Earlier on Thursday, Rolling Stone published allegations from two current and 14 former employees, including production crew and writers, who requested anonymity out of fear of retaliation. Rolling Stone claimed they had approached an additional 80 current and former employees, but “not a single one agreed to speak on the record or had positive things to say about working on the Tonight Show”.

According to Rolling Stone’s report, multiple sources alleged Fallon had a history of “outbursts” and lashing out at staff when under pressure; that previous senior staff on the show had bullied and belittled them; and that guests’ dressing rooms were commonly known as “cry rooms”, where employees could go let out their stress.

Nine showrunners have worked on the Tonight Show since Fallon took over from Jay Leno in 2014; a much faster turnover than comparable late night shows like Late Night with Seth Meyers and The Late Show With Stephen Colbert.

129 points

They should have given it to Conan when they had the chance but they keep insisting on giving it to soulless narcissists like Leno and Fallon.

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112 points

This, Conan has always been infinitely funnier, and he still has employees that followed him from the Late Night show that seem to love working with him

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9 points

so much love for Conan. I’ve only seen a few clips, I’ll have to seek him out a bit.

ok I just watched this and he’s actually great: https://youtu.be/FIHxrzOQtm0

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61 points

They did give it to Conan, then they gave it back to Jay. Like everything else wrong in my life, I blame the boomers.

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18 points

Oooh yes, they did Conan sooo dirty during that clusterfuck.

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7 points

Fuckin boomers

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1 point

I love the single downvote… “god damn kids…” grumble, grumble

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-37 points

Unpopular opinion: Conan SUCKS and is not funny. His personal antics are downright cringey middle school level drek.

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35 points

Yeah, not everyone like all types of humor. By actually having a personality and a distinct sense of humor he opens himself up to not being liked.

Unlike the charismatic black holes of Falcon and Leno that are just there and fills time until the inevitable heat death of the universe.

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11 points

At least Leno was an ok interviewer and (at least based on his post tonight shown life) seems not to be a dick.

Fallon is SUCH a bad interviewer, it is incredibly grating.

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-79 points

Conan is a jackass too, except he treats people like crap on camera and people think it’s funny.

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62 points

You…think what you see on TV is…real? It’s a comedy bit.

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49 points

Conan acts like that to get a laugh because he isn’t like that at all as a person and everyone knows he is joking. You won’t ever see Fallon or Corden be that way on camera because it’s really how they are in everyday life off camera.

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30 points

I’ll wait to hear about all the people crying from working on Conan.

Because last I checked, Conan does seem to care about his staff. He has a history of paying people out of pocket while his shows were on hiatus.

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22 points

Those are comedy skits where people play exaggerated versions of themselves for your amusement.

It’s acting.

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21 points

Almost like it’s a bit for entertainment! Being a “jackass” on camera is not at all the same thing as this story.

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14 points

I’ve never heard of anything saying Conan was inappropriate to them while working for him. He seems like one of those bosses that let’s people do there works and get a way with shit here and there.

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0 points

I’ve loved Conan for decades, but a certain point the bits with him and Jordan Schlansky started to make me uncomfortable. Like yeah, he’s a weird, possibly neurodivergent guy who does odd things that are funny and Conan wanted to make a bit out of it and obviously Jordan was on board. But as it progressed Conan did seem to get a little mean at times, and when you have a national platform like that, you aren’t just being silly-mean to your quirky buddy, you’re opening the door to making it acceptable to ridicule people with autism spectrum disorder.

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89 points

Whether this is a “hit piece” or not, I have never found Fallon funny in the slightest bit and absolutely hate the entire late night talk show format. It’s just sucking up to celebrities for 2 goddamn hours. Utterly fake conversations with fake people trying to plug their latest projects. Every thing about it annoys the fuck out of me.

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36 points

I’m the same, except when Conan does it. But also Conan could read out my tax returns and it’d be hilarious.

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20 points

Conan has his moments, but I much rather see him write/act in skits about current events than sucking up to celebrities. Peak Conan was when he was still fresh from being a writer for The Simpsons, and I seem to find him less and less funny as the years go on.

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14 points

I’d recommend giving his travel show “Conan Obrien Must Go” a shot. More just Conan being Conan and it’s great.

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11 points

I’ve been really liking his podcast. He still has celebrities on, but the idea is that it’s more people he wants to talk to rather than people promoting stuff, or people he had on his show who he never got to have a proper conversation with and he’ll sit with them to a proper in-depth talk for like an hour or so. And sometimes they’ll do an episode where just a random member of the public calls in and he interviews them instead. Also one of his co-hosts is his assistant who does not respect his position as her boss at all, so that’s a good dynamic.

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1 point

Weird, I’ve actually found him to be funnier and more witty/insightful as the years have gone on. I couldn’t stand him back in the '90s.

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17 points

Conan has admitted that he can’t turn it off.

If you see him at a restaurant, he will accidentally ignore his family to to entertain you. He mentions his wife hates it.

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14 points

I sat next to him and his wife at a restaurant about 6 years ago. Now I’m personally offended he didn’t ignore her to try to entertain me.

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12 points

I feel like you could ask Conan to be funny after you read 2 lines from anything and he’d knock it out. Recipe. Taxes. Obituary. Jimmy Fallon’s set. Anything normally not funny at all

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8 points

Idk i laughed pretty hard when mamoa smacked the everloving shit out of him.

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8 points

I’m thinking this could be a successful new format

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4 points

The Graham Norton show is actually pretty entertaining as late-night talk shows go. Graham seems like a good dude, the guests can actually talk to each other after pitching their bullshit, and they drink onstage so they don’t have to pound booze and drugs in the green room beforehand.

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3 points

Congratulations, you have a brain.

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76 points
*

I’ve always gotten strong Ellen vibes from Fallon.

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66 points

I never understood how this unfunny douchebag got famous. Are people really fans of him or was having him TWO shows purely a studio decision? He was never funny on SNL.

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36 points

I thought maybe it was just me, maybe I wasn’t seeing something in ‘slow jam the news’ that was hilariously funny. But then he sucked up to Trump during the campaign in 2016 and I didn’t give a fuck any more. Fuck him.

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21 points

Jimmy Fallon is all that awkwardness of Nathan Fielder minus the intent or semblence of humor. He is the most boring, lame host I have ever seen on a show like this and I find him painful to watch.

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7 points
*
Deleted by creator
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8 points

Will Farrell funny either, though from what I’ve heard his success is largely in his ability to get people motivated, so you see a lot of good films with unfunny Farrells, where Farrell is the reason why it’s funny, but it’s not obvious because Farrell himself isn’t.

I came to this conclusion too! always considered Will Farrell to be unfunny.

But I think he has like a “funny aura boost”. Because when he’s in a movie, it feels like the whole staff is having a lot more fun and are looser. And that makes the whole film more enjoyable.

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1 point

Not sure, I’ve never watched him. I don’t really watch late shows that much lately, but I’ve enjoyed content from Last Week Tonight, Seth, Colbert, Jon Stewart when he was host of Daiky Show, and yes, Trevor Noah’s show roo (I’ve heard people lambasting him as being Neoliberal, which probably is true, but I liked how they had some angles based on black people. Same with Seth’s jokes Seth can’t tell for black and lesbian stuff). Of those I probably liked Last Week Tonight the most.

The others can be charming sometimes even in ways that’s not inherently funny, but more like hamming it up (Colbert and Seth).

I’ve never found a clip of Fallon that made me want to watch.

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19 points

Totally. I said the same thing when someone posted a thread about his behavior yesterday. I got a real asshole sense from him.

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75 points

Give Craig Ferguson his time slot.

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18 points

I’d start watching non-streaming TV again if Ferguson came back.

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12 points

I miss Craig

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3 points

Conan was awesome and I thought it couldn’t get any better. But then came Craig and he was in a league of his own. He reinvented the genre and nobody was able to copy him since.

It was a privilege to have lived through and watch both of them in their prime.

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2 points

I haven’t even seen him since he left his show. What is he even doing now? Just enjoying retirement? I mean he deserves it, but I miss him too.

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1 point

I have no idea. He did like one Netflix comedy special after leaving the show but that was so long ago.

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11 points

I think he’s said he never wanted the earlier time slot because the network would be too involved with the show.

“Tonight Show with Craig Ferguson” would just be like what Tonight Show has been for many decades with just the few flourishes here and there that the network would allow Ferguson to do.

With the 12:30 slot he could do whatever he wanted, the network didn’t care. Which is what made his show the best talk show of all time.

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65 points

“I’m sorry (this got out).”

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