Edd Hall

Hall was born in Boston, Massachusetts.^[1] Best known as Jay Leno's announcer on The Tonight Show with Jay Leno for 12 years, Hall started in show business at an early age. As a child and teenager, he worked as a magician, clown, fire-eater, and radio announcer. Hall's first network TV job was for Saturday Night Live as an NBC page in January 1979. His first network TV appearance was performing an impression of Tom Snyder on Tomorrow Coast to Coast in March 1980. In June 1980, Hall began working as a production assistant for The David Letterman Show, David Letterman's short-lived morning show on NBC. In 1982, he became Letterman's visuals producer on Late Night with David Letterman. He remained with Letterman until 1990, often appearing in or lending his voice to comedy sketches on the show. Soon after leaving Letterman in 1990, Hall moved to Los Angeles where he designed the Worldwide Pants logo and animation for Letterman's company. He also wrote an episode of and performed voiceovers for Chris Elliott's show, Get A Life in 1990 and 1991. Some of his other pre-Tonight Show credits include appearances and voiceovers on such TV shows as Saturday Night Live, Married... with Children, Murphy Brown, and Blossom.^[4]

Unlike his predecessors on The Tonight Show (i.e., McMahon with Carson, and Hugh Downs with Jack Paar), Hall did not serve as the only sidekick for Jay Leno during his time on Leno's incarnation of The Tonight Show. Hall did, however, appear in hundreds of sketches during his 12-year tenure. He often played the "stooge" to host Leno. Some of his most memorable sketches included vehicles running him over in the studio parking lot, getting "attacked" by actors in large animal costumes, or Leno's discovering Hall "missing" from the studio and after searching for him eventually finding Edd in some ridiculous place or situation.^[5]