Jack Paar hosted his last Tonight Show on March 29, 1962 and Johnny Carson hosted his first on October 1st of that year.
Why the gap? Carson still had several months on his contract to host the afternoon game show Who Do You Trust? on ABC. It was commonly reported that the network refused to let him out early but as I understand it, it never really got to the point of ABC saying yes or no. Don Fedderson, who produced Who Do You Trust?, didn't want to let Johnny go before he had to…so that was that. By some accounts, ABC told Johnny, "If it were up to us, we'd be glad to let you go," which of course doesn't mean they really would have.
So how did NBC fill those twenty-six weeks? With guest hosts. The program was hosted during that period by Art Linkletter (4 weeks), Merv Griffin (4 weeks), Hugh Downs (2 weeks), Joey Bishop (2 weeks), Bob Cummings, Jack Carter, Jan Murray, Peter Lind Hayes, Soupy Sales, Mort Sahl, Steve Lawrence, Jerry Lewis, Jimmy Dean, Arlene Francis, Jack E. Leonard, Groucho Marx, Hal March and Donald O'Connor.
Those shows are apparently lost. I saw one of them. My parents let me stay up late on the Friday night that concluded Soupy Sales's week and I recall being disappointed that it was not my Soupy. He did it in a suit without puppets, pies or his signature routines.
The 26 weeks of fill-in hosts reportedly disappointed most folks. Merv Griffin and Jerry Lewis both did well enough with theirs to get offers to do their own talk shows but extant reviews and memories suggest most of the hosts didn't make much effort to do anything more than plug — in some cases, relentlessly — their other gigs. Carson was reportedly so distressed at what he saw when he tuned in that he repeatedly called NBC and warned them those hosts were killing the time slot he was about to inherit by filling it with commercials instead of entertainment.
Why do I bring this up now? Well, I'm watching with some fascination the fill-in hosts of The Late Late Show on CBS while it awaits the arrival of its new host, James Corden. Drew Carey hosted the first week and he did talk a lot about The Price is Right — and brought along his announcer from that show, George Gray, who contributed a couple of great quips. Carey had some sharp monologues but the rest of the program, he acted like he had someone waiting for him in a restaurant across the street and was in a hurry to get to them.
Mr. Carey, of course, is not auditioning for much of anything else. Monday and Tuesday this week, Jim Gaffigan hosted and he brought along his whole family. His wife co-hosted and he had his five children involved. His guests Monday were the stars of his upcoming sitcom on TV Land and they spent most of the time plugging that enterprise. I generally like Gaffigan as a stand-up but if I were James Corden, I would have made one of those calls like Johnny did.
Last night, the Gaffigan family turned to other topics and delivered a decent show, mostly due to funny contributions from their lead guest, Sarah Silverman. Tonight, they have on Adam Goldberg, David Koechner and Tig Notaro, and the rest of the week is hosted by Judd Apatow, probably with none of his relatives assisting.
In the meantime, CBS seems to be swapping hosts around madly. The taping schedule said that Billy Gardell was hosting two shows taping next Monday and Tuesday, while Kunal Nayaar was to host three shows taping Wednesday through Friday. But the current broadcast schedule says Monday and Tuesday are hosted by Regis Philbin, Wednesday and Thursday are Whitney Cummings and Friday is Adam Pally. Up until yesterday, the announced schedule said Philbin on Monday and the rest of the week, TBD.
The broadcast schedule says that Nayaar is hosting February 23, 26 and 27 while Gardell is hosting February 24 and 25. Drew Carey returns March 2 through 6 and they already have three shows with him they taped last week. It's very confusing and I'm wondering if they're really changing things around on the fly like this or if the announced schedules have just been premature and inaccurate.
As a longtime fan of talk shows, I'm curious as to what all these different folks will do with the opportunity. I'm guessing Regis isn't auditioning for anything. I also note that he isn't taking any chances, guest-wise. Monday, he has Martin Short, Alan Alda, Tony Danza and Susan Sarandon. A rhesus monkey could host a decent talk show with just the first two of those folks as guests, let alone all four. (Mr. Apatow is taking out the same kind of insurance. Thursday night, he has Adam Sandler, Lena Dunham and Maria Bamford; Friday night is Garry Shandling, Jeff Goldblum and Ryan Adams. In ten years, Craig Ferguson never had lineups like these.)
But Regis aside, some of the other hosts doubtlessly see this as a chance to show what they might do with a regular show of this kind…or even this one if Mr. Corden crashes and explodes. I wonder if any of them have the power to reshape the show for a night or two into something different or if the people in charge are demanding consistency.
That would be a shame because the Talk Show World really needs someone to come in and do a show that isn't just a guy behind a desk turning to someone in the guest chair and saying, "So, tell me about your new movie." I hope James Corden will be that but it would be nice to see someone before him seize that opportunity.