Heeeeeeere's More Johnny

Hopefully highbrow critic Terry Teachout, on his website, has a fairly unobservant piece on Johnny Carson. He wasn't too impressed with Johnny. (Teachout, like many critics, often goes against the mainstream--readers can decide if it's natural or he's pushed a bit by a belief that highbrow means opposition to the mainstream). He claims that just about no one nowadays can quote anything Carson said, and claims Steve Allen and Jack Paar were greater personalities.

Latter point first. I'm not going to rate the personalities of Allen, Paar and Carson. All were different and successful in their own ways. My parents thought Paar superior to Carson, but that's probably because they imprinted on him at the right time. (I recently bought a Paar DVD to see what the fuss was about. What stands out most is how the talk in talk shows has changed--it's much more chopped up and joke-oriented than it used to be.) But Paar is far less remembered than Carson, at least partly because he's been off the air much longer. (Allen did so many more things than host the Tonight Show that any comparison is pointless.) But to believe, as Teachout does, that Johnny, who reigned as king of late night for three decades, was somehow lesser known as a personality is silly. (Which of these three did the Beach Boys write a crappy song about, after all?)

As to no one remembering what Johnny did, I could list hundreds of lines and routines and moments. But maybe that's just me. The bigger point is if Carson is mostly forgotten a decade or so after leaving his post, it's due to the ephemeral nature of the show, not the failure of his work. Everything becomes forgotten if it's out of the public eye. Even Shakespeare would disappear if his plays weren't published and performed. Talk shows are shown once or twice and that's it. (Carson's earliest New York shows, in fact, were wiped by the network, so little was thought of them at the time.) Meanwhile, because of revival houses and DVDs and television, old movies are still well-remembered. And because of reruns and DVDs, people are still holding Star Trek trivia contests, and can quote hundreds of lines from The Simpsons and many other shows that might otherwise seem, to critics like Teachout, pop ephemera.

Reason magazine's blog, Hit & Run, ran a squib on Johnny, mentioning Teachout. A number of replies quoted bits Johnny did, mostly old Carnac. Here's one from "Jens" (please ignore the misspellings):

Carnak: "Ghotzbadegh"
Ed: "Ghotzbadegh"
Carnak: "What does an Iranian farmer do when he can't get women at night?"

Sorry, Jens, that was a Franken & Davis Iranian/Carson parody on Saturday Night Live.