Here's Johnny!

Johnny Carson, the King of Late Night for 30 years.

Johnny Carson was the host of The Tonight Show on NBC from October of 1962 through May of 1992 - just under thirty years as the King of late night television in America.  He went on the air just months before I was born, and I was married by the time he signed off.  I was a huge fan.

On September 27, 1954 Steve Allen became the first host of The Tonight Show.  Allen created the parameters of the late night talk show that we take for granted today: an opening monologue, a live band, a desk, a sidekick, interviewing a mix of celebrities and odd personalities, some musical acts and a little comedy.  That all came from the genius of Steve Allen.  He only hosted the show for a bit more than two years.  If you watch clips of Steve Allen today, you will notice that his direct descendant is David Letterman, but he paved the way for Carson.

The temperamental Jack Paar took over for Steve Allen in the late 1950's, and took The Tonight Show into the 1960's.  Paar was so high strung that he once walked off his show mid-broadcast because he was so angry with a joke cut by NBC censor's from his show - a joke which not only seems incredibly tame by today's standards, but wasn't really funny - only to return a month later.  That was part of Paar's appeal.  He was an open wound.  A ticking human time bomb ready to explode at any moment.  That initially makes for great television, but it wears thin after a few years.  He was the anti-Carson, but it was during Paar's reign that Carson first made an appearance as a guest host of The Tonight Show.

Johnny took his rightful place behind the desk of The Tonight Show in the Fall of 1962.  The wise-cracking, cool, quick-witted young man from the Midwest hit the bullseye as a late night comedy host.  It seemed like he was inviting everyone to end their day with a few laughs, and maybe some interesting conversation, in his living room.  The way Johnny pretended to invite you into his living room made America invite him into their homes in large numbers for years.

I can't remember the exact moment I first watched Johnny Carson on The Tonight Show, but I would guess it was in the early 1970's.  I was just hitting puberty and was entranced.  He was smooth, classy and quick on his feet.  He always had just the right ad-lib, knew exactly what to say, and looked so comfortable on camera.  Like all the greats,  he made it look easy.  I didn't understand all the jokes early on - many of the political and sexual references went way over my head - but it was like sitting at the adult table.  If you're adult table included Dean Martin, Don Rickles and Jimmy Stewart.

My parents let me stay up late on Fridays and during breaks from school, and that meant only one thing - the chance to stay up late and watch The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson. 

What's noticeable when you watch clips of Carson today, particularly when he's interviewing a civilian (which meant unpredictability - he was working without a net) such as a young spelling bee champion (like in the clip below) or an elderly potato chip collector, is his lack of ego and willingness to share the stage.  He knew he looked good if his guests looked good.  If someone was entertaining and doing well, he was willing to sit back and let them go.  You just don't see that much on television today.

Steve Martin, with his "Wild and Crazy Guy" routine, started to become popular in the mid 1970's.  He was right in my wheelhouse.  I thought his appearances on Saturday Night Live were amazing - we would all be imitating his routines and sketches the following Monday at school.

But it was his appearances on The Tonight Show with Johnny where he became almost a show biz bridge between his (Vietnam) and Carson's (World War II) generations.  He was a welcome fixture on The Tonight Show - a show the new breed from SNL considered "square" and "old school" - straddling the line between becoming part of the lore of Hollywood comedians to mocking talk show conventions at the same time.  It was a tough balancing act, and he walked it with aplomb.

Watch this clip where Martin sends up the talk show convention of a "big" star having to leave the show early - they're too high up on the Hollywood food chain to sit there on the couch like a normal person and listen to someone ELSE talk.  Note in this clip, too, how Carson is perfectly willing to let Martin run with the bit and get the laughs.  Carson just plays the straight man, but he knows it's great television.

So I can't pinpoint the exact date when I had my brush with Johnny, but I believe it would have been during 1979 or 1980.  No, it wasn't a "brush" in the sense of encountering him out in public.  That just didn't happen.  He was a ghost, an apparition, in real life.  Even celebrity guests on his show would marvel that they never saw him at restaurants or parties around town.  It was as if he only existed that one hour a day when he taped his show.

My younger brother and I were visiting my father in Los Angeles during the summer break.  My father had a friend who was able to get us on the V.I.P. list for a taping of The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson.  We didn't have to wait in line all day in the heat of the San Fernando Valley - just walk up to the page in front of the studio - give our names and be escorted in.  It was that sweet and simple.  But it didn't turn out that way.

My father drove my brother and me from his home in Playa del Rey to beautiful downtown Burbank.  The temperature difference between the two places was 30 degrees.  It was hot in Burbank that day.  How hot was it?  I'll tell you how hot.  It was so hot that Dolly Parton was selling shade.  Ah, that's how hot it was.

We drove right past the NBC Studios in Burbank, and saw the long line of people standing out front waiting for a chance to get in to see a taping of The Tonight Show.  My father parked the car, and the three of us walked over to a page with a clipboard, who seemed to be in charge, and gave our name - Cleary - party of 3.  The page looked at his clipboard and scrolled down a list of names with his pen, stopping about halfway down the page, and then looked back up at us.  I knew immediately by the look on his face we were in trouble.  He took one look at my younger brother, about 15 years old at the time, and said, "I have you on the list, but (pointing towards my brother) he can't go in.  We don't allow anyone in the audience under 18.  If the two of you want to watch (now pointing towards my father and me), that's fine.  But not him."

Damn.  My father was a lawyer and even he couldn't talk them into letting my brother attend the taping.  He tried to talk to the page with the clipboard, another page, and then I think even a supervisor in street clothes with a walkie-talkie.  He may have even gone inside and called our friend who had put us on the list.  They all made it quite clear there wasn't any wiggle room.  Mr. Carson was adamant that he didn't want any children in his studio audience.  Everyone had to be 18 or older.

I was heartbroken for my brother, but I was a much bigger Carson fan than him anyway.  Most TV shows had a much lower age cut-off - 14 or 16.  It didn't make any sense, but there wasn't any getting around it.  It wasn't as if Carson worked blue or anything.  My father and brother decided to go have dinner at a nearby Mexican restaurant while I attended the show.  It was just about five o'clock, and they were starting to let the audience inside for the 5:30 taping.

Once we had tried everything we could to get my brother inside to no avail, I got in the short V.I.P. line as they left.  A page quickly escorted those of us in the V.I.P. line  into the lobby, through a pair of double doors, down a hallway and then we came in through a side door into Stage 1 - the set of The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson.

The studio pulsated with the tension and bustle that occurs just before a television taping.  Or a rocket launch.  But this crew had been doing this for 20 years at that point.  Everything was perfectly plotted down to the second with Swiss precision.  It wasn't done live - those days were long gone - but was shot what they call "live to tape," which means you shoot it straight through without stopping, as if it were live.  You still had the safety valve of time afterwards to cut or censor anything in the two hours between the end of the taping in Burbank and when the show was broadcast on the East Coast.

I've traveled around the world and seen many iconic buildings, structures, statues and paintings.  I don't think anything had the impact on me of walking into that studio.  There's Johnny's desk!  Oh, my god!  The cup with his pencils on the edge of his desk!  The curtain where he's comes out and does his monologue!  The star on the floor where he knows where to stop and stand when he comes out!  Look, it's Doc Severinson and the NBC Orchestra!  It all looks so small!

All five hundred of us in the studio were having the same thoughts go through our minds.  TV and film sets ALWAYS seem smaller in person than they do on TV or the silver screen.  It was probably less than 80 feet from one side of the set to the other.

As I settled into my seat - a pretty darn good seat - and scanned my surroundings, it started to dawn on me that it was cold in there.  Damn cold.  Also common on a set that's about to start taping.  Bright lights started to flicker on and off around the set as they made one last lighting test.  It gets hot under those lights during the taping, and you don't want to see Johnny or his guests sweating under those lights.

Ed McMahon walked into the audience about 5:20 and did a brief audience warm-up.  He introduced himself, Doc and the band, made a couple of lame jokes about the heat, asked a few audience members where they were from, and then got set at his familiar position in front of a mic stand, just to the left of the audience.

5:29 p.m.  There was a big clock above a television monitor, down on the stage right next to Johnny's couch, that Johnny, the crew and the audience could see at all times.  It showed 11:29 p.m.

Suddenly the studio got very quiet.  All four studio cameras, one on Ed, one on Doc and the band and two ready to pick up Johnny as soon as he came out from behind the curtain, were in position.  Two boom operators had their long boom microphones in place, hovering over the star on the floor.

The silence was broken by a stage manager, a gentleman in his mid-40's, wearing a headphone and a microphone, loudly counting down, "we're on the air in 5, 4, 3, 2 ..."  There was no "1."  Doc Severinson moved his baton and the familiar sounds of the Tonight Show theme came thundering from the bandstand down to my right.

The stage manager turned and pointed at Ed McMahon.  His familiar booming voice started, "from Hollywood...the Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson..."

I cannot describe the adrenalin and energy pumping through the audience at that moment.  Hearing the band live, Ed's familiar baritone, the thought that we were seconds away from seeing our TV idol right in front of us.  It WAS a rocket launch.  I felt like I was INSIDE my television set.  If it was like that for the audience, I can not possibly fathom would it must have been like for Carson.  Talk about a drug.

Ed continued with the announcement of the night's guests, "...inviting you to join Johnny and his guests Steve Martin..."  Wait a minute?  Did Ed just say Steve Martin was on the show?  Holy shit!  I go to see a Tonight Show taping for the first time in my life and Steve Martin is the guest?  Jackpot!  I felt even worse for my brother...for a moment.

"And now heeeeeeeeeere's...Johnny!"

A spotlight suddenly clicked on and illuminated a large circle dead center between the now opening curtains.  An averaged sized man, maybe 5' 10", dapper and trim in a charcoal sports coat and light slacks, jauntily emerged from the curtain and, without looking down, casually stopped right on the star on floor, as if he could do it in his sleep.   Johnny's iconic face, outlined by gray hair, emerged into that familiar grin.  It was as if you were staring at Mt. Rushmore and the Abe Lincoln figure had suddenly come to life.

He raised his hands to acknowledge the warm greeting from the audience,  put his hands in his pockets, took a quick glance down at the 20 or so cue cards that were stapled onto three 4' X 8' pieces of plywood right in front of him, and started another trademark monologue.  The rocket was launched.

The rest of the show was a blur.  It went by so incredibly fast.  Everything was choreographed to the second.  A segment would last 6-7 minutes, they'd break for a commercial, the bright lights on the set would die down, the band would go into another number - and the band just filled that room.  They sounded so much better in person - something I would hear from everyone else who had attended a Tonight Show taping.

It was time for his first guest and Johnny introduced Steve Martin.  Martin was already making movies at this point, and had given up live performing.  He could have toured around selling out every 18,000 seat arena in the country, making millions of dollars in the process, but he had stepped away from stand up comedy.  Goldmine or not, it just didn't interest him anymore.

The band played an intro for Martin, the curtains parted again, and out strolled Steve Martin with a banjo around his neck.  Wow!  Johnny Carson, Steve Martin and now the banjo! - which he seldom used for any appearances by that time -  I felt even worse for my brother.

I have no recollection of any of the jokes Martin did that night or what he played on the banjo.  I just know it was the only time I ever saw him perform live, and he was hysterical.  He killed.  I kept glancing over at Johnny's silhouette in the darkness behind his desk - hunched over, his cackling laughter audible even though his mike was turned off.  I can't find this appearance on YouTube or on Carson's web site.

Another thing occurred to me for the first time during Martin's appearance: he's always an impeccably dressed man.  Carson was always dapper, he had his own clothing line at one time, but Martin was in another stratosphere.  The next time you see Martin appear on TV, check out his suit.  He's a man who knows good clothes.

(Note:  A few years later I would work as a page on a short-lived summer sit-com starring Martin Mull.  It was entitled Domestic Life, and was produced by Steve Martin's production company.  The show only lasted six episodes, but Martin was on the set once or twice a week, usually on taping days.  He didn't seem much for fraternizing with the crew, and I was much too intimidated to introduce myself or say anything to him, but every time he walked by me he looked FABULOUS.)

I have no recollection of any other guests besides Steve Martin.  There must have been somebody else: an author or rising comic.  My mind's a blank.  It was Johnny Carson and Steve Martin.  Two innovative entertainers who were able to produce work at a high level for decades in the fickle world of popular entertainment.  Two comedy legends.

Every rocket, no matter how powerful, eventually must come back to earth.  Johnny said goodnight to the camera and stood up from behind his desk and waved to the audience as the band played out the end credits.  Johnny came around to the front of his desk and shook the guests' hands and walked off the stage to our left.  And like that, he was gone.

After Carson retired in 1992, he only made a couple of more appearances on television.  For a man who lived most of his life in front of the cameras, it was amazing how he was able to walk away from it so abruptly and stay away.  A good entertainer always knows to leave the audience wanting more.

His last television appearance was a brief walk-on during David Letterman's show, when Dave was doing a special week of broadcasts from Los Angeles.  I hope you'll take the time to watch the clip below.  We will never see the likes of Johnny again.  Television is too fragmented and diffused now with 700 cable and satellite channels, YouTube and iTunes.  So many people watched Johnny on the Tonight Show in the 1970's and 1980's that his average rating then would equal the highest rated show on prime time TV today.

And what's fascinating about this clip is that he was retired and had not been in front of a camera in years, Letterman and the audience were both awed and adored him, there were multiple cameras and microphones in place to record his every word.  And what does he say?  Not a word.  He does a few takes, milks the moment for a few laughs, and then gets up and exits without saying a word.  Wow.  If only he'd be right back.