Ferguson and the deconstruction of late night

I've been meaning to do more posts on late-night talk shows in general and, in particular, Craig Ferguson ever since Colbert and Kimmel brought the genre back into the news.If you are a fan of Anthony Head's work or are simply curious about the man, this is a charming piece of video. Head and Ferguson co-starred in the London revival of The Rocky Horror Show in the early '90s and are clearly having a great time catching up. Though he was always a strong interviewer (scroll down for examples), like Dick Cavett, Ferguson was at his best when he had some kind of relationship with his guests, such as having dropped acid together 20-plus years earlier. Or an even closer relationship than that... What we now think of as late-night talk was basically created by three hosts: Steve Allen, the erratic Jack Paar, and Johnny Carson, with considerable input from various producers and writers such as Fred de Cordova. By the mid-'70s, the template was set.Despite the enormous audience that these…