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Some comedians suggest that the Tonight show will turn Leno into an electronic vaudevillian, a video jokemeister. He worries about that. "I went from telling jokes to telling stories," he says, "and now I'm back to telling jokes." He is concerned about becoming detached from his audience. As a stand-up, Leno traveled to your door like a salesman; now he's popping into your bedroom without ever leaving the studio.
As a boy, Leno watched comedians on The Ed Sullivan Show making lame jokes about kids with long hair. He remembers thinking how hopelessly out of date they were. The idea is chilling to him. "I heard an older comedian the other day trying to be young, and he used the word hep," Leno says, shaking his head. "You try to be the age that you are."
Although he may never admit it, his goal seems to be to join the grand Will Rogers-Bob Hope succession of American comedy, as a kind of spokesman for the national sensibility. He would like to stand for his generation the way Hope -- and Carson -- did for theirs. If so, he is moving into the right seat for it.
CHART: NOT AVAILABLE
CREDIT: TIME Chart by Steve Hart
CAPTION: THE LITTLE KINGDOM OF LATE-NIGHT CHAT