Since The Tonight Show is traditionally the only late-night show that works on Friday’s Jimmy Fallon gets the pick of the guests. (And the A.V. Club’s late-night coverage. Sneaky.) Which means that he trotted out everybody’s big buddy Dwayne Johnson to talk about anything he wanted for much of the show. Speaking from his rental house in Georgia, where he found himself stranded once his someday-upcoming action flick Red Notice shut down halfway through production thanks to the pandemic, Johnson was his trim, polished, and charming self. In a crisply casual short-sleeved shirt that revealed his legendary commitment to staying action-figure enormous has not gone on hiatus, Johnson explained that, once the Ryan Reynolds co-starring Netflix flick was responsibly but inconveniently shuttered, he decided to make Georgia his family’s temporary home, rather than risking everyone schlepping back to Cali in a pressurized metal sky-tube potentially filled with contagion. (Georgia, one imagines, is fine with this arrangement.)
Telling Fallon about his daughter Simone’s upcoming WWE debut (while he and Fallon studiously did not discuss Vince McMahon’s thoroughly shady sweetheart Florida deal to endanger its wrestlers and fans by prematurely reopening), Johnson was every bulging inch the proud Rock-poppa, saying that Simone’s out to make a name for herself her own way. He also was effusive in praising his young daughter Jasmine’s athletic prowess, although the fact that she apparently whacked her dad in the nuts with her while he was unwisely holding up a Peppa Pig birthday piñata was less than optimal. Family-wise, Johnson and Fallon then shared the story of how Johnson’s mom Ata spent last New Year’s Eve sending increasingly alarming pictures to Johnson from the restaurant they both happened to be at. With Fallon acting as ringmaster, scavenging props and setting up boozy photo ops, the pair started out with a standard “sorry to interrupt your dinner” selfie, before amping things up (with tiaras, balloons, empty champagne bottles, an accidentally spilled bottle and ice bucket) that made it look like their celebrity meet-cute had turned into an all night debauch between Fallon and Mrs. Johnson. Well played, Mrs. The Rock.