Johnny Carson Dead at 79
Moderator: S2k Moderators
-
Miss Mary
This will no doubt appear in print but it's such a nice tribute, I thought I'd post it for anyone interested:
______________________
"Matt Roush bids a fond farewell to the legendary Johnny Carson."
TV Guide
http://www.tvguide.com/special/tribute/carson.asp
Missing Johnny
by Matt Roush
One of my most prized possessions is a letter that came, unheralded, in the mail not long after TV Guide published a piece in fall 2001 in which we declared how much we still missed Johnny Carson — who had already been off the air for nearly a decade.
The typed letter simply reads, "Dear Matt, Thank you for your gracious remarks in the recent TV Guide. It almost rekindled my desire to return to TV — but not quite. Sincerely (signed), Johnny Carson."
That "but not quite" is pure Carson. You can almost hear the classic timing in the pause before the gentle punch line. The man had class. So much class he knew when to take a final bow and to make it final.
When Johnny Carson left The Tonight Show in 1992, after an unprecedented and never-to-be-equaled 30-year reign as the clown king of late night, he left behind a gallery of delicious, delirious, downright captivating moments of sheer show-biz genius. In the wake of his death from emphysema at 79 on Sunday, the TV memorials have been a curious mixture of sadness and delight.
We're devastated that Carson is no longer around to tempt us with the promise of one last comeback. We're sorrowful over what the world has lost and what we've been missing for so long. But watching those clips again — Johnny at work, which meant Johnny at play, with celebrities and kids and the oddest collection of everyday folk, with all the creatures from the animal and Hollywood kingdoms — we are filled with joy.
As he said on his final night as he signed off: "I am one of the lucky people in the world. I found something that I always wanted to do, and I have enjoyed every single minute of it."
Johnny, we were the lucky ones. We who stayed up each night to hear the monologues and laugh, even at the duds (and there were many). We who found pleasure in your own genuine delight at those who came to entertain alongside you — a roster that embraced old Hollywood and some of the brightest new comics of the last few generations (Seinfeld, Roseanne, Ellen, Steve Martin, to name just a very few).
Carson, born in Iowa and raised in Nebraska, never lost the unassuming nature that endeared him to millions, even as he became one of TV's highest-paid and most celebrated stars. The comfort level we felt tuning in to Carson's Tonight Show each night was incalculable. His tenure encompassed some of the most turbulent decades in our nation's history, but he never lost his cool. And, needless to say, he was always cool.
One of the most-played sequences in the last few days has been Bette Midler's gorgeously emotional rendition of "One for the Road" during Carson's next-to-last night on NBC (the last show with actual guests). As she sings, thanking him "for all of the years, for the laughs and the tears," he discreetly blinks back tears of his own. I know I was crying that night, along with millions of other fans bidding reluctant farewell to one of TV's, which is to say the world's, greatest and longest-running acts.
We missed Johnny then. We never really stopped. And now that he's gone, it's up to us to remember him fondly and forever.
Which should be easy. Just try not to smile when you hear that Tonight Show theme playing in your head. The-e-e-e-re's Johnny!
________________________
______________________
"Matt Roush bids a fond farewell to the legendary Johnny Carson."
TV Guide
http://www.tvguide.com/special/tribute/carson.asp
Missing Johnny
by Matt Roush
One of my most prized possessions is a letter that came, unheralded, in the mail not long after TV Guide published a piece in fall 2001 in which we declared how much we still missed Johnny Carson — who had already been off the air for nearly a decade.
The typed letter simply reads, "Dear Matt, Thank you for your gracious remarks in the recent TV Guide. It almost rekindled my desire to return to TV — but not quite. Sincerely (signed), Johnny Carson."
That "but not quite" is pure Carson. You can almost hear the classic timing in the pause before the gentle punch line. The man had class. So much class he knew when to take a final bow and to make it final.
When Johnny Carson left The Tonight Show in 1992, after an unprecedented and never-to-be-equaled 30-year reign as the clown king of late night, he left behind a gallery of delicious, delirious, downright captivating moments of sheer show-biz genius. In the wake of his death from emphysema at 79 on Sunday, the TV memorials have been a curious mixture of sadness and delight.
We're devastated that Carson is no longer around to tempt us with the promise of one last comeback. We're sorrowful over what the world has lost and what we've been missing for so long. But watching those clips again — Johnny at work, which meant Johnny at play, with celebrities and kids and the oddest collection of everyday folk, with all the creatures from the animal and Hollywood kingdoms — we are filled with joy.
As he said on his final night as he signed off: "I am one of the lucky people in the world. I found something that I always wanted to do, and I have enjoyed every single minute of it."
Johnny, we were the lucky ones. We who stayed up each night to hear the monologues and laugh, even at the duds (and there were many). We who found pleasure in your own genuine delight at those who came to entertain alongside you — a roster that embraced old Hollywood and some of the brightest new comics of the last few generations (Seinfeld, Roseanne, Ellen, Steve Martin, to name just a very few).
Carson, born in Iowa and raised in Nebraska, never lost the unassuming nature that endeared him to millions, even as he became one of TV's highest-paid and most celebrated stars. The comfort level we felt tuning in to Carson's Tonight Show each night was incalculable. His tenure encompassed some of the most turbulent decades in our nation's history, but he never lost his cool. And, needless to say, he was always cool.
One of the most-played sequences in the last few days has been Bette Midler's gorgeously emotional rendition of "One for the Road" during Carson's next-to-last night on NBC (the last show with actual guests). As she sings, thanking him "for all of the years, for the laughs and the tears," he discreetly blinks back tears of his own. I know I was crying that night, along with millions of other fans bidding reluctant farewell to one of TV's, which is to say the world's, greatest and longest-running acts.
We missed Johnny then. We never really stopped. And now that he's gone, it's up to us to remember him fondly and forever.
Which should be easy. Just try not to smile when you hear that Tonight Show theme playing in your head. The-e-e-e-re's Johnny!
________________________
0 likes
Who is online
Users browsing this forum: No registered users and 26 guests