monologue. they were calling them opening remarks. because if you called them a monologue and there were too many, you would have stepped on johnny s toes. now with that in mind, let s continue with the opening remarks. it was just a little off. it looked like a talk show, kind of. sometimes he wore sneakers, which was weird. and they talked about the events of the day. to a certain extent. but also more focused on weirdness than on the newspaper. dave is passing out ham. dave was a very new york-centered show. jay could be monica lewinski and o.j. trial and dave could be like there was a squirrel today in the park. you know, just some bizarre offbeat thing. so you re not going to just get monologue jokes about the front page. it s whatever dave wants to do. sometimes it seems like a cable access show, like why is he throwing a watermelon off the building? i think that s an important consideration for all of us. and believe me, ma am, you ve come to the right place.
same time. you know, they reintroduce the mcrib every [ bleep ] year. it is nothing new. the power of topical humor is everyone is on the same page. they are primed. they are laughing already. so your joke has rocket fuel under it. the best comedy is novel, like you ve never heard it before. and the things that are happening in the headlines give rise to brand-new jokes. we interrupt this broadcast to bring you this important bulletin from the united press. flash, the white house announces japanese attack on pearl harbor. world war ii was the most uniting war in the history of the united states. so it was natural that the biggest comedian in america would participate in the war effort. i d like to stop the show for just a few minutes here and explain why we are here.
revisions made necessary by last-minute changes in a changing world. bob hope was the first guy to utilize an actual staff of writers to give you topical material of the day. he really did invent the idea of the comedian being the head writer, managing editor, and having a bunch of writers. the traditions of standup comedy in the 50s were still really derived from vaudeville. those performers like bob hope had nothing more on their mind than just getting laughs. that was plenty. the guy who really came along and changed all that was mort sahl. richard nixon is running for governor of california, and i realize sometimes the shows to hit on are all topical. he will be running for something no matter when this show is on, so sorry. mort sahl was the first person to talk like a human being on stage. it wasn t schmaltzy. he did for comedy what james dean and marlon brando did for acting. which is, he humanized it.
and so it has come to this. i am one of the lucky people in the world. i found something i always wanted to do, and i have enjoyed every single minute of it. i bid you a very heartfelt good night. it s certainly true that with johnny out, a vacuum was created. a big decision that had the entertainment industry buzzing, this week. that s of course the fate of late-night stars jay leno and david letterman. the tonight show without johnny carson as the regular host made its debut last night. jay leno emerged from behind the curtain. oh, i don t care if you laugh. i got the job. look at this. they are getting more press than the president. so start up your remote controls. a late-night race is about to begin. jay was a brilliant standup. he continued the tradition of johnny. he had a big group of monologue writers. that was the main writing on that show. he was writing the best topical
who would have thought you would ever hear the words intellectual property and nbc in the same sentence? there was not much emphasis on that monologue for dave. because when we started on late night we weren t allowed to do a monologue. they were calling them opening remarks. if you called them a monologue and there were too many, you would have stepped on johnny s toes. now with that in mind, let s continue with the opening remarks. it was just a little off. it looked like a talk show, kind of. sometimes he wore sneakers, which was weird. and they talked about the events of the day. to a certain extent. but also more focused on weirdness than on the newspaper. dave is passing out ham. dave was a very new york-centered show. jay could be monica lewinski and o.j. trial and dave could be like there was a squirrel today in the park. just some bizarre offbeat thing. so you re not going to just get