On Television
KITMAN, MARVIN
Onlelevision WHY JOHNNY CANT LEAVE BV MARVIN KITMAN w ? ? hen Johnny Carson announced last month that he wanted to leave NBC's Tonight Show in September—or earlier, whichever came first— it was...
...I kept the speech to myself, however...
...But my own f avorite is Chevy Chase...
...Perhaps he was attracted by the fact that it was about expense accounts—a subject in which his expertise probably could only have been matched by the Father of our country (who put all his retreats and scouting patrols on his Revolutionary War tab...
...It seems unlikely that anyone can—but of all the names I've heard kicked around, an interesting case can be made for Freddy Silverman...
...An ambulance may cart him away before next September...
...the jokes have to be one-liners and the larger, sententious statements guests like to make are reduced to slogans...
...There is also a Bring-Back-Jack-Parr movement, whose chances are very slim...
...Everybody has their favorite moment from the past 17 years of Tonight...
...Carson, who reportedly has seen everything, rubbed his eyes with the heel of his right hand and carried on as if nothing unusual had occurred...
...Onlelevision WHY JOHNNY CANT LEAVE BV MARVIN KITMAN w ? ? hen Johnny Carson announced last month that he wanted to leave NBC's Tonight Show in September—or earlier, whichever came first— it was not surprising that he made the front pages...
...w ? ? hatever the case, there are still millions who watch nightly, and my heart goes out to these addicts...
...When Mr...
...But between commercials, Carson argued with me about historical matters in the book...
...She stopped by on her way to a Hollywood party, dressed in a beautiful red shawl and gown that some fancy couture house had ripped off from the design of those old-fashioned men's undershirts...
...Since he's off six days out of five, he has done a lot for the vacation industry, too...
...I did notice, though, that before I could exchange any pleasantries after the show, Carson had vanished...
...I have to go to work in the morning...
...I wonder if the evening clothes he wore at the Oscars were made by his own company...
...He can read...
...When its over, one or both of the partners will say or think, "Are you crazy...
...No, how could you...
...To this day, I believe the bright young talent-coordinator was disappointed that the publisher sent me, instead of my coauthor...
...Certain pigs don't...
...He didn't move his show to California out of cowardice, he merely wanted to report to us on the natives, like a National Geographic correspondent...
...On top of that there are two 'station breaks' of more than a minute and a half each...
...Trying to catch Johnny on Tonight since then has been like playing the lottery—and I'm not very lucky...
...You may recall him as the Farrah Faw-cett-Majors of TV comedy...
...Tonight has nine commercial positions of two minutes each," Frank told me a year ago, "six for the network, and three for the local stations...
...Equally predictable were the next day's banner headlines, citing the network's position that he could quit over their dead corporate body...
...How does he manage such perfect posture...
...Another candidate being tossed around is Sy Sims, the prominent New York clothier, public television underwriter and star of his store's tacky TV commercials...
...After all, even the Great One needs a cost of living bonus in the days of California's runaway inflation...
...I suggest Miss Piggy of The Muppet Show...
...Maybe, but the Carson spot has to be a lot more interesting than managing a taco stand in Santa Monica, or whatever job "I'm Chevy Chase and you're not" is doing since Gerald Ford tripped from the Presidency...
...I'm not sure Jack Paar—with or without his sidekick Hugh Downs— would increase NBC's laugh stock, but he would certainly drive up Kleenex stock...
...That will make us forget Johnny Carson in a three day week or two...
...Once home, he no doubt curled up with a good biography and some chamber music...
...And h-e-e-e-e-e-re's Chevy and Miss Piggy...
...He abandoned TV satire for sleazy movies the same time FF left Charlie's Angels for sleazy movies...
...Last time I tuned in I drew Rich Little doing his impersonations...
...Not only because Carson has done so much good, but also because he is such a terrific entertainer...
...A-M entered, walked across the stage to give Johnny the standard hello kiss—and then it happened...
...Mine involves an accident that befell the great American actress, Ann-Margaret...
...The method works in the following manner: Viewers stay up too late watching the program...
...A much better analysis has been provided by Reuven Frank, the former head of NBC News...
...What he tuned in for is cut up into slices and slivers...
...Certain pigs have it...
...The New York Post, my current favorite guide to popular culture, would run the end of the world itself on page 7.) Still, Carson's controversy with his boss, Fred Silverman—concluded May 3 when Johnny told his national audience that he would stay on for at least another year—really was newsworthy...
...Well, that's showbiz...
...This means that the viewer spends about a quarter of his time watching something he doesn't want to see...
...According to my sources, he spends his time walking around the RCA building talking to himself...
...On a Paul Simon Special last year he played Casanova hosting a late-night talk show from the middle of his led...
...The Tonight Show, for instance, is the most important birth-control device since the headache...
...Heck, I'd lend my ear to Freddy Silverman, and he only makes a piddling million for picking awful shows like "Super-strain...
...I asked my friend Max Friedman during Carson's long stint (it seemed like three days) as host of last month's Oscar show on ABC...
...That could serve as the prototype •or the talk shows of the 1980s, expressing the new sexual freedom Johnny is too uptight to get into...
...I'm not describing this too well, but I could draw you a picture...
...And have you heard Freddy's monologues...
...Can you imagine the fights he would have with Freddy Silverman...
...He is a comedian, as we know because his shows are jokes...
...Thus, out of 88 total minutes, over 20 minutes are devoted to ads, and that is not counting titles or other hoo-ha...
...So, although I've never missed a chance to poke a little fun at Carson, I secretly like the man...
...Gucci loafers are going for $ 150 a pair, and you can't get a burger at the Polo Lounge for less than $10...
...It was as if somebody had pushed a button to a trap door and dropped Johnny into a waiting limousine...
...Finally, Johnny has been a boon to the men's clothing industry...
...Actually, Carson's sexual innu-endos are a stand-in for sex life, just as fast food has become a stand-in for real food...
...For Tonight, judging from Carson's frequent need of rest, is clearly no longer a one-man operation...
...Some cynics have speculated that Carson never intended to leave in the first place...
...That still leaves the crucial question: When the black day comes, who will replace Carson...
...As a matter of fact, when the retirement was announced, telephone wires from New York to the Coast began burning up...
...Every comic with a union card was on the line to his agent asking, "What about me...
...The shawl jumped, or fell, from her shoulders, revealing a low-cut top held up by two strings of cotton the width of sewing thread...
...the tux made him look like three million bucks...
...It came to naught, of course, when Johnny decided to hang in there...
...What a dresser...
...He is similarly a master of understatement and overstatement, and is brilliant at both the double entendre in English and single entendre in foreign languages...
...Television eventually departs, we should brace ourselves for a population explosion, like the one nine months after the 1966 blackout...
...Here are just a few of the other social benefits attributable to Tonight: Johnny has saved the lives of many tourists by warning them about the dangers of being mugged in New York...
...Nevertheless, I don't buy Silverman's contention that Carson's heavy schedule of nonappearance is one of the major factors in the gradual decline of Tonight's ratings...
...Asked a few months ago whether he would try to replace Carson, he said, "What do I want that job for...
...His doubletake was a joy to behold...
...I was stunned during the commercial breaks to discover that Carson had actually read my book...
...Unfortunately, Sy has no national recognition...
...Or else he lives in my mother's house...
...It's that Carson has had a significant impact on American society...
...But Chevy was brilliant on Saturday Night Live, and I think he would be a joy in the Carson spot every night...
...He tended to cry a lot as well...
...He has a brace on," Max replied...
...Such a charge could ruin a man's career in today's culture...
...It also goes out to the thousands of entertainers who think they have a chance of replacing Johnny one day...
...And he has done more to keep us straight than anybody in media...
...Chase denies that he is in the running...
...It was a cheap publicity trick, they claim, calculated to give him leverage for reopening his contract negotiations...
...It's not simply that anybody who earns $2.5 million-$3 million a year, or $ 13,123 an hour (Time magazine's estimate after Carson's current contract was renegotiated back in 1977, when a dollar was 70 cents), deserves attention...
...Don't be conned by his blatant anti-intellectualism...
...I tell you, when the end really comes, both the man and the myth are going to be missed...
...I met him once in the early 1970s, when I was a guest on Tonightto push a book I had written with General George Washington, titled George Washington's Expense Account...
...He plays the fool, but deep down he is a lot smarter than he lets on...
...Of course they will adore moi," Miss Piggy told me recently, "It's my incredible beauty...
...All you do is sit around and talk to a bunch of boring people...
...And agents got on the line to whomever they call all the time...
...I wanted to stand and shout: "America, this man is a phony...
...Parr is the man who walked off Tonight when the network refused to let him mention the initials " W. C." in a toilet joke...
...Many will be called, as the Bible says, but will not be chosen...
...When the time is right and when this young comedian finally changes his mind, he should demand a cohostess...
...For history has shown that anything having to do with Carson is automatically page-one stuff—easily eclipsing Three Mile Island, inflation, the gas shortage, the Middle East crisis, and other such trivia around the world...
...Johnny is pretty impressive in person as well...
...He is, as Harlan Ellison once observed, the world's oldest Huckleberry Finn...
Vol. 62 • May 1979 • No. 11
