Word: paars
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...perform for 20 or so relatives impressions of Aunt Rose with the sagging upper arms and Uncle Max with the pants the size of New Jersey." He learned show-biz patter, pulling his chair alongside the old Magnavox TV and pretending to be the next guest on the Jack Paar show, peeking down Jayne Mansfield's dress and rolling his eyes, flacking his latest gig. "You know, Jack, I'm really looking forward to eighth grade. A lot of interesting transfers, some hot new teachers -- it's going to be a good year...
...business where success is fleeting and burnout comes fast, Carson's durability is not only unprecedented, it is almost unimaginable. An Iowa-born, Nebraska-raised standup comic and host of a popular game show, Who Do You Trust?, Carson replaced Jack Paar as host of NBC's Tonight show on Oct. 1, 1962. His tenure on the program has lasted for two-thirds of the time that national TV has existed. He has hosted the show long enough to have had Judy Garland, Groucho Marx, Joan Crawford and Hubert Humphrey as guests. If Jay Leno lasts as long...
...really own it, you just hold it and try not to drop the ball when you hand it to the next guy. I like the history of The Tonight Show, being able to look back over the years and think, gee! Steve Allen! Jack Paar! Johnny Carson! You get to hang your picture on the same wall...
Allen built the wall in 1954, establishing Tonight as a bedtime slot for zany comedy and snappy conversation. For five years beginning in 1957, Paar turned it into a wailing wall; he made Tonight into Event TV by tangling with politicians and crackpots, discussing his young daughter's training bra, walking off the show one night after the censors clipped a joke. And Carson, unquestionably the longest lived power player in TV, bought the wall. Or rather, as his popularity and contract demands escalated, NBC bought...
With his sangfroid and Swiss-watch timing, Carson brought a temperate temperature to Tonight after the Paar boil. But he did more: in his nightly monologue he helped set the nation's political and social agenda. When Johnny made jokes about Vietnam, Watergate, errant Senators or TV evangelists, he enabled the audience to laugh the problem away. "Nobody can figure out Johnny's politics," Leno says. "The joke comes first." The trouble is that Carson's monologues have stayed hip, while his studio audiences have grown duller, less attuned to the issues he makes fun of. The star now gets...