Watching Tonight's Tonight Show…

And I see someone there had the sense to edit in a little of the clip of Carson going across the hall to interrupt Rickles during his C.P.O. Sharkey taping. They didn't run it when I saw the show taped earlier today.

By the way: This will only be of interest to about three of you but I was watching the night it originally occurred, and the entire segment was covered by the Tonight Show cameras, so you saw it as shot from the hallway. When Carson reran the incident on his anniversary shows, they always used the feed from the cameras in the C.P.O. Sharkey studio. In the clip they ran tonight on The Tonight Show, they were using the feed from the Tonight Show cameras again, meaning that someone went back to the original footage in the Carson archives. For some reason, I like that.

I wish someone would try marketing all that material in its original form. After retirement, Johnny reportedly became quite determined to find a way to keep his old shows before the public and to make money off them. Unfortunately, they kept trying to put out edited versions, emphasizing comedy sketches or stand-up spots and such, and they never attracted an audience. I don't think that material works well when it's taken out of its quasi-live context. What we'd really like to see is the old shows in their original form, especially with monologues intact. Maybe someday, someone will start The Talk Show Channel and run old Carson shows (and Merv and Dick and Mike, etc.) intact.