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Leno Escalates War of Words With NBC ‘Snakes’ — Are Latest Salvos Part of His ‘Tonight Show’ Endgame?

Mar 19, 2013  •  Post A Comment

Jay Leno isn’t backing down after angering NBC entertainment chief Robert Greenblatt by joking on "The Tonight Show" about the network’s ratings struggles.

The Hollywood Reporter’s Live Feed reports that Leno kept up the assault during Monday’s monologue. Leno aimed a joke at the network’s executives, saying, "You know the whole legend of St. Patrick, right? St. Patrick drove all the snakes out of Ireland — and then they came to the United States and became NBC executives. It’s a fascinating story."

As previously reported, Leno is in the doghouse with Greenblatt after the comedian made jokes about NBC’s ratings slide and its fifth-place finish in the February sweeps. Greenblatt sent an email to Leno complaining about the jokes, which led to a pointed exchange between the two.

THR is reporting that two high-level industry sources have said NBC has been considering making an announcement in May about an exit plan for Leno as host of “Tonight.” Leno is widely expected to be replaced by Jimmy Fallon, with the latest report forecasting the transition for 2014.

2 Comments

  1. I don’t get it. If the higher-ups at the network don’t like what Leno says in the monologue, why don’t they just cut it out of the show before it airs? Problem solved.

  2. See, this reminds me of Conan’s last week at NBC. The network didn’t give one rat’s ass what he said or did, so he totally ripped the network a new one. It made for some of Conan’s best material.
    But, you know…Maybe instead of getting angry at Leno for making fun of his crappy network that used to be the best one on TV, they should just…you know…try to improve the ratings somehow.

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