The star of “The Late, Late Show with Craig Ferguson” took the long road to fame from his early days in the U.K., where he carved out a career in music, theater, comedy and drinking. That last bit ended in 1992, when Ferguson noticed: “If I have one beer, I wake up in Tijuana four days later with a tattoo and a sore ass.”
He moved to Los Angeles in the mid-‘90s, snagging a role on “The Drew Carey Show.” In 2005, he took over as host of “The Late, Late Show,” three years later beating Conan O’Brien in the ratings and never looking back.
He also lent his voice to the role of Gobber in DreamWorks Animation's “How to Train Your Dragon.”
He sat down with TheWrap to talk about the late-night wars, inspirational words from Howard Stern, Paris Hilton and why he dresses like a ‘50s car salesman.
I’d be remiss if we didn’t talk about the late-night wars.
I don’t give a f--- about the late-night wars. You can quote me on that. I don’t even think that I do a late night show. What I do is I do a TV show that goes on late at night. If anybody thinks I’m part of all that, they haven’t seen my show for more than five f---ing minutes. So my opinion about how the business is run is really meaningless.
What I think is that the wake-up call for me, when it all broke down between Conan and Jay and stuff, is that there was a lesson there about trying to be something you’re not. Jay was trying to be some primetime guy, and he’s not that. And Conan was trying to be this kind of corporate thing, and he ain’t that.
It’s like everybody f---s up when you try and not be what you want to be. So here’s what I’m not. I’m not that guy. I’m not any of these dudes. I’m who I am and I do my show. And if late night is a club, then I don’t want to be a member.
What would you have done in Conan or Leno’s place? Would you have just walked away?
Yeah, I don’t care about being a f---ing late night-talk show host. What the f--- do I care? I swear to God, you must hear this if you don’t hear anything else: I genuinely don’t give a f---. I do this show because I like doing it and they pay me good money to do it. I don’t define myself by being on f---ing television.
If you define yourself by being on television, you’re already f--ing lost. And if they fire me, guess what, I’ve been fired before and I’ll f---ing live.
When you came to “The Late, Late Show,” did you look at what everybody else was doing and decide to go in the opposite direction?
When I started, I wanted to fit in.
