He will always be the king of late night American TV. No one has done it better and I've really missed him these many years. When I was a little boy it was always a special treat to be able to stay up and watch the Tonight Show on Friday nights. I called it "Johnny Night" and remember asking my Dad many times "Is it Johnny Night tonight?".
There was indeed no one greater in the medium of late night talk than Johnny. True, Steve Allen created the format and Jack Paar refined it, but Johnny perfected it in his own special way.
And there has NEVER been anyone who could somehow be more side-splittingly funny whenever material bombed or died, with the way he would react to the moment. Case in point, his quick thinking here in 1985 after a monologue joke gets NOTHING!
Somehow, a moment like that is more priceless than if the joke had gotten a big laugh.
Admittedly, Johnny was more at his peak in the earlier years of the show, especially when the show was in the more relaxed format of 90 minutes, and things could breathe more easily in contrast to the rushed tempo of a 60 minute show that is only 42 minutes ultimately without the commercials. Even so, I would still take Carson from the 80s over what we have today any day of the week.
He will always be the king of late night American TV. No one has done it better and I've really missed him these many years. When I was a little boy it was always a special treat to be able to stay up and watch the Tonight Show on Friday nights. I called it "Johnny Night" and remember asking my Dad many times "Is it Johnny Night tonight?".
Every time I think of late night television, I will always think of Johnny Carson.
At one point he was considered by many in the industry to be the most powerful man in Hollywood. If he liked you he could help you start/boost your career which he did for so many or he could elevate your popularity from appearing on his shows often, as well as saying good things about you to others in the business. On the other hand if he didn't like you, which was rather rare, you never appeared or quit appearing on his show and the word got around which many people seemed to take serious notice of. Many feared crossing him and getting on his bad side because of his power to make or break careers. No late night talk show host has ever had that kind of power before or since. Just another facet of his amazing career in late night TV.
That clip as uploaded to YouTube comes from a 1983-84 special on NBC about old commercials which showed that clip after showing one of the classic Vicks spots that Sakata did. I've never seen an "extended" version of that scene though I do have several of those commercials in some of my other holdings (there's one during 1968 Election Night coverage!)
That clip as uploaded to YouTube comes from a 1983-84 special on NBC about old commercials which showed that clip after showing one of the classic Vicks spots that Sakata did. I've never seen an "extended" version of that scene though I do have several of those commercials in some of my other holdings (there's one during 1968 Election Night coverage!)
There was a similiar thing when Johnny Carson was talking about the miniseries "Shogun" and a samurai came out from the curtain, and destroyed Johnny's desk!
That clip as uploaded to YouTube comes from a 1983-84 special on NBC about old commercials which showed that clip after showing one of the classic Vicks spots that Sakata did. I've never seen an "extended" version of that scene though I do have several of those commercials in some of my other holdings (there's one during 1968 Election Night coverage!)
When he cried on his farewell show, it was one of the times i could really believe there was really no acting, it was real, as real could be, it was his life he was leaving and as i always said unlike others, he stuck to his beliefs when he left the show he pretty much left the media and i give him credit for that. he was no 1 of his kind, always will miss him i try to get everything i can on him that survive, sadly so much has been destroyed, what a waste.
Not so much destroyed (though the first ten years are mostly gone) as suppressed. Carson's nephew tightly controls the archive and shut off the access to the public to obtain complete shows and then last year the DVD set he put out was of edited shows that at 30 minutes each simply do not do justice to the format. Time is running out for those who appreciated Carson the most to enjoy the material that is available and sadly the more years removed we are from him, the less likely it is we'll ever have access to the material the way we should.
Not so much destroyed (though the first ten years are mostly gone) as suppressed. Carson's nephew tightly controls the archive and shut off the access to the public to obtain complete shows and then last year the DVD set he put out was of edited shows that at 30 minutes each simply do not do justice to the format. Time is running out for those who appreciated Carson the most to enjoy the material that is available and sadly the more years removed we are from him, the less likely it is we'll ever have access to the material the way we should.
Carson admits he made a mistake not saving the majority of the first decade of the "Tonight Show", and what exists was preserved on B&W kinesope.
There's some fragmentary stuff from the 60s in color too, and the oldest complete color show (which I have a copy of) is December 31, 1965 as New Year's Eve is celebrated live in New York.
All of Jack Paar's and Steve Allen's Tonight Shows fell victim to the same senseless policy of destruction in those days. The level of shortsightedness by network record keepers to realize the historic legacies they were creating remains an aesthetic and archival crime.
So true, Neo. In the world of television, just about *everything* that represented a historical document of the age we were living in, was among the first stuff consigned to the dumpster or the equally impersonal area of tape recycling. That's why when things do surface and can be experienced again, the excitement is like that of an archeologist who just found something at a dig site. And like in archeology, you sometimes have to settle for fragments like when only a few minutes of a lost telecast resurfaces, or if only select cues from a lost score are found ("Satan Bug").
The vigor of the search and the chase for that lost material can never let up. Because while most of the time it leads to frustration, the times when it hits paydirt more than compensate.
The vigor of the search and the chase for that lost material can never let up. Because while most of the time it leads to frustration, the times when it hits paydirt more than compensate.
I agree with you guys on that issue 100%, what always bugs me on that issue is of course the artistic lost, but knowing first hand myself, the cost and time it took to do all these creative ventures, not to keep at least one copy of those ventures, MR Paddon being a sports fan, all those games and broadcasts gone into oblivion, how nice it would be to see a typical Yankess broadcast of 1970, with sportscasters like Phil Ruzzoto[God rest his soul], Frank Messer[as well] and Bob Gamere[spelling] doing a game with players like Bobby Murcer, Jerry Kenney, Horace Clarke etc etc or a Mets game with the Late Lindsay Nelson, Bob Murphy and Ralph Kiner, i mean if the Mets were not a good team like the yankees in that era, we would see nothing, but Thank God they have the 69 world series and the 73 world series, which reminds me, have they ever found the Super Bowl, they lost, is that one still lost? amazing.
