Jay Leno’s long time of living on the West Coast has included hosting “The Tonight Show” from 1992 to 2009 and again from 2010 to 2014, plus guest hosting stints on the show dating back to 1985. He’s also hosted a car show, a game show and the 2010 White House Correspondents’ Dinner. He’s been known as a movie actor, a producer, a philanthropist, a devoted husband and a collector of cars and motorcycles.
But the main through line of Leno’s 50-plus year career in entertainment is his stand-up act, which he began doing on the East Coast in the early 1970s. He was born in New Rochelle, New York but spent much of his youth in Andover, Massachusetts. He stayed in the Boston area for college, beginning his stand-up career in the city years before the massive comedy scene there coalesced.
In an interview with the Courant, Leno reflected on his New England roots in anticipation of his Warner Theatre appearance on Nov. 21.
Hartford Courant: What is a Jay Leno set like now? Do you talk about current events?
Jay Leno: Not a whole lot of current events. Living in this world now, you really just get … I mean, I stopped doing political stuff and ticket sales are up 20, 30%. I also don’t get dirty. Not to say you can’t be a little risqué, but with some guys you really have to be a gynecologist to follow the act. I enjoy working clean because I think it’s more of a challenge. I mean, I’m not making balloon animals. I’m not trying to be Mr. Moralistic. To me it just seems lazy. When I used to do the Letterman show, the fun part was coming up with things to say to replace obscenities. I’d say “Dave, at the carnival they had this shirtless syphilitic druid running the ride.” And Letterman would repeat “shirtless syphilitic druid.” “That’s right, Dave, they’re druids who don’t wear shirts and they have syphilis.” It’s so much better than saying “They have this (expletive) or this old fat (expletive). Lazy.
In those days your work could be more absurdist. Does that side come out at your live shows now?
It’s hard to do that when you have to do 14 minutes a night. I think it comes back now. I always loved Newhart. A lot of people liked the more crazy comics. Newhart was very erudite. Newhart had a joke that killed me. He did a whole bit about the first astronaut to make contact with aliens, extraterrestrials. The astronaut comes back to America, there’s this whole press conference. One reporter says to him “How far ahead of us are these aliens?” And Bob says “About six weeks.” It’s perfect. Just the idea that a civilization is six weeks ahead, that’s the kind of stuff that always made me laugh.
There was a huge Boston comedy scene in the 1980s, but you came before all that, didn’t you?
There wasn’t really any comedy scene in Boston when I lived there. It was mainly guys with guitars singing “Stop your war machine, man.” It was more of a music scene than a comedy scene. They tolerated comedy but they didn’t have any comedy clubs or anything. I worked in strip joints. That’s where you worked to do comedy, in between strippers. Not the best audience. You’d take any gig you could, it didn’t matter if you made money or lost money.
You went to Emerson College, which is now known as a place where a lot of comedians started. What was it like when you were there?
When I said I wanted to be a stand-up comedian, they were more about theater and said “That’s not really viable.” Now they have a comedy department. My attitude at school was “Is this going to be on the test? What do I have to know?” My parents wanted me to graduate so I graduated but I can’t say I got a lot out of it.
But didn’t you end up doing a lot of acting later?
Only because I got asked to. I never really wanted to be an actor. Just the idea that you had to wait around all day to tell your joke, that seemed crazy. The thing about stand-up is write joke, tell joke, get check and you’re outta there. If a show goes well, great. If it doesn’t go well, you’ve got another show tomorrow, don’t worry about it.
Jay Leno’s first love as a comedian was doing stand-up. He’s at the Warner Theatre in Torrington on Nov. 21. (NBCUniversal Media)
Are you still doing stand-up 200 nights a year?
Yeah about 200. I enjoy it. I like being a comic. I don’t do stand-up specials because they’re not special anymore. There’s so many of them. I would rather do 150 separate shows than do one show and get paid for 150, like with a Netflix special or something. There’s something about being in a room. Like I always say, you can stand outside a comedy club and listen to it through a window or you can go on the other side of the wall and be inside and it’s a totally different experience. I also talk to people who say “I saw so-and-so’s comedy special and it wasn’t that good.” I say, “Where’d you watch it?” “On my iPhone.” OK. You’re by yourself, in a parked car, on your iPhone listening to a comedy special. Do you really think you’re going to roll with laughter? Why don’t you go to a club?!
Do you still have to win a crowd over?
When you start out, comics always say, “It was 10 minutes before I got ’em,” “It was a half hour before I got ’em” or “I never got ’em.” When you’re famous you say “I had them for 10 minutes, then I lost ’em.” That’s the one advantage to being on TV and being well known. They say “Oh, that guy! Let’s go see him before he dies.” So it actually works out OK.
Do people still have people who write your jokes or send you jokes?
It’s pretty much me at this point. The fun part is that on TV you do different jokes in the same place every night. On the road you do the same jokes in a different place every night. The thing about the road is that if you don’t have a new joke, that’s OK. But if you think of something, you can try it. You can do it one way Monday, another way Tuesday. I had a new one last night. It worked pretty good. It was kind of an ad lib, but I was talking about a college professor who exposed himself to a female student. He got a lawyer and the lawyer said “He didn’t expose himself, it was a gender reveal.” That made me laugh.
Some of us still remember you as the leather jacket guy who always had a beef. Then it changed and you put on a suit and talked to people and it felt nice. Was that a big change for you?
Well, I’m still wearing the same leather jacket and riding the same motorcycle, so not that much is different. When you do “The Tonight Show,” there’s always going to be somebody who’s not pleased. I mean, you’ve got a million people watching. There’s always somebody mad about something: “I liked you before, you were edgy.” Well, you can’t be the edgy guy every night. You can’t be the outside guy when you’re obviously now an inside guy. When you’re hosting “The Tonight Show” and doors open for that reason, you can’t act like life is tough. You’ve got to go a different way with it.
Would you ever go back to hosting a talk show?
No, I did that and that’s fine. I did it for 22 years. That’s fine. I mean, the format’s changed. Why would you watch somebody interview a celebrity for eight minutes between two six-minute commercials when you can catch them on a podcast doing an hour saying whatever they want?
President Barack Obama talks with Jay Leno on “The Tonight Show.”
Was your revival of “You Bet Your Life” an interesting challenge?
I enjoyed that. It was fun. It was a totally adlibbed show. We did six or seven a day, banged them all out. You know it’s so funny because I’ve always been a union guy. When I started that show I said “I’ve been a union guy my whole life so I don’t want to suddenly do a non-union show, because most game shows are non-union.” So I said “Let’s do a union show.” Then the unions went on strike. I’m the only one that lost their show. That just made me laugh.
Didn’t you help organize to get better wages at comedy clubs back in the day?
It was interesting. Comics were just looking for $25 a set. When someone’s eating steak every day and they won’t even give away a French fry, you know that’s kind of not good. I learned that a long time ago. When I did “The Tonight Show” I made sure I paid everyone really well and I made sure that I was the first one at work and the last one to leave. I find that people don’t begrudge your success if they think you’re working harder than they are.
Is it true that you always saved your “Tonight Show” salary and lived on what you made from stand-up?
Yeah, I never touched it. When I was a kid, you know, I always had two jobs. I worked at a Ford dealership and I was a comedian. I’d bank one and I’d save the other. Whichever job made the most money is the one I’d bank. So I got “The Tonight Show” I kept the austerity. I was on the road every Thursday, Friday, Saturday and Sunday when I had “The Tonight Show.”
You know, when I started, it was “The Tonight Show Starring Jay Leno.” Of course my mother, who was from Scotland said “Ooooh, starring Jay Leno! Why do you have to say ‘starring’? It makes you sound…” I said “Mom, it’s just what they do in show business. I didn’t name the show.” “But ‘starring Jay Leno…’” After two weeks of this driving me crazy I just switched it to “The Tonight Show with Jay Leno.” It just makes me laugh because my mother’s all “You’re Mr. Big Shot now.” I remember when I was on the cover of Time magazine and I called my mother and said “Hey mom, I’m on the cover of Time.”
“Which one?”
“Time magazine, Ma. Call Uncle Frank in Florida and call Aunt Fay in New Jersey and tell ‘em I’m on it.”
There’s a long pause and my mother says “Well, I think they’d put you on the cover of the ones they sell around Andover. I don’t think you’d be on the cover those other places. I don’t think so.”
“Ma, I’m on the cover across the whole country.”
“Well, I’ll check and see.”
Here’s my favorite story like that. I was in Dayton, Ohio. I’d just gotten “The Tonight Show,” so I’m on an NBC tour of affiliates. I sit down for the 12 o’clock news and there’s a female anchor. Before the break she says, “I’m sorry I’m not familiar — could you tell me your name?” I said “Sure. It’s Jay Leno. I’m gonna be the permanent guest host of ‘The Tonight Show.’” She says “Oh, OK.” We go on the air. She says “Welcome back. We’re talking to Jay Leno. Leno, who claims to have hosted ‘The Tonight Show’…” I said, “Well, actually, I’m not claiming. I can prove it. I think there’s tape right here in the building here.”
Do you have any other memories of coming up in New England?
New England to me is the funniest place in the world. When I go back to Boston, I get what is known as Boston compliments. This actually happened. I’m on Marlborough Street. A guy comes up to me, says “Hey Jay Leno, how’re you doin’? How are ya?” He goes, “You know, my friend met you in California. He said you’re not an (expletive).”
I said “Oh? Thanks.”
“No, he really said that.”
“Well tell him thank you, man. I appreciate that.”
“Yeah, no problem.”
That’s as good as you’re gonna get. You get that Yankee kind of “Eh, what’s this, some (expletive) with a BMW? Your father get you that car? Is that a trust fund thing?” I love that New England suspicion. Everything is suspicious. You grow up on a diet of “Silas Marner,” all these depressing things. That New England stoicism always made me laugh. It’s like the funniest place in the world.
Do you ever get back to Andover?
Sure, I go back all the time. I still have the same friends I had in high school. That’s the fun part about growing up in New England. Here in L.A. — and I don’t mean for this to be derogatory — but when I meet teachers, they’re working on a screenplay or they’re teaching for a couple of years until they do what they want. In Andover, Mr. Robichaud was in the same home room for like 45 years, wearing the same shoes coming apart at the front and the chalk marks on the suit. They were career teachers. I had great teachers. I had a teacher named Mrs. Hawkes. I’m dyslexic so I was a terrible student. One day she said “Instead of writing a term paper would you rather give a talk?” I said “Yeah, I can talk.” Later in the year she said “Have you ever thought of being a comedy writer or maybe something like that?” Of course, we grew up in New England where you’d go across to Lawrence and work in the shoe factory. I said “No, I never really thought you could make it like that” and she said “No, you should try that.” It just opened my eyes. I set up a scholarship for her that still exists.
Jay Leno is performing on Nov. 21 at 7:30 p.m. at the Warner Theatre’s Oneglia Auditorium, 68 Main St., Torrington. $50-$138. warnertheatre.org.
