I watched Oprah Winfrey's interview with Jay Leno, and I think Leno was right about the absurdity that he's been in the news so much. Why am I commenting on it, then? I refer you to the title of this blog. So... my useless opinion(s) on this useless business...
Selfishness is not always a bad thing, and there isn't always a reason to hold selfishness against someone. While it's selfish for Leno to want to host the Tonight Show, it's understandable and not in itself something to hold against him. The selfishness that's a problem is his apparent inability to look beyond himself at the consequences of his actions. Here I'm talking about the (minimum) four hours of prime time he didn't have to take up for his 10:00 show. According to this interview, he didn't even realize that he'd be putting 1,000 (or more) people out of work until after it was pointed out to him after he'd agreed to do it. While he said he regretted that, he apparently still hasn't connected this to the charge of selfishness. He also said in the Oprah interview that he thought the network would ask him to do 2 or 3 nights in prime time, and returning to late night (for the half-hour show) never occurred to him. When Conan announced that he didn't want the Tonight Show to be on at 12:05, why didn't Leno suggest this as an alternative?
Cheap shots. Letterman took a cheap shot at Leno by calling him Jay "Big Jaw" Leno. Leno's response was to take a cheap shot a Letterman's marriage. Leno thinks this was fair. It would have been fair if Leno had taken a cheap shot at Letterman's hair or teeth. Leave his wife out of it. (And yes, if you bring his marriage into it, you bring his wife into it.)
All in all, I can't say that Leno said anything I didn't expect, so I can't say my opinion of him has improved much. I'm sure he's devastated.
