Progress Report: Late Night with Jimmy Fallon

A little background: Jimmy and I haven't always gotten along. I mean, he seems like a nice enough guy. But when it came to his tenure on SNL, our relationship was at an all time low. Jimmy would ruin half of the skits he was in by laughing incessantly when anyone would say anything funny.

But now Jimmy's all grown up. Donning a sharp suit and talking with important folks five nights a week on Late Night with Jimmy Fallon, Jimmy's been working on filling Conan's giant shoes (literally, he's a goddamn giant) for the past four weeks. At first, I was a little skeptical. Even leading up to the show, Jimmy reminded me of one of those spoiled kids who's given every advantage (tutors and such), but no one really understands why. Really, they promoted the shit out of this show! But that's the past. Who cares? Everyone wants to know, how's it been going?

Pretty well, actually. It'd be hard for things to be going too badly--he somehow scored The Roots as his house band (one of those advantages I was talking about), an amazing set, and an all star line up of guests. And he's charming! He's everything Jeff Zucker could ever want in a late night host whipping boy. I mean, he played beer pong with Anna Kournikova last night (here), who, by the way, is such a mess that she deserves her own post. Despite the beer pong playing theme he's been keeping up (he played with Serena Williams too), he's really trying to change things up.

So he should be smooth sailing right?

Well, he's still got that laughing issue. Even when it's not in a bit and someone actually says something genuinely funny, Jimmy can manage to lower the funny factor a few notches by giggling a little too long. Also, I'm not sure who is writing his monologue, or if the writing is even the problem, but sometimes it's downright painful.

Overall though, I'm here to say that he's worth watching. I'm all for supporting late night and believe that he'll grow into the job, just as Conan did. So make sure to check out Late Night with Jimmy Fallon, weeknights at 12:37 on NBC.