Monday's Tonight Show, featuring nearly two-thirds of California's historically crowded gubernatorial field, was not a circus.
A circus features elephants, tigers and many, many clowns. Monday's Tonight Show boasted no elephants, no tigers, no Angelyne, and just one clown--make that, one guy dressed like a clown.
And one guy dressed like Rocky Balboa...And one guy dressed like Uncle Sam...And one guy dressed like Abe Lincoln (from the stove-pipe hat upward)...And one guy dressed like a T-800 (from the Terminator 2 robot mask upward)...
"That's what 'God Bless America' is all about," declared Gary Coleman after the show.
Dressed as themselves, Coleman, the former child star, and Mary Carey, the current adult film star, were the biggest names to sit in host Jay Leno's late-night audience for the largest gathering yet of the state's governor hopefuls.
The top-polling candidates in the could-be October 7 recall election, from Arnold Schwarzenegger, who announced his candidacy on Tonight in August, down to Arianna Huffington, apparently were less inspired. They took passes on the invites extended to every confirmed ballot entry.
In all, NBC counted 81 heads--from Iris Adam, business analyst from Irvine, California, to Jon W. Zellhoefer, energy consultant-slash-entrepreneur from Tecopa, California. Prior to taping, the network said 90 of the state's 135 candidates had RSVP'd.
Among the last-minute scratches: Gallagher. The watermelon-smashing comedian was spotted Monday afternoon outside NBC's Burbank, California, studios trying out some of his non-melon-smashing material for civilians who actually weren't running for governor. NBC said Carrot Top's spiritual forefather chose to leave when he was told he would not be allowed to stage a gag in which audience members would hold up pictures of his zany self.
NBC lost another candidate about 30 minutes into the taping when the guy in the robot mask, Bill Wyatt, "the candidate formerly known as William Tsangares," tossed $2 bills in the air and began to shout, "Equal time! Equal time!"
"Gee, it's hard to believe there's a nut in the audience," Leno quipped from his desk before the show was halted for about five minutes while Wyatt was escorted from the set by security and Burbank police.
Wyatt, who was not arrested, carried on his protest outside an NBC parking lot, holding up a sign, waving at passing cars and wearing the robot mask (natch).
Specifically, the Los Angeles man, listed on the ballot as William Tsangares, a name he deemed too difficult to pronounce as he launched his candidacy for U.S. President (he announced on Monday), was protesting NBC's "condescending, patronizing" treatment of the non-Schwarzenegger candidates. Wyatt, a Republican like the Terminator star, argued Schwarzenegger got a full Tonight segment all to himself, while Monday's field got nothing but a group photo-op, dubbed the "lawyer-approved wide shot" by Leno.
"At least I got my two cents in there and wasn't humiliated in the crowd," Wyatt said from his street-corner position as a person in a chicken suit grooved to polka music behind him.
For the record, the person in the poultry get-up, calling out Schwarzenegger as a "chicken" for agreeing to participate in just one debate, was not affiliated with Wyatt. ("The chicken's on his own," Wyatt said.)
If Wyatt was hoping to rally his fellow candidates in a people's uprising against the network machine, his dream was quickly dashed.
"When he started [chanting] and it was clear he was going to be kicked out, I was like, 'I want to stay and watch the rest of [the show],' " said Daniel Watts, a 21-year-old San Diego college student and, of course, candidate for governor.
The Wyatt protest was edited out of Monday night's broadcast, although Leno and guest Robert Downey Jr., who tried to quell the outburst with a brief, but bellowed "Sir, please!," joked about the incident during segments that did air.
Downey was one of three acts, along with Last Comic Standing standup Tess and the Blue Man Group, who used Monday's Tonight for its usual purpose: plugging upcoming show-biz gigs.
The gubernatorial candidates, who accounted for about 25 percent of the studio audience, were something less than guests and something more than seat fillers. They were, to borrow a circus phrase, the side show.
Cue ring announcer Michael Buffer: "Let's get reaaaaady to reeeecall!"
One day after hundreds of media types gathered at the Emmy red carpet of Los Angeles' Shrine Auditorium to capture the likes of Debra Messing in her high-fashion habitat, about 50 journalists, photographers and camera operators staked out NBC's Tonight set to capture the likes of Robert Cullenbine, the guy in the clown costume, in his unnatural habitat.
"Welcome to California, now a division of Ringling Bros.," Leno announced at the top of the show, the first gag in a monologue that broke all records for California-gone-crazy jokes.
Leno proceeded to give the 81 candidates the opportunity to explain how they'd improve the state. To up the comedy quotient, they were allotted 10 seconds of air time--at the same time.
Leno announced that, per network lawyers, he could not single out candidates for attention--unless he made fun of them. (NBC said this was an exaggerated take on very real equal-time rules.)
Given their Tonight Show closeups for the purposes of Tonight Show oneliners were eight candidates, including used-car dealer Mike P. McCarthy (the guy in the Rocky-style boxing gear), Coleman and Carey, noted by Leno as having "the only hole in the ballot that's already been punched."
Displaying the reflexes of seasoned campaigner, Carey quickly responded by saluting the camera with her middle finger, a bit of the festivities digitally obscured for viewers back home.
Later, Carey told reporters she offered Leno the old familiar suggestion because she felt the joke was "a little bit mean."
"I don't think any girl [was pure] we had in the audience. I'm sure they've all been 'punched,' " said Carey, dressed as demurely as one can be in an awfully tight black dress with pink collar. "He picked on me just because mine happen to be documented."
No hard feelings, though, between the 21-year-old star of New Wave Hookers 8 and the Tonight host.
"His show is funny--I mean, that's what he does...It's not like I expected him to come out like The O'Reilly Factor," Carey said.
Coleman, likewise, was under no illusions that Leno was seeking a serious discourse of the issues.
"If you really want to talk circus atmosphere, it's Jay Leno's show tonight," the ex-Diff'rent Strokes star said.
More important to Coleman, who'll be joined by Carey on the Game Show Network's Who Wants to Be Governor of California? debate special, taping Wednesday, was that 80 of his fellow "so-called circus acts," as Carey dubbed the Tonight invitees, were given their collective chance to meet the press.
While Coleman and Carey have done their share of photo-ops during the campaign, including Sunday's Emmys, others had never seen so many lenses almost pointed at them.
After the show, NBC let the candidates loose on reporters, and vice versa. The clown-clad Cullenbine explained he wears a business suit when not trying to get free media attention. Badi Badiozamani boasted of his distinction as the nation's first Iranian-American gubernatorial candidate and displayed a powerful singing voice--"...and the world will go on 'til the eeend of tiiiiiiime!" ("It's not original," the San Diego man said of the tune. "I have just adapted it.") Ronald Jason Palmieri boasted of his distinction as California's first openly gay Democratic gubernatorial candidate and displayed a knack for the soundbite ("Keep the governor in office," he repeated over and over and over again.)
For the freshest in quotables, Carey was the one to visit. She chatted about issues big ("Feel--they're real," she said, offering up her signature campaign assets to a reporter) and possibly bigger ("I want to have sex with Arnold Schwarzenegger. I think he's hot.")
At the end of the day, as NBC declared itself happy with the show, the camera crews packed up and the candidates trekked back to their cars, and their largely ignored campaigns. Returned to downtown Burbank, Cullenbine's clown nose and hat fell to the sidewalk. The semi-circus was officially leaving town.
Watching the parade of politicians file past him at an Alameda Avenue bus stop outside NBC was Robert Hernandez. The 44-year-old Canyon Country, California, man was nonplused--"embarrassed," he said--to be in the presence of so many would-be California governors. If he hadn't overheard them talking about their campaigns, he wouldn't have recognized a single one.
Hernandez said he planned to vote for "the stripper," presumably a ballot for Carey. "At least I'll know I'll get screwed," he said.