've just spent most of the week gone by skiing in my favorite mountains of Colorado; at Vail and Beaver Creek. When up in the rarified atmosphere at over 11,000 feet, the woes of the world seem hard to comprehend. I'm usually anxious without, at least, the L.A Times, the New York Times, The Christian Science Monitor and the Financial Times and several other dailies. But when you are skiing the almost virgin-like snow in the backbowls; from China Bowl in Vail to Larkspur in The Beav, that becomes the escape from reality that we all should have from time to time.
There was one reality I couldn't escape; Johnny Carson's death was the one story that topped all others. Even more than the on-going war and the second Bush inauguration.
What a man. He didn't invent late-night television, but he perfected it. There was the quirky, funny, one-of-a-kind Jack Paar who preceded him. But when Johnny came along it was, almost immediately, a love affair with the nation.
That cigarette that was omni-present on stage, was always present off-stage too. It was that which took his life - Emphysema. I never heard him complain about the difficulty he endured breathing. It must have been tough and painful for a man who could spend hours on a tennis court but a short while ago. He knew well the severity of his disease.
He gave us 4,350 shows over nearly three decades. He was more than the host he was the main reason for tuning in each late-night: "wonder what Johnny will be up to tonight.
There's not been another like him. He was so polished, poised, funny, unflappable and flappable. He was "The Tonight Show!"
He was a great audience too to the guests who were on the show.He was truly generous. He knew the stress of being alone with a microphone, a studio audience and a highly critical world. He laughed so easily at other peoples jokes and if his guests were outstanding he would consider them as replacements when he took time off. Meaning, of course, that he never feared potential competition.
So many careers were made as a result of a booking on the Tonight Show. I don't think it works that way anymore.
One of his unique attributes was his ability to make us all feel that we knew him, but somehow, with 30 years of his being in the nation's bedrooms, his private life remained just that - private. Of course he made fun of his three failed marriages, but for the record, Alex, his wife and love until the end of his life, was a perfect companion. My heart goes out to her.
Alex and Johnny would take off on their superb 145 foot super-yacht , take a couple of friends with them, and go cruising. Last time it was up into Canadian waters. The next plan was to voyage down the coast to and through the Panama Canal. It didn't happen. They loved to be let alone and be together.
We lunched together as recently as four months ago. When he had heard that my wife, Alana, had had a stroke, he immediately sent us a batch of his show tapes. They kept her entertained for many a painful night. We cherish them. He told me that there was no record of the first ten years of his shows, because NBC did not realize their worth and so cleaned off the tapes to be used again!
John William Carson from Corning, Iowa. Later, Nebraska. Then the Navy. Then a small town radio announcer and d.j. As a radio man all my life, let me say yours was great radio voice; meaning, one word uttered and everyone knew who was speaking.
When reporters would ask him that most obvious of questions, he just about always offered a polite rejection, "No thank you. The question? "Will you let me interview you. Being a guest was never something he enjoyed. He claimed that he was always "ill at ease" when someone else was doing the questioning and he was the subject. I think there was another reason, one that he gave me when I posed the question a couple of months ago. He said "Michael, if I do it for you.. where would it end. Everyone would be wanting to do the same thing. He just wanted the life he and Alex had made for themselves.
Johnny's sense of timing was near perfect on stage, but also in life. He left NBC and the nightly show when he was at the top of his game. He simply said goodbye. Then he started his life anew playing, enjoying and traveling.
There was a book a quarter century ago, which was all about John F.Kennedy, and would fit so well as a title for a book about John Carson: "Johnny we hardly knew you."
His was a life well lived...and he will be sorely missed and always remembered.