I loved watching how he interacted with baby animals-don’t remember the name of the zoo lady who visited, but it was always a great show with little critters crawling all over Johnny.
Another performance great is gone. 
I once saw a tape of Johnny being asked what he wanted on his gravestone. The question seemed to take him by surprise, but he quickly recovered and said, “I’ll be right back.”
With tears in my eyes, all I can say is, if there is a Heaven,
“Saint Peter, Heeeere’s Johnnnny!”
79 is young?
“Thanks for the mammaries.”
I believe that was a Johnny line, if not, it surely could have been. 
Goodnight Johnny.
God this sucks!
Honestly, some of my fondest memories from childhood were friday nights (and other non “school nights”) when I could stay up late and watch the tonight show.
The void he left when he retired is now eternal, for there shall never, ever be another like Johnny!
Who was it that said “A man deserves paradise who can make his friends laugh”?
There was a show where Dolly Parton was a guest. When she sat down on the panel for the interview, Johnny stared longingly into her ample bosom and said, “I’d give a year’s salary to have a look in there.”
Dolly laughed, the audience rolled.
At that time his salary was about $5 million/yr.
That was Joan Embry.
Special Dateline NBC on right now dedicated to Johnny. Another hour at 8. Ed Mcmahon interview tomorrow on Today.
NBC News said he died from emphysema.
Growing up with Carson’s Tonight show, I didn’t realize for a long time what a comic and improv genius he was. He was great in his monologues, and was the best comic on earth when a joke fell flat, but that seemed fairly static.
His last week, he had Robin Williams and Jonathan Winters on, two for the world’s most hyper comic lunatics. And they were riffing on each other, winding each other up in an incredibly fast back and forth. Suddenly I realized that it wasn’t just Williams and Winters, but Carson was there in the middle of them, playing along and fully keeping up.
He was amazing, particular since he kept himself toned to the situation so well.
Actually, not all of it is NBC’s property. Johnny was able tr wrest control of the show from NBC, and he owned the rights to at least the last decade of the show, if not longer. (He was sorely pissed after he found out that NBC had taped over some of the early seasons.)
I imagine though, that Letterman will do for Johnny what he did for Rodney Dangerfield, and spend large portions of the show reading gags Johnny did.
Some comics said that they fely Johhny liked it when gags in his monologues fell flat, since that gave him the challenge of recovering from the flop.
Letterman has been doing “Stump the Band” for several months now.
I had CNN on mute for about an hour while I was talking to a friend and saw the same Tonight Show clips over and over and over and over . . . Not a single one of Matinee Girl Carol Wayne–am I the only one who remembers her?
Please tell me Larry King is not going to interview Mickey Rooney about this . . . If I accidentally saw thse two evil gnomes on the same screen I’d have to shoot myself . . .
Huh. I’m only 23 and Leno’s imprinted on my brain as the Tonight Show host, not Carson, but this is still surprising. I thought he and Dick Clark were going to live forever.
Best improv one-liner ever:
Not long after Johnny’s retirement, Letterman gave him a call, on-air.
(Paraphrasing David, quoting Johnny)
Dave: Hi Johnny! How are things in California?
Johnny: Well the mudslides are putting the fires out…
The man will be missed.
I’ve merged gobear’s MPSIMS thread with this one.
Cajun Man
for the SDMB
I was surprised too. I thought she lasted until the color years. I wonder if there ever any truth to the omnipresent rumor that she was his mistress? (Yes, Virginia, there were rumors before the Internet.)
The problem with the old shows isn’t so much that NBC taped them over as that NBC dumped its entire New Jersey warehouse of old shows into the trash as a cost-cutting measure. A few here and there (not sure if any were Carson’s) were literally taken out of dumpsters by people who tried to preserve them, but the vast majority of black and white shows are simply gone. It’s true that they had no idea that that warehouse would someday be worth a billion dollars, but they could at least have had a nice tax writeoff by donating them to a museum or foundation for preservation.
As for Carson’s career, any honest appraisal has to be mixed. Almost certainly his best work is now completely lost, so we only have the later days and older memories and memoirs to guide us. He created the modern talk show, a very different beast from the type of show that either Jack Paar or Steve Allen had done. This is both good and bad, as he also moved the show along with the times, changing from a talk format to the comedy format we’re stuck with today. Talk alone was a lot better, especially when he did interviews with people who had something to say beyond plugging their next project. He loved comedy and he could make or break careers, so fortunately most of the careers he made were the right ones.
Yet for a good ten years before the end he was just phoning it in, appearing as little as three times a week, forty weeks a year. His jokes and bits had long since gotten stale and out of touch with the times. He was notoriously stingy about giving credit to those whose acts and bits he stole with both hands. He developed a nasty habit of jumping on everybody else’s punchlines, not allowing anyone other than his trusted comedian friends to get a laugh. He probably should have quit in 1982 instead of 1992; and maybe if so late night would look completely different today and not have hardened into a rigid boringness.
Overall, he’s still a major figure in television and unlike many of those who get these teary post-death praisefests actually deserves most of the good words. He knew who and what he was, made the most of it that anyone could, and didn’t disgrace or tarnish his memory after he left the stage. Few in Hollywood ever get close to that mark.
Johnny Carson hosting Joan Embry had something to do with why I’m now “zoogirl”. I’ll never forget the peeing lemur…
Damn
I used to try to con my mom into letting me watch on school nights. As I got into my teens, my mom and I were regular viewers together. So I partly associate Johnny with fond memories of times spent with my mom at a time in my life when, other than “The Tonight Show,” we didn’t have much in common.
My three kids are too young to “know” Johnny like I did, but they have been introduced to this incredible comedian through those “Best of…” tapes, and they are all sad.
He got me through a lot of sad nights. I wish I could think of somethign clever to post, but I am just glad he finally had a happy marriage and retirement. I can’t even think of a favorite skit, there were too many.
The Tonight Show went to color in 1967, and Carol Wayne didn’t even start on the show until 1970* (her last two appearances were in 1981 and 1984). The videotape archive is virtually complete after 1971.
The Tonight Show guest database.
- And it was the perfect Tonight Show guest lineup that night: Buddy Greco, Carol Wayne, Shelley Winters, and Rodney Dangerfield.