Oddly, one of my more persistent Tonight Show memories involves death. I remember hearing that Jim Henson had died, tragically, from what was called "walking pneumonia." And I was upset — as if I'd lost a friend. Because I'd seen Jim and Kermit and Piggy and the whole gang on The Tonight Show not three weeks before. The fact that Henson was now dead was somehow incomprehensible to me; I'd just seen him, and he was fine. He was on Johnny's show.
But so it goes. And now, Mr. Carson has joined Mr. Henson. And we're all just a little bit less classy, a little less funny, with a little less heart and soul and wit than we had the day before yesterday.
Some of my favorite moments:
George C. Scott, reciting a monologue from Christopher Fry's The Lady's Not for Burning.
You bubble-mouthing, fog-blathering,
Chin-chuntering, chap-flapping, liturgical,
Turgidical, base old man! What about my murders?
And what goes round in your head,
What funny little murders and fornications
Chatting up and down in three-four time
Afraid to come out? What bliss to sin by proxy
And do penance by way of someone else!
But we'll not talk about you. It will make the outlook
So dark. Neither about this exquisitely
Mad young woman. Nor about this congenital
Generator, your nephew there;
Nor about anyone but me. I'm due
To be hanged. Good Lord, aren't two murders enough
To win half the medals of damnation? Must I put
Half a dozen children on a spit
And toast them at the flame that comes out of my mouth?
You let the fairies fox you while the devil
Does you. Concentrate on me.
Richard Harris, telling stories about Peter O'Toole; one of those ended with the immortal line, "It's O'Toole here to see you sir, and he's dressed like a nun." Also telling stories about being in Camelot and about the night he royally screwed the king, a great British actor, when Harris was playing the physician in Macbeth. "How goes the queen?" Harris was supposed to say, "the queen, my Lord, is dead," but instead replied, "oh she's fine, she'll be out in about fifteen minutes."
Johnny in that great Reagan skit.
Buddy Hackett being Buddy Hackett.
Johnny, Robin Williams, and Jonathan Winters.
Johnny talking to a professional football player, one of the guys from back before protective headgear, shoulder pads, and the like. This guy was a legend, but he was also crass and intemperate. He said, "and then we took the G--D----- ball, and we ran it down the field into the G--D------ endzone." Johnny said, "that's a technical term, right?"
And so many other things.
Letterman got it right yesterday, in his statement. All of us who come after Johnny are pretenders. We will not see his like again.
I do find myself wondering what Robin Williams has to say, not having heard.