still conducting imaginary three-way conversations between two versions of himself and a crocodile puppet and Jimmy Fallon is still rightly being ignored by the world at large.
Things aren’t completely back to normal, of course – Conan O’Brien has stopped hosting The Tonight Show in order to concentrate on weeping into his Scrooge McDuck-style money vault full-time, and then there’s Jay Leno. And, for someone who prides himself on being a regular, trustworthy, man on the street, Jay Leno’s public image has taken an almighty battering for his part in NBC’s woes.
That’s bad news for Leno – if he loses his reputation as middle America’s favourite everyman, he’ll have nothing left. He’ll just be a tired old man telling weak topical jokes to a sycophantic guitarist who gets paid to laugh at him. But this won’t be the end of Jay Leno, not as long as he’s got powerful friends like Oprah Winfrey to help him out.
That’s why Jay Leno has decided to appear on Oprah – to a) show the world that he’s still the same old middling, inoffensive, mediocre everyman that he ever was and b) talk about Conan O’Brien in a manner that superficially resembles sympathy. Here’s an excerpt from the transcript:
Winfrey Have you talked to Conan in person?
Leno I haven't talked to him through all this. No. I haven't.
Winfrey Did you want to pick up the phone?
Leno Yeah, but it didn't seem appropriate.
Winfrey Why?
Leno I don't know. I think it ? let things cool down and maybe we?ll talk, you know.
Of course, pretending to be the bemused bystander in all of this is just Jay Leno’s first step towards reclaiming The Tonight Show for himself. The second step involves doing an extra-long patronising high-five session with his audience at the start of his first episode back.
Then, and we could be wrong here, Jay Leno will start ploughing his fortune into the research and development of low-temperature technology so that, even after he dies, he’ll still be able to present The Tonight Show With Jay Leno’s Cryogenically Frozen Head and nobody will ever be able to take his place ever again. Ever.
Follow hecklerspray on Twitter
Justa Notherguy says
Apology, schmology – at this point it’s all just phony-baloney PR, including Ms. Winfrey’s softball question.
Meanwhile, unfortunately for Mr. Leno (plus Mr. Gaspin, Mr. Zucker and the rest of NBC’s executive ranks), this story just won’t go away. The endless explanations and press releases don’t seem to help much, either – much less, on-air interviews with soul-searching galore. And a big part of that is the history involved. Like Letterman said, ‘I know it’s not his (Leno’s) fault. But isn’t it funny how he always turns up at the scene of the crime?’
For any readers here who are too young to recall – or maybe just weren’t interested in late night TV, at the time – your perspective on the current Leno vs O’Brien mess might be clarified by reading some background info on the original Leno vs Letterman feud. Here’s the full story of how Jay Leno took over the ‘The Tonight Show’ hosting gig from long-time host Johnny Carson, way back in 1993.
.
http://bit.ly/6FjAQq (complete article – NY Times; 1994)
Ben Burnett says
“The Tonight Show With Jay Leno
Gena says
Leno is just so dumb. His jay walking bits are just a way of portraying himself. I would be surprised if he knows in what state Los Angeles is situated. Who the heck enjoys seeing this man reading his jokes from the teleprompter? He has no improvisation skills, he is not witty and he is such a cry baby. Letterman is definitively right when he says that he keeps showing up at the crime scene. Leno is one of those people that will smile at you while stabbing you in the back. When the knife wound starts to hurt the person he stabbed, he says that the devil made him do it or that he was sleepwalking.
JoeMomma says
LOL
I say we need Futurama style head jars now! At least then we could get Johnny Carson back and the tonight show would still be funny.
Lets be ohnest though, who actually stays up to watch this crap when you have to wake up at 6:30am to grab the 7:15 train/tub/donkey/camel to work/school/terrorist camp.
Mary says
It doesn’t feel appropriate to call, but it feels appropriate to muscle back into Conan’s timeslot and make weaselly jokes about Conan in your monologue. God help me if I ever develop Jay Leno’s sense of “appropriateness.”
Karla says
What an exaggerator, lol
Craig Ferguson is the only King of late night in my book.
Well Conan is sort of too, and Letterman…and I’ve never found Jay funny but he was actually kind of entertaining at 10pm.
Gus Naggy says
Conan is funny? Conan is NOT funny, Conan is a goof-ball…his kindergarten type humor bodes well with the mentality of his followers.The guy is scary looking and NEVER fit into the mold of a “Tonight Show” host. I knew from the beginning NBC made a mistake when they hired this clown act. Conan should go back to writing his humor rather than wasting his time on another television show.