Jay Leno raised $100,000 in Biloxi, Miss., toward the Gulf Coast Community Foundation to help victims of the BP oil shed. (Rogelio V. Solis/Associated Press)

Tonight Show host Jay Leno took his comedy act to Biloxi, Miss., without interrupti~ Saturday, raising $100,000 US to help the Mississippi Gulf Coast recover from the BP oil spill.

More than 1,000 people bought tickets, at prices ranging from $40 to $150 US, because the benefit show at the Beau Rivage Resort and Casino. It was billed for example Stand Up for the Gulf Coast: A Special Evening with Jay Leno.

The comic actor, who has done similar benefits for the victims of Hurricane Katrina, Detroit autoworkers and Iowa flood victims, kept the audience laughing with his spot-on delivery, assembly of hearers interaction and often-bawdy jokes.

America, he said, has become “a people of excuses, one of the most insane of which is that fatness is caused by a virus, not double-thick burgers and milkshakes that comprehend chunks of cheesecake. We have now reached the point where cheesecake is each ingredient!”

At the end of the hour-long show, Leno presented an oversized cheque for $90,336 US to Rich Westfall, president of the Gulf Coast Community Foundation.

The groundwork provides emergency grants to non-profit groups that help oil-shed victims and invests in long-term recovery efforts.

Leno added his hold donation to bring the total to $100,000.

Earlier in the sunlight, he told WLOX-TV in Biloxi that he has been moved through the plight of the oil spill victims and wanted to guard attention focused there.

“We have this habit in America, something happens and we follow it intently for weeks and months, and then … we move ~ward to the next project.”

But he said a long road of convalescence lies ahead for the Gulf Coast, especially for those who win their living on the water.

Earlier this week, retired U.S. Coast Guard admiral Thad Allen, the U.S. sway’s point man for the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico, uttered he cannot provide a timeline for when BP’s blown-lacking well will finally be plugged.

The plan had been to clean the relief well by early to mid-August. But stormy stand and questions of how to make the job less risky accept delayed the process.

With files from The Associated Press