Sunday Sitdown with Willie Geist - Jimmy Fallon

Episode Date: May 12, 2024

On this week's episode, Willie sat down with his NBC neighbor, Jimmy Fallon. They got together as he celebrates his 10-year anniversary as host of "The Tonight Show" - reflecting on his long career in comedy, his years at SNL, and landing the biggest job in "Late Night".  Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Hey guys, Willie Geist here with another episode of the Sunday Sit Down podcast. My thanks, as always, for clicking and listening along. Got a great one for you this week with our friend upstairs at Rockefeller Center, Mr. Jimmy Fallon. I will not waste your time with a long biography. You know and love the man. You've known him since he hopped on to SNL in 1998, where he spent six years left in 2004 for a movie career that, as you'll hear him discussed, did quite pan out the way he hoped it would. But Lauren Michaels, creator of Saturn and at Live had Jimmy in mind as the host of Late Night to come in and follow Conan O'Brien as he moved up to the Tonight Show. Five years later, Mr. Fallon gets the job as the host of the Tonight Show in 2014, that was. So now he is celebrating a decade in the most prized seat in all of late night as the host of the Tonight Show. Jimmy was nice to invite us backstage, to invite us in his office when you hear us discussing.

his 10 years on the Tonight Show. We are literally sitting in his office right in front of his desk with a big fish tank behind him that Lauren gave him the board up, the pinboard that shows who's going to be on the show, pitch ideas, sketches, all the things they do to make that show run. So great to catch up with my old buddy, Jimmy Fallon. Also gave us a little tour backstage of the studio, which we'll get to in just a little bit. But for now, sit back, relax, and enjoy my conversation with Jimmy Fallon on the Sunday Sit Down podcast. What's up, Jimmy? Willie, you're in the office. This is the office.

This is as inner as the inner sanctum gets. This is the best my offices ever looked ever. I go, wow, who's off? Oh, it's mine? I know, you're like, can we keep the lighting? I'm a professional, yeah. It looks great. Thank you for doing this.

Can we keep this here? We dressed it up for you. I appreciate this. Thank you. I didn't even have a desk. You see, I work off the floor. Somebody pour some Cheerios out and I get to work. It's like, yeah.

You're all around the floor. Of course. Oh, man. Well, I got to start with congratulations. on 10 years in Tonight Show. It's so bizarre. Can you believe it? I can't really believe it.

We're editing the best of special, which is airing this Tuesday. So we're editing it right up to the last minute. But we're still editing it now. There's so much stuff to pull from and to look at and things to look at. It's so fun. And I forget half the things I've done.

You know, because we do these shows every single day. And somebody goes, dude, yeah, that scene where Carol Burnett slaps you? And I go, Carol Burnett slap it? What was that scene? And they're like, oh, dude, we have a whole month. montizer people slapping you like and we actually do that heard robert denier all these different people was that with the big hand that's a different game kevin hard slaps me as well yeah we have the big hand slap was a big thing we played that we had a big giant foam hand it's called slap jack and you play a game

of cards and then someone takes a foam hand and hits you across the face jason statham yeah i don't care if you have a foam hand or whatever he's holding if he slaps you with something you're going down It's not fun. I had a red mark on my face for like two weeks. It really looked like I was allergic to something. I was like, what happened? Dude, Jason St. Stanton slapped me. I had a giant welt over my face.

It was swollen on that side. What a great workplace injury, though? What happened? Oh, Jason Steele did he do with a giant foam hand. Yeah. Jane Fondon once cut me with an egg. And that was another good injury. Yeah.

That's a great game, too. That game came about, it was called egg roulette, and you have a dozen eggs, and we thought it would be funny to have two, that are raw, the rest are hard-boiled, and we pitched it to Tom Cruz. And his publicist said, Tom is not playing this game.

I go, come on, what's the big deal? It's fun. He's like, no, he's got a premiere this night. He's not playing. I go, let me talk to him. They go, you talk to him. I go, I'll talk to him. I go, I'll talk to him.

It's called Egg Roulette. You crack an egg in your head. There's only two that are raw. First person to crack two raw eggs in their head loses. He goes, I love it. Let's play it. I go, you're the best. Let's do it.

Play the game. I'm not kidding. First two eggs he cracks his head or raw game over. Oh, no way. He goes to the premiere covered an egg. Oops. So now we have like four raw eggs just in case. So out of solidarity, I can crack an egg and be like a good part of this game.

I really don't want them. But we're not rigged. He was like, why would I do this? He's covered in egg all over his beautiful suit. He felt like he walked into one of that one. Yeah, I didn't plan it out. It just happened. Do you stop and think at this moment right now,

10 years about like that first show what it felt like to walk out on that stage for the first time, the show that you've watched your whole life growing up. It had to be like an out-of-body experience, right? It was emotional because everyone I knew in my life was there. I mean, we had, our studio was filled. My mom and dad were in the audience.

We also had another studio next door full of just people that meant something to me from either growing up or people from Saturday Live. I mean, it was packed with all. people I knew. And that's pressure for me, you know, and emotional. Yeah. My dad actually heckled me during the first Tonight Show, which is so classic, my parents. What did he say? I said something about not graduating high school or something like that. I go, but look, now I'm the host of the Tonight Show or something. I did graduate at high school. But he was like, we pay a lot of money for that school.

And yelled it out. And I go, why would you heckle your son? First of all, I went to public schools. You didn't pay a lot of money for the school. So your joke doesn't even work. But also, just be proud and let this why would you can yell at me? This is my debut of the Tonight Show. I'm like thanks, Dad. You're also like, that's not how this works. I'm not doing a set in the funny bones. It's his national

I was so nervous. Every executive was there. Everyone was like, do we make the right decision? Do we bring Leno back? What do we do? You know, Leno's waiting on the set, like I'm trying to go back here. But it worked. You know, it's 10 years. I mean, I remember we did a bit in our first show

where I said, hey, to my buddy who said that I would never host a tonight show, you owe me a hundred bucks. And then one at a time, I had all these different celebrities come out and throw 100 bucks on the desk. It was everybody. It was De Niro, Sarajiska Parker, Mike Tyson, Joe Namath, Kim Kardashian, Lady Gaga, Colbert came out with a bucket of pennies and dumped a bucket of pennies over my head, which I remember because it went down my shirt, and I had to go up to the roof to watch you, too.

They were our first live band and they were performing on the roof and Lauren last minute goes, I think it'd be good if you shot it in dusk. It's better than being dark. You should shoot it in dusk. I go. Okay, let's go. Are you ready?

So I'm running up to try to get through the thing and there's pennies flying out of my underwear. It's like just the honest night of my life. Which is maybe a little window into what the next decade was going to be like. Just insanity every night, right? Every single night, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, five nights a week,

just insanity. And no breaks. And you go, yeah. It's great, though, because it's that thing of a roller coaster. You have one great show and then an okay show, then another great show. You can't get too excited about the great ones and you can't get too bummed about the ones that aren't that great. I feel that way even about our shows. When you have a daily show, you're like, and you're down for a minute.

I wish I'd done this differently. You don't have time, right? You have time because you've got to be on the next day. Yeah. Yeah. Turn the page. Turn the page. Yeah.

And it's, yeah, I love that part of it, too, because it's like, every, day also is a new experience. It's all new guests, you know, new bits that you're working on. I mean, our show, we get to do kind of everything. My wife always says that she's so grateful for the show just for my brain, just for therapy-wise, because

it's so good for me. Because if I have an idea, however weird it is, most likely we do it. We try it on the show, which is an odd thing. But like, I'll have a dream and I'll wake up in the middle of the night with my phone and be like, I don't know what he's talking about my tight pants.

I got my tight pants. And my wife's like, oh my gosh, this guy's lunatic. And then I go, I got a dream last night. It's me and Will Ferrell dancing in tight pants. And we want to see who has tighter pants. There's only one guy that can live in the town with the tightest pants. So the other guy has to leave the town. And it was going to be like a Western.

But it turned out to be this cool, weird song. But all those ideas get made. So that came to you in a dream type pants? Yeah. Yeah, isn't that sad? You got a weird brain now. I know. I wish.

Why can I get the lottery numbers? or who's going to win, who's going to win, you know, the World Series or something. Now, I see, yeah, I see tight pants and I see stuff like that. I go, why don't we crack eggs in people's heads? It's funny, I heard your wife in another interview saying, I need him to stay in this job. People are like, how long do you think it will be 20 years? She's like, I don't care. I need him there. I need him.

Not here. Exactly. By the way, I already used all my charm up during COVID. She's like, okay, I'm getting to know you. Now I know you again. Get back to work, buddy. Let's go. Do you have, this is a terrible question, I realize,

but do you have favorites of these bits you've done? There's so many, you mentioned a couple of them that are so famous and well-known. No, they're watching these back. I go, oh, my gosh, I forgot. I played, you know, played Ennard Sandman with Metallica with classroom instruments. Yes. You know, and like, and they came as a joke. They came all wearing Jimmy Fallon T-shirts,

and we were wearing Metallica T-shirts. Neither one of us knew that we were going to do each other a bit. They were so fun. And it's song sounded great, actually, even though it's such a heavy song. I remember doing Wonka Fooled again with The Who, and Pete Townsend took this tiny little toy ukulele and smashed it and then stuck it into this tiny little bongo drum thing.

And I go, it's just fun. All these moments keep coming back here. Oh, yeah. Or Keith Richards playing the guitar, which was a last-minute thing. So I talked to Keith before the show, and the Stones have a new album out, and I go, I have an idea. would you ever want to come out and just show every kid who's watching this how you do it?

Because you are the pro. You're the one and only, Keith Richards. Give him a little, do something. He's like, I don't know. People who won't see that. I don't know. People don't care. I go, they do want to see it, man.

He's like, I don't know. He's like, maybe. We'll bring out a guitar. We'll see what we end up. So we do the first half of the interview, and it turns out great. Now, the first half of the interview, I wanted to surprise him because maybe 10 years ago, I interviewed Keith. one of the first interviews he's done since the 60s

was my interview. And I talked to him and I saw this bit that he has a lemon tree. I go, you have a lemon tree? Like, talk to me about this is in his house, upstate. And he goes, yeah, I have a lemon tree. It's great grape.

Giant lemons and size of great fruits. Yeah, he's lemons are crazy lemons. You know, just hear him talking about lemons. This was interesting. So I went some party and Keith Richards walks in. And we know, I go, Keith, was that buddy? He goes, Jimmy. pulls out of a bag, gives me a lemon.

He brought the lemon. So he brought a lemon from his tree. So I took the lemon. I went online. I cut it open. I took a seed from the lemon. I germinated it in a Ziploc band. I grew a lemon tree from Keith Richards' lemon.

No. And I surprised him with the tree. And he was a little emotional. You took the seed, planted it. Yeah. And grew Keith Richards' lemon tree. Yeah. I don't know who else to compare myself to.

Yeah. Bill Nye. Bill Nye, the science thing. Yeah. Something like that. People always confuse me. And Bill and I, but does he do gardening? Anyway, I grew this lemon tree, and it's starting to not really get lemons yet,

but it's on its way, it's big. That's incredible. And he was like, great. And we went to commercial and he goes, oh, Jimmy, good to see it, man. I go, no, we got to do the guitar bit. He goes, do we need the guitar bit? And I go, I think, I mean, let's try the guitar bit. Let's do it.

He's like, I don't think. But if you think so, let's try it. He played the first riff of like four legendary stone songs and Jumping Jack Flash. and I remember getting up and I was like maybe I'll just do Mick just over Keith just to make it

and the roots will come in so I was like I was born and across by her king I was out outside I was even saying words set up

it's just whatever and did the bit it was super fun loved it and Keith was like so happy he never does this on shows and I go backstage and Mick Jagger's there

because he was doing a bit he was doing a bit pre-taping after the show and I go here and he goes you're a little flat on jack flash come on a little flat on jack flash oh why didn't you come out why didn't you come out that's one of those moments that's incredible he's like now I want to keep to have this thing see that gets it something I wanted to ask you about which is you are living out a lot of your boyhood dream grow up a stone's fan just like I did and now you're playing in the sandbox with them. But you're also living out a lot of our fantasies and like you're performing with the stones and you're doing it in such a funny and joyful way and we're like, that guy's one of us and

he gets to be there with them. Do you feel that? Like, God, how lucky am I to be sitting there with Keith Richards? No, I did I did one bit once with Neil Young where I was dressed as Neil Young. We sang old man. Yes. And we sang it harmonizing. And I go, I just remember because I, unfortunately, I don't know if you've heard this, but I laugh sometimes when I do a sketch. I hadn't heard. Yeah, yeah, yeah, I laugh sometimes. I like to laugh. So I remember biting my lip and just going, do not laugh during this, because you probably have one take of this. I don't think Neil Young's going to do two takes of old, man. And so I was like, I might have even just bit until I hit blood.

And I just did it, and we nailed it on the first thing. And I go, and that was it. And he's like, thanks a lot, man. Take care. You know, he's just quiet and he laughed on. It was so fun. Right? But yeah, and you go, I can't believe we've got to do that. We're doing a bit with Springsteen.

You know, I'm a big music guy, as you are too. Yeah. But doing a bit with Springsteen, and I remember I was doing push-ups because I did a bit where, like, he had a sleeveless jean jacket on. I was doing springsteen. My arms aren't as big as Springsteen's out, clearly. And that was the part where you're supposed to interrupt. No, Jim, you're on. No, yeah, no.

In the sweater, yeah, I see. Sorry. Thank you. Yeah, I guess the sweater comes out. Thanks for bringing up, Willie. And he's like, so, anyways, I was doing push-ups. and he walks by her dressing and goes, No fair, man, you're cheating, man, you're cheating.

Come, and he went and sat next to me and did push-ups next to me. So not only did it do the bit with Bruce Springsteen, I did push-ups next to Bruce Springsteen. Incredible. Yes, all in the name of comedy. Incredible. Come on.

In some ways, does it feel like your entire life brought you to this place, which is like comedy fan growing up, loved SNL, loved the Tonight Show, loved music, played the guitar, got you to SNL, and, like, you were made for this job. it feels like.

You know, Conan O'Brien gave me advice that he got from Johnny Carson, which said that you'll, with this job, you'll do everything you've ever tried or learned or did, you will do it in this job. And I was like, okay, and that is the exact smartest thing that anyone could ever say, because I've done things like, I've tap dance,

I don't even really know how to tap dance, I've tapped dance, I've played the spoons, I've played the guitar, I played the sitar, I've harmonized, I've danced, I know I've wrapped. I've done all this stuff. And you go, it's just all this stuff. Done characters, wigs, you know, accents.

It's the most fun job in the world. And I'm so lucky to be given this sandbox. It's crazy. And a big part of that, as you've said many times, is the roots that you get to pull off all this music. So can you go back to the beginning for me of the germ of the idea that you needed a band, but that it should be the roots?

Because I heard Quest, in an interview say basically you harassed them for so long. He makes it sound so sweet. Like you showed up at a state of the Rose Bowl or something. You know, like, okay, okay, we get it. We get it, dude. Yeah, we'll do it. All right.

So I was with a friend of mine, and I said, he goes, who are you going to get to be the band? Because you got to Conan has a great band, Max Weinberg. That's the best band in late night. I go, I know I got to get better than that. He goes, you know, you should ask the roots. I go, do you think the roots will do it? He goes, no, no, you should ask the roots because they can get you a ban. I mean, they're good.

They've helped out our show before the other show. I go, oh, okay. Then I go, what's the worst that could happen? I'll ask the roots. And see, you have to say, and I asked them and didn't hear anything back for four months. And I'll just take that as a no. They're just not that into you. And so I go, well, we didn't actually hear a no yet.

So I go, and I try to find out where they were on tour, and they were in Europe. And then they came back to L.A., UCLA. They did this jazz fest, and I went to the concert, and I saw them, and they were just mind-blowing. They are great in concert. If you've never seen the roots in concert, that is a mistake. I mean, it's one of the best performances you ever see. And so I saw them. Then after the show, I was waiting around and hanging out.

Yeah, not stalking, but just being friendly, as a way I call it. And I was like, hi, guys. And just talk to him. We were laughing. And then Quessa was like being cool, him and Tariq. or like, you know, they're the cool guys and they're just being cool. And then Tariq, I was talking to him. And then Quest went into his trailer.

And then he came out. And when he came out, I was in a cheerleader pyramid with the roots. And they were on my back and we were doing a triangle. You know, this. And Quest, I was like, what? I mean, they're the coolest hip-hop group on Earth. They're doing a pyramid with Jimmy Fallon. And in this lawn of UCLA. And he's like, oh, man, we're going to be stuck with this.

We're going to be stuck with this guy. Like, he's charmed my band. And so, yeah, so now we've been family now for 15 years. Yeah. And they're the best. You can't throw them, man. It's like any group that comes on obviously respects. They get nervous to play in front of the roots.

Yeah. You know, but any guests we have, they know that if they throw a song out, the Roots can play it. Yeah. You know, anyone from Jay Z to Tony Bennett, you know, they've done it all. They play with everyone. And it's not easy night to night, right? like learning a couple new songs playing along with whatever the game is.

Also doing the rim shots and doing the things and when they come in or, you know, they're just alive and a wake and funny. They're actually comedy nerds as well as music nerds. You know, they love they love comedy. They love the business. They love doing all this weird stuff and playing tight pants or whatever. Like they get weird and funny. I'm so glad you got into that pyramid and that we have the roots here. Yeah.

Good job. Like, I was looking at who we have on the show coming up. I know Will's coming back. Yeah. I had an idea for a bit with him about maybe two guys that love to wear jorts. Great. For the summer. Sure.

Like a high jort? Yeah. Yeah. But I think, no, I think high but low. I think a normal jort. Okay. Like, I'm in my jorts. I'm in my jort shorts.

You know, something like that. I don't know where it goes, but again, this came to me and a dream. So I don't know where jor shorts is going to be. It feels like you have very, very strange dreams. If I could, not your therapist. Well, yeah. Would you, will you be my thing? I'm afraid I can't help you.

I'm afraid I can't help you. I'm afraid I can help you. Oh, man. I need help. I need another 10 years, man. You've got to help me do with your friends for a while. Can me through this, man. You are beyond my help.

I'm afraid. I know. My wife is just like, keep it going, buddy. He's keeping you going. Hey, guys, thanks for listening to the Sunday Sitdown podcast. Stick around to hear more from Jimmy Fallon right after the break. Welcome back now more of my conversation with Jimmy Fallon. Going back a little earlier,

even Jimmy to the time when Lorne suggested to you that you could host a late night show, going back to late night. So you've done SNL, huge success at that. You do the movies. You have some good success there too. And then Lauren's like, I think you should be a late night host. What did you think of the idea? I was leaving Sarat Live and Lauren was like, would you ever want to host a late night show?

I don't know. Why? I was like, Conan has some deal where it's like in six years. Jay was going to give Conan the show or Tonight Show, Jay was going to retire. You go, we'll see what happens in six years, I don't know, you know. So, seriously, that was the real truth. So

I went and tried movies and it didn't really work. And I got a call from Lorne. Obviously, he stayed friendly with him. I was in L.A. And he's like, remember I brought up that thing about the late night show that? Would you ever want to do that still? And I go,

yeah, I mean, I have to ask my wife now because I'm married now. So I'm like, I have ask her. So I'm like, honey, you think I should do this? And she was like, you have to. Yeah. Even if it doesn't work, I'm not saying it won't, but you're on the list. It's David Letterman, Conan O'Brien, and you. You have to do this. And I was like, I go, I think I want to do this. And then my wife moved to New York just to help me out and support my career. And I came here and I just head down and just hard work and just like, just keep doing whatever we can do. We're on 12.30 at night, who's awake then?

You know, we're just doing bits and just created a whole kind of world and a brand, and I fell in love with it. It's great. I mean, I think you could probably test this too. You get better the more you practice. The more you do it is good advice to anyone who wants to do a talk show. Just do it. The more you do it, the better you get at it.

Reps. The reps. It's like, here I am 15 years later, 10 years of the Tonight Show, And I've seen, I'm friends with all these people. I've seen their biggest movies. I've seen their biggest flops. I've seen their wives. I've met their bad boyfriends.

I've lived through all this stuff. So now I'm comfortable. They're comfortable with me. They can trust me. It's like, oh, this is fun. I feel like it's even better than it's ever been. Like, for me, I love coming to work and I love seeing people that I've seen before and go, like, let's talk about another chapter. This is exciting.

Like, we're getting to know each other. We're growing old. And that comes across on the air. Like you know these people, you're rooting for these people. I think it's fair to say, right? The guests on your show, you want success. I want everyone to win. Absolutely.

That's my job. Yeah. I love it. And I love the daily change of it all, too. And I love the show business part of it. I love seeing publicists and agents and NBC executives. I love all that stuff. I think it's fun.

I think it's fun to watch. I think it's fun to see things pop up on the Internet if it works or goes viral. I mean, you never know what is going to work. You really don't. But if something does, it's kind of exciting. And you knew pretty early on with late night, even before the Tonight Show,

that you had something, that you were doing something unique, that it was taking off online. This was a time before we fully understood that things were going to change. I remember going on Twitter and going, guys, we have 100 followers. I mean, that's 100 more people that will watch.

show 100. This is massive. I mean, we're so happy. And now I'm probably at 30 million or something. Crazy. It's insane. And your clips on your show are far and away the most viewed in late night, which is interesting because

the old measurements sort of don't apply anymore, which were of a time when it's like, what are your numbers? What are the ratings? Right? And now it's how are you doing online? Socials and it's international. I mean, I think, I really think, like, if I could see, talk to

Steve Allen or Jack Parr or Johnny Carson be like, guys, I hope that you're proud of me because the show is still on and now it's bigger than ever. Like, people in, people around the world watch the Tonight Show. Like my audience, there's,

last night I talked to three people there from Germany. They love the show. You know, we have someone from Dubai that were here, the other. It's like, it's India. The show is international now. to the internet.

You know, it's just bigger than we can't stop it. You put something out and they go, oh, I saw the thing with Doja Cat. And it just goes everywhere. It's fascinating. It's great. I just want to see how big we can make it. You know, it's kind of exciting to see that.

Yeah. That's one way the show's obviously different 10 years later than it was when you started the focus online. Are there other ways, as you think back to like night one of your tonight show than today, beyond your obvious company? level with doing the show. Does it feel different at all? The studio's colder. I know that because I was really sweaty. The first couple of interviews, a lot of flop sweat.

Sure. Because there's some of these lights on you. But then you don't think about how many people come in. We have a live audience. We have 250 people. So that makes the room hot. The first couple of interviews were just dripping sweat. But so it's much, it's much cold. I remember we had Aretha Franklin on the show. She loved the show. She would just call me, by the way. Really? During the week and be like, Jimmy, whoever made me.

that fried chicken the other night was terrible. I am so much better. I should come on to make fried chicken with you. I go, come on, let's do it. She's like, all right, I love you, and blah, blah, blah. She would call me all the time. And that's always the best. So I would randomly call she had me the office. And so we had Aretha on the show, and when Aretha Franklin comes on the show,

you have to turn off all the air conditioning. Because her vocal chords. So you go, okay, so there's no AC. You want to talk about rough comedy. I mean, my monologues, no laughs. No one's clapping. the audience is like, it's 100 degrees in the audience.

Questlove is going to die. And I go, oh my gosh, this is rough. And I go, here she is. Ladies and gentlemen, the Queen of Soul, Aretha Franklin. And she comes out in a fur coat. And I go, what is wrong with you? What is wrong with you? What is absolute?

She's like, what? I'm cold. I got to wear it. This is like, you know, she was the best. And so luckily for us, she did two songs. Because I'm like, we got a bank one to make this worth it. She was awesome. But a fur coat.

Oh, my God. God, oh my God. The stuff you've seen, it's incredible. I walked her out that night. We went down to the basement into her car, and we walked past the vending machine. She's like, can I get the Snickers? Sure. And so someone gave me $2, and I got Aretha Franklin a Snickers bar out of the vending machine.

Come on. That's just kind of fun, right? Right? Yeah, weird stuff. Small moment you'll never forget. I love all, but like watching this two-weights. hour special is like it's two hours of clip, clip, clip, clip of Lin-Manuel and I doing Broadway bit, me and Timberlake singing the show from home during COVID.

Yeah. My wife directing, my kids running in the shots, which they had no idea they're on TV. My kids are running like, Daddy loves a tooth. And there's blood everywhere. He go, get out of it. Get out of here. It's frightening. It's scary people.

It's not as cute as you think it is. But like, yeah, we did those shows. and I haven't seen them since we did them, you know, those COVID shows. And it's wild to see what we did and how creative we got, not having, you know, props or cue cards or a script or wigs or costumes. We just had to make stuff up at the house. It was wild. I feel like that was a good test, though.

Like, what's the raw talent? And you can pull that off. People still bring it up to me on the street. They go, that's our favorite shows when you were at home and with your wife and the kids. And I go, yeah. It was just bizarre. I just remember we had to keep going. I was like, when is this going to end?

When are we going to go back to work? Yeah. This was it. It was the normal for like four or five months from home. And it just kept going. Didn't end. Remember at the beginning? They're like, we think it's going to be two weeks.

The kids, two weeks. No, two weeks. Yeah. Exactly. I think we were the only people in the building when they came back. Yes. How weird was that? That was bizarre.

We couldn't even go past, we had to go through a front security thing first with the nurse. to swap us downstairs to another nurse's office. That's right. And then wait 40 minutes, get another test, wait for the results. Then we go to our studio. Everything in this office, I don't even know if I was allowed in this office, but it had pieces of, it had cards on it. You remember it and said this office has been sanitized?

Every day. Every day. They put a no one down. Yeah. They did a great job. And sitting alone in the studio. I was in there by myself, not even a stage manager. We had only half the roots.

I was walking out to a no crowd. and walk out. It was almost like I had tap shoes on. You can hear my feet going, and I go, oh, the Kardashians are in the new. No one's laughing. Hey, someone laughed. The camera, I had to say that to my wife

when she was holding the phone when I was doing my monologue in my living room, and I go, honey, please fake laugh just for a couple. It feels like everything's just, give me something, man. A monologue without laughs. I mean, that's brutal. It was really like going. It was really learning some lessons there.

It was like how to do a show with no audience. I love my own. audience. I miss them so much. I'm so grateful. Every time that curtain opens, I hear audience, I'm like, ah, it's a, you know, it's, it's just a jolt of adrenaline, you know, I, I love it. I mean, we do the show. It's, it's a lot of work. It's, it's 260 people work on the show, the show, 260 people work to make me look at writers. We have bookers. We have hair, makeup, lighting, audio, camera operators. It's insane. And it's work and blocking and how is this thing going to work and doing all this stuff.

But once the show's on and the light turns on and the red light goes on, it's like, we're putting on the show. It's like we're little kids again. It's like we're going to do whatever we're going to put out in the show and like entertain you guys and make you laugh and make you forget about what's going on with your life, with work, with whatever's happening in the world. Politics is like, yeah, I'll make you laugh. That's my job. And hopefully I do my job. Well, I think that's what you've been so good at over the years is that escapism, because let's be honest, the last decade has been unpleasant in many ways.

I mean, COVID is just one of them. Politics is another of them. So do you view your show as an escape for viewers? Because I have noticed lately you're taking on politics a little bit more in your monologue and things like that. We do every, I mean, we try to be, you know, hit everything that we possibly can. I wouldn't say our show is a political show. You know, the other guys do that better than I do. they're great at it.

But we do a couple good... If we get some good pops here on both sides, you know, they'll make me laugh. You know, it's like we did a Biden impression the other day. Because you just kind of go like, come on, man, come on, man. And you've got to mumble.

Come on. And he'd mumble stuff. So we did a bit with him where I was like doing, you know, we had subtitles under what he was saying. and he responded. Who he did? The president responded and he goes,

Jimmy, I'm, Jimmy Fallon, I'm honored that you, to be spoofed by the number one person in late night and the fact that Stephen Colbert couldn't do it. You were the next best thing. Wow. POTUS has jokes. Yeah, exactly.

POTUS does jokes. But, I mean, to do a bit where the president responds to you, you know, that's always fun. So we try to pick the best jokes that we can just don't harp on it too much. We try to hit as many subjects. So it's almost like you're reading the news and seeing stuff from the Today Show or whatever, like things in you're like, oh, that's what happened today.

So I can go to bed knowing what happened in the world, you know, whether it be sports or entertainment, pop culture, you know, and just try to hit everything, make everyone laugh. I feel like the last time you were on this show we were talking about, I think it was 2017, maybe you were talking about what you just said, which the other guys are really good at that political stuff. It's just not natural. It's not who I am. Do you still feel that way? They had that. They have that in space. They're, they're fantastic at that. I can do sketches. I can sing. I can do impressions. You know, that's my wheelhouse. I don't even know if I want the other guys doing that. You know, it might be weird if they do that in fact. So I'm happy that they don't do

that. So I do that. That's my, that's my landscape. That's what I can contribute to this late night landscape. That's my thing. And I'm happy for that being my thing. Because looking back on 10 years, I'm proud of the work that we put in and all the stuff we've done. It's crazy. And hopefully, we get to do many more years. You don't want Colbert smashing eggs on Tom Cruise's head. I don't know if I want that. I don't know if I need it. I don't think he wants it. I don't think he wants it. I don't think he needs that. But yeah, I want to just, yeah, I just want to like come, have a, have a show where you don't know really what's going to happen. I could do anything.

I could do anything tonight. You go, oh, yeah, that makes sense. Why? Because the Tonight Show is just what he does. He does stuff that makes no sense. But you can do anything. You never know what's going to happen, whether I'm going to do a song and dance with Will Ferrell

or, you know, who's going to come out, Janet Jackson's going to come out and teach me choreographed dance out of nowhere, which happened two weeks ago. Yes. It's just that. You don't know what's going to happen. And there are no rules.

at this show, except that it's going to be fun. Stick around for more of my conversation with Jimmy Fallon right after a quick break. Welcome back now to the rest of my conversation with Jimmy Fallon. What have you learned over the last decade, because I grapple with this and people who host shows, about being, like, the leader and the face of the show. And in your case, kind of the face of NBC. Yeah. Did that feel like a burden at any time?

That's not why they hired me. You know, when you get hired, you're hired as the entertainment. or, you know, not the boss. I don't know what I'm doing. I don't know how to hire people or fire people or anything. I don't know anything about it. That's why we have other people, you know. So it's interesting to watch that part of it and learn that part and go like,

oh, yeah, I've gotten better at that stuff, you know. But I surround myself with really good people, you know, to worry about that stuff and take care of all that. But it's been, I mean, I've worked with the same people basically for 15 years. Yeah. That's a rare thing to say for any job. First of all, that you worked at the same job for 15 years. I've been in this building for 25 years, maybe.

98, you started SNL? 26. 26 years. More than half of my life. I've been in this building. Isn't that wild? It's just crazy. That's wild.

Yeah, so I do everybody in this building. So it's wild. I'm coming through the same doors. How lucky am I? How lucky is that to be here? And NBC's been great. To me, we have a great relationship. And I don't see my.

myself anywhere else, but this company. I love it. I know, I know everyone here. So it's like, I'm so happy to see you in the elevator. Yeah, I know. I feel that way too. It's just fun. If you're tired or whatever it is, you look down to that peacock carpet in the elevator and you go, oh, right, I get to work with 30 Rock. You get to work at 30 Rock. This is awesome. Yeah. I'll help Al Rooker with his bike. His bike coming into the elevator. This guy taking his bike. That's foldable bike. Yeah, come on now. I'm helping him fold. He's a machine. He's up. 3 a.m. He's doing too much.

Too much. Too much. Get a driver. So this year, you've got 10 years of the tonight show. Oh, I got so much stuff. You've got 50 years of S&L coming up. You have a birthday coming up. I'm turning 50.

One that's around the corner for me, too. We're in the same boat on that. Are you doing anything? People keep asking me, are you doing it? It's next year. I don't know. Probably something. I can't do nothing that's not in our nature.

I'm sure my wife is cooking up something. You're going to do something. I don't want to. We always thinking the, the Emmys are around. my birthday. Yeah. So if we get a nomination, it'd be fun. You have to get a nomination to go to the Emmys, turns out.

I just found it out this year. But if we get a nomination, maybe go to L.A. and have a big bash. That'd be great. Everyone will be out there. There's some Emmy talk this year. You guys aren't having a good season. Would that feel good?

It feels good to hear that buzz. It brings up morale. I mean, we don't do it really for the awards, but it makes you proud to feel like other people are seeing the hard work you're putting in. That plus the 10-year special. It's all kind of, yeah, it feels good. But if we do get a nomination, I'll throw a big bash out in L.A. for my 50th birthday and just do it as a combo party.

There you go. Why not? You get a bit. But also, I got, I have a book coming out. Yeah. This one, I know we've talked about my books and my novels. They're really just kind of text messages with artwork. You think about it.

I'd say if you put them all together, it's like three cents. but they're meaningful sentences you understand will but this one's a five more sleep still Halloween is what I'm doing this year because I'm getting it for spooky season it's not as easy I mean tie pants it's again two words dad that mama easy books they just come to me just dad that right there that was that was my yeah yeah yeah that's probably where it was originated this is probably originated from my daughter yeah she wrote dad die we're currently she's suing me so Oh my gosh.

That's vicious. I got good lawyers. I got good lawyers. And I'm going to take her down. You know what's funny? I have the best kids. They're awesome. Franny is nine.

How's your kids, probably? Great. 14 and 16. Yeah. I know. Watch out. That's coming for you. It's coming for you.

So I have two girls at 9 and 10. So the 9-year-old Franny was April 1st. I get home before early enough to put the kids to sleep, which is a great night. So I get home and they go, Daddy's here. Daddy's here. running up and hugging me and you know the love is the best the world's the best everything's awesome I love my life

and they go dad can you put on a shirt that you don't care if it gets messy I go okay so I already know something's up so I take my coat off I put on a t-shirt I don't know what they're going to do but so I get you ready dad yeah I'm in the hallway by the kitchen she comes across with a paper play flow of whipped cream and slaps me hard across the face

I mean no real wall up and then whipped cream all over my face all over the wall up nothing on the t-shirt, of course. I go, what's cool? She goes, it's April Fool's. I go, that's not how the April Fool's works. Are you, like, I go, that's terrible what you just did. I go, I'm going to get you back.

I'm going to take a year of my life. I'm going to really get you back. She goes, do you think I care? Oh. And I go, really? What's going on? What shows are you watching? Wow.

Yeah, I go, you will care. Because guess what? I'm going to put like snakes in your bed or something. Oh, God. And I'm going to do something. And she goes, she goes, She goes, I like snakes. I go, oh, yeah.

Well, that's it. So anyways, I went to the hook. I put her down. I talked to her. I kiss her good night. I go, I love you. And I'm leaving, I'm turning the light out. And she was, hey, dad?

I go, yeah, she goes, I don't really like snakes. And I looked here and I go, you think I care. Oh, wow. I shut the door. Wow. How old is she? She's nine. I'll see her in court.

You brought it. I'm sure this will be brought up. I don't care. You don't mess with me, man. You think I care? You hit me in face with a pet. Whip cream pie? No, I'm going to get you back.

By the way, this interview is now evidence in the case. She's got you, man. Oh, my gosh, right. She's like, see what he's like. You're like Andrew Durecky. Who are you? You're going to mumble in the mirror? Yeah, I did it all.

I did the whipped cream. I did the snakes. Hot Mike? Hot Mike? You didn't get me on saying that I put snakes in my girls' beds. You're a bad man. You're a bad man. Bad bad man.

Of course I am. Thanks, brother. You're the best. see it's so much fun. Thank you so much for taking time doing this. Thanks for having us. I love you and you're always great. Thank you, good to see you. Jimmy and I also took a little look backstage at Studio 6B, went into his dressing room, which was cool, showed me around. Yes, there is a sauna in there, which he says he actually never uses, and a secret door. You're just going to hear it, but picture it from his dressing room, push open a door, and you were suddenly on the stage at the tonight show. Now that's VIP access

that you'll only get here. So here's Jimmy and me. backstage at the Tonight Show. So this is my dress here. This is the room, yeah. It's kind of like a spaceship or something like that. Yeah. It's a little... It's a little...

Sorry about that. But this is... And what's this? All right, so this is the door here. This, you open this... You open this door here and you go into the backstage, and then this is a actual fake wall. And you press this and the wall opens.

Come on. And then here we are. We're on the stage. It's like one of those secret bookcases. Yeah. Isn't this something that you always wanted? Yes. Every kid wants a secret bookcase.

Yes. Sorry. Oh, I go, can we have a secret door, please? Just so at the end of the show, I will come out. I'll say hi to everybody, then I'll leave through the secret door. Do you want to sit behind that? I can't sit in the chair. No, no, no, no.

People want to see this. No, no, no. People have never seen this. No, people have not seen this. They want to see Willie guys behind the desk of the tonight show. Yes, this would be. This is a, okay. This would be my pleasure, my honor.

Wow. Yeah. Oh, that's nice. It feels, yeah, it feels, it feels, it feels powerful. You're up a little higher now, I see, aren't you? The older I'm getting, I'm shrink. The older I'm getting, I'm actually getting shorter and shorter. Yeah, exactly. It would be higher than the guest.

Oh, man. It's kind of fun, right? Yeah. Yeah. It's always so fun to come out here. You are so welcoming in your whole show, the culture. It's just warm back there. It's not as, it's also as big as everyone thinks.

You know, on TV, it looks so much bigger. But the roots were right in front of you. Yes. You know, and they're loud. It's like, it's really electric. It's like being in, well, this is where Johnny Carson did his show. Right, that's right. For 60, from 1962 to 72.

And I remember when we were redoing this, someone from NBC said, maybe we should add a balcony and put a bar upstairs and make this a screening room or something. I go, I don't want this to be any of that. I want this to be the Tonight Show. Also, I don't want a balcony. I remember talking to Lorne. And Lorne was like, you don't want a balcony. because that half of the audience

is going to miss what's happening down here. They're not going to see it. So you want everyone to experience the same thing. And also, like, 220 tickets is still a hot ticket. So everyone that gets here, it's not easy to get a ticket to the show. And the intimacy, as a guest, I can say,

is part of the charm of it. You feel like you're in here with a little family of people and there's a cool band and a nice guy hosting the cocktail party. You can hear each other and you laugh and you're talking. Yeah, exactly.

It's fun. It's like, you're in a little. Yeah, and it's good. It's enough space for us. It's well lit. And it's really, we got actually the people that did Lincoln Center. You know, if you ever been to Lincoln Center, those walls are like airtight. So the same people did this with our show.

Like this, this right here is all done for a reason. This is all acoustically sound. So some of these are hollow. Some of these are filled. This is all here for a reason. That's all done. And that's like soundproofed all behind the roots. Like, we can make this so quiet that we could record an album in here if you wanted to.

Really? Definitely. Like, we had Yo-Yo Ma here with no audio. We just picked him up from the crap. That's unbelievable. Patty Lepone came here once. Again, she had a microphone, but didn't need it. She just crushed it, melted the walls.

And musicians love this room, right? Springsteen loves this room. He loves it. You don't get to play something like this. He's with, Jimmy, you know, when we're doing this song, Because I was like, let's do you want to do 10th Avenue freeze? I go, yes, do 10th Avenue freeze. But the roots would be great.

He goes, you think we can have the audience come down and like dance with the band? I go, yes. And I look at our security guard. I go, can we? And my security guy goes, no, absolutely not. It's a fire hazard. I go, okay, can you pretend I didn't? He goes, yeah, I go, he was a good dude.

He doesn't work here anymore. But I loved him. And I go, spring's like, come on down. And I said, come in out. And the whole crowd came down. And it was a full on party down here on the floor with the East Street band and the roots. And it was loud. And people had tambourines and horns and saxophones.

It was just fun, man. It was great. That's what you want, though, right? That's what you want, that's all we want is those moments in that electricity, you know, and that, which is New York City. You know, that's why we have the show here. You know, it was a big deal to bring it back to New York, you know, because it was such, it was in L.A. for so long that they didn't want to

get rid of it. They're like, no, we can't lose a Tonight Show. I'm right. I work in this building. I work in New York. I work in 30 Rock. We got to bring it back here. We're like, okay. They had to talk to people. It was a big deal. I remember NBC like, we got to call you back on this one. But I think we did the right thing. We brought it back. We have that energy. And this is like, it's a, it's a pretty exciting very, very New York show. It is. And that adds to the magic that we were talking about of this building. You got SNL, you got the Today Show over there, and I think you got Tonight show is here too. We have all these beautiful buildings that this artist made. And I remember going like, we don't have the Empire State Building. We have every building but the Empire State

building. And I'm looking at it. I go, wait, I think we have it. And I go, yep. No, that's not yet. I go, no, here it is. I was over here. We have the Empire State Building. And that's the Chrysville building. I go, how embarrassing. We actually don't have it. This is the Empire State Building. My home. background bigger than anything in the world on the screen is the i go i'm jimmy yeah yeah you notice i'm not getting up from the seat i guess i should before NBC security comes i mean come on gracie abrams is on the show tonight love it we started a book club yep yeah you didn't know i could read right yeah not this long yeah yeah that's a big one i know no photo no pictures either uh

but it's pretty good these are all this is they're the books this is the books i mean this is this is what I'm talking about. You want... These are the ones that you say are text messages. Turn baby over and this is baby's bottom. There you go. That's it. That's high quality, high class.

Keep it, Jimmy. Huge advance. Mark Twain. Don't be giving out the Jimmy Fallon Prize. I'm trying to think what else is over here. I feel like you were the guests. We should throw it a clip from your new film Taxi. Oh, yeah.

This is Jimmy Fallon. Yeah. By the way, oh, man. I'm trying to remember who gave it to me. somebody from the Today Show gave me the actual from Air Force One, the actual movie list from Air Force One

Tax it was one of the movie. Really? Yeah, I meant that. I was like, it was the best. I still have it. I was like, wow, they were showing my movie. They were the only people that watched that movie. Fever Pitch, underrated, I feel. Thank you. I like fever pitch. You know, you like sports. Yeah, exactly. You can't make a movie like that anymore. I have a team that hasn't won in 86 years.

Right. As you're filming, they win? It was crazy. experience of my life. And you ran on the field, right? We went over budget. We went over budget so we couldn't even afford cameras. We had to ask Fox because it was a Fox movie. Can we use your cameras to shoot this movie we're making? They're like, perfect. They go, just one deal. Don't cut to them really in live TV because they're acting in the movie.

Right. No problem. Cut to the real world series. Drew and I are like making out or something on second base. And they air that and everyone's going, what are they there? What's going on? It's like, yeah, yeah. Very confusing for a moment. Very confusing for everyone involved.

This is us. So you and me go take a steam real quick and then we'll get you after work. I'm telling you, it's a one-man steam room, but we can make it work, man. We can see what's up. Should we go to the clip? So this is the four-leaf clover. Used to be a star, and I figured I just need all the luck I can get. So I'm in the four-leaf clovers.

So I stand over that every night, and the roots are right there. I mean, they think it's further away. Right there. No, yeah, was it? One, two, three, four feet, four or five? Yeah. I'd say, yeah. I mean, how tall am I? I'm six. So, oh, we're doing that?

Yeah. Hold on. So it's one of me here. And then I'm six to three. Yeah, so you're six to three. So it's like probably 12. Yeah, let's call it 12. 12 feet, yeah, 12 feet away from the roots. Perfect. There we go. Let's go measure other things with our bodies.

Yeah, so this is good here. These are like, yeah, these are the seats. These are the same seats you'll see. I don't know if you, have you been to the, ride in Universal? Yeah. Oh, yeah. I mean, if we have our own roller coaster. And I'm not just saying this. I think we have the best roller coaster based on a talk show. And you can quote me on that. I really think that ours is up there. But when you're on these things, these are the red leather seats that you see in the, on the ride. If you're in Orlando, Florida, and want to do a really fun

ride for the whole family, even if it's raining, we're an indoor ride. We're a simulator. We're a simulator. That's right. Do it. It's worth it. You'll love it. Through the streets in New York. Yes. We go to space. Sure. You can cross over here. Yeah, we, we come up with that because when I first came on, I was at NBC. It wasn't NBC Universal. Right. So then when I came out, I'm like, oh, it's NBC Universal. I go, I should have my own ride. So I go, can I have a meeting with the ride people? And they're like, this guy's going to be trouble already. So I met with Mark Woodbury through like a Zoom thing, way before Zoom was on. I was doing late. night and I pitched them all this idea of racing through New York and blah-la-laws, almost like the

Soren ride and Disney. Yeah, yeah. Something like that. And they go, this is great. This is so exciting. But no, we're not going to do it. We don't have, not really know who you are. But good luck in your show, Jerry. I go, it's Jimmy. And whatever, we're going to miss Conan. I go, I know. And so I did the show and then we did pretty well. And then we got the Tonight Show, and I get the phone call from the roller coaster. That's a big moment. And I go, do you want I got my papers out. I'm like, let's do it. And we wrote it with these communities.

We had to spend us two years it took to do it. We shot all the screen screen and stuff in Vancouver and made this whole thing. And we had to test out the rise of people aren't getting too sick. And then we had it. We pumped in pizza smell. There's a pizza smell when you stop at the pizzeria and they're throwing slices in the camera. And then at the end, we also had a smell. We had, there's fireworks.

So we had a fireworks scent. But then that was conflicting with the pizza scent. We're fighting. And it was smelling like garbage, so people were getting sick on that, too. There's all the stuff that goes into a roller coaster. Then they made a fake theory rock. Yeah. It's a really fun.

It's a good ride. It's a really good ride. It's a really good spot kind of right as you walk in. Yeah, it's a good, again, as far as talk shows go. I love that you've led when you got the job with. I'd like a ride at the amusement park. Like, hey, man, let's work on the model. Yeah, try to be a success first.

And then we'll give you a roller coaster. Who is this guy's troublemaker? This is where our producers. sit right here and we text back and forth during the show, make sure we're on time. And we've got to make sure that we have mints here. You know, oh, you do a classic. Yeah, well, throwing a high shoe. Oh, I love a high chew.

This is a gift for you. No, no, I couldn't. Is it the last one? I want you to have a good day. Have a high chew. Come on. Come on. The greatest.

My big thanks to Jimmy for a great conversation for showing us around backstage. You can catch the 10th anniversary Tonight Show special that airs Tuesday, May 14th at 9 p.m. on NBC. And of course, five nights a week you can watch Jimmy hosting the tonight show on NBC and also streaming on Kika.

My thanks to all of you for listening again this week. If you want to hear more of these conversations with our guests every week, be sure to click follow so you never miss an episode. And don't forget to tune in

to Sunday today every weekend on NBC. I'm Willie Geist. We'll see you right back here next week on the Sunday Sit Down podcast.