Guy likes monologues.
Fascinating and utterly silly little tiff between the Writers Guild of America West and Jay Leno, who - as you know - performed a full monologue last night, and (as you may not know) thus broke an obscure rule that said he was not allowed to perform a monologue.
The Guild has just released a statement, finally, and we release it in full right now:
“A discussion took place today between Jay Leno and the Writers Guild to clarify to him that writing for The Tonight Show constitutes a violation of the Guilds’ strike rules.”
OK, let's translate and clarify:
1.) Jay's a WGA member and because he has no deal with the Guild (unlike Dave) isn't allowed to write for his show.
2.) Jay knew this, and millions of others did too because it was widely publicized last week.
3.) Jay went ahead and gave his monologue anyway because he knows the Guild has absolutely no way to enforce this.
4.) Jay will give another monologue tonight, and then tomorrow night and then next Monday, and....so on, ad infinitum, because the monologue is his stock in trade and the biggest weapon he has against Letterman who DID get a deal with the WGA to write a monologue. .
Any questions?