Earlier on Thursday, Rolling Stone published allegations from two current and 14 former employees, including production crew and writers, who requested anonymity out of fear of retaliation. Rolling Stone claimed they had approached an additional 80 current and former employees, but “not a single one agreed to speak on the record or had positive things to say about working on the Tonight Show”.
According to Rolling Stone’s report, multiple sources alleged Fallon had a history of “outbursts” and lashing out at staff when under pressure; that previous senior staff on the show had bullied and belittled them; and that guests’ dressing rooms were commonly known as “cry rooms”, where employees could go let out their stress.
Nine showrunners have worked on the Tonight Show since Fallon took over from Jay Leno in 2014; a much faster turnover than comparable late night shows like Late Night with Seth Meyers and The Late Show With Stephen Colbert.
I’ve been really liking his podcast. He still has celebrities on, but the idea is that it’s more people he wants to talk to rather than people promoting stuff, or people he had on his show who he never got to have a proper conversation with and he’ll sit with them to a proper in-depth talk for like an hour or so. And sometimes they’ll do an episode where just a random member of the public calls in and he interviews them instead. Also one of his co-hosts is his assistant who does not respect his position as her boss at all, so that’s a good dynamic.