“This is not your father’s ‘Tonight Show’, quipped
Jay Leno after one particularly hip musical act. The hefty jut-jawed comic took over the show from the legendary
Johnny Carson in the blinding glare of high expectations and from the start tried to give it his own spin – while not alienating the huge Middle American audience Carson had left behind him. It was a tough balancing act. Doc Severinsen was replaced by hip, jazz musician Branford Marsalis and there was no Ed McMahon – style sidekick. The guests were still standard Hollywood A-list (Billy Crystal appeared on the first show), but musical acts tended toward the off-the-wall (Hootie and the Blowfish, Blue Man Group).
Among Jay’s recurring bits were comic newspaper headlines, “Ask Jay Anything”, “Police Blotter”, fitness expert “Iron Jay”, “Mr. Brain” (the smartest man in the universe), a “Jaywalking” man-in-the-street segment and “Evil Jay”, his nefarious alter ego.
Ratings were fine for the first year, but when
David Letterman – who had been passed over for the ‘Tonight’ seat – launched ‘Late Show’ opposite him on CBS in August 1993, ‘Tonight’ dropped out of first place for the first time. Ratings later recovered as Jay introduced such news making stunts as the “Dancing Itos” (a chorus of dancing, black-robed, Asian-American “Jurists”, mocking Judge Ito of O.J. Simpson trial fame).
Another defining moment was his 1995 interview of hot actor Hugh Grant, who had recently been arrested for soliciting a prostitute, in which Leno began by simply asking, “What the hell were you thinking?”. As the 2000s dawned Leno kept his show up-to-date with timely features such as “Stuff We Found on eBay”, “Videos We Found on YouTube” and “Wheel of Consolation”, a consolation game for contestants voted off of ‘American Idol’. On “Celebrity Jeopardy” actors portraying famous people such as Martha Stewart and President George W. Bush competed in a Jeopardy-style game, with Gilbert Gottfried tossing in wisecracks.
In 2004 John Melendez (formerly “Stuttering John”) took over as Jay’s announcer.
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