Sarah Palin, Shaun White, snowboarder and gold medalist, Lindsey Vonn, gold medalist and skier, along with Jamie Foxx are some of the big names not taking up the call from Team CoCo to boycott when Jay Leno returns to “The Night Show” on NBC beginning on March 1.
Instead they will be some of the first guests for Jay when he returns triumphantly to late night television after being booted last year by NBC in favor of Conan O’Brien, who was on the show for seven months. NBC then pushed O’Brien from the 11:35 pm slot, causing Conan to walk.
White and Palin will be headlining the second night back for Leno. Palin will be discussing the feud she has with Seth MacFarlane regarding his decision of having a Down syndrome cartoon character say she was an ex Alaskan governor’s child on “Family Guy,” his series on Fox. She will probably also be plugging her long time, ongoing feud with David Letterman, late night host on CBS and competitor of Leno’s. For his part, White will be looking like Carrot Top.
On March 1 Vonn and Foxx will be guests on the first back night for Leno. Foxx will be plugging “Malice N Wonderland,” his upcoming movie. Vonn, the It Girl of the Vancouver Games, will warm up to hopefully guest host on NBC’s “Saturday Night Live.”
Just after the “I’m Sorry” speech from Tiger Woods had wrapped up on Friday, Vonn showed up at USA House at the Olympics to do an interview. She said she was hoping to do “Saturday Night Live” and said she would be contacting Dick Ebersol, former executive producer for “SNL” and NCB Sports chief. She said she had some ideas for the show. Vonn, according to a report by Time Magazine, was overhead joking with Vonn-tourage members that she wanted to do a skit on SNL where she would be standing at Tiger’s podium and then say, Tiger you are my idol. There’s something you don’t know. I have a problem with sex too.
Vonn, in a blond moment added, it would be really freaking funny.
The first musical guest for Jay will be Brad Paisley.
Leno on March 3 will host Jersey Shore’s cast. They will be plugging their Italian American organizations feud. It’s unclear who Chelsea Handler, the late night diva from “E!” has a feud with, however she will be sure to say when joining Leno on that night. Apolo Anton Ohno, the Olympic speed skater, will as well. He has a feud with Lee Jung-su, the Korean gold medalist. Avril Lavigne will providing musical entertainment and doesn’t have a feud with anybody as far as anyone knows.
On March 4, things will be calming down somewhat. Jason Reitman and Matthew McConaughey will be sitting down with Jay that night. On March 5 Meredith Vieira and Morgan Freeman are scheduled. In his second week returning to “Tonight” Leno will kick off with Simon Cowell as his guest.
For Conan O’Brien’s die-hard fans, the impressive lineup spells bad news for them. They had hoped that A-listers would be boycotting “Tonight Show” with Leno, to express their disapproval of the return of Leno. However, the only person indicating he will be boycotting is Will Ferrell. He told a radio station in Omaha, Neb that if asked that he wouldn’t make a guest appearance on “Tonight” with Leno, but would call in sick instead.
For Team CoCo that’s bad news as well. A Ferrell guest appearance could kill a talk show about as fast as an appearance by Chevy Chase.
A name was even given for the phenomena by Huffington Post. They called it “The Will Ferrell Curse.”
The first Conan guest on the “Tonight Show” was Ferrell. In seven months it was toast. Ferrell also appeared as John McEnroe’s first guest on his talk show. That show had even a shorter life of only six months. Megan Mullally’s first guest was also Ferrell. The show only lasted five months.
The three shows were all NBC Universal properties. Apparently they have learned at long last the lesson of not inviting Ferrell to be one of the first guests for Leno.
