After 22 years, a departure and a comeback, Thursday night was it for good for “The Tonight Show with Jay Leno.”
The longtime NBC late-night host bid a final and teary farewell to his audience with the help of Billy Crystal — his first-ever guest on “The Tonight Show” in 1992 — Garth Brooks, and a surprise list of celebrities who dropped by to perform a rendition of “So Long, Farewell.” The guests provided the fun part. Saying goodbye was — well, you know.
“Boy, this is the hard part,” Leno began his speech at the end of the show, thanking the fans for their loyalty. “This has been the greatest 22 years of my life. I am the luckiest guy in the world.”
He emotionally touched on the concept of family in his closing remarks, recounting how he lost both of his parents in the first two years of his tenure, and his brother thereafter.
“After that, I was pretty much out of family. And the folks here became my family.”
Crystal — Leno’s old friend and colleague in comedy — was part of the show’s extended family. He reminisced about the years long gone, pulling out an ‘executive planner’ that showed Leno’s name and phone number scratched down for an overnight stay in Boston in the 1970s when Crystal was traveling for work. “Your name is actually spelled wrong. It’s two n’s,” he joked.
He also pulled out the night’s biggest showstopper: a version of “So Long, Farewell” from the “Sound of Music,” aided by a procession of celebs, from Jack Black to Oprah. The time has come to stop the late night talking / Into the sunset, now we’ll see Jay walking, Crystal sang.
Not before one last tune from Brooks, who sent Jay out with a number typically drunk on its own happiness, “I’ve Got Friends in Low Places.”
Jimmy Fallon, Leno’s successor, is slated to get the new “Tonight Show” era underway Feb. 17 with first guests Will Smith and U2. We’ll see if Leno has managed to get new health insurance by then, now that he won’t be employed.
“The worst thing about losing this job? I’m no longer covered by NBC — I now have to sign up for Obamacare,” Leno lamented.
