14 DAY TRIAL // Comedienne Joan Rivers died yesterday at the age of 81, from complications stemming from a routine endoscopy procedure. Hours after the sad news broke, she was remembered by her peers on late night shows, through the inclusion of beautiful tributes in their regular programming.
You will find most of them embedded below: Jimmy Fallon started choking up as he recalled how she had come on his show after a 25-year ban, to congratulate him on his new Tonight Show gig, while Conan O’Brien and guest Chris Hardwick got technical, enumerating the many ways in which Rivers was a pioneer.
Craig Ferguson honored the “great” Joan with a joke, while Jimmy Kimmel just spoke about what an amazing woman she’d been. David Letterman also spoke highly of Joan, though his words felt insincere with me because he was reading them from cue cards.
They say that, once you die, your true value is shown in the way other people remember you. Joan Rivers has nothing to worry about in this sense: she might have been immensely controversial when she was alive, but she was also loved and respected for all her years of hard work.
This was a woman who managed to stay true to herself, and at the same time, relevant, for almost 6 decades. In an industry where many other talented people end up being a flash in the pan of stardom, that’s truly something else.
Her legacy will stand the test of time and these beautiful tributes from her fellow comedians prove that: she was a true “legend” and a “great” comedienne and writer, a trailblazer.
