Late night television history

by Brian McKim & Traci Skene on January 18th, 2010

As we watch late night history being made, with an internet-enhanced, front row seat for this incarnation of Talk Show War II.

FOS Kliph Nesteroff provides an account of a late-night talk show disaster that is rarely talked about… not even by the principal participant– Jerry Lewis.

Forty-seven years have passed and Lewis has rarely talked about the show. In his most recent book Dean & Me (2006, Broadway) Lewis devoted one sentence to The Jerry Lewis Show. “After a successful stint guest hosting The Tonight Show … I tried a talk/variety show that didn’t quite jell.” The book actually devotes more time to a Martin & Lewis anecdote about the time Jerry asked Dean Martin to assist him in picking crab lice from his pubic region (I am not joking). Obviously the disaster is a sore point that Lewis would much rather forget. And as we see another late night disaster play itself out before our very eyes between Jay Leno, Conan O’Brien and NBC, it is easy to see why.

Nesteroff’s article is called “Late Night Distemper of our Times.” It’s well worth the read. And don’t skip the notes at the end!

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