John and Wesley’s excellent “Tonight Show with Jay Leno” Adventure.
It’s hard to believe that it has been 17 years since the Tonight Show with Jay Leno first premiered on NBC. The show first aired on May 25, 1992 after years of Johnny Carson’s reign as the King of Late Night.
Wesley Calhoun, Jay Leno, John Montgomery @ NBC in '92
I had the pleasure of being there in the beginning and I have some really fond memories of that experience. It all took place on a trip west to L.A. with my old friend Wesley Calhoun in late June of 1992. I scored us some free Southwest Airlines tickets from a promotion I was coordinating for a then upstart City Stages. We were crashing at our friend Chase “Barry” Foster’s pad in beautiful downtown Burbank. The way I recall it, we had been out all night at clubs on Sunset Boulevard. I seem to recall being at Roxbury, the cheesy night club made famous by that terrible Will Ferrell movie and now some Chinese restaurant kinda near the famous Carney’s Hotdogs (the spot in an old yellow train car on Sunset.) I also believe there was a bizarre Alan Thicke encounter somewhere along the way that night. It was a blur.
Anyway, we had gotten back to the condo about 4 a.m. and were trying to crash. I had to share a room with Wes. At exactly 4:57 a.m. all hell broke loose, suddenly the room started shaking and the lamp on the bedside table crashed to the floor. What the hell? It was the famed Joshua Tree Earthquake which registered a 7.3 on the scale.
It was actually the biggest earthquake in the area since 1952. I remember screaming to Wes, “Stop shaking the BED!” Wesley was like, “I am NOT shaking the bed!” It was crazy. Our first earthquake for sure.
So we get up out of bed, stand in the doorway until things seemed to stabilize and turned on NBC to get the news report of what the hell was happening. They kept running Jay Leno promo’s. It was kind of bizarre. I remember it like it was yesterday. They said, “Tonight on Jay Leno, Jay’s guests, Tom Hanks, Brian Ross of NBC News and musical guest, Delbert McClinton. I am like, hey Wes, “Rick’s in town with Delbert!” Our friend the amazing guitar pickin’ legend Rick Kurtz was playing with Delbert’s Band at the time. So I called NBC’s Guest Services line and left Rick a message. He called us back and left us tickets for the show. We were on!
We arrived at NBC Studios and were given artist passes and had free roam of the sound stage. We even had taped-off reserved seats! The show tapes at around 5:30 p.m. every week day. So roaming around The Tonight Show set was pretty cool I must say. The old Carson set was still up and we got to see Johnny’s famed desk and that cool multi-colored curtain that every body who was anybody walked through coming onto the show. After the show taped we even got to meet Jay Leno himself. Super nice guy. It was a special day for sure.
I have been to tapings of Dennis Miller, Conan, The Daily Show with Jon Stewart, Letterman and Ellen and even back to Leno’s show a few years ago but none as memorable or as exciting as that day in late June of 1992.
Best of luck to you Jay Leno. I hope you have as long of a reign in prime time as you did in late night. We could all use bit more laughter right now.
- john montgomery
