Here's What Working For Jay Leno Is Really Like According To His Former Employees And Staff Writers
While hosting The Tonight Show for over a decade, Jay Leno conducted some of the most memorable celebrity interviews. Before Conan O'Brien became the new host in 2009, Leno spoke to actors like Arnold Schwarzenegger and Hugh Grant, and these conversations were never dull or forgettable. And Leno even came back as the show's host from 2010 to 2014.
Stories about the former late-night show host range from positive to super negative. While Jay Leno is said to work hard, which is always inspiring to hear about, Leno didn't recognize a star from The Bachelor. But what was Jay Leno like to work for? Did his employees enjoy being part of his various TV shows?
What Did A Writer Say About Jay Leno's Writers Strike Behavior?
Jimmy Fallon's staff spoke out about him when he commented on the 2023 Writers Guild of America strike. And a former writer for The Tonight Show With Jay Leno also has something to say.
A writer didn't like Jay Leno's behavior during the 2023 strike and explained the problem on social media. According to Yahoo!, Jay Leno attended a WGA protest and gave the writers donuts. He had done the same thing in 2007.
Dicky Eagan, who wrote for the TV show You Bet Your Life With Jay Leno, which began airing in 2021, shared his thoughts on Twitter. He tweeted that writers who worked on You Bet Your Life have been waiting for the money that they were supposed to get.
Eagan tweeted, “That’s really nice! But you know what would be even better than $30 worth of donuts? If @jayleno helped track down the millions of dollars in residuals his show @youbetyourlife owes his @wga and other union workers.”
Eagan also tweeted, “Pulling up in a $100,000 car to pass out $30 worth of donuts after refusing to pay writers millions in residuals isn't @WGAWest solidarity.”
Jay Leno doesn't appear to have commented on what Dicky Eagan wrote about You Bet Your Life with Jay Leno.
During the WGA strike in early December 2007, 80 people who worked for The Tonight Show with Jay Leno lost their jobs, according to CBC.ca.
The Hollywood Reporter shared that Jay Leno's writers were unhappy with the way that he behaved during the 2007 strike. An employee explained that the host didn't want them to have any concerns at all about what would happen in the future, but that didn't end up being the case.
An employee said, “He was on speakerphone. There were 80 of us. He told us not to panic. He said to trust him. He said: ‘I can’t get into details, but nobody will miss a car payment or lose their house. We’re family. Trust me. I’m going to take care of this.’ But that was the time we should have been looking for new jobs," according to Reuters.com.
An employee also said, “A lot of people don’t want to work for Jay anymore. His true colors have shown. We were told he won’t cross the picket line until David Letterman or Conan O’Brien do so that he can look like the good guy to the WGA.”
What Do Former Employees Say About Working With Jay Leno?
John Knox, an Interactive Producer at the Tonight Show With Jay Leno who also worked for Late Night With Conan O'Brien, shared what working for Jay Leno was like. According to Knox's post on Quora, he said that he worked on Jay Leno's websites, both for Jay Leno's Garage and The Tonight Show with Jay Leno.
Knox had only positive things to say about collaborating with Jay Leno. He wrote, "In my experience, he was a class act with an incredible work ethic."
He shared that he showed a pal the set one morning and when they bumped into Leno, "he used my name, was humourous, and asked about how the hiring was coming for my web team." Knox was impressed that although he and Leno had only met once, Leno knew who he was.
Knox continued that in a meeting, "he made a point of thanking me and my team for the hard work on the web site. I had been working at the show for less than 2 months when Christmas rolled by and I was shocked that I was to receive a Christmas present from Jay/the show. Just little things and big things that made me think ‘this guy is the real deal’."
While employees told The Hollywood Reporter that they didn't like the way that Jay Leno behaved during the 2007 WGA strike, other former staffers have shared good stories about working with the late-night host.
Jimmy Brogan wrote a piece in The Hollywood Reporter in March 2013 and said that Leno's determination to make the show the best it could be was inspiring.
Brogan wrote, "In my nine years working on The Tonight Show, my job as a writer was to sit with Jay and decide what jokes would go into the monologue every night. I would go to Jay’s house every night at 10 p.m., and we would sift through 200 jokes to get the 10 to 15 that were comedy gold. Those 10 to 15 would be the base for the next day’s monologue. I would limp home at 2 a.m."
Brogan explained in his THR piece that when he would come back to the office the next day after lunch, Leno had been working for many hours. Leno would give Brogan around 150 jokes to choose from.
Brogan said of his former boss, "He is just a great white shark — never sleeping, always moving forward."
Dave Berg, who was a producer on The Tonight Show with Jay Leno, wrote a book called "Behind the Curtain: An Insider's View of Jay Leno's Tonight Show." In an excerpt shared on the Barnes and Noble website, Berg wrote that Leno was "fair, generous and loyal." He said that he never heard Leno yell at a staffer. He also described Leno as someone with a great work ethic who always wanted his work to be funny. Leno would say "You're only as good as your last joke."
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