Jay Leno doesn’t star in A Series of Unfortunate Events, but he may as well do given the string of misfortunes he’s had lately. The former television host has been enjoying his free time after retiring from late-night TV ten years ago, but it feels like he’s spending most of it hitting the emergency room, considering the medical calamities he’s had in recent years.
At Monday’s Comedy For Kobe event in Beverly Hills, Calif., former Tonight Show host debuted a shocking new look. Even though we’re way past the Halloween parties, the Hollywood star was seen rocking an eyepatch, not for aesthetic reasons, but to conceal the horrifying injuries he obtained recently from a nasty fall that sent him to the hospital.
When Inside Edition caught up with Leno outside the venue, he nonchalantly raised the patch to show reporter Jim Moret his swollen left eye, which he could hardly open. He also had bruising on the left side of his face, an injured wrist, and his middle finger was wrapped in an adhesive bandage since he lost his nail there. Leno also shared that he’s “all black and blue” elsewhere on his body.
Leno’s dire situation is all on him. According to him, while staying at a Pennsylvania Hampton Inn over the weekend, he stepped out to grab dinner at a local restaurant before his show. However, he got lazy and ditched the mile-and-a-half walk down the road for a shortcut down the hill. What happened next was a nightmare reminiscent of a child’s nursery rhyme. “I fell down and rolled down the hill. Hit my head on a rock, knocked me on the eye,” Leno said.
In a separate interview with TMZ, Leno proudly shared that he pushed through with his performance three hours later despite what happened. He said he did not want to disappoint the thousands of fans who waited for him to take the stage, so he finished his gig before getting his injuries checked at a nearby hospital.
This is the latest mishap Leno has suffered in recent years. In January 2023, he got into a motorcycle accident that broke several of his bones, including his collarbone, ribs, and kneecaps. In an interview with the Las Vegas Review-Journal, he explained that he was driving a 1940 Indian motorcycle through a parking lot and did not notice that “some guy had a wire strung across the parking lot but with no flag hanging from it,” so he got clotheslined and knocked off the vehicle.
“I got knocked off my motorcycle. So I’ve got a broken collarbone. I’ve got two broken ribs. I’ve got two cracked kneecaps,” he said before assuring the outlet that he was fine. He also downplayed his condition, saying, “I’m OK, I’m working. I’m working this weekend,” instead of taking a break from his schedule.
And that’s not all for the streak of bizarre accidents that kept following him in recent years. In Nov. 2022, Leno was enjoying fixing up one of his prized possessions in his Los Angeles garage when the car his working on exploded. The freak car fire left him with three-degree burns on his face and hands. He was quickly transported to a burn center for treatment.
A month after the incident, he went on the TODAY show to share some harrowing details about it. According to the comedian, he decided to work on his 1907 White Steam after noticing that its fuel line was clogged. He went underneath the vehicle to have a closer look at the problem and asked a friend to “blow some air through the line.” Moments after, the fuel line made a noise and then bam, his face caught fire as the gas leaked while the pilot light jumped.
Jay had to go through several surgeries and skin graft procedures after that. He also had eight-hour sessions in a hyperbaric chamber for nine days to speed up his recovery. He wanted to get back to his normal routine ASAP since he missed a scheduled appearance in Las Vegas after the incident.
What’s really fascinating about all this is that the comedian remains optimistic and does not even complain about the bad things coming his way. In May last year, he told Page Six that he was “fine” after the accidents, and he even considers himself “luckier” than most people.
