Better late night host? (1 Viewer)

rockaction said:

Lucas and Spielberg are different animals with differing career paths. Lucas is an earnestly uneven talent. Spielberg takes the tropes and deconstructs them. Lucas simply fetishizes archetypes into space; Spielberg winks at the audience but gives them what they want. In the television realm, Letterman won't let you have any of it for consumption until you know that in its reconstruction you're the butt of the joke itself. 

That realization that you are ridiculous is necessity for his act to work on your unwashed self and to his own benefit.     

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i should rather think realization of our utter ridiculousness would be the password for washed

Voted Carson, he's #1 no question.  Sometimes I will go on youtube and just pull up old interviews with various guests.  Good stuff.

Letterman was ok early on.  As others have mentioned, he got angry as time passed.

Hands down #2 is Craig Ferguson.  As with Carson, sometimes I will pull up Ferguson interviews.  His cold openings, skits, songs ... so much great stuff.

wlwiles said:

Ferguson was my favorite.  Conan probably second.  Carson was before my time, and I just never got into Letterman.  He was funny, I won't try and say I didn't like him, just always been indifferent towards him for some reason.  Always liked Leno, but Ferguson was the funniest and had the most fun IMO. 

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If you didn't see him when he was on NBC you missed much of what made him great. And if you only mostly saw him after his heart surgery, that was almost a different person. Early Letterman had an edge to it that none of the others ever had.

Still voted Johnny.

Also big fan of Ferguson. I recommend the WTF episode with him.

This discussion is cute and all (pats everyone on the head in the most patronizing manner possible) when we all know this is the single greatest late-night host of all time.

•    The Very Best of Jiminy Glick
  

Jiminy:  What's your big-beef with the Nazis?  

Mel Brooks (doubled over in laughter pointing both hands to his chest):  What's my big-beef?

Jiminy:  Yeah, it seems like your always knocking...

Mel Brooks (Incredulous still giggling):  What's my big-beef?  My big-beef?

Jiminy:  Every time, its always your knocking the Nazis.

For me I'm a younger cat than most here, so I grew up on CBS Letterman and Leno. Dave always came off to me as the grumpy old curmudgeon.

Leno is tops for me. He had some great segments. Loved the weekly Headlines segment with the newspaper gaffes. I think the only segment I ever looked forward to more on a weekly basis is Kimmel's Unnecessary Censorship. And I loved Leno's enthusiasm for the animal segments. I'm sick of every late night host these days being a b#### about any animal they have on. Kimmel and Fallon are straight cowards with the animals. Jay wanted to get right up in there, didn't care if his fingers got nibbled on. Conan is pretty good with them too. Lastly, I need to say, I miss Kevin Eubanks laugh.

Anybody who missed out on Conan back in the 1230 slot or Craig missed out on some amazing comedy. 1230 slot just allowed the guys to stretch the limits that much more, but they were amazing. Humor is subjective and there are so many types, but Craig matched my sense of it better than anyone else. Just stupid stuff with no point to it other than to try to get you to laugh. The man made a show work with a gay robot side-host (with incredible chemistry) and a pantomime horse. Who else could pull that off? Also, I absolutely loved Sid the Cussing Bunny.

Conan, absolutely loved how off the rails his stuff got. He really hit his stride the last 3-4 years in the 1230 slot. To this day I'm obsessed with Triumph. Anything he did with Max Weinberg was gold. Dude filled a co-role as band leader and side-host in the years Andy was missing. Guy had awesome comedy chops. Stupid recurring segments like The Evil Puppy. In the Year 2000/3000 with La Bamba.

Damn, now I'm on a viewing spree of the late, great days of late night. Glad so much of this is still available on YouTube.

Given my age, I didn't see as much Carson in real time as I would have liked, but I saw enough of it eventually to where it is obvious that he was the man. Letterman in his NBC days was the only one who has ever come close to Carson's greatness.  I view them as 1a and 1b.

Mr. Pickles said:

NBC era Letterman was fantastic. It really didn’t translate to CBS unfortunately. I was able to see a taping of Letterman and it was like 55 degrees in the studio.  

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OMG...Yes.  In college, i had a girlfriend who had an uncle at NBC and got us in backstage and for Letterman's show.  This was in the summer and the studio was literally 55 degrees.
Anyways, it was during a writer's strike in 1988 and dave was given a toaster from NBC / General Electric and decided to make toast for everyone (and as a time filler).  My claim to fame was that i was sitting in the 2nd or 3rd row and caught one of the pieces of toast he threw into the audience.

I actually found the exact Letterman episode  -->  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6gckkuZYmEw
Starts making toast at 6:40.............but keeps stretching out the bit
i caught toast around 30:29   (they show the audience and I'm there, but only silhouettes so you can't see very well)
And we were lucky to witness "Stupid Human Tricks" on the episode we visited.  Pretty good bar trick at 18:00 !!!!

But Yes...........you could hang meat in the studio and I swear it was so cold it wouldn't spoil.
But as for the poll, i still voted Carson

Mr. Pickles said:

NBC era Letterman was fantastic. It really didn’t translate to CBS unfortunately. I was able to see a taping of Letterman and it was like 55 degrees in the studio.  

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I saw two tapings. Unfortunately one had no musical guest and the other was Bryan Adams (playing the Robin Hood song).  :(

Watching Johnny Carson now from 06/01/1990. Opening he mentions Clint Eastwood turned 60 yesterday, makes some jokes about his age etc. etc. 

Happy 91st yesterday Clint.

Voted Carson

Voted Carson. My brother and I shared a room and had one of the little Black & White TVs in our room. We would stay up late and turn on Carson. I was only like 8-9 years old, but I remember howling with laughter at some of his interviews. Rickles, Bob Newhart, Charles Grodin, Rodney Dangerfield, so many guests that would absolutely kill on his show. All the great comedians he had on, that launched to superstardom on his show. I am heading down the rabbit hole of old interviews, as soon as I finish posting. Nobody ever did it better than Carson. He was one of those guys that made everyone around him better, without hogging the spotlight. That was his genius.

Dave was more my generation. Loved his show, especially the early years on NBC when he was constantly pushing the edge and being hysterically sarcastic. He never tried to do what Johnny did, I think out of his immense respect for Johnny's talent and legacy. But, he did a great job of bringing Late Night in a new direction. He is a great interview now. I love his show on Netflix. 

General current late night comments....

I know I will get a lot of crap for this but I'm consistently surprised how entertained I am when watching Fallon.  He's not anywhere to the level of Carson/Letterman (or some of his current peers) but he's just entertaining.  He's talented and seems to just love what he's doing.  He seems to break down the barrier many guests keep up by just having fun.  He's not a good interviewer, not a great comedian but he doesn't take himself too seriously and is just entertaining.  And I bring this up as a contrast to Dave - who I loved.  His sarcasm was biting and fantastic - I loved it.  But there were many times where he didn't seem to be having fun and he did come across as bitter.  I had no issues with that in my 20's and 30's but I've mellowed and want to be entertained.

I should also point out that being much older now than back then I barely watch any of these guys.  I catch Conan from time to time and his show seems to be really suffering without an audience.  Not sure if they are back yet but he looked horrible and it just wasn't working for me when he was in isolation.  I like Colbert and Myers but way too much politics for me.  Corden seems like he's in the Fallon mode of just having fun and being entertaining.  Very talented and gets guests to kind of be themselves. He's just on too damn late.  I'm never awake and I don't enjoy any late night show well enough to record it.  Last - I feel like Kimmel has been in my life for too long - he's really good too but I've kind of tuned him out.

AAABatteries said:

General current late night comments....

I know I will get a lot of crap for this but I'm consistently surprised how entertained I am when watching Fallon.  He's not anywhere to the level of Carson/Letterman (or some of his current peers) but he's just entertaining.  He's talented and seems to just love what he's doing.  He seems to break down the barrier many guests keep up by just having fun.  He's not a good interviewer, not a great comedian but he doesn't take himself too seriously and is just entertaining.  And I bring this up as a contrast to Dave - who I loved.  His sarcasm was biting and fantastic - I loved it.  But there were many times where he didn't seem to be having fun and he did come across as bitter.  I had no issues with that in my 20's and 30's but I've mellowed and want to be entertained.

I should also point out that being much older now than back then I barely watch any of these guys.  I catch Conan from time to time and his show seems to be really suffering without an audience.  Not sure if they are back yet but he looked horrible and it just wasn't working for me when he was in isolation.  I like Colbert and Myers but way too much politics for me.  Corden seems like he's in the Fallon mode of just having fun and being entertaining.  Very talented and gets guests to kind of be themselves. He's just on too damn late.  I'm never awake and I don't enjoy any late night show well enough to record it.  Last - I feel like Kimmel has been in my life for too long - he's really good too but I've kind of tuned him out.

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The issue with Fallon is that he is seemingly incapable of letting a guest be the main focus.  Check out any clip of Conan when he has Bill Burr as a guest; Conan has no problem just letting Burr be the star and running with it.  Fallon does not have that kind of restraint.  Aside from the fact that he laughs at everything, he has the tendency to constantly talk over and/or interrupt guests.  I don't think he is a good interviewer, but to his credit, he seems like a good guy and a lot of celebs seem to really like him, so the atmosphere does often seem very laid back even with his constant yapping. 

Ghost Rider said:

The issue with Fallon is that he is seemingly incapable of letting a guest be the main focus.  Check out any clip of Conan when he has Bill Burr as a guest; Conan has no problem just letting Burr be the star and running with it.  Fallon does not have that kind of restraint.  Aside from the fact that he laughs at everything, he has the tendency to constantly talk over and/or interrupt guests.  I don't think he is a good interviewer, but to his credit, he seems like a good guy and a lot of celebs seem to really like him, so the atmosphere does often seem very laid back even with his constant yapping. 

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Totally agree with this - he's not a good interviewer at all.

Time for my semi-annual "miss you, otb_lifer."Come back and grace us a bit, no? You were picking up what I was putting down in here. Kindred spirits. 

Heh. You do what you need to, friend. We'll be here.