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Posted: |
Nov 12, 2018 - 8:07 AM
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By: |
Eric Paddon
(Member)
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Regarding Paar, I think it's safe to say most of us got to know him first as this figure from a distant era whom we first experienced through the rose-colored fog of clip show specials that would always show us light, innocuous material of Paar clowning around etc. Of course the fact that almost all of Paar's "Tonight" work was wiped out of existence (when we do see clips, it's usually from his less remembered 1962-65 weekly prime time show) means we really don't have the ability to go back and see and hear the things that made him controversial and polarizing on a nightly basis. The audio clips I used of his walk-off, return and his last show reveal more the real figure people experienced and you can hear good bad and ugly. Paar certainly invented the standard mold of late night talk, but he was much too mercurial a personality compared to Carson, and the fact that he used the *show* as the occasion for his public feuds with the likes of Kilgallen and Walter Winchell I think also contributed to why he flamed out in just five years. Carson, to be sure, had his share of public feuds but he never used the show as the medium for them. That's a big difference.
Ironically, while Paar could come across as petty and immature on the air, off the air he was a model husband, father and family man. By contrast, Johnny was always relaxed and nice on the air but off the air was a terrible husand and father and tended to be more aloof.
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Posted: |
Nov 12, 2018 - 8:46 AM
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By: |
Jim Phelps
(Member)
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Regarding Paar, I think it's safe to say most of us got to know him first as this figure from a distant era whom we first experienced through the rose-colored fog of clip show specials that would always show us light, innocuous material of Paar clowning around etc. Of course the fact that almost all of Paar's "Tonight" work was wiped out of existence (when we do see clips, it's usually from his less remembered 1962-65 weekly prime time show) means we really don't have the ability to go back and see and hear the things that made him controversial and polarizing on a nightly basis. The audio clips I used of his walk-off, return and his last show reveal more the real figure people experienced and you can hear good bad and ugly. Paar certainly invented the standard mold of late night talk, but he was much too mercurial a personality compared to Carson, and the fact that he used the *show* as the occasion for his public feuds with the likes of Kilgallen and Walter Winchell I think also contributed to why he flamed out in just five years. Carson, to be sure, had his share of public feuds but he never used the show as the medium for them. That's a big difference.
Ironically, while Paar could come across as petty and immature on the air, off the air he was a model husband, father and family man. By contrast, Johnny was always relaxed and nice on the air but off the air was a terrible husand and father and tended to be more aloof.
My grandmother used to read the National Enquirer and things like that, and I remember Carson and his then-wife Joanna were constantly being followed--nearly as much as Liz Taylor and Jackie O were in those years.
In some ways those feuds become too much of a distraction and takes away from what the audience initially liked about those personalities. A real shame about Paar's show getting wiped out. Are Carson's and Steve Allen's earlier shows also gone?
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