Axiom Home Page Forums General Discussion The Water Cooler Favorite Comedians

While I agree that Jay Leno is the pinnacle of bad comedy, with Jimmy Fallon nipping at his heels, I will always enjoy Letterman and Conan and Kilborn. I got sick of Conan for a while because for a while they kept recycling the same material with too little variation, but I learned to appreciate him again years later. Letterman's monologues suck, and the Top Tens are never that wonderful, either, but the stories he tells in between the monologues and the first guests are almost always hilarious. The interviews are hit or miss, but he finds the right rhythm with a guest, it can be magical.

He was until around 1952. After that, he operated by a formula that, IMHO, became sadly superficial, predictable, and unfunny. But those early years were something special.

Truthfully, I haven't seen much of his early stuff. Mostly, I used to see the USO on-stage stuff. While I respected the cause, I just never found him particularly funny.

Conan is definitely the funniest out all the late night tv shows. Who do you think wrote/co-wrote some of the most classic Simpsons episodes ever? Letterman was pretty good at one point but that is no longer the case. Leno just sucks.

When late night with Jimmy Kimmel started that was really, really good. He had some excellent guests and moments with the likes of Snoop Dog and Mike Tyson that was really refreshing for late night at the time.

Agreed, although I find that Ferguson guy kind of funny.

I'm probably being unfair. I think they're generally limited by the format. I'd forgotten that Conan wrote Simpsons eps.

I don't find latenight that funny anymore. Maybe getting stoned will help? I might even laugh at some of Leno's attempts at jokes

I'm willing to take one for the team and try it....

"Zooey Deschanel is positively adorable." I have a thing for her, actually. She was in a Jim Carey movie I saw pieces of (one where Jim Carey had to tell the truth all of the time), and she was "positively adorable" there as well. She has a bit of a "different" type of look, so I actually assumed I was unusual in having a thing for her.

I've seen Bob Sagat standup on HBO. I couldn't make it through it. I thought it was horrible. I think he definitely overcompensates for his sitcom days. His appearances on Entourage were o.k., but even those got tiresome fast. Same basic problem.

That being said, good call on Dirty Work, CV. I thought that was a cute movie, and in fact just bought it on DVD. Norm McDonald is one of those people who just makes me laugh, almost no matter what he is doing.

On the Tine Fey front, I just recently started watching 30 Rock. I think that show is fantastic. I never got the Tracy Jordan thing, but now I think he is very funny. In fact, I was thinking just last night how there are an unusually number of good Sitcoms on TV now: 30 Rock, the Big Bang Theory, Community, and Parks and Recreation all give me enough chuckles to warrant 30 minutes of my life (each).

Is she on your buckher list?