Peter Lassally, the dean of late night producers who worked with Johnny Carson on the “Tonight Show,” David Letterman on “Late Show” and Craig Ferguson on “The Late Late Show,” has died. He was 93.
Lassally was long dubbed the “host whisperer” for helping steer some of the biggest franchises of all time in late night. He worked with Carson until that host retired in 1992; after that, he joined forces with Letterman, who had hoped to take the “Tonight” mantle but was famously passed over for the gig. That’s when Lassally, joining Letterman’s Worldwide Pants shingle, was instrumental in helping Letterman decide to leave NBC and create an entirely new “Late Show” franchise at CBS.
Under Letterman’s deal with CBS, Worldwide Pants also programmed the 12:37 a.m. slot with “The Late Late Show” — which Lassally executive produced in its first incarnation with Tom Snyder. When it later went to Craig Kilborn, Lassally semi-retired, but when Craig Ferguson took over in 2005, Lassally served as the show’s executive producer.
“Peter had two loves in his life that lasted more than a half-century, the first with his lovely wife, Alice, and the second with the world of talk television,” said Michael Naidus, who worked with Lassally on Ferguson’s “Late Late Show” as showrunner. “Each of those love affairs was a two-way street. Quite literally, hundreds of millions of people owe their late-night smiles and laughs to this beautiful soul, whose gift for finding extraordinary talent and honing it is unmatched and unrivaled.
“And all the while, Peter took such joy from the moments he helped create, that his grin was as ubiquitous as his daily sliced apple,” he added. “Whatever little I gave to the format is because he was kind and patient enough to teach it to me. It’s traditional to say ‘he will be missed’ in these circumstances, but the truth is Peter was and is irreplaceable.”
Lassally retired in 2015, as Ferguson departed “The Late Late Show,” overseeing guest hosts before James Corden took over.
In a 2015 Variety profile, then-CBS Entertainment chairman Nina Tassler referred to Lassally as “the strong, silent type,” with an unerring ability to “diagnose problems with surgical precision” and a nurturing attitude that elicited the best from the big personalities with whom he’s dealt, as well as with the show’s staffs. “He’s kind of ego-less,” Tassler noted. “There’s a comfort he derives from not wanting or needing to be in the spotlight.”
An NBC spokesperson shared, “When Johnny Carson and David Letterman needed counsel and an honest opinion, they immediately went to Peter Lassally, the professor of late night. His relationship to each of these giants was immeasurable and both of them would undoubtedly say his contribution to their success was so impactful that it would be difficult to put in words. A quiet man whose influence and stature spoke volumes, Peter’s brilliance was in shaping what we watch, how we watch and why late night was, and remains, vitally significant.”
Lassally was born in Hamburg, Germany, in 1932 to a Jewish family that later had to flee to the Netherlands with the rise of Nazi Germany. While there, Lassally’s sister went to school with Anne Frank, and he, his mother and sister were imprisoned in the Westerbork transit camp and later in the Theresienstadt concentration camp. After surviving the Holocaust, Lassally and his family moved to New York in 1947.
Lassally was a part of TV from the very beginning, joining the NBC page program at age 19 and serving as a Radio City Music Hall usher alongside his pal Regis Philbin. He worked in radio, then moved to Arthur Godfrey’s popular program.
He joined “The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson” in the 1970s, rising to executive producer until Carson’s retirement. From there, he moved to “Late Night with David Letterman,” and then helped establish “Late Show” with Letterman. (That franchise, which later continued under Stephen Colbert, recently wrapped following CBS’ surprise cancellation.)
Lassally’s final act in late night was identifying comedian Craig Ferguson (then known mostly for his role on “Drew Carey”) and transforming him into a talk show host — which ultimately, as Ferguson grew into the role, became a critically acclaimed, unique late night outpost.
Lassally won two Emmy awards over the years, while discovering and nurturing multiple generations of talent.
He was preceded in death by his wife, Alice Lassally, and is survived by his daughter, Andrea Gibbin (Chris Gibbin); his son, 3 Arts’ Tom Lassally (Romi Lassally); and his four grandchildren, Walker Gibbin, Eloise Gibbin, Annabel Lassally, and Owen Lassally.