Jay talking: Leno stops at Cobb Energy Centre

Long before the advent of Jimmy Fallon, an entire generation knew Jay Leno as the innovative host of “The Tonight Show.” But the affable comic — who followed Johnny Carson, Steve Allen and Jack Parr into the position in 1992 — has juggled a busy stand-up career with various television, film and voice jobs since the ‘70s.

Hitting the road nearly every weekend while balancing his “Tonight” duties, Leno racked up massive frequent flyer miles as he played national and international venues. Since 2015, he’s combined his road-tested comedy gigs with an ever-expanding collection of classic cars and motorcycles. “Jay Leno’s Garage” has been a consistently popular series via broadcast TV and You Tube segments.

Recently, in addition to wrapping a recurring role on Tim Allen’s “Last Man Standing” sitcom, Leno also contributed a gear-head column for Popular Mechanics and currently hosts the revived edition of “You Bet Your Life.” His most recent film role is a cameo as fellow television pioneer Ed Sullivan in “Midas Touch,” an upcoming biopic about the Beatles’ manager Brian Epstein.

Credit: Brent N. Clarke/Invision/AP

Credit: Brent N. Clarke/Invision/AP

This week, he finally returns to Atlanta for a thrice-rescheduled performance at the Cobb Energy Centre. The AJC spoke at length with Leno by phone from his expansive Burbank, California, garage.

How have you managed to keep the Garage show interesting — for yourself and your guests?

There’s always an interesting angle, so you’re basically doing “The Tonight Show” in a car, just driving around. For some reason, people seem to loosen up a lot more and speak a little freer because there’s no audience, it’s just two people talking in a car.

A car is much more than a machine, it becomes an extension of the owner in many cases.

Yeah, people either really love cars or they hate them. Some people see them as just a way to get from point A to point B but for a lot of us — especially people of my generation — your car was sort of the iPhone of the day. It took you out of everyday reality.

Credit: Jordan Strauss

Before you hosted “Tonight,” you were a frequent guest on many late-night talk shows. One of your particularly enjoyable bits was called “What’s My Beef?” So what’s your beef, circa 2022?

I think it’s the loss of personal communication, of actually talking one-on-one. I enjoy doing the live shows because people gather, then you talk. You get immediate reactions. It’s always amazing to me when people say, ‘Oh I saw so-and-so’s comedy special and I didn’t think it was that funny.’ I go, ‘Oh yeah, well where did you watch it?’ ‘I watched it on my iPhone.’ It’s not going to be funny on your phone; you need to experience it live with other people. This lack of real communication is a problem. I’m still amazed that people would rather type than talk. People say, ‘Send me a text.’ ‘How about if I give you a call?’ ‘No, don’t call me!’ I’m dyslexic, so when I write letters, I’ll misspell some of the words and I have to start all over again. So I’m still a talking guy.

Speaking of comedy, there was a time when being seen on the “Tonight Show” could make or break a comic in the span of five minutes.

Oh yeah. Now you’d have to do ten or fifteen appearances to get the visceral impact that only one appearance used to get.

Content is much different now, too. Many modern comedians don’t even have a “tight five” set suitable for network TV.

Yeah, that’s definitely different but the thing that’s really changed is the attention span. When you see a clip of, say, Bob Newhart on the “Tonight Show” in the ‘60s, he’d do eight or nine minutes. Just his setup would seem intolerable now. ‘Ok, here’s a woman, she’s 62, she’s going in to get her driver’s license for the very first time. Ok, now here we are…’ It seems like forever. If you don’t get a laugh in the first few seconds now, people switch off. But funny is funny. The difference now is you can rocket to the middle and then you’ll just stay there. And then what? It’s not hard to take a clean joke and make it dirty. But it’s almost impossible to take a dirty joke and make it clean.

There was a time when a comic had to have some clean material or they’d never work on commercial television.

That’s right. Now you can do whatever you want and put it on YouTube. Sometimes it’s sad, you’ll see guys who have a really funny five-minute clip and some promoter will book them to headline and they don’t even have forty good minutes yet. But they have to fill up the time with something. In the old days, it was harder to get to the success but you could stay there longer.

Some of the newer acts are headlining tours based on one or two Netflix specials.

Yeah and when you go see ‘em, they’ll be doing their Netflix special. How long can that last? That’s why I don’t like to do the specials. I’d rather come to your town and do it live. That way I always know where my act has been. ‘Ok, I haven’t been here in like five years, so I’ll come back.’

Credit: Richard Shotwell/Invision/AP

You’re one of the few comics who can do a seemingly effortless show for a solid 90 minutes or more without relying on filler or crowd-work or profanity.

You know, Seinfeld and I talk about this all the time. It’s about having an act and just being ready. I try not to write stuff down, so I like to work a lot to keep it all fresh. I hate comedians that obviously waste time by going, ‘Ok, so what do ya wanna talk about?’ It’s like, ‘Hey, I bought the ticket. You do your job!’