I seem to be binging old 90-minute Tonight Shows here. This one is from November 7, 1975 and the guests are Gene Kelly, Shecky Greene, Ronnie Graham and Stockard Channing. This is before Stockard had done Grease and she wasn't on the show to plug anything in particular. Johnny would have on guests just because he or someone thought they'd be amusing conversationalists.

I call your attention to Ronnie Graham, who was a comedy writer and cabaret performer…and a very funny man. For a while, Johnny would have him on often to just play his silly songs. I met Mr. Graham briefly on a few occasions and he was just delightful to be around. This link will take you directly to his performance which I think is quite wonderful. (In case you don't know, his second song is about Abe Beame, who was the mayor of New York City from 1974 to 1977. In '75 when this show aired, the city was in the midst of a huge financial crisis and Beame's popularity rating was somewhere below that of flea-and-tick season.)

Or you can watch the whole show from the start below…

Could Donald Trump declassify classified documents just by thinking about it? According to this article and this article, legal experts say no and they point out that he didn't seem to think that when he was president. One should remember that when Trump explains in interviews and speeches how he really won in 2020, he is advancing theories and claiming facts that his own lawyers rarely (if ever) bring up in court.

He's got one set of explanations for his followers and another, very different one for judges…or anywhere he or his lawyers could be charged with perjury. If they ever do assert in court that Trump could declassify via the Vulcan Mind Meld (or whatever he claims), it'll probably just be a stalling tactic, as opposed to something they think is a winning tactic.

Here's a pretty good explainer of how Trump and his attorneys screwed-up by demanding a Special Master and nominating Senior Federal Judge Raymond Dearie to fill that position. Judge Aileen Cannon, who initially ruled in Trump's favor about the classified documents, has been overruled and slapped down pretty hard for her decision…and you wonder if any further Trump-appointed-or-favoring judges are going to think thrice before they bend his way.

This is not a prediction but it's sure looking like the chances of Trump winning the presidency again are getting slimmer and slimmer. But he might just run because of all that donation money he'd be able to pocket.  Lately, it sometimes feels like he cares about that as much as he cares about, say, staying out of prison. And I'm sure we all would enjoy a debate among Republican candidates that included Donald and also Mike Pence.

And finally and non-Trumpian, here's some solid info on the new COVID booster shots. I'll be getting one soon. And a flu shot.

Ah, yes…Saturday morning. When I used to get up, scamper out to the living room and watch cartoons on CBS, ABC and NBC — with the volume set just low enough that it wouldn't awaken my parents in their bedroom. Actually, it wasn't all cartoons. There were shows with real human beings in them. I remember watching Captain Kangaroo's first show. Many years later, I got to meet Bob Keeshan, who of course played that role, and I of course told him I'd seen his first episode. He nodded as if (a) he believed me and (b) he was pleased. He later told me everybody he met claimed to have seen that first episode.

That meeting took place on Stage 33 at CBS Television City where, years later, I went to see Red Skelton tape his TV show and Carol Burnett tape her TV show and I saw Politically Incorrect with Bill Maher there and many other shows. Its main tenant for many decades now has been The Price is Right and at some point — probably because they didn't want to give its host a raise — it was renamed "The Bob Barker Stage."

Amazingly, other shows still tape in there when The Price is Right doesn't need it. I think Real Time with Bill Maher may still be in there on Fridays. I was there on a Saturday morning (appropriately enough) in 1985 because we were taping the wraparound intros for a season's worth of a Saturday morn series I worked on called CBS Storybreak. Mr. Keeshan had flown out from New York to host them as himself, not the Good Captain. Captain Kangaroo had been recently cancelled after almost thirty years on CBS. This and other jobs he did for them were the network's way of keeping him "in the family," which usually means "off the competition."

It only took a few hours to record thirteen intros and thirteen outros that morn. It could probably have been done faster but Mr. Keeshan declined the use of a TelePrompter. He said, "I have to use those from time to time but I don't think I ever sound genuine. I think I always sound like I'm reading."

And then I said, "Well, we certainly don't want to inspire kids to read" and everyone laughed including Keeshan/Kangaroo. The stated premise of the CBS Storybreak series was to encourage the reading of books.

Before each intro or outro, he'd read the script out loud and someone would time it and then say something like, "We need to lose fifteen seconds" and the producer and I would cut whatever lines needed to be cut. Once we had the script down to time, Mr. Keeshan would read it aloud a few times, then step in front of the camera. We'd roll tape and he'd do it from memory. Having done five hours of television each week for thousands of years, he'd gotten to be pretty good at this.

There were a number of breaks for technical problems so there was plenty of time to talk to this man who I can't bring myself to refer to as "Bob," even though he politely asked all of us to stop with the "Mr. Keeshan." One of the first things I asked him about was Mr. Mayor. Years ago on this blog, I wrote the following…

During the 1964-1965 season, he turned up on CBS Saturday morning with a show called Mr. Mayor. Mr. Mayor looked and sounded exactly like Cap'n Kangaroo but he was a different guy in a different outfit and with a different set and supporting cast. (The set had a wonderful, elaborate toy train layout.) At the time, I wondered why Bob Keeshan was playing one guy Monday through Friday and a different but similar character on Saturday. When I finally met him, it was one of the first things I asked about and he told me the following story…

It seems that when Captain Kangaroo was launched, Keeshan had an unwanted partner. I think (but am not sure) he said it was related to the fact that the Captain had evolved out of the Tinker character [which he had done for another station] so someone who had a business interest in that show wound up with a percentage of Captain Kangaroo. As he explained it, Keeshan was having trouble with this partner and finally decided he wanted to have total ownership and control of his character. He tried to buy out the partner's interest but when the guy declined, Keeshan threatened to give up Captain Kangaroo and to create a new character…one in which the partner would not share. The partner said, "You wouldn't dare," and Keeshan decided to go ahead with his bluff. When CBS decided they wanted to add a Saturday morning installment of Captain Kangaroo, Keeshan insisted he would do it as Mr. Mayor.

And he did. It was essentially a way to convince the partner that he was serious about abandoning Captain Kangaroo. "I was prepared to do that and continue as Mr. Mayor," he told me. "But what I really hoped was that it would convince him to sell out his interest in Kangaroo." That was how things played out. The partner sold out his share and the following season, the Saturday morning hour of Mr. Mayor was replaced by an hour of Captain Kangaroo. I always thought this was a fascinating story…how close Captain Kangaroo came to disappearing due to a business dispute.

All the CBS Storybreak intros were done by about 1 PM, which was just in time to avoid the producers having to break for lunch or pay a meal penalty. Mr. Keeshan, who'd flown in the night before and was flying home the next morning, had an appointment to be interviewed by someone for something after we were done. Our producer asked him what he had planned for that evening. He said, "Oh, I'll probably just get room service at my hotel, read a book and then turn in early." I suddenly found myself asking him if he'd like to go to dinner.

To my delight/surprise, he said yes. At 6 PM, I met him in the lobby of his hotel and we walked two blocks to RJ's, then one my favorite restaurants…now, a nearly-forgotten memory of Beverly Hills. I was curious if anyone would recognize Captain Kangaroo in his street clothes and no one did…visually. But our server and the party in the next booth recognized him by his voice. He said that he was rarely recognized in public but when he was, it was by his voice.

He quizzed me as much about what I did as I quizzed him about his career, including the years he spent playing the non-speaking role of Clarabelle the Clown on the original Howdy Doody show. What amazed me was him telling me that during the years he did that show, he assumed it was the end of his show business career and when that gig ended, he'd be going into the insurance business…or somewhere. "There's not much room on television for someone who can't talk on camera," he said. "And back then, I couldn't and didn't think I could learn."

Somehow though, he did. I said, "For a guy who couldn't talk, you seem to have done pretty well." He sighed and mentioned "Buffalo" Bob Smith, his boss on Howdy Doody and its star. "And you know, he still refuses to admit that Captain Kangaroo was any sort of success."

We talked a lot about the current state of programming for children. It did not please him and his views on what children should be watching did not coincide with mine. I kept saying things like, "I watched tons of shows that feature what you call hostility or violence and I think I turned out all right. It's been almost a month since I knocked over a liquor store and shot the manager."

That's what you do when you find yourself in a debate with someone you really like. You try to make them laugh. At least, that's what I do.

But it was a respectful and friendly debate…and he really liked the restaurant, which in addition to great food had a happy, festive mood. The only real fight we had was over the check — a battle he won by pointing out that CBS was paying all his expenses for the weekend. Then I walked him back to his hotel and that was the end of my relationship with Bob "Captain Kangaroo" Keeshan.

It was a very nice evening and I got to thinking about it when I woke up. I thought it might be a good story to post here on a Saturday morning…which I would have done if I'd finished it before Noon.

I can't embed today's video on this site but you can click the link below and go watch it on YouTube. You should.

It's another complete Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson from back when the show was ninety minutes. This one's older than the last one I posted and it even has commercials in it. The guests include Alan King and Raquel Welch (who join Johnny in a sketch mid-show) and Pigmeat Markham. This one aired June 19, 1968 and you'll be impressed with how good the picture is on this video.

Dewey "Pigmeat" Markham was a popular comedian for many years, mostly on the "Chitlin' Circuit" of night clubs and theaters that catered mostly to black audiences. He enjoyed a national notoriety in the late sixties when the Rowan and Martin's Laugh-In TV show usurped his "Here comes the judge" routine and for a while, added him to their cast.

You'll notice a couple of different things about the Tonight Show format. For a time, each episode started with Ed McMahon welcoming viewers and promising Johnny would be right out…and then throwing to the first commercial break. This got a commercial break out of the way so they didn't come quite as often during the show. Johnny stopped doing that when he started getting more competition and the shows opposite him started with the show itself.

Also in '68, Johnny's show wasn't followed by anything that he or the network cared about. Tom Snyder's Tomorrow Show didn't start until October of '73. Before that, local stations either programmed reruns or old movies after Johnny…or signed off the air. As a result, the mood of the last part of The Tonight Show sometimes had a kind of "time to go to bed" mood, as this episode does, ending as it does with the band playing a sleepy rendition of "By the Time I Get to Phoenix…"

The pace of the whole show is a bit slower than later years but there are some fun moments in it, including a Rexall commercial with Louis Nye. Enjoy, won't you?

I just fixed a real stupid mistake in the most recent chapter of the Blackhawk journal. I wrote a paragraph about how I wished Dick Dillin, who drew Blackhawk for several centuries, was still around when I did my silly little run on the comic. Then I decided to delete that segment but I only deleted part of it and then I merged it with another section about writing a story that Gil Kane was supposed to draw but didn't and…well, I wound up writing that I wrote it for Dick Dillin. Which I wouldn't have done because he passed away a few years before. I have fixed the text so it is now correct. Sorry.

Lorne Michaels discusses what's up with Saturday Night Live, which is about to lose a number of key cast members.

Before you read this, you'd be a fool not to have read Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5, Part 6, Part 7 and Part 8. In that order…

When we started doing the Detached Service Diary short stories in Blackhawk, other DC editors started calling to ask me to give Detached Service Diary assignments to certain artists drawing their comics. There was a reason for this.

Several DC artists had contracts that guaranteed them steady work. The minute they finished one assignment, they were to receive a script for their next job. Artists who only make money when they're drawing don't like to sit around with nothing to draw.

So one Tuesday, Len Wein called me and asked if I'd like to have Jim Aparo draw a Detached Service Diary. I thought Jim Aparo was a superb artist so of course, I said yes. Len asked, "Can you get me a script for him by tomorrow?" and he explained why the rush…

Aparo was drawing a book for Len. I think it was Batman and the Outsiders but I may be wrong about that. Whatever it was, Mr. Aparo was about to deliver the finished art for an issue — all 23 pages of it.  All DC books then contained 23 pages of story and the next day, Len had to FedEx Aparo the 23-page script for the next issue.  So what was the problem?  Simple: Len didn't have that script. The writer of whatever book it was hadn't turned it in yet.

Sending Aparo a script to draw was not a problem. There were several editors there who had scripts that were as yet unassigned and they'd have been pleased to have Jim Aparo draw those scripts. The trouble was they were all 23 pages in length. The stories for my Detached Service Diary series stories were six or seven pages.  They were at the moment the only stories being produced for DC that were less than 23 pages.

Jim Aparo was one of those dependable, like-clockwork artists. He penciled, lettered and inked one finished page per day. Len explained to me, "The next script I need him to draw will be in any day now. The way the schedule is, I can't afford to lose him for 23 work days." If Mr. Aparo drew a six-pager for Blackhawk, Len would only lose his services for six work days — and by that time, that next script would be in. Made sense.

Len's call came in about 3 PM my time. I was on my way to a 4 PM doctor's appointment so there was no way to write the script and get it to Federal Express by 6 PM, which was the cut-off time for overnight to New York. Ah, but I could get it to the post office out by the airport by 10 PM that evening. 10 PM was the deadline for Express Mail to be delivered the next day in New York City.  Many a time back then before fax machines and e-mail, I made the drive to that post office to overnight something to a publisher in Manhattan.  I usually got there at 9:59 and the same nice lady each time would take my envelope and sweetly tell me not to cut it so close next time.

I told Len he'd have a script to send Jim Aparo, then I figured out a story on my way to and from the doctor's office and as soon as I got home, wrote a script I thought would be perfect for Jim Aparo. It was a breeze to get it to that airport and into the hands of that lady well before 10 PM. I think I got it there at 9:58. The next morning, Len called to say he'd received it…

…but as luck would have it, he'd also received that next 23-page script for his book. Jim Aparo never did draw that script or any script for Blackhawk.

But that was okay because a few days later, I got a call from DC editor Julius Schwartz, who had the exact same problem Len had had, but with Curt Swan. The following day, Julie had to send Curt his next assignment and that next script was late. Julie asked if I'd like to have Curt Swan draw a Blackhawk back-up. Well, of course, I'd like that. Name me a writer who wouldn't have wanted Curt Swan drawing a script of his. I decided the script that was perfect for Jim Aparo was even more perfect for Curt Swan and I told Julie that Len had a script of mine that was ready-to-go…

..and Julie said, "I know. I have it in front of me. Len's the one who gave me the idea."

I told him it was fine to send it to Curt…and he would have except that the next day before he did, the 23-page script Julie wanted him to draw arrived. So Curt never drew a script for Blackhawk either.

But that was okay because it wasn't long before I got a call from Pat Bastienne, who was an editorial coordinator for DC, asking if I'd like Gene Colan to draw a Detached Service Diary for Blackhawk. I asked her whose script was late for whatever comic that Gene was drawing and she told me. Deciding the script that was perfect for Jim Aparo and more perfect for Curt Swan was super-perfect for Gene Colan, I told her, "Fine…send him my script.  If Julie doesn't have it, Len probably does."

By now, I knew how this would go and so do you.  Gene never drew a script for Blackhawk while I was doing it.  (He actually did draw a Detached Service Diary tale once but not for me. He penciled the one in Blackhawk #211 back in 1965.)  I think the script that Aparo, Swan and Colan didn't draw wound up being drawn by Don Newton. The script for whatever comic Don was then drawing for DC was really and truly late and mine was super-super-ultra-deluxe perfect for him.

In the meantime, Len or Marv talked Howard Chaykin into drawing a Detached Service Diary story which turned out quite well, I thought. I got one drawn by Dick Rockwell, who was then the ghost artist on Milton Caniff's Steve Canyon newspaper strip and I persuaded Will Meugniot, Pat Boyette, Mike Sekowsky, Doug Wildey, Richard Howell, Joe Staton, Ken Steacy and Alex Toth to all do short stories.

These were all artists who were not drawing a regular monthly book for DC so it was easy. The one Mike Sekowsky drew had been perfect for Irv Novick when I wrote it…and I wrote it because a script for another book Irv drew was running late, just as Pat Boyette's had been perfect for Gil Kane because a script for a book Gil drew was running late.

Also, there were a couple Detached Service Diary tales drawn by Dan Spiegle, one of which he finished and inked over my rough pencil layouts.  He made it passable and professional in spite of that handicap.  My time on Blackhawk ended before I could give scripts to Al Williamson, Ernie Colón and Murphy Anderson, all of whom wanted to do stories.

As I mentioned in the previous chapter, there came a day when DC was using Dan Spiegle for so many other assignments that he couldn't draw a certain issue of Blackhawk in time. So what we did was to have him draw a short sequence to introduce three Detached Service Diary stories from the pile of those that had been completed by then. The editor at that point was Ernie Colón…I think. Let me check…

Okay, I checked and it was Ernie Colón and it was Blackhawk #260, sporting a great, generic Howard Chaykin cover. Len, in his capacity as Cover Editor for DC, had had Chaykin do a few of those "it'll fit any issue" covers, just in case. Ernie and I picked the Detached Service Diaries that had been drawn by Chaykin, Dick Rockwell and Alex Toth for that issue.

I've written so much here about how happy I was with how those Blackhawk comics turned out, I should probably tell you about my least favorite story from that run. It was the one drawn by Toth and much of why it was my least fave was my fault.  I'll tell you about that next time.  This series is running way longer than I'd intended…longer even than my run on Blackhawk did.

Click here to jump to the next part of this long, long tale

An elephant got stuck in a muddy trench and couldn't get out. Watch what happened…

• My lawn didn't get mowed this week. I think Ron DeSantis kidnapped my gardener and sent him to Martha's Vineyard.

As I tweeted, I watched a bit of the Alex Jones trial today. Mr. Jones was on the witness stand probably doing every single thing his attorneys told him not to do. If you ever have to testify in a court of law, watch some of this trial and get a good lesson in how not to behave. Apparently, nothing has ever happened to this man that was not the result of large groups of people conspiring against him.

And like you, I've never understood everything Donald Trump says and now it's getting worse. The F.B.I. raided Mar-a-Lago because they thought they might find Hillary Clinton's e-mails there? Isn't that the least likely place to find them? If Trump had them, he sure wouldn't keep that a secret. I think when Trump doesn't know what else to say, he just reflexively says something about Hillary's e-mails.

The next part of the Blackhawk history will be along tomorrow or maybe Friday.

• I watched a little of Alex Jones testifying today. Every time I tuned in, the judge and his lawyers (HIS) were admonishing him to not talk so much.

• Donald Trump said he could declassify top secret documents just "by thinking about it." Barack Obama should announce that he thought about declassifying all those documents in Hillary's e-mails that Trump is still screaming about.

Let us flashback to the time, not only to when Johnny Carson hosted The Tonight Show but to when The Tonight Show started in most time zones at 11:30 PM (not 11:35) and ending at 1-in-the morning. Johnny's last 90-minute program was September 12, 1980 and this one is from December 20, 1979. At the time, it seemed like the shortening — which Johnny demanded as a condition of his new contract — was a bad idea…but he was right and those who thought he wasn't were wrong. An hour soon became the standard length of a talk show.

The guests on this one are, in order of appearance: Bruce Dern, David Letterman and opera star Judith Blegen. When was the last time you saw a talk show make time for an opera star? After her song, Ms. Blegen sits and talks with Johnny…and when these days do you see a talk show give panel time to a musical guest in the latter part of the show?

The guests are preceded by Johnny's monologue and by a couple of segments in which Johnny and Ed McMahon play with new Christmas gift items. Again, talk shows don't do that anymore. Most don't have sidekicks who participate in bits. Most don't do segments that depend to a great extent on the ad-libbing skills of the host. Johnny had pre-written lines for spots like this but he still had to think a lot on his feet.

You may not want to watch all of this but you may enjoy watching some of it…

Was President Biden right to say The Pandemic is over? Well, it depends.

• So do you think Donald Trump's starting to get the idea that if you stick a political ally in a position of power, they just might double-cross you and do the job properly rather than in some dishonest way that benefits you?