Posted on 05/26/2017 2:35:33 AM PDT by iowamark
I was at a dinner honoring the British playwright, Simon Gray, and Nathan Lane shamelessly used that line. Since we were the only Yanks at the party, he must have thought he could steal it!
hahaa....
This is a total whitewash of Carson.
He was a first-class a**hole off the air to everyone around him.
He was horrible to his wives, his family and many times destroyed the careers of performers just because he was not honored by them.
The man was funny and presented a nice demeanor while on the air, but the reality is anything but that.
Carson called Wayne Newton “Chief” in reference to his native American ancestry. http://www.today.com/popculture/wayne-newton-johnny-carson-mean-spirited-wbna22043375
Stumbled on this when researching all the great entertainers who have passed:
https://consumerist.com/2008/08/15/donald-trump-saves-ed-mcmahon-from-foreclosure/
Donald Trump doesn’t know Ed McMahon, but he “grew up watching him on tv,” so he’d like to be his new landlord. McMahon is currently facing foreclosure from Countrywide, and had 2 weeks to sell his house before the bank repossessed it. Mr. Trump has agreed to buy the house and lease it to McMahon, says the LA Times.
I’d love to also have a collection of the old Steve Allen shows, with Louis Nye, a pre-Mayberry Don Knotts, and other great characters. Bill Dana, “My name Jose Jimenez” also got his start on that show. That show and my brother’s destroyed by over use Jonathan Winters album collection formed my sense of humor. I hate to think about what effect modern “entertainment” is having on kids today.
If you have DirecTV look for JLTV...Jewish network with the awesome motto....American’s Chosen Network. I happened upon that network a few weeks back. They play The Jack Benny Show, The Soupy Sales Show and the Dinah Shore show. I tape all of the Jack Benny’s. It is my favorite part of the week to watch those. Oh and we are also watching Peter Gunn on streaming. How sad is that? I have to go back 60 years for good TV!!
The night before Trump’s inauguration, I saw Dana Carvey perform at a private function. All I could think of was Carson. He was quick, funny and especially given the day it was, highly political. But, the audience left laughing and not having any real idea where he actually stood. His act was funny and not mean.
I miss comedians who are actually funny
TV has always been a vast wasteland to some degree or another. Sleaze became institutionalized January 20 1993.
MeTV, Antenna TV, the Retro Channel, Decades etc. They are all taking your idea. That’s pretty much what I watch.
Decades has Cavett nightly, Antenna has Carson.
GRIT shows lots of old westerns. There’s another channel that shows the 70’s black family shows, Jeffersons, What’s Happening, Good Times etc.
Carvey does the best Carson impersonation.
That was great. I miss performers like that.
According to Wikipedia, Carson appears to have been a sort of squishy RINO politically, which I guess would make him sort of middle-of-the-road. In the article, he is quoted as saying he "didn't want the show to become a political forum". From the article:
In his book, Carson's former lawyer Henry Bushkin stated, he "was by instinct and upbringing definitely Republican, but of an Eisenhower sort that we don't see much of anymore.... Overall, you'd have to say he was anti-big: anti-big government, anti-big money, anti-big bullies, anti-big blowhards." Carson served as MC for Ronald Reagan's inauguration in 1981 at the request of Frank Sinatra.
My wife and I watched an episode of Carson this week and found it to be really refreshing. Classy host, classy guests, nothing like today's late night crap.
The sister and BIL of one of my best friends were very wealthy and owned Jack Benny’s old house in Hollywood. Their three best friends were Gene Hackman, Gene Wilder and Johnny Carson. My girlfriend used to visit out there several times per year. She said Johnny Carson practically lived at her sister’s house because he loved their tennis court. He was a tennis maniac. She also said he was very introverted in real life. He was a nice guy but very quiet. Nothing like on TV.
Not to mention Ed Sullivan.
Johnny’s introversion was in large part the reason that when he retired from the Tonight Show, he retired almost completely from show business. I guess he did a little Vegas stuff, but not much, as I recall.
There used to be as little as 5 minutes of ads per half-hour. Then it went to around 8 minutes per half, but now it’s over 11 minutes of ads. That’s for EVERY program out there including the news, and the non-news shows repeat what they did just before the commercial break as soon as the show returns.
There *might* be as much as 15 minutes of programming per half-hour once the repetition and ads are removed. I use the TV for a night light, or to entertain the dogs when I’m not home.
Then again, I occasionally find myself watching Chinese TV, and believe it or not, Al-Jazeera is pretty even-handed in their news most of the time.
Everyone one of those are back on over the air television - I’ve seen them on AntennaTV, GetTV, Decades, etc. I don’t pay for my TV - I just use the old antenna and get dozens of channels for free. Saved thousands of dollars over the years. I spend a lot of my time watching old shows I never heard of before and were made long before I was born...it’s genuine comedy with actual talent - not just perverted sex jokes all the time. I’d take Burns and Allen over any current “comedy” sitcom.
Yes, I got one of those SmartTV boxes - that and an antenna to supplement it with your over the air stations (there are more and more channels popping up these days) and a radio is all you need...no reason to pay thousands of dollars over the years on cable.
Dick Cavett was very clearly a liberal Democrat and really pushed his point of view on his show. Mike Douglas was more of an old fashioned Democrat and old fashioned entertainer.
I'd distinguish a bit between Jon Stewart, who's obviously a liberal, but sometimes said surprising things, and Stephen Colbert, who's sticks much more to the party-line. Stewart wasn't always as predictable as Colbert and was never as vicious.
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