Funny Business

Thanks for your profile of Jay Leno (“It’s Not Just ‘Tonight.’ It’s Every Night,” by Paul Brownfield, July 9). It shows the man has a great work ethic, shuttling from gig to gig, giving up the shtick, working the room like an old pol, collecting the cash and moving on. Crack of dawn, dead of night, gotta dish the laughs: He’s a comedy machine. And, people say, a “nice guy.”

One little problem: Leno isn’t funny. I don’t enjoy saying this, but watching him feels like oxygen deprivation. How can this be happening, you ask, gasping. How can such a bad comedian be so successful, a mystery you failed to address. In stark contrast to the great comics, there’s nothing liberating, or true, or insightful, in his humor. Leno is flat, forced, formulaic and leaden. The audience, it seems, laughs not as an authentic reaction, but because it’s expected and prompted to. The result is a collective co-dependent death rattle.

Leno seems to have won the comedy wars by crafting a hollow imitation of the old David Letterman “Late Night” show, softening it and dumbing it down--way down. This may have succeeded because, although Letterman’s current show is also a softened, and oddly bitter, imitation of his old show, it works even less well than Leno’s. But winning really isn’t everything, so let it be said: The comedy emperor is naked as a jaybird.

LOUIS J. VAN DEN BERG

Riverside

*

The guy obviously loves what he does, has a wonderful wife, is successful, and can do and have whatever he wants. We should be so lucky.

But success hasn’t spoiled Jay Leno. A lot of famous people would never be accessible to the public the way Jay is. I saw him buying groceries in a supermarket, sharing a bag of chips and joking with people in the checkout line. I’ll also treasure the memory of that day, when he let me sit in his Lamborghini Countach while he talked to folks in the supermarket parking lot. You can bet other famous people wouldn’t be so friendly, or approachable.

It’s good to know there are still nice guys around, regardless of their competitiveness, drive or success.

STEPHANIE DONON

Los Angeles

*

Being No. 1 does not mean you’re any good. It just means you’re more watched than any other show at the same time. No. 1, in the ratings world of television time slots, can mean two vastly different things: good or least bad. “The Tonight Show” is the latter.

Leno, whom I used to admire endlessly, is the reason the show is bad--from his phony Hollywood half-hugs, to his exaggerated giggling during interviews (it’s like the nervous first dater--”See? We’re having a great time since we’re laughing”), to his stupefyingly amateurish interview skills (many questions are prefaced by “Lemme ask you somethin’ “--just ask already!).

And the humor is, collectively, so childish it must make Johnny Carson spin in the grave he probably wishes he were in any time he sees what happened to his show. The saddest thing is, as long as “The Tonight Show” leads in the ratings, there will be no change.

DAVID McMILLAN

Los Angeles

*

Will Leno please hire some writers who can feed him jokes about someone other than Bill Clinton? They have been done to death and are no longer original or relevant or even amusing! The same can be said about Leno himself. He has managed to become a mean-spirited bore.

EDGAR SMALL

Beverly Hills

*

Leno’s workaholism was interesting but more so was his take on why he clobbered David Letterman in the ratings several years ago. Leno would have us believe it occurred “when he embraced his stand-up self,” whatever that means.

To all of us watching TV at the time, it was clear that Leno cleaned Letterman’s clock during the O.J. trial. While Letterman was proclaiming that there was nothing funny about a double homicide, the “Dancing Itos” were proving him wrong.

STEVE SMITH

Costa Mesa