The passing of Adolph Green reminds me of one of my all-time favorite Johnny Carson ad-libs. It occurred back when Mr. Green's loving spouse — singer-actress Phyllis Newman — was a regular guest on The Tonight Show. Apparently, they needed a quick cash infusion in the Green household, so Phyllis came up with an idea to boost her hubby's ASCAP rating. She had an arranger she knew assemble a medley of a few dozen songs for which Adolph had written lyrics.
So she goes on Mr. Carson's program and sings this shameless montage of her husband's hits, tied together by an autobiographical theme. She sings of how she came to "New York, New York" and it was her "Never Never Land" where she found Adolph "Just In Time" and felt "Lucky To Be Me" because she'd learned to "Make Someone Happy" but now "The Party's Over," et cetera, et cetera. At the close of all this, she took her bow, went over and sat in the guest chair next to the host.
Johnny turned to her and said, "It's too bad you didn't marry Irving Berlin. You could have finished with 'God Bless America.'"