7 Things for Jimmy Fallon to Think About

Here’s the thing, Jimmy Fallon. When you debuted your video blog, I wasn’t impressed, but it did get better. So today, I am stuck. Do I just flat-out mock last night’s premiere of Late Night with Jimmy Fallon, fully aware that the first show was never going to be flawless and that you’ll undoubtedly improve? My inner Mean Girl says yes, but I am trying to ignore her these days. So instead, here are seven things you can do to improve:

1. When it comes to the monologue, avoid the obvious political jokes. Think about it like this: Your show starts at 12:35 a.m., and once The Tonight Show completes its transition to a new host, you’ll be NBC’s third hour of late-night. Which means by the time you’re on the air, Jay Leno, David Letterman, Jimmy Kimmel, Conan O’Brien, Jon Stewart, and Stephen Colbert have already pummeled the day’s news into submission. Skip the big stories or find your own spin on them…
2. …Like, for example, the Slow Jam The News bit, which might turn out to be a really solid ongoing gag. But just a heads-up: I love the Roots. Everyone loves the Roots, and loves you in turn for picking The Roots as your house band. But the fastest way to make yourself look like the whitest white boy who ever wore khaki is to stand in front of the Roots while they get their groove on.
3. Last night’s audience was pretty lively and unruly, and Jimmy, you seemed to have a great time interacting with them. What were you serving, beer? Wine? Jaegermeister? Anyway, keep it up.

4. Space Train with Robert De Niro was pretty painful, Jimmy. Same goes with you and Justin Timberlake riffing on a sketch you did on Saturday Night Live three times over the course of four years. New rule of thumb: If it’s something you did or would have done on Saturday Night Live, think twice about whether or not it’s appropriate for this format.
5. HOWEVER, the more often you can have Justin Timberlake on, the closer we will come to ensuring his future global domination. His imitations of John Mayer and Michael McDonald were priceless. Thank you for your support for the movement.
6. Not to continue harping on the Space Train thing, but seriously, Jimmy, the reason you’re now the host of a talk show is that you weren’t very good at acting in movies. Please remember that.
7. And by the way, as a talk show host, it’s customary to let the guest talk a little. I admire the pluck of making your first ever on-show interview a gimmick-heavy one with Robert De Niro, but it did nothing to showcase your abilities to interview a difficult guest. This is probably the most important skill for you to hone. After all, everyone knows Letterman’s a pro for his ability to handle Joaquin Phoenix-ish stunts, and Leno is an icon not for his one-liners, but for his gentle yet firm takedown of Hugh Grant.

Nothing in last night’s episode was as good as the online-exclusive test clip from last week, in which Fallon got Jack McBrayer to respond to Internet chatter that Illinois governor Bobby Jindal was a dead ringer for his 30 Rock character. And that wasn’t funny because of you, Jimmy, that was funny because it was a joke being made all over the Internet, come to life. Of course, it turns out that’s part of the plan, as you and producer Gavin Purcell are promising to change TV forever, according to Nicholas Carlson of Business Insider, who writes, “The way Gavin described plans for the show, it began to sound more and more like a blog for TV.”

Count me among those excited to find out if you succeed. There’s plenty of time to find your footing, and taking the blogosphere point of view on current events and translating it to a talk show format is a novel way to approach this show. But while I know it’s the Jimmy Fallon take that’s going to keep us tuning in, I’m not quite sure what that is yet. But maybe that’s because you don’t know yet, either.