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As host of The Tonight Show, Jay Leno's last guest on May 29th will be successor Conan O'Brien. Also making appearances during Leno's final week with the franchise include Mel Gibson (May 25th, his first sit down since his impending divorce was announced), Arnold Schwarzenegger (May 26th, after he first announced running for California Governor on Jay's show), Wanda Sykes (May 27th, off her controversial gig at the White House Correspondents Dinner) and Billy Crystal (May 28th, Leno's first Tonight Show guest back on May 25, 1992). Video packages featuring 17 years of "moments, gaffes and laughs" will premiere throughout the week.
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Gibson – creepy old fart, who cares
Schwarzenegger – creepy old fart, who cares
This will not have the touching appeal of Carson’s finale. Leno can’t summon a genuine emotion, and it’s embarrassing when he tries.
What an inane wank. All so he can do exactly the same thing one hour earlier. How imbecilic do that network think people are? They deserve to fail big.
17 years, and he never improved as an interviewer
Jay has won the ratings war against Letterman for 17 years.
This is either because a) the American people who watch late night TV are complete idiots or b) great writing, killer delivery of a monologue night after night, a common touch of unpretentiousness and affability along with being no better or worse than Letterman or anyone else in that space at the interview gig makes for a powerful winning combo.
I also hear Doc Brown is coming on to discuss his latest invention the flux capacitor. Snooze…
what a great lineup for the last week!
Leno stopped challenging himself a long time ago. Then again, he’s way better than Jimmy Fallon, who’s just horrible. The only thing they’ve done right on that show is to target the tech-geek. It was a brilliant strategy move and make keep Fallon on another 3 months instead of another 2.
Btw, I hear in 2012 Leno is moving to 8 o’clock.
It could actually be a brilliant move on NBC’s part. I dont though think it was deliberate. If it works they get incrementally cheaper programming they can rely on for a long while. If Leno fails, then they’ve basically neutered him and he goes away a failure without being able to segue quickly to another competing network.
Letterman may be “sharper”, but I prefer Leno, as does the majority of the country. There is something a little too smart-ass about Letterman for my taste that’s a turn-off.
And while I give Letterman’s show the edge on “special material” i.e. the Top Ten list, Leno’s monologues are, to me, always funnier. I’m always amazed at how flat Dave’s monologues are and how he, and Paul Shaffer, have to lead the laughter.
It will, of course, be very interesting to see how Jay fares in prime time. And I do think Conan will do very well in his place.
Craig Ferguson kicks both Kimmel’s and Fallon’s asses on a nightly basis. Great Scot, this guy is terrific!
The answer is a) the American people who watch late night TV are complete idiots. As humorists, there is no comparison between Leno and Letterman. Jay has NEVER been funnier and the gulf widens every year.
Hey Jay! You know who you should have on your last episode? The hundreds of hard working episodic crew members who will lose their jobs because of your new show! Seriously, Jay, just bring ‘em all up on stage for a curtain call so you can have the audience applaud for all their hard work while you wish them luck finding work in a struggling economy so you can stoke your ego and build your car collection.
I don’t know how after making so much money and claiming to be an “everyman” you can justify doing such a thing. Just because you practice your stand up on stages outside of the Tonight Show doesn’t mean you’re in touch with reality.
Shame on you, Jay Leno and NBC. Really. Shame.
Leno is a CLASS act. He will be missed on late night TV.
And this is why so many people hate Leno!
He’s having that fucking anti-Semite Gibson, for a second time since the arrest!
The monologue is often very funny & extremely vicious towards those that fuck up, either in politics or entertainment.
But Leno also has this blind spot towards scum like that Kansas born pile of shit!
That may be the worst part, he’s a natural born American citizen!
Oh, COME ON!….
Who the fuck cares? I heard from a very reliable source that there’s maybe one, at most two network shows shooting up at Universal. Last year, there were over a dozen. Get your priorities straight, ass wipes. We are screwed in this industry!
Leno’s core audience is getting older, which means they’re going to bed earlier – hence the earlier show. But… (what Roger M said above) …it’s the same show (at least similar) with the same guy on the same network but a little earlier. Why the big send-off as if he’s going away? Tacky, faux importance. Not unlike NBC these days.
Anyone who thinks Leno is funny needs to remove their head from their ass.
I’ve never understood why Leno gets a bad rap. There is no question that he is way more consistently entertaining than Letterman. Letterman may have higher highs (Drew Barrymore wouldn’t standup on Leno’s desk, that’s for sure) but he also has way lower lows, whereas Leno is just funnier on a nightly basis. The monologue writing is better, the sketch writing is better, and Leno’s delivery is better, even if he’s not Barbara Walters interview-wise every night. And yes, by all accounts, Leno is a great guy, and has been ever since he was working the clubs in Boston. I don’t understand the widespread Leno-bashing, not to mention the outright dismissal of his formidable audience. There’s a reason why Leno’s been #1 for so long. He’s great at what he does. All the haters can take it on the chin.
I will settle this: as a European I think both Letterman, Leno and Conan are pathetic, humorless entertainment products. You should deport them to Guantanamo to torture the prisoners with them.
I can’t watch either one of them anymore – both have become intolerable (although Leno’s been hard to take for a lot longer). I’m looking forward to Conan at 11:30, and Dixon Steele above (!) is right – Ferguson is the best of all. Too bad he’s on too late for me.
I still can’t believe it’s going to be 5 nights of Leno at 10. Take this out, and NBC has the same number of hours of programming as Fox, maybe less with the Saturday reruns and Sunday football. Sad.
The Tonight Show with Jay Leno has been the NUMBER ONE rated late night talk for years and years! He is winning on late night! Yes, Number 1. I am glad that he will have great guests for his final episodes, to include Conan O’brien.
I will probably see how The George Lopez talk show will go before I make any decisions on my late night viewing.
Nightline on ABC has been beating the ratings war on David Letterman so ABC will do just fine. David Letterman’s time has since long gone. CBS might want to start thinking of someone who could replace David Letterman with a fresh approach and new ideas for CBS.
Jay Leno is a class act and yes, his interview skills are A-One. He obviously knows what he is doing, all a person has to do is look at the ratings and that will tell the whole story and provide solid facts too.
Looking forward to his new show in September.
Hey scab–don’t let the door hit you on the way out.
Hey WGA–how many more years it gonna take you to discipline this strikebreaker? Grow a pair….
I think people are hostile toward Leno partly because of the rivalry with Letterman, but partly because the Tonight Show just never fit Leno all that well.
Leno is enough of a professional that he could do the show OK, deliver jokes well and get laughs, and that’s great.
But the Tonight Show was a Mad Men reality show as much as it was a talk show. It was built around a smooth, brittle, potentially heroic WWII veteran host. You watched Carson partly to hear jokes and see Billy Crystal, but partly to see if Carson would crack and let a litttle raw sadness flash out, or if he’d say, “Enough is enough” and express (every five years or so) some immensely sensible, important view about politics.
I haven’t watched Letterman very much, but think his show has an obvious Mad Men reality show layer. You watch the show a little bit for the interviews and the comedy bits, but more to see what kind of a mood the guy’s in and whether you can figure out what he’s thinking about Jay Leno, his girlfriend, and his kid.
Leno, unlike Carson, never was a boy soldier riding through America with a train full of fresh WWII corpses. He also doesn’t seem to have had the passionate ups and downs in marriage that Carson had, or the same kind of raw emotion-encased-in-ice thing that Letterman has going on. What he does have is a Bostonian kind of irritablity and sense of class conflict, but he shut most of that out of the Tonight Show. So, he’s been doing a perfectly nice, professional talk show, but there’s no drama there.
I for one am a fan of the Tonite Show. Like Jay (and probably many others) this is the last week I’ll be watching. Conan does NOTHING for me. I’m guessing Letterman viewership will be rising after Jay leaves.
Leno is great. Nice guy, works hard and people love him. Whereas Jimmy Kimmel is an asshole, is only on because ABC doesn’t want to give that time back to the affiliates and nobody cares. How they can even be mentioned in the same breath is ridiculous. But that’s what the late night world is all about – rewarding fat, sleepy looking, talentless morons who have no right to be on tv.
Kimmel can’t get enough cancer for my liking. Leno may be a scab, but Kimmel is pure evil.
Jay,
On your first night behind your new desk, think about the people who lost their jobs so you can hold onto that 11:30 feeling.
I used to be a fan but I just can’t stomach looking at you anymore without feeling icky.
A Spouse, what are you babbling about? The Tonight Show has nothing to do with Mad Men, thematically, spiritually or otherwise. People don’t watch Tonight to see the host expose his own personal drama. I saw countless shows with Carson and was never wondering how WW 2, or his personal life, affected his psyche. You can’t be serious. Like everyone else, I watched because he was funny, charming and the best at what he did. A true entertainer.
With his “Everyman” appeal, Leno fit the show perfectly well, which is why he always beat Letterman in the ratings.
Save the psychobable for your shrink.
Wow, all you whiners are pathetic. Jay Leno doesn’t owe you your jobs. Obviously Leno will pull in a bigger audience than any other show at 10:00 pm and hence, it makes more sense to keep him than some show with miniscule ratings, all for the sake of letting people hold onto their jobs. Also, there are a lot of people who work for Leno that will be kept employed by this move. Please stop whining: if you are any good, you will get another job.
Leno will most likely keep his entire staff…the 10 pm show spells total job security and huge dollars for Leno…
Lame of NBC to have Conan on the last Jay’s last show…because it is JAY’S MOMENT…It is just bad form on the network front…
Probably Zucker and Ben’s idea…
To those who have mentioned the number of jobs that will be cut because Leno is on five nights a week, I wonder what you think the alternative really was. NBC could have gone with 5 more hours of reality shows or given the affiliates five more hours to play with. NBC seems to be going with a bottom line strategy. I don’t think that it’s reasonable to believe they would have brought in 5 more hours of new scripted television. I wouldn’t wish that anyone loses their job. But I don’t think that you can blame Leno for the state of the entertainment industry.
Christ, people. Personally, I like Letterman better. But I don’t watch him either b/c I’m not a thousand years old.
That being said, I’ve got no beef w/ Jay. The whole “what about OUR JOBS” thing is absolute bullshit, because Jay’s show has union crew and union writers who will continue to be employed because his show is staying on the air. In fact, if it wasn’t Jay at 10, it’s likely Zucker would have demanded reality shows to fill those spots, which would have removed WGA writers from the equation entirely. This is a network cost-cutting measure. Look past your egos and recognize that.
Lots of Leno shills posting, huh? Look, the scab is unfunny, and yeah, when is WGA gonna grow a pair and discipline him? Aside from that, for a litany of reasons, he’s easily the most hated guy in town.
Jeff Thomas, you’re full of shit and here’s why:
The WGA gave Letterman’s show a waiver because Letterman “owns” the show, not CBS. What a load of crap! CBS finances and broadcasts and profits hugely from Letterman’s show. For all intents and purposes, it’s their show. But the Guild looked the other way.
Why? So they could pressure NBC into capitulating. I’m no fan of NBC aka Nothing But Cancellations. But who could blame them or Jay for giving in knowing the Guild was letting Dave getting away with it?
As far as Leno being the most hated guy in town…only someone with brain damage, or you, would believe that. Jay has a rep for being a decent guy, and I say this as one who’s close to someone who’s worked with/for NBC ever since he took over The Tonight Show. This person is the first to call out NBC for even minor things. He hates them, but not Leno.
So there.
Dixon Steele,
The WGA called Leno to testify several weeks ago, and we’re still waiting for whether or not he’s expelled. Does this sound like somebody who’s respected about town? When I think of respected and well liked I think Tom Hanks, Leo DiCaprio, Tim Allen, none of whom are on the verge of being booted from their unions. The violation during the strike was flagrant and morally repugnant and the cover up disgusting.
I think the most hated man in town would be Christian Bale, or maybe Zucker. (With Leno cracking the top 10.) Is Jay the most hated man in the Writers Guild of America, West & East? Hands down.