Thoughts on Strike Force Five
I've always had a respect for late-night talk shows. They're a staple of American culture and are synonymous with classic television. Almost vaudevillian, they're a manicured window into the world of entertainment that for generations has reflected the pulse of the nation.
With the writers' strike lasting all summer, the 5 big late-night hosts, Fallon, Colbert, Kimmel, Meyers, and Oliver jumped on Zoom and made a podcast to support their unemployed staff. It was a noble gesture, whose only flaw was arriving 3 months too late.
They took turns hosting an hour-long podcast where they chatted about their experiences as talk show hosts, how their shows are similar yet differ both in front and behind the cameras, their respective career routes that led them to late night, and even some fun personal life anecdotes.
The stories and convos were fun, hilarious, and often fascinating, but the real meat of the cast was getting to hear their banter. 5 professional funny dudes, gently ribbing each other while clearly maintaining a healthy friendship. The show revealed a lot about each host. Everything from their ability to tell an unscripted story to how quick they are on their feet. Each host has their own strengths and as morbid as this sounds, getting them on a cast together was a unique venue in which to size them up.
Here's what I learned about each host after listening to all 12 episodes of Strike Force Five (insert thunderclap). We'll sort these by Late Night tenure.
Jimmy Kimmel (2003-present: Jimmy Kimmel Live!)
Oddly enough, Kimmel has been on the air longer than any of his peers and despite being the least naturally funny of the group, seems like the most driven. Not to say that Kimmel isn't funny, he's just not comedian-funny. He is great at long-form jokes, and situational pranks, and some of his more absurd stunts border on artistic brilliance. Kimmel is undoubtedly a good hang. He comes from a more awkwardly offensive time, and in this unscripted show you could, at times, hear him wanting to drift towards Man Show style humor. To his credit, he never strayed too far from his Disney-approved late-night persona, which at this point might actually just be his natural self. He's an idea man, and the bigger the idea, the more he wants to do it. He was apparently the brains and engine behind Strike Force Five and those traits track through his surprisingly long and often bizarre career.
Stephen Colbert (2004-2014: The Colbert Report, 2015-present: The Late Show with Stephen Colbert)
As the oldest host on the cast, Colbert emerged from the Second City Chicago improv scene and found a home in the John Stewart stable of comedy writers. His journey to network television was weird, primarily because before taking his job at CBS he was famous for reporting news as a fictionalized version of himself on the Colbert Report. On Strike Force Five, Colbert was very much the elder statesman. His storytelling style was a noticeably slower template, leading to his tales being a bit long-winded and meander-y. In another setting that would be fine, but alongside his late-night peers, the difference was much more obvious. Part of this might also be a by-product of his Southern upbringing, but for what it's worth, as of 2023, I think The Late Show with Stephen Colbert is the best "traditional" late-night show on TV. Colbert feels like a writer's comedian, he has a brilliant delivery when given a script and, if needed, he can seamlessly fall back on his improv training.
Jimmy Fallon (2009-2014: Late Night with Jimmy Fallon, 2014-present, The Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon)
The most aloof member of the Strive Force is easily Jimmy Fallon. I've long thought of Fallon as the accidental lottery winner of the Leno vs. Conan late-night war of 2010. He was a no-brainer to replace Conan on Late Night, but once Leno's original successor was out of the picture, the big-boy-job of the coveted Tonight Show fell into his lap in 2014. He's turned it into the most modern late-night show with his higher-concept, Youtube-friendly, celebrity bits. Jimmy's energy is what the Tonight Show needs, but when placed among his peers, Fallon seems outclassed. He's inherently more charming than the rest of the Strike Force, and pretty fast on his feet, but for long stretches of the podcast, it almost seemed like he was either on-mute or not paying attention. Maybe he was waiting for his opening and just more polite than the others, but his soft-spoken demeanor got bulldozed through much of the series. With that being said, his willingness to play the buffoon might have turned him into the star of Strike Force Five. The infamous episode 5, in which Fallon created a match-game style quiz for the hosts and their spouses quickly devolved into a confusing train wreck that only got funnier as it spiraled into chaos. The potential for antics like this became one of the reasons to check out the show. Fallon leaning into his sheep-ish oaf routine had him emerging as the comedic battery of many of the episodes. He seems like the kind of comic that can show up half-prepared and still crush a room, just because his quick wit and charm do most of the heavy lifting. The most disappointing thing about Fallon's presence on the podcast was a complete lack of acknowledgment of the Rolling Stone article scandal, which was published a mere week after Strike Force Five's debut.
Seth Meyers (2014-present: Late Night with Seth Meyers)
Meyers is secretly the funniest member of the Strike Force Five. While his career may not be as prestigious as his podcast-mates, (this was hilariously made clear as the crew discussed the sad t-shirt rack of Late Night shirts in the NBC studio store at 30 Rock), Meyers is the most accomplished stand-up comedian of the bunch and that can't be ignored. He's the fastest with a joke, the funniest with that joke, and can craft a long-form story from his life with a careful-comedic-nuance I've never heard from any of the others. His version of Late Night strays from what Letterman, Conan, and Fallon did by being more of a Weekend Update or The Daily Show-style news desk show, but he's comfortable with that format and it works for his humor. A lot of Strike Force Five was 5 funny dudes fighting for air time, and while Kimmel and Colbert did the most talking, Meyer's joke-per-minute rate was off the charts compared to the two more talkative hosts. Like one of his predecessors, Conan, Seth Meyers does not get enough credit for the quality of his work and like Conan, he will likely get screwed out of The Tonight Show job. Conan's was a true screw job, but Seth's will more-than-likely be an age hurdle. Meyers is the same age as Fallon and both of them got their current shows around the age of 40. If Fallon hosts The Tonight Show for 25 years (which is reasonable, Leno finally left the show when he was 64) both him and Meyers will be 65. I don't see NBC giving their premiere late-night franchise to a 65-year-old Meyers. Note: Watch Seth Meyers: Lobby Baby on Netflix and you will understand my love for his stand-up.
John Oliver (2014-present: Last Week Tonight with John Oliver)
Like Colbert, John Oliver comes from Jon Stewert's stable of Daily Show correspondents. He's carved out a unique place in the Sunday night landscape, where his often outlandish and troll-like dark humor has thrived. He's my personal favorite of the bunch, and his show is the most likely to teach you something genuinely valuable. He's the only non-American-born host on Strike Force Five and the only host without a nightly show. His inclusion is curious, yet welcomed. Juxtaposed with his Strike Force peers, Oliver's bitingly dark wit and chaos-favoring humor stands out. No one enjoyed Fallon's Match-Game going up in flames as much as John Oliver and he seems to genuinely gain his life force from getting under the skin of the subjects on his show. On the podcast, Oliver was one of the more quiet hosts, and that led to his presence feeling more like a courtesy than an obligation. In my mind, I can hear him saying in his most polite British voice, "Oh, I'm aware that I don't exactly belong here, but I'm appreciative of the opportunity." Like Colbert's Southern roots, maybe John's just too British to dominate time on a podcast with so many white American hosts. Oliver is a great stand-up comic too. Like Meyers, if his TV career ended tomorrow, he could easily fall back on his remarkable stand-up talents and find excellent work for the rest of his life. John Oliver is a gem that I think would be dullened by a nightly show, and as a huge fan of both him and his show, I'm super grateful he was asked to be a part of the podcast. Hearing him hold his own with the more mainstream late-night stars was wonderful.
As a whole, the show was really fun. It's a snapshot of a moment in time that will never be captured again. Imagine if, David Letterman, Conan O'Brien, Tom Snyder, Jay Leno, and Dennis Miller had a radio show in 1997. What would that have sounded like? What would we have learned from it? It's just fascinating. I guess I need to mention the John Stewart and David Letterman episodes of Strike Force Five. It was great getting two legends of the format in on the conversation, but I don't know if it was necessary. Note: Letterman is super old now, but he's still sharp as a tack and maybe the best to ever do the late-night job.
One of the elephants in the room on Strike Force Five is the distinctive lack of any representation of people of color. As it stands, I'm not aware of any current major shows hosted by people of color. Both the Late Late Show and Daily Show's desks are currently vacant with the former likely to not be filled at all. The all-white Strike Force Five panel might just be a by-product of who is still watching these shows. It's probably middle-aged white people who are irreversibly accustomed to watching late-night television, and as the format dies, they will go down with the ship. In turn, the risk-averse networks stick with the white male hosts to not scare their tiny remaining audience away. It's not just, but sadly it's probably true.
Network talk shows might be a dying genre, but while they cling to relevance, Strike Force Five could go down as an important moment in the history of late-night television and I'm thrilled to have been here to experience it in real-time.