There’s a new level of malevolence at Rolling Stone magazine. They spend a lot of time acting like faux Keith Morrisons at Dateline. The once vaunted music and politics periodical now spends a lot of time trying to find trivial dirt anyone to tarnish their image, or hopefully, destroy them.
Now it’s Jimmy Fallon’s turn for a backstage toxicity story. They say they’ve interviewed 16 former staffers who a variety of complaints against Fallon including that he’s mean to them, gives them dirty looks, and snatches their lollipops whenever possible.
One anecdote in the story is about Jerry Seinfeld disapproving of Fallon’s behavior. Seinfeld completely refuted it in a statement supplied to me by NBC.
“This is so stupid. I remember this moment quite well… I teased Jimmy about a flub, and we all had a fun laugh about how rarely Jimmy is thrown off. It was not uncomfortable at all. Jimmy and I still occasionally recall it and laugh. Idiotic twisting of events.”
We’ve reached a level of crybaby complaints now six years after #MeToo in is which everyone who has a gripe against a celebrity, particularly an employer, becomes clickbait. Ironically, this is what Seinfeld’s Festivus is for — the airing of grievances. The complainers used to be called whiners. The so called journalists should be spending their time on more important matters.
But just to circle back a bit: If the writer of this piece had watched “The Larry Sanders Show” or “Mrs. Maisel” or the great Richard Benjamin movie, “My Favorite Year,” maybe they’d be more sophisticated about how a talk show runs. Or any daily or nightly show. Regis Philbin was treated like dirt by Joey Bishop; he became a bigger star. Is this whole business ‘woke’? I don’t know. But I’m tired of it. It’s time for everyone to grow up.
As for Rolling Stone, how about 10.000 words on Jann Wenner and the corrupt awful way he ran that magazine for decades? Nah. We won’t be seeing excerpts from the books by Robert Draper or Joe Hagan. Jimmy Fallon is a cupcake by comparison.
