Posted on 05/26/2017 2:35:33 AM PDT by iowamark
He treated political humor gingerly, making The Tonight Show something all of America could enjoy together. It was exactly 25 years ago tonight that Johnny Carson signed off for the last time as the host of The Tonight Show, ending a 30-year run on NBC.
Jeff Sotzing was there. “It was an overwhelming outpouring of emotion,” said Sotzing. “We didn’t get standing ovations very often. But beginning that May we got them every night. On the final night, it lasted three minutes. It seemed like it would never end.” Sotzing is now the president of the Carson Entertainment Group and oversees Carson’s estate, including 20 years of Tonight Show episodes. He is also Carson’s nephew. His famous uncle offered Sotzing a summer job in 1978. The summer never ended. Sotzing started out answering phones, sorting mail, and getting coffee. Within a decade, Sotzing had become an associate producer and eventually the show’s producer.
First, Johnny Carson is back on TV. Since 2016, Tonight Show reruns have been airing on the retro network Antenna TV seven nights a week. Sixty-minute episodes from the 1980s and early 1990s are aired Sunday through Thursday; the 90-minute episodes from the 1970s are aired on Friday and Saturday. Then 'There’s . . . Johnny'. Conceived by David Steven Simon and Paul Reiser, a frequent Carson guest best known for the 1990s NBC sitcom Mad About You, 'There’s . . . Johnny' is about a young man from Nebraska (where Carson spent his formative years) landing a job with The Tonight Show shortly after moving from New York to Burbank in 1972. There’s . . . Johnny made its debut last month at the Tribeca Film Festival in New York and is expected to air as a web series on Seeso later this year...
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Someone will eventually wake up...get the whole collection of Johnny Carson, Dick Cavett, Mike Douglas, and Merv Griffin shows...line them up from 9PM to midnight. At that point, half of the over fifty crowd will leave the garbage TV of today, and stage a revolt.
Great idea for Fox Business after Kennedy since it is all re-runs and the quirky but fun show Strange Inheritance. Find a week end slot for S.I. and you have a winner!
Whoever owns the rights to the Mike Douglas show....ought to go and offer up a deal. I think you are right...Fox Business would be brilliant to load this to the 9PM slot. I don’t see anything much left from the networks that really appeals to the over-fifty crowd.
TV is unwatchable. Not only the trash they air but way too many commercials.
I miss that guy, he was the epitome of cool.
Even as a kid, I liked Carson and watch those same highlight on Antenna.
They’ve still better than almost every thing else running now.
“...get the whole collection of Johnny Carson, Dick Cavett, Mike Douglas, and Merv Griffin shows...
I’m in! What a fabulous idea! Can we add The Show of Shows to the lineup? How about adding The Carol Burnett Show too?
Go talk to Fox Business and suggest it. I think that’s the place to park them. Start it at 9PM, and run it for three hours. Enough material from a dozen-odd shows from that period that you could go ten years without going to re-runs.
You can watch tons of Johnny Carson programs on YouTube.
https://www.youtube.com/user/johnnycarson/featured
with no commercials!
Since getting a SmartTV late last year, we now only watch YouTube programs and Netflix on the TV.
“Sis, Boom, Bah”
What sound does an exploding sheep make?
How about also “Dinah!” from the 1970s? If one of the nostalgia channels were to bring her daytime talk show back, that would be a nice alternative to garbage like “The View” and other freak shows on during the day.
Johnny always acted like he was having a good time, smiling and laughing. How much of that was an act and how much was real, I do not know. But, it made him likeable.
It could also be said of the sports nostalgia channels showing vintage hockey games having the same sort of popularity for the same reasons. Those games that featured many not wearing helmets and thus considerably less stickwork and more player individuality and appeal, a bit more fighting and more standing up for oneself, and even the organ music in the background without the canned music and sound effects of today are probably that much more watchable as opposed to today’s brand of NHL hockey in many instances.
“Did you ever get the feeling that the world was a tuxedo and you were a pair of brown shoes?” George Gobel.
There was a cable station that showed bits and pieces of the Mike Douglas show a couple of years ago. Some of it was hilarious because he got the weirdest guests to be co-hosts for a week. Masters & Johnson!
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