After 24 hours of really bad publicity Jay Leno followed the suits of David Letterman (who is also paying Craig Ferguson's staff) and Conan O'Brien and paying the non-writing staff of his show out of his pocket for the next week according to The Hollywood Reporter. For obvious reasons the staff was not happy with Jay Leno who kept telling them would be OK if they were laid off. But when push came to shove they were laid off yesterday with a Christmas bonus of $100 for each year they worked for him.
But "Tonight Show" insiders say Leno's actions have destroyed morale at the show and in the process dented the host's previously squeaky-clean reputation as one of television's A-list nice guys.
"A lot of people don't want to work for Jay anymore," another staffer said. "His true colors have shown. We were told he won't cross the picket line until David Letterman or Conan O'Brien do so that he can look like the good guy to the WGA."
All of the laid-off workers who spoke for this article asked that their names not be used.
Insiders said the source of the sudden hostility toward Leno is a conference call he held shortly after the WGA strike began.
"He was on speaker phone," a staffer said. "There were 80 of us. He told us not to panic. He said to trust him. He said: 'I can't get into details, but nobody will miss a car payment or lose their house. We're family. Trust me. I'm going to take care of this.' But that was the time we should have been looking for new jobs."
More recently, a letter NBC sent to now-laid-off staffers said, "If your services are needed, we will contact you."
"That's standard boilerplate," said Joe Medeiros, a striking writer who has worked with Leno for 18 years. "It's corporate butt-covering."
Corporate butt-covering or not I wonder if the staff will be going through this all over again when Jay Leno loses his show to Conan O'Brien? I also wonder if he would have paid the staff if all the negative press did not come out about him yesterday?
