One Year Later: The Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon

It's been over a month since my last blog post, over 4 months since my last non-football post, making this my first post of 2015.  Happy New Year!  Seriously, for the 5 people out there that regularly read my babbling - sorry, the Tuesday Morning QB experiment was fun, but absolutely fried my brain's ability to think about anything non-football in a creative manner.  Long story short, I needed a month to re-charge.

When I first launched this blog, I gave some teasers for 3 future posts, delivering on 2 of those.  I had yet to do the last one, which was going to be a rant on why Jimmy Fallon was a poor choice for The Tonight Show. With this week marking the 1-year anniversary of Fallon taking the reigns, I thought this would be an appropriate time to write on the subject.  That said, I'm glad I waited a year, because everybody seems to love Fallon, and I've even warmed up on the dude.  There are a lot of things he does right, and I think it's only fair to highlight those.  That said, looking at his career trajectory compared to those of his peers, I still contest that there were better fits in the pool of late show talent.  In the next few moments, I will try to find a balance between critiquing his resume and giving credit where it is due.

What If?

I like history.  While I can't always retain the incidents in the long term, I was always fascinated with accounts given in history class and even some extra-curricular readings I did.  As a sports fan, I would spend hours reading the backs of baseball, football, basketball, and hockey cards to get a grasp on the legends of the game.  In that same light, I've been to 3 hall of fames as well as Lake Placid, NY, home of the 1932 and 1980 Winter Olympics.  Same goes for television. One of the neat things of being a broadcast/mass media major was getting to take courses in broadcast history.  You get the picture.

To understand my discontent with Jimmy Fallon as host of The Tonight Show, one needs to consider some of the history of late-night television.  The Tonight Show is the gold standard of late-night talk shows, a tradition that the legendary Johnny Carson spent decades establishing.  In the early 90s, Johnny was coming towards the end of his brilliant career, and the man seemingly waiting in the wings as his successor was the Late Night show's David Letterman.  You need to understand that the Letterman of the 80s is not the same Letterman of today.  Dave is admittedly past his prime, a key reason why he is hanging it up at The Late Show. David Letterman of the 80s and 90s, however, was funny.  And not just funny, he was a weird kind of funny, almost with an edge.  He was doing things no one (not even Carson) had thought to do on talk shows.  The choice seemed academic.  Unfortunately, politics infiltrated NBC, and Jay Leno came away as the host of the legendary show.  For a more thorough understanding of what happened at NBC, I would recommend either the book or HBO's adaptation of said book, The Late Shift.  In hindsight, Leno won the 11:30 time slot ratings in a head-to-head with Letterman, which is all that matters for the network. I would argue that much of that success had to do with the branding power of The Tonight Show.  As a raw comic and an interviewer, I'd take Letterman any day.  So what does poor Jimmy Fallon have to do with this?  Well, initially, nothing.  But, if NBC had made a choice based on talent instead of under-handed deals in the early 90s, we might not be having this conversation today, as Letterman, a much funnier talent in his prime than Fallon, would still be the host of The Tonight Show.

A few years ago, when Leno stepped down, another red-head Late Show host was dubbed the heir (and actually landed the gig this time), Conan O' Brian.  Like Letterman, O' Brian was another kind of weird and edgy, which in turn displayed his comedic genius.  O' Brian was a writer on Saturday Night Live (SNL) in it's best years, maybe not so coincidentally, when Fallon was not on SNL.  He was also a writer for The Simpsons in that show's prime.  While O' Brian started out strong, his ratings suffered among the older demographic. Then, in 2010, just like in the early 90s, Leno came in and usurped the spot.

My point is, if weren't for Jay Leno, we might not even be talking about Fallon as host of The Tonight Show today.  Oddly enough, Fallon occupied the Late Night slot after Letterman and O' Brian, and in my opinion, he was a distant 3rd place in terms of comedic performance on that show.  While I'd take him over Leno (more on that later), he's clearly not on the same level as some of his contemporaries. Which leads me to...

"Live from New York, It's Saturday Night!"

Another milestone to be celebrated this week is the 40th anniversary of SNL.  As mentioned before, Fallon was not a cast member in what I would consider it's best years, being the early to late 90s.  He came in on the tail end of that era, and ironically, left at the point where I found the show almost un-watchable. Now, most of what I'm saying can be argued as subjective.  In a Today Show interview, SNL producer Lorn Michaels said most people consider the era in which they were in high school as the best era.  There may be some truth to that, but I would also consider skits from the late 70s (when I wasn't even born) better that skits from the early 2000's (late high school, early college).  But let's take this a step further.  I believe that if you were to poll viewers familiar with the whole span of SNL to rank their top 40 cast members, Fallon probably makes that list.  Is he top 10 though?  I don't think anyone would agree with that.  Top 25?  I think only a slim margin casts him that vote.  In other words, Fallon had funny moments, but I don't think he really produced anything on that show that would stand the test of time.  "But what about when the did skits with Justin Timberlake?  Those are classic!"  They are, but there's an interesting wrinkle that I'll address letter.

Of the SNL hall of fame members (I don't think there's an actual hall, just metaphor for the best cast members), many of them went on to have brilliant TV or movie careers.  Some, on the other hand, fall had seen their best days on SNL (see Tim Meadows, Chris Kattan, et. al.).  So where does Fallon stand?  Quick, without looking at IMDB, name a Jimmy Fallon movie?  Stumped, right?  If you guessed Fever Pitch, I'm betting you're a big Drew Barrymore fan. I've seen it, and I'd rate it OK.  Even then, Fallon's character does not take over the screen, something good SNL alumni do in movies.  It also doesn't help that he played opposite Barrymore, best known for her romantic comedies with Adam Sandler, who, you guessed it, is a much funnier SNL alum.  

Am I comparing apples and oranges.  Yes, but it's still important.  On the one hand, it's really hard to compare talk show host to comedy movie and TV star.  But when you look at the relative talent between his peers, comparing Jimmy Fallon to the likes of Chevy Chase, John Belushi, Mike Meyers, Chris Farley, Will Farrell, and many others is like comparing a bruised apple to a barrel of fresh, juicy oranges.  And this guy was the best we could do for The Tonight Show.

Report Card

Everything you've read up to this point is a reflection of how I felt before Fallon started his tenure on The Tonight Show.  While I still contest that all of the above is valid and worth considering when evaluating the talk show show host, I also think it's fair to say he hasn't done a bad job up to this point.  For starters, his ratings are great, and as already mentioned, that's what counts for the networks - it is a business after all.  But here are a few things I've grown to appreciate after one year:

1.  He's not Jay Leno.  I couldn't stand Leno.  For my money, his monologue was his only real strength.  His sketches were really just an extension of that monologue, and his interview style wasn't all that interesting.  I know a lot of people liked him, but I won't miss him on TV anytime soon.
2. The Roots.  Fallon's band is a real asset, and he uses them well.  I must admit, every time I've seen a clip of them in the green room with his musical guest playing one of their hits with toy instruments, it makes me chuckle.
3. He's clean.  As much as I like Letterman and O' Brian, they have their crass moments that I could do without.  Fallon, from what I've seen, strays away from the off-color stuff and keeps it fun.  It's kind of a throwback to Carson's era when comedians could be funny without being dirty.  I respect that.
4. He's salt to his guests.  This one might need some explaining.  As mentioned above, Fallon had some memorable SNL moments with JT.  I also mentioned what he does with The Roots and his musical guests.  I've caught a couple lip-sync battles with his guests and had a good laugh.  What's the common denominator here?  Fallon's funniest moments are always with a guest.  I already established above that based on his own work, I don't find him funny.  But put him with someone else, and he finds ways to get the funny out of them.  That may sound like a dig, but I really mean it as a compliment.  The man is a talk show host, meaning he's supposed to highlight and celebrate his guests.  Fallon has found creative ways to incorporate his guests in such a way that not even his predecessors have done. Salt brings out the best taste in foods.  Fallon brings out the funny in his guests.

The Verdict

It's still really hard to justify his credentials for the show compared to other available candidates and the success of his peers at that time - almost as if we were lowering the standard for what's funny.  I don't think Jimmy Fallon will ever be top of mind when I think funniest people in show business.  I also don't think I'll ever sit down at 10:30 CT and flip over to The Tonight Show just for the sake of watching The Tonight Show.  

That said, I will tune in if he has a guest I'm interested in.  I'll probably continue to watch the sketches that go viral online the next day (I almost forgot to mention, I got a kick out of the Full House and Saved by the Bell re-enactments he did with the respective original casts).  He's got a brand that will stand the test of time.  I may not always like it, but I can respect it.