Jay Leno opens up about first exit from ‘Tonight Show,’ Conan O’Brien, Jimmy Fallon

While Jay Leno has not exactly spoken out at every opportunity over the past couple of weeks about his impending exit from “The Tonight Show,” he is making sure that everyone knows one thing: He is not upset about being replaced on the late-night institution by Jimmy Fallon.

Speaking in a new interview with “60 Minutes,” Leno claims that it makes “perfect sense” that he is being replaced by someone who is younger, and already has proven himself to be a talent and an asset for the network. He even goes as far as to compare him to a young Johnny Carson.

So why isn’t Jay any more upset about this? He claims that had he been completely blindsided, or if he had been fired from the show without there being some sort of replacement already in mind for the role, then he would have been up in arms. However, it has already been made pretty clear that this was not the case.

One thing that Jay is still not that thrilled with, though, is the move that was made a few years ago to replace him with Conan O’Brien. In the interview, he says that he was “blindsided” by the move, and felt very rejected about it after the fact. While in this case leaving was not his idea, either (as he said that he would have kept going for a little while longer, were he to be the one to make the decision), he is being a good soldier about it and not saying anything negative about his heir apparent.

Jay likely knows that there are going to be a flurry of opportunities available to him the moment that he steps away from this show. He will get a chance to possibly go to another network, or do some specials for NBC. It has already been revealed that Fallon will be one of his final guests, and we will have some more news all about that soon.