When striking Tonight Show writers open their mailboxes this week, they’ll find a paycheck; not from the network, but from host Jay Leno himself.

Over 120 Tonight Show staff recently received Christmas bonus checks, but were laid off early for the holiday season, with no guarantee they’d have jobs when the program resumes following the writers’ strike, which could come within the next couple weeks if the WGA accepts a contract proposal they are reviewing from producers, but may stretch into the unforeseen future if they do not.

The 120 layoffs match a similar layoff two weeks ago of staff who depend on the NBC comedy The Office for their weekly pay. The longer the the strike stretches out, the more common such layoffs will become.

The personal bonus from Leno was $100 for each year a staffer has been on staff with the show since he took over; not much money by Hollywood standards, but all of it apparently out of Leno’s personal account, not the network’s.

Despite Hollywood’s obsession with adult-rated fare, family films still sell, a lesson Disney’s Enchanted proved again this weekend, extending the film’s reign at the top of the holiday box office season to two weeks in a row.

Box office was down this weekend, though, as it only took Enchanted $17 million to take the top spot over the weekend, though its take to date is over $70 million. The live action musical comedy is a bit of an anachronism in an era when most musicals either take place on stage or via animation. However, animation is clearly changing, too, as the adult-themed Beowulf has been a box office flop in the US, largely due to its adult-rated content; the film is said to be a hit in Europe, however.

No matter how much market research film companies do, it seems they’ll never learn that making a film the entire family can watch together always reaps the most rewards.

Producers decided to get realistic recently, presenting Hollywood screenwriters with a three-year deal proposal that would add approximately $130 million in additional compensation over that period of time, covering the wireless and Internet sales writers consider the crucial point of the strike. The WGA is said to have been seeking a different formula, although the two sides are only apart by an additional $20 million over the same three-year period, according to most online sources.

It doesn’t take a utility cart full of caviar and champaign to close that gap from either end, I would suspect; the WGA is taking the proposal seriously enough to call a halt to negotiations while they consider and pour over the details of the agreement this weekend.

If writers accept the deal, the month-long strike could be over by the second week in December, with writers having plenty of time to start salvaging the 2007-08 TV season. We can only hope.

At age 69, daredevil Eval Knieval, the trendy 70s icon who is perhaps best known for his daring failure to jump over the Snake River Canyon, made his final jump this week, into the afterlife; he passed away after years of failing health, suffering from diabetes and pulmonary fibrosis, an incurable condition. In 1999, he had a liver transplant after nearly dying of hepatitis C, contracted through a blood transfusion. He also suffered two strokes in recent years. Knievel had trouble breathing at his Clearwater condominium and died before an ambulance could get him to a hospital.

The passing of the 70s icon marks a later exit than his early exploits might have promised him; he lived fast at the height of his popularity, and many expected him to accordingly die young. He nearly did, several times, following such daring stunts as jumping the fountains in front of Caesar’s Palace in Las Vegas, the aftermath of which kept him comatose for a month.

Knieval was a throwback star, known for his actual stunts rather than celebrity endorsements for products unrelated to what made him famous, unlike make stars today who are better known as advocates for a diet patch or a brand of jeans than for their actual work.

He is survived by four children, 10 grandchildren and one great grandchild, as well as two ex-wives. Only son Robbie has attempted to mirror his father’s daredevil stunt career. Eval – born Robert Craig Knieval – suffered nearly 40 broken bones and countless other injuries before officially retiring in 1980.