From nicknames to impressions, to being called a robot and compared to Richard
Nixon. Jay Leno definitely has his fair share of haters.
The rich and famous didn't wait long to start taking aim at Jay Leno once he
joined the highly competitive world of late-night TV. Arsenio Hall was
particularly keen to let the New Yorker know he wouldn't be in for an easy ride,
telling Entertainment Weekly in 1992 he had little respect for his new rival's talents.
Hall took particular offense with reports claiming he was bosom buddies with the car enthusiast:
"Jay Leno and I aren't friends! And you know what? I wasn't anointed,
okay? [...] I earned every drop of mine. And I'm gonna treat him like we treated the kid
on the high school basketball team who was the coach's son. He was there because he
was anointed too. We tried to kick his a--, and that's what I'm going to do — kick Jay's a--."
Hall contradicted himself shortly after when he told "Good Morning America" he
used to have a friendship with Leno before adding,
"Something's wrong with someone who is always surprised about people being upset with him."
The "Harlem Nights" star continued his tirade in the same outlet that was invested in the
late-night wars. Hall accused his ex-pal Leno of being two-faced and spreading a rumor
that was both "racist and insulting," while pointing out that himself, David Letterman,
and Johnny Carson had worked harmoniously for three years without a war of words.
A year before "Jimmy Kimmel Live!" entered the pantheon of American late-night talk shows,
its host stirred up a little controversy by throwing shade
at one of his soon-to-be-rivals. Yes, in a 2002 interview with TV Guide, Kimmel joked,
"I want to do the comedy version of 'The Tonight Show.'"
The jab apparently cut Leno deep. Although he'd apparently mended
his relationship with Leno by the time he spoke to The New York Times months later,
Kimmel still couldn't resist getting a few more digs in:
"I think he turned comedy into factory work — and it comes across."
Kimmel discussed how his publicist had been contacted by Leno following his
initial put-down, summing up the situation with,
"It's just amazing how insecure he is."
To make his feelings crystal clear, the self-effacing funnyman added,
"The people who like Leno are largely the stupid group. The people who root for Letterman are the
smarter group. The people who like me? Also stupid. I figure I cut into the dummies."
But Kimmel saved his most ruthless shade for a 2010 episode of his self-titled show
in which he spent the entirety impersonating Leno. Kimmel sported a giant prosthetic chin
and unflattering gray wig for the occasion, and although he was later invited to appear
on Leno's show to discuss the impression, the pair apparently haven't spoken since
then. Leno appeared on Bill Maher's "Club Random" podcast and apologized to Kimmel for a previous
misunderstanding when Leno was considering moving to ABC and interfering with Kimmel's time slot.
George Lopez found out how brutal the late-night chat show circuit can be when his TBS vehicle
"Lopez Tonight" was axed in 2011 after airing for only two years. The first-ever Mexican-American
to be given such a gig was unlikely to have been consoled by Jay Leno, however.
In 2007, Lopez tore into his fellow stand-up-turned-talk show host in an
interview on Orlando radio station WOMX 105.1. The star said on the
"Scott and Erica Show" that he hoped to start a beef with Leno, saying,
"Leno is the biggest two-faced dude in TV."
So what had gone down between the pair to cause such a hostile reaction?
Well, according to reports, Lopez appeared to be insulted by the fact
that Leno had dropped him like a hot potato in the wake of his 2005 surgery:
"When I had my [kidney] transplant, he called me and was the nice guy
on the phone. And then he just puts the knife in your back."
The Californian also took aim at his new nemesis' professional capabilities, adding,
"It tells you something about Jay Leno if Conan O'Brien is coming into 'The Tonight Show' when
Jay Leno is still young enough to be the host. The dude's, like, the worst interviewer on TV."
While some celebrities were content to stay neutral during the late-night talk show debacle
between Conan O'Brien and Jay Leno in the early 2010s, others were more than happy to take sides.
And it was pretty clear who multi-talented comic Patton Oswalt was rooting for.
In an interview for the podcast "Comedy Death Ray," the Emmy Award winner questioned Leno's
determination to wrestle back the most coveted slot in NBC's late-night schedules, saying,
"You almost want to take [Leno] aside and go:
'Why do you want this so badly? Because you don't do anything with it.'"
“Whereas Conan clearly wants the show because there are things he's dying
to do with his writing staff and on the air."
Oswalt, who'd appeared as a guest on Leno's show several times previously,
also compared the star's obsession with power to Richard Nixon's. But
Oswalt was keen to point out that he didn't enjoy roasting the man he once respected:
"Comedians that don't like Jay Leno now, and I'm one of 'em — we're not like, 'Oh my God,
Jay Leno sucks.' It's that we're so hurt and disappointed that one of the
best comedians of our generation [...] willfully, like, threw that switch off."
"I don't like Jay personally."
"I do not like how he's behaved with me personally. I've done his
show many times in the past, I won't do it again."
It's little surprise to discover that the most relentless Jay Leno-basher in the showbiz world
is Howard Stern. The shock jock appears to treat insulting his fellow talk show host as
a sport, describing him as everything from "insane" to an "a--kisser" over the years.
Referring to what was supposed to be Leno's final episode of "The Tonight Show" in 2009,
Stern remarked on "The Late Show with David Letterman",
"I've never seen anybody who behaves like a robot like this
guy. Where's the emotion? Where's the humanity?"
On Leno's controversial return, the "Private Parts" star revealed to CBS' "Early Show" that
the car enthusiast made him nauseous. Stern said in a chat on "Piers Morgan Tonight."
"Jay is insane, and Jay is a crook [...] he steals a tremendous amount
of material. He's not fit to scrub David Letterman's feet."
Stern later appeared on Letterman's show to express frustration with
the host patching things up with his main rival. He said,
"I feel like a Vietnam veteran! I feel like I'm still in the jungles fighting your war, and
you've made up with Vietnam! Jay Leno will forever blow my mind. This is a guy, he took "The Tonight
Show" from you ... Mind you, I work for NBC Television now, and I'm not speaking to Jay Leno."
"The first day that I woke up and was no longer the host of "The Tonight Show",
I remember the first thought I had was 'I am not shaving.'"
"That was my small victory."
Few celebrities have more grounds to hate Jay Leno than Conan O'Brien. In 2009, the latter
replaced the former as host of "The Tonight Show," a development that had been in place for years.
But the redhead's patience didn't exactly pay off. Instead of walking away gracefully from NBC,
Leno decided to stick around with a new eponymous show that initially aired straight after
"Tonight." And when the network decided to switch this new struggling show to an earlier time,
essentially bumping "Tonight" to a post-midnight slot, O'Brien was left with no option but to quit.
O'Brien first addressed the drama on the show itself, telling audiences,
that hosting "The Tonight Show" was the fulfillment of a lifelong dream for him, adding,
"I just want to say to the kids out there watching,
you can do anything you want in life. Yeah. Unless Jay Leno wants to do it, too."
The star told The Hollywood Reporter in 2012 that Leno hadn't built any bridges:
"He certainly isn't calling me. It's not like he's going to sneak up on me in traffic. [...] The
odds are we will both leave this earth without speaking to each other, which is fine. There's
really nothing to say. We both know the deal. He knows; I know. I'd rather just forget."
That same year, O'Brien guested on "Letterman," where he offered an
unflattering impression of his talk show nemesis.
"He is watching every second…'Eehehehehhheh!'"
Another famous face keen to show they were firmly on Conan O'Brien's side during the ultimate
late-night talk show war was Rosie O'Donnell. The comedian, who had her own syndicated daytime
talk show back in the 1990s, told HBO's Television Critics Association panel, via Today, she believed
that Jay Leno had played dirty. O'Donnell remarked that she was a big fan of Conan O'Brien and added,
"['The Tonight Show' is] a franchise that has been 60 years with NBC, and if you're privileged
enough to be asked to drive the bus, you should say thank you [...] When it's time for them to
hire a new driver, you should say, 'Thank you for allowing me to drive this [...] and pass
the keys to the new guy [...] and not try to flatten his tires, before he even gets going."
The funnywoman also compared Leno's behavior to another major pop culture scandal,
the 1994 incident in which Nancy Kerrigan
was attacked by rival ice skater Tonya Harding's husband. She told Us Weekly,
"At least Jeff Gillooly took a pipe and [admitted] he did it. He didn't do it and go, 'I don't know
who hit her.' Gee, it was you, you're the one who hit her right in the knee, you know?"
It was Shane Stant who carried out the action of hitting Kerrigan,
but O'Donnell's point was received.
In 2019, Jay Leno told NBC's "Today" that he wished there was more "civility" in the
current era of late-night television. This call didn't go down particularly well with
one of the modern critical favorites, John Oliver, who used his "Last Week
Tonight" show as a platform to point out the gray-haired funnyman's hypocrisy.
Oliver reminded viewers that back in the day, the talk show circuit used Monica Lewinsky
as a punching bag in the wake of the Bill Clinton sexual relations scandal. And while he
acknowledged that many comedians have apologized for their part in the pile-on, Oliver said,
"One who hasn't, and who is the among the most relentless, was Jay Leno."
The host then recalled some of the latter's offensive quips before adding,
"Those jokes have not dated well in any sense of the word. And they're pretty rough,
especially coming from a guy who just this week complained about
late night TV saying he'd like to see a bit of civility come back."
Acknowledging that he, too, had been guilty of shaming Lewinsky during his
time on "The Daily Show," Oliver finished the piece in his typically emphatic style:
"If that's what he means by civility, may I offer my new book: 'Oh,
the Places You Can Go F--- Yourself, Jay Leno!' Look how civil I'm being."
David Letterman took a while to make his feelings clear about his late-night talk
show rival. It wasn't really until the year 2000, after he'd just undergone heart surgery,
that the TV icon even mentioned Jay Leno. And even after poking fun at the man's turn-of-the-century
chat with George W. Bush, Letterman largely kept quiet for another nine years.
But it's fair to say that he's since made up for lost time. In 2009,
Leno revealed that a flattering letter he sent to Letterman after another heart operation was
never responded to. In 2010, the "Late Show" host described his nemesis as "Big Jaw" while
also serving up a derogatory impression. As the talk show war continued to escalate,
Letterman quipped about a "Law and Order" spinoff, Leno Victims Unit, which would
follow two different kinds of hosts: "Jay Leno, and those who have been victimized by Jay Leno."
Letterman's offensive tactics didn't end there,
either. During one particular monologue, he admitted,
"I'm telling jokes and making fun of Jay Leno relentlessly,
mercilessly, simply for one reason: I'm really enjoying it. It's just fun!"
And although the pair have since appeared to call a truce,
it seems unlikely that they will be sending each other Christmas cards any time soon.