Attention-grabbing gambits on talk TV

HOST Jimmy Fallon performed a crazy stunt with an A-lister. AP

TV hosts with daily or nightly shows are fully aware that familiarity breeds, if not contempt, then the constant bugaboos of predictability and consequent boredom. So, they literally stay awake at night thinking of unusual attention-grabbers to keep their shows’ regular viewers happy—and surprised!

This month, the runaway winner of the most attention-grabbing feature on TV is none other than “The Tonight Show’s” new host, Jimmy Fallon. What did he do to win that title? He persuaded one of his recent interviewees, Halle Berry, who was guesting to plug her new TV series, “Extant,” to do (much) more than just the usual plugging bit.

To make sure that viewers would remember her stint on the show, Fallon asked her to join him in coming up with a most unusual demonstration of physical agility (and craziness): As millions of viewers watched with mouths agape, Fallon and Berry performed a “surprise” stunt that the TV host dubbed “the human hamster wheel”: The host and his amazingly cooperative guest grabbed hold of each other’s ankles, and proceeded to roll over one another for more than 10 seconds—giving a very good and convincing impression of a human version of the wheel that hamsters love rolling in over and over for many minutes on end, to get their daily exercise!

Talk about a lulu of a showstopper, that one was for the pop-history books! All praises to Fallon, and especially to his amazingly “game” and limber guest, for that fantastic promotional feat, which got extra mileage from being reshown on many other TV programs, including some newscasts!

What made the “Tonight” feature even more impressive was the fact that both Fallon and Berry aren’t stuntmen, and yet their physically-demanding showstopper went off without a hitch! All sorts of dire things could have happened to turn the feat from an impressive stunt into a disaster—like either or both participants spraining this or breaking that, Halle’s dress ripping and unexpectedly revealing her best-kept secrets, Fallon swallowing his dentures and choking on them, etc.!

And yet, the amazing stunt went off without a hitch, like its performers were members of the Cirque du Soleil! Amazing.

Used, abused

Other attention-grabbing features on TV this month include Joan Rivers’ own guesting stint on David Letterman’s “Late Show,” to plug her new book, “Diary of a Mad Diva.” During the interview, she recalled the time when another interviewer asked her so many negative and combative questions that she felt used and abused, and was impelled to walk out of the interview!

Now, that’s attention-calling enough, but what made Rivers’ interview with Letterman even more attention-grabbing was the fact that, before her stint on his show ended, they manipulated the situation in such a way that their chat concluded with Letterman “getting miffed” with Rivers—and “walking out” of his own show!

Now, that was a lot of unexpected fun and games—especially when the “nonplussed” Rivers refused to be upstaged, and promptly took over as both guest and host of the program that Letterman had just peremptorily and huffily “abandoned”! Take a well-deserved bow, everyone.