Peter Lassally, a concentration camp survivor who became known as the “Host Whisperer” of talk show productions headed by Johnny Carson, David Letterman and Craig Ferguson, has died. He was 93 years old.
Tom Lassally, partner, producer and manager at 3 Arts Entertainment, said Lassally died Sunday of natural causes at a memory care facility in Los Angeles. Hollywood Reporter.
Lassally produced shows starring Arthur Godfrey and Mike Wallace before joining Carson on NBC Tonight showwhich was based in New York in 1969. He served as the quiet behind-the-scenes man in a production partnership with the rowdy Fred de Cordova and remained with the show until Carson’s final broadcast on May 22, 1992.
After just one week off, Lassally jumped in Late Night with David Letterman as executive producer of what could be the final season of the NBC show. When Jay Leno was chosen over Letterman to replace Carson, Lassally advised Letterman what to do next.
“I said to Dave: If you’ll follow Jay Leno at 12:30 when he arrives Tonight show“You’ll hate yourself, and you’ll be miserable,” Lassally recalled in a 2009 conversation for the Television Academy Foundation website. Interviews.
“You’ll be thinking: Why am I following Jay Leno when I’ve been hosting the show at 12:30 for 12 years… and my reward should be… Tonight show“If you agree, I will try to make you an offer at 11:30 – not knowing when you said that exactly how I will do it.
Lassally paired Letterman with powerful CAA agent Michael Ovitz, and the host made lucrative offers in syndication, cable and broadcast before deciding to move to CBS in 1993 to take the top spot. Late Show with David Letterman From the Ed Sullivan Theater on Broadway at 11:35 p.m
The deal included ownership of the 12:35 a.m. program, The Late Late ShowLassally returned to California to set up this program with host Tom Snyder. When Snyder left four years later in March 1999, Lassally rejected his replacement, Craig Kilbourne – who had pushed for Jon Stewart – and stepped aside. But when Kilburn resigned over a salary dispute in 2004, he got his man in the charming Scottish comedian Ferguson.
“I always had a good relationship with the hosts I worked with because I would tell them the truth. That worked well for me. That’s how I earned the title ‘Host Whisperer,'” the two-time Emmy winner said. “I’m not good at pumping sunshine up their asses. If I don’t like it, I can’t pretend, I can’t pretend it was good. I’m very lucky that the hosts respected that.”
Peter Edward Lassally was born on October 14, 1932 in Hamburg, Germany. His father, Paul, was an importer and exporter in the coffee trade, and his mother, Elsa, was a housewife.
He and his family fled Germany in 1938 en route to England to escape the Nazis, but they “didn’t go far enough”, and settled in Amsterdam, where he went to the same primary school as Anne Frank. After his father died and the Germans invaded the Netherlands, his mother and older sister were interned in two concentration camps from 1943 to 1945.
The second camp, Theresienstadt in Czechoslovakia, “was a very strange place,” Lassally told NPR in 2012. “This is the place where the Nazis set up the camp with all kinds of fake, fantastic decorations, and they invited the Red Cross to come and visit and see the wonderful things they were doing.”
In 1947, Lassally came to live with his uncle in Canton, New York, where he attended St. Lawrence University after graduating from high school in Queens. Returning to New York City, he worked as an usher at Radio City Music Hall and as a page (alongside Regis Philbin) at NBC.
Lassally reviewed Broadway plays for the WOR radio show hosted by Robbie Mercer and continued to produce her show, then produced the NBC radio show Night linewhere he hired Mort Sahl, Shelley Berman, Nichols, and May to do short comedy segments. “This is where I found myself doing what I truly love more than anything else, which is finding and developing talent,” he said.
Lassally produced Godfrey-hosted programs on CBS Radio and Television—eventually becoming president of Godfrey’s Production Company—and in 1961 moved to Evening Easta syndicated talk show from Westinghouse hosted by Wallace. He regularly booked Barbra Streisand because she lived in an apartment above the studio. She had not started her singing career yet.
Lassally met Carson’s second wife, Joan, when she asked him to produce a television pilot for her, and she helped him get a job. Tonight show. De Cordova later joined the team, and they enjoyed a complementary relationship, he told Mark Malkoff on a 2014 episode of his show. Carson podcast.
“Mr. Jolly would be there and talk to the guests, which I didn’t want to do, and I would do all the work. It worked out perfectly,” he said. The couple ate lunch together every day for more than two decades, and often played poker.
Lassally had the last word on everything Tonight show Guests – He recognized Garry Shandling’s potential during his appearance The Merv Griffin Show He stalked Steven Wright after seeing him doing stand-up at a Chinese restaurant – and stormed off to host guests who had been seated while Carson was on vacation.
“The gift I constantly look for in people, whether they are hosts or guests, is the ability to like,” he said. “I don’t care if you have a No. 1 record or a No. 1 movie; if you’re not popular, I’d rather not put you on the playlist because I don’t think the audience will stay up.”
Joan Rivers eventually became the permanent host, and assumed that Lassally would follow her when she hosted her own late-night show at Fox in 1986. However, he remained loyal to Carson.
After Carson retired, Lassally convinced him to send Letterman jokes for his monologues. “He didn’t want to force Dave to use it because of who Johnny was,” he told Malkoff. “I said, ‘No, these jokes are great, and Dave would be proud and proud to do them on his show.’ “He finally gave up.”
Shandling also turned talk show ideas away from him to HBO The Larry Sanders Show. “Shandling and his writing partner would ask me, ‘Could this have happened?’ I would say yes and no.”
In his interview with the Television Academy Foundation, Lassally pointed this out Late show It was originally scheduled to spend only one year in New York before moving to Los Angeles. However, when the show came out beating Leno in the ratings, those plans were shelved, and Lassally remained in New York for about two and a half years, longer than he would have preferred.
He worked as a consultant in Late Late Show When he was asked to oversee the selection of a new host following Kilburn’s exit. Four of the finalists – Ferguson, DL Hughley, Michael Ian Black and Damien Fahey – emerged from more than two dozen guest hosts (including Stewart) before Ferguson, despite his heavy Scottish persona, got the job.
Lassally retired in 2014 as executive producer of Late Late Show When Ferguson left. He received 13 Emmy Award nominations during his career, winning it in 1992 Tonight show And 1994 l Late show.
NBC said in a statement: “When Johnny Carson and David Letterman needed honest advice and opinion, they immediately turned to Peter Lassally, professor of night studies.” “His connection with each of these giants was immeasurable, and both would undoubtedly say that his contribution to their success was so impactful that it would be difficult to put into words. [He was] A quiet man whose influence and stature spoke volumes; His brilliance has shaped what we watch, how we watch it, and why late night was, and continues to be, vitally important.
In addition to his son, survivors include his daughter Andrea and grandchildren Walker, Eloise, Annabelle and Owen. His wife, Alice, predeceased him by 60 years.
He once said: “I respect talent, and I am in awe of talent.” “If you’re really talented, I’ll put up with your madness. Because if you’re that talented, you’re not an ordinary person; there’s something strange about you.”
