Word: carsons
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...invented comedy bits that others copied (Allen's Answer Man become Carson's Carnac the Magnificent). He discovered or introduced talents like Don Knotts, Bill Dana and Tom Poston, Steve Lawrence and Eydie Gorme. He gave Elvis Presley his first national TV exposure, even before Ed Sullivan. He was, as the obits reminded us, a renaissance man who played jazz piano, composed thousands of songs (but only one hit, "This Could Be the Start of Something Big"), wrote a couple of dozen books and even dabbled in politics. Though a lifelong liberal - a union man to the end, opponent...
...that kept his wisecracks from ever being cheap, or risqué, or mean. He kept a police whistle at his desk, which he'd blow whenever a line or bit of business crossed the line. He remained old-fashioned that way, as well as in his stubborn refusal, unlike Carson and almost everyone that followed, to do "savers" when a joke bombed. He might strip to his shorts onstage for an ice-water bath, but he never lost his dignity...
...believed in rearranging it as necessary. He was elected to Congress before Al was born and reached the Senate by the time Al was 4, which guaranteed that the dinner table could turn into a policy briefing to make sure young Albert fully understood all the implications of Rachel Carson's environmental crusade. His mother talked about "wedging Al in" if a particularly useful dinner guest was in town...
...started a Sunday-night variety hour, "The Steve Allen Show." By then he was so busy he let Ernie Kovacs host "The Tonight Show" on Mondays and Tuesdays. Kovacs ascended to his own level of TV-comedy immortality, and Jack Paar took over "Tonight" in 1957. Then Johnny Carson and Jay Leno - 46 years of the longest-running entertainment show on network...
...believed in rearranging it as necessary. He was elected to Congress before Al was born and reached the Senate by the time Al was four, which guaranteed that the dinner table could turn into a policy briefing to make sure young Albert fully understood all the implications of Rachel Carson's environmental crusade. His mother talked about "wedging Al in" if a particularly useful dinner guest was in town...