In so doing,
Leno followed in the footsteps of great past hosts,
Johnny Carson, Jack Paar and Steve Allen. As a working-class
undergraduate
Leno began his stand-up career in Boston and New York
comedy clubs and strip bars. During the 1970s, he became
a popular warm-up act for such divergent performers
as crooner Johnny Mathis and country singer John Denver,
and wrote scripts for the sitcom Good Times, starring
Jimmy Walker. He obtained similar work for David Letterman,
who, after he began hosting Late Night with David Letterman,
granted Leno over forty appearances on the program.
Leno became a popular guest on the Merv Griffin, Mike
Douglas and Tonight Shows and by 1986 was named one
of several guest hosts for the Tonight Show. An untiring
success-seeker, Leno still spent 300 days per year on
the road.
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As a popular stage and television stand-up comic, Leno
strives not to offend, offering non-racist, non-sexist,
anti-drug humor. Like forerunners George Carlin and
Robert Klein and contemporary Jerry Seinfeld, Leno is
uncapricious. His focus is on ridiculing the mundane,
the idiocies of social life. His feel-good approach
avoids cynicism, and promotes patriotism; in 1991, for
example, he performed for American Service Personnel
stationed in the Middle East. Despite his penchant for
politically liberal jokes, Leno insists that his humor
is non-ideological and thus apolitical. Hence, he appeals
to a conventional and politically diverse, that is,
broad American public.
Though he was the exclusive guest host for the Tonight
Show since 1981, Leno's selection as Johnny Carson's
successor caused surprise and controversy in the industry.
David Letterman--whose youth-popular late, late show
had followed up Tonight for years, and created expensive
advertising slots--had been slated for the job. However,
NBC was attracted to the more cooperative Leno, matching
his wit to the older Tonight Show audience. Moreover,
an aggressive Leno promoted himself, working the affiliate
station personnel, who in turn boosted his popularity
ratings. Ultimately, Leno was simply more affordable
than Letterman, allowing the Tonight Show to maintain
its $75-$100 million profit base.
Seeking Letterman's fans, Leno's Tonight Show featured
a renovated stage, young, popular guests, and the music
of popular jazz musician Branford Marsalis. Controversy
came to the set early on when NBC fired Leno's long-time,
tumultuous manager Helen Kushnick, and later when Marsalis,
in a wrangle over artistic control, quit and was replaced
by Kevin Eubanks. Thereafter, Leno faired decently in
the ratings, but failed to impress reviewers as had
Carson and Paar. Accustomed to practicing his routines
many times before a show, Leno suffered agitation with
his new, full-week schedule. Moreover, a year into the
show, Leno was faced with a rating war against CBS'
new Late Show, hosted by highly paid competitor, Letterman.
During the Late Show's first three years, it regularly
bested the Tonight Show in ratings, particularly with
the under 50 crowd. This was particularly damaging as
Tonight had the advantage of airing a full hour earlier
than Late Show across 30% of the nation. Leno, in comparison
to Letterman, was an unseasoned monologist, and a sometimes
distracted interviewer, lacking ad-libbing skills. To
boost ratings, Leno agreed to hire new Tonight writers
and to hawk advertiser's goods--Hondas and Doritos--on
air. In early 1995, Tonight revamped the show from talk
to a variety format, creating a comfortable, comedy
club-type studio for Leno. A more responsive and fluid
Leno raised Tonight's ratings to competitive levels,
and by 1996 had intermittently regained its status,
held since 1954, as the most popular late night show
in the United States.
Leno was frustrated, though not broken by his make-or-break
Tonight Show role; rather, he responded predictably
to this mid-career trauma with more strenuous effort
on the set and increased appearances at Las Vegas clubs
and college campuses. An ever popular comic, Leno has
been named Best Political Humorist by Washingtonian
Magazine, and one of the Best Loved Stars in Hollywood,
by the TV Guide.
