Here's a short clip, date unknown, of The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson. Johnny does a great, Carsonesque "take" when he notices that Tommy Newsom is filling in as bandleader for Doc Severinsen. He says he was unaware Doc was off…but then he segues into prepared material (which he, of course, approved) that makes fun of Tommy. Kinda makes you think he did know Doc was off, doesn't it?
For a long time on Johnny's show, the line of succession worked like this: Ed McMahon was, of course, the announcer. Doc was Musical Director. Tommy was a band member and Doc's assistant, and he also supervised most of the band's arrangements. If Doc had the night off, Tommy would lead the band. If Ed had the night off, Doc would rotate over to serve as announcer and Tommy would lead the band. There was also a third-position band member named Shelly Cohen who occasionally led the band if Doc and Tommy were out at the same time…and there was at least one night when Ed and Doc were away so Tommy served as announcer and Shelley led the band.
One day, Johnny decided to change this. Ed was often off doing Star Search or those sweepstakes commercials or hosting corporate events for Budweiser or other extra-curricular activities so he was frequently absent when Johnny hosted. He was finally told he had to rearrange things and always be there for Mr. Carson. Ed, who knew darn well why he had a career, immediately complied.
Doc was apparently told the same thing and he also began canceling outside gigs with a band he had called Xebron. At the same time, Johnny decided to stop featuring Tommy Newsom on the show, either as a bandleader or as he'd occasionally been used, as a sketch player. Tommy was relegated back to his musician function and thereafter, he only led the band if Doc had to be away due to some personal emergency. I'm not sure there was one for the rest of Johnny's run. Ed still did some outside jobs but only when Leno hosted and on those nights, Doc would serve as bandleader and announcer.
As a devout Carson fan/expert, I was always curious about what triggered the new policy…why suddenly, Johnny decided his crew had to show up for work. And was there some incident that soured him on Mr. Newsom to the point where he didn't even want him fronting the band on Leno nights? Years later, I asked a few folks who'd worked then at The Tonight Show, including Fred DeCordova, and got a lot of shrugs and comments like "That's how Johnny operated." He would suddenly decide something had to be changed and he'd change it.
The end to Ed's and Doc's nights off was probably just because Johnny felt he should have his "A" Team around. Perhaps Tommy's exile had something to do with Johnny's fears that his audience was skewing too old. I can't imagine that he decided Tommy wasn't a good foil to bounce jokes off of. Take a look at this clip…
