Jay Leno Screws Up Plot Of Hamlet While Mocking Kids For Not Reading Books (VIDEO)

The folks at Media Yenta caught a gaffe on the "Jay Leno Show" last night. The host was doing a segment about back to school stuff, like smiling swine flu masks and computers that make sandwiches, when he joked about kids getting their books on Twitter, 140 characters at a time. This is the image he used, and the words he repeated, which do not in any way describe the plot of "Hamlet," but instead loosely outline "Oedipus." (SCROLL DOWN FOR VIDEO)

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Comments

[balancedsolution]

Jay's time has passed. He was best on Laverne and Shirley.

He fit the suit back in the day. But to trump Conan like that really sucks for Conan.

I used to watch Jay but then his schtick was all too familiar. Stupid people being interviewed, which was obviously canned. Goofy Kev jokes. Jay got very "sensual" with the ladies at the end of his run. Anyone else notice his comments towards the good looking starlets?

These guys like Jay and Dave, they get paid way too much for what they do. Most of the work is done by the support staff. Jay should sell some of his cars and let the world know that materialism isn't success. It's success only by one standard. There are many successful people without much money.

Look at Mother Theresa. She was successful!

Jay it's time to go off the air. Even Jordan had a hard time hangin up those shoes.

We know it's difficult.....

[iLoveOldNY]

I've been watching Jay Leno's new show and have come to the conclusion that the show should be canned. He is not funny, a bad interviewer, and the skits are just annoyingly boring. What's with the video appearances? Can't get the actors to come to the set for you? It's LA for chris+sakes! Beside him, the set looks like a car dealership, complete with double glass doors. Just overall lame. Between him and Jimmy Fallon, NBC really $ucks. What a disappointment. I was looking forward to this show.

[savconsulting]

It's not hard to understand Jay Leno's success. It runs parallel to the dumbing down of America. He is a terrible interviewer. He made Robin Williams, the greatest comedian of our time look uncomfortable this week. Jay just tries to make his guests laugh. He never asks the appropriate follow-up question that his audience is wanting to ask. His audience are a bunch of his Jaywalking drop-outs who can only shriek. They don't know how to applaud. Letterman is soooooo much better. A true comedian, not only a teleprompter reader of his writers jokes. Watch Letterman slightly glance at his teleprompter then watch Jay. It is like night and day. Jay peers in and reads every word. So amaturish for a 17 year veteran. His success baffles me.

[rtblues]

Screw Hulu! And Huff Post should realize that there are a lot of readers outside
of the USA.
Really tired of clicking on a link only to see that it is Hulu content
not available outside of the USA.
Here is the double speak from Hulu when you click on READ MORE:

"For now, Hulu is a U.S. service only. That said, our intention is to make Hulu's growing content lineup available worldwide. This requires clearing the rights for each show or film in each specific geography and will take time. We're encouraged by how many content providers have already been working along these lines so that their programs can be available over the Internet to a much larger, global audience. The Hulu team is committed to making great programming available across the globe. "

9 times out of 10, the same content can be found elsewhere.

P.S. Using a USA proxy server address in Firefox beats Hulu from abroad anyway and I can see it, but, hate the hassle of having to edit properties and go through a proxy server just to see Hulu content.

[CraziesAreRunningTheShow]

I agree... Huff Post should not link to closed feeds. The networks and Hollywood are greedy nits and bow to the greedy foreign govs.

[twisted-european]

Jay-walking into high culture won't behoove you, Jay! Aren't there any car jokes around anymore?

[Kevin McAlpin]

First thing first. The head writer and producer were both warned by who but the visual effects artist on the show last week. I know for a fact because the visual effects artist is my father who has worked with Jay for 15 years. The producer and writer both blew off his warning that it was Oedipus and not Hamlet. Don't blame Jay for the slip-up. Blame the head writer and producer that were too ignorant to listen to a warning from a co-worker. E-mail them or contact them by any means and make them realize their mistake.

[suigeneris]

Jay Leno is an unfunny, ignorant clown? Real newsflash there.

[Rick in Arizona]

I thought it was very funny, You must be too serious or dumb.

[LaughingMan]

I vote too dumb

[YMCA]

It's not that huge of a mistake as it is pretty obvious that Hamlet has a ton of Oedipus in it.

[WeAreTheWorld]

Exactly. Snarkiness is a two edged sword.

[bgofca]

jay leno sucks; he is not a good example of a well educated person.

[LaughingMan]

.......yes, based on one flubbed joked which his writers screwed up, and which granted, he did not pick up on, let's henceforth decree that Jay Leno, is not only not well educated but also a sucky human being. That's solid logic right there.

We should also lump in Letterman, Kimmel, O'Brian,Ferguson, Maher, Chapelle, Garofolo, Silverman, Prior, Carlin, and any other comedian who's ever dared step onto a stage, because I'm pretty certain at one point or another every single one of those names I've listed above there have messed up a joke and got a fact wrong in telling their jokes. A bunch of uneducated savages and barbarians they are.

..........I mean, based on your stellar reasoning and logic, that is.

[iLoveOldNY]

Those comedians you listed are smart and funny. Some are very smart and very funny.

But Jay Leno sucks. Not smart, not funny.

[HistoryBuff15]

How did they get this wrong!

[phredralf]

Wikipedia:
In the first half of the 20th century, when psychoanalysis was at the height of its influence, its concepts were applied to Hamlet, notably by Sigmund Freud, Ernest Jones, and Jacques Lacan, and these studies influenced theatrical productions.
In his The Interpretation of Dreams (1900), Freud's analysis starts from the premise that "the play is built up on Hamlet's hesitations over fulfilling the task of revenge that is assigned to him; but its text offers no reasons or motives for these hesitations".[86] After reviewing various literary theories, Freud concludes that Hamlet has an "Oedipal desire for his mother and the subsequent guilt [is] preventing him from murdering the man [Claudius] who has done what he unconsciously wanted to do".

[TheMisanthrope]

The "joke" doesn't say that Hamlet had feelings for his mom, it says that he hooked up with his mom. Let's see, who hooked up with his mother, Hamlet or Oedipus? Even allowing for the Oedipal interpretation of Hamlet, the premise is still incorrect. Just because it's (supposed to be) a comedy show, is that any excuse to not be accurate in the material? Then again, it's been a long time since actual facts were relevant in the mindless media.

[jimmyjames2]

Actually, the joke does not explicitly state that Hamlet hooked up with his mom. Technically, the joke's premise is established as a poor synopsis of a work in which a major plot point, in fact, involves a main character hooking up with his own mother. You (and the post author) are assuming that the "tweet" is referring to the title character when it need not be. It may be in fact referring to another main character, Claudius. There's enough wiggle room here for the writers to escape the charge of "screwing up." All we can do is ask them which character they were referring to in order to fully determine if their joke was factually incorrect.

[KillgoreTrout43]

Freud thought that every man wanted to sleep with his mother.

[Lucky123]

For good reason ~ Freud's mother was hot!

[bugsbonzai]

Leno is an former car mechanic turned uneducated joke teller. He depends on other joke tellers to feed him his bits. Leno couldn't tell you the plot of Hamlet or Oedipus if his life depended on it. The whole mother/son insinuation in Hamlet was an actors' tradition of playing the relationship between the two characters with Oedipal undercurrents. It was not written in Shakespeare's text, and it certainly isn't what Hamlet is about! It was simply a tradition that developed amongst actors, directors and performers. I also happen to think it's a grossly misguided and incorrect interpretation of the play, but has been performed that way by everyone from Olivier to Branagh. In my humble opinion, the performances where the actors playing Hamlet and Gertrude didn't inform their relationship with this undercurrent were vastly superior. But I'm just a Shakespeare snob.

[LaughingMan]

......a former car mechanic turned uneducated joke teller, whose made more (money, fame, and impact) in his nondescript life and career, than you likely ever make in three of your glorious-by-comparison lifetimes.

Yes, I know, truth hurts.

[TheMisanthrope]

You must be a Republican since you clearly believe that merely by making a certain amount of money, facts and logic no longer need apply.

[bugsbonzai]

OH my GAWD, I'm like, so depressed now. Because like all patriotic Americans, I base my entire wort as a human being on how much money I make. Since you and I make far less than the millions mediocrity peddlers like Leno and, oh, Larry Flynt, make, we are then logically worth less as human beings. Why oh why didn't I get into an industry where I could make huge amounts of money in exchange for mediocrity, instead of getting into a profession I know and love, look forward to, and savor every moment of, but only makes me 60 grand a year? HOLY MOLEY WHAT WAS I THINKING? Thank you, kind sir, for setting me straight. Jay Leno making millions peddling mediocrity makes him a far superior person than you and me. Your reasoning is sound. Bravo.

[KillgoreTrout43]

I watched Leno last, just to see what his new show was like. It sucked, big time.

[oz3472]

not funny -
can we have real entertainment back yet?

[Kevin McAlpin]

can you write any comedy? you obviously arent offering a solution.

[Maygun]

...I hate to defend Jay's writers (?) but I seem to remember Hamlet being hot for his mom, he was overly jealous of Claudius in sort of a weird overbearing way

[KillgoreTrout43]

The joke was that Hamlet, "hooks up," with his mom. That was clearly from Oedipus Rex.

[ChiGuy]

This show shouldn't be sullying the American airwaves at all. It's nothing more than an earlier version of the tripe Leno offered up on the Tonight Show.
But if NBC insists on inflicting this c rap on television viewers, they should reschedule it for right after Carson Daly's show.

At least that way they could help minimize the agony.

[LaughingMan]

I hate to inform you that based on his ratings over the last 17 years, you're in the minority.

You Leno haters seem to have a hard time coming to grips with reality. He's a likeable guy and good at what he does. Fact.

Oh and the fact that so many people like him and you don't does not make them idiots and you a genius.