(applauding) (pleasant music) (narrator) They are the inventors of late-night television.

(Steve) Wait a minute, wait a minute, these bananas are freezing.

(Jay) And the Steve Allen show, it was a live show.

Anything really could happen.

I just couldn't wait to watch that every single night.

(energetic music) (narrator) They could create laughter from any situation.

(applauding and cheering) ♪ (Jonathan) Well, Steve was such a-- I mean, you throw that word around, "genius," but he was.

(narrator) They transformed the art of conversation into a national spectacle.

(Jack) Can Kennedy be defeated in '64?

♪ (Richard) Well, which one?

(Dick) When there were two people on camera you're watching Jack all the time.

It happened to me, I kid you not.

He would come in a nervous wreck -before the show.

-I have elastic stockings on with garters.

And he made small talk just seem wonderful.

Wanted to do a talk show and I wanted to open it like Jack Paar.

(narrator) They had the power to create stars overnight.

-...nobody ever played with me.

-We let you play games with us.

Every time we played spin the bottle-- -I was the bottle.

-He was-- (Tommy) If you were good, you were a hit, and after the first Jack Paar show I couldn't walk around New York.

(contemplative music) (applauding) Thank you very much, ladies and gentlemen, and we're delighted you'll join us tonight for our first show.

(narrator) They became a part of the family.

He was always that nice guy from Nebraska.

Yeah, good to see ya.

He was a very, very uplifting kind of a person to be around.

He was always up.

(indistinct remarks) He never wanted to be the fanciest, the flashiest.

You know, he was always the classiest.

He spoke rather eloquently.

I mean, he knew every word in the dictionary.

That'll be enough of that.

(narrator) They took a simple idea and turned it into a national phenomenon.

(laughing) They don't call him the king for nothing.

Even as a child you know who the king is.

We've got something that's gonna be really, really exciting.

(applauding) (narrator) Together they opened a new frontier on the television landscape... (laughing and applauding) ...and gave us a reason to stay up late.

They are the Pioneers of Television.

♪ -How far is that anyway?

-40 feet.

40 feet.

I did not realize it was that far.

You're gonna hit this from there?

-I hope so.

-Alrighty.

(chuckling) (vocalizing) (applauding) (drum roll playing) (cheering and applauding) (upbeat music) ♪ (narrator) For 30 years Johnny Carson was America's boy next door.

(pleasant music) His ratings remain the highest in the history of late-night television.

(applauding) (cheering) (Johnny and singer) ♪ Oh, the Rockies may crumble ♪ ♪ The boulders, they tumble ♪ ♪ They're only made of clay ♪♪ (narrator) The stage Carson inherited from Jack Paar and Steve Allen was already successful, but Johnny broadened The Tonight Show's appeal and created a national treasure.

Things that people don't realize, as well as Jack Paar did in the ratings, when Johnny Carson came on I don't know if they doubled, but it was pretty close to it.

(narrator) Under Carson late-night television became a fixture of American life, the hearth we gather around at the end of the day to unwind, refresh, laugh.

Are you married?

-Oh.

-Yeah.

(laughing and applauding) I--I see.

(applauding) I'll put that down as a "no"?

Yeah.

-And now here's... -On Carson's watch late-night television reached its prime.

(upbeat music) (applauding) But he wasn't the only pioneer of the genre.

He shares that honor with a handful of other creative talents, who looked into the dark and saw the light.

It's a story that begins even before television itself.

(quirky music) The founding father of late-night television was more accurately a mother: Belle Montrose, widely acclaimed as the funniest woman on the vaudeville circuit.

Montrose never had a television show, but she did have a son named Steve, Steve Allen.

She had a remarkable, sort of low-key, ad-libby, muttered Irish wit.

♪ (narrator) Steve applied the family wit to a new form of entertainment called radio.

♪ By age 24 he was a national figure on the CBS Radio Network.

Steve was probably one of the funniest people I've ever met.

Steve never, when he told something, a story, a joke, a whatever, never had a word out of sequence.

♪ (narrator) But Allen's perfection soon led to a big problem: He exhausted all his tightly crafted material and he couldn't write new bits fast enough for a daily radio show.

He was desperate for fresh comedy.

So I just went out in the audience and began to speak to people at random, horsing around the way I had always in high school and around the house, and got very big laughs.

But again, I didn't know that you could do that for a living.

I thought that was too easy.

(narrator) The technique was a big hit.

Allen had accidentally invented a brand new approach to broadcast comedy, an idea that would later become a staple of late-night television.

But back in the 1940s late-night television did not exist.

♪ (announcer) As in radio, many television programs will come from the especially equipped studios such as this one in Radio City.

(narrator) Television broadcasting had a painful infancy.

In the 1940s, TV sets were expensive and the programs were primitive.

(host) I'm sorry, girls, we'll stay here for a minute.

Speak to me, you.

(woman) Could you rhyme the word "Vincenza"?

(host) Can you rhyme the word "Vincenza"?

Yeah, with "credenza," it's a form of furniture.

You're the lucky mother!

When television first appeared I thought it was a gimmick, like 3D movies, you know?

It might just disappear.

I didn't take it seriously.

I have a nice letter from East Elmherst, Long Island.

(narrator) By 1948, there were a few successes.

But overall the new medium was struggling.

It needed a visionary... (orchestral music) ♪ ...and the savior arrived just in time in the form of a new president at NBC, Pat Weaver, the most creative television executive of the era.

(Sigourney) My father always felt the audience was very intelligent, 'cause I think he thought that television was really like your-- at its best it would be like your own personal rocket ship to anywhere in the world and to any kind of knowledge and information, and, uh--and I think that he-- he wanted to enlist people in that.

(narrator) By 1950, Pat Weaver believed America wanted a few light moments before going to bed.

Anyone who could make you laugh, that was just a gift, and it was something that my father really thought people needed.

-Mr. Lester.

-Yes?

(Dagmar) I'm sorry I came empty-handed.

(narrator) Weaver's first late-night creation was a vaudeville-style comedy show called Broadway Open House.

(quirky music) And the show created television's very first female star, the statuesque sidekick named Dagmar.

In less than two years Broadway Open House had run its course.

(Dagmar) We started at 11:00 and before we knew it we were done.

(energetic music) (narrator) Pat Weaver wasn't sure what to do next, until the night he came across a quirky local TV show hosted by Steve Allen.

♪ (Jay) And there was something sort of wonderfully childlike about Steve Allen.

He--he was like an adult who acted like a kid.

He was loud.

(narrator) Weaver brought Allen's show to NBC and gave it a different name: Tonight.

The show's title was new, but Allen was following a formula he had developed years earlier, an inventive arsenal of comedy that would serve him well for decades.

(Steve) The ice cream.

(screaming) (Pat) And he becomes totally buried in it and that was the Steve Allen Sundae.

I mean, you know, I mean, I looked at it and my jaw dropped and I didn't know what to think, but, boy, when I watched that on television and that camera went in on him, I--it was hysterical.

You know, he knew what he was doing.

(Steve) Will nobody save me?

-Ahh!

-And he did wild, wacky things.

You know, you'd show up and Steve would say, "Well, we're gonna be in a bowl of Jell-O tonight, so just put on that bathing suit," and you go, "Jell-O?"

It was a live show, anything really could happen.

A door would open and you'd see somebody do this who wasn't supposed to be there and he would do the "ha-ha-ha!"

He'd do that laugh and you realize, "Oh, you're seeing something that's happening live that wasn't supposed to happen."

And that was always the most exciting part of the show for me.

-Hey, a pool, hey!

-Sure, you're going swimming -a little later, huh?

-You don't mind if I go in, -do ya?

-Well, we're gonna have suits for everybody in just a few minutes and I think if you would just-- wait, you don't have your suit on!

You don't--oh!

(Tim) He put me in a tank with a porpoise and he said, "You're going with the porpoise and the porpoise will push you over to the side, kinda save you," you know.

I said, "Okay," and I saw a guy standing there with a gun and I said, "Uh, Steve, uh, the guy with the gun, what is he doing?"

(narrator) With just a single-page outline, a piano, and a quick-witted personality, Allen and a few friends would create nearly two hours of entertainment every night.

(Andy) He didn't speak much at all during the day, and, uh, you know, I'd say, "Hi, Steve," and he'd say, "Hi, Andy," and that would be about it.

And then when he got in front of a camera, then he just talked and talked and talked and talked, but he hadn't said anything all day long.

We pride ourselves on the high moral standards of our programs and I mean that sincerely.

We don't reason with the sex, or crime, or violence, or drinking ...on the programs.

(chuckling) Run off, Charlie, look out for these guys.

I remember he would take rock-and-roll lyrics and read them.

I remember him reading "Be-bop-a-lupa, she's my baby."

It was the Gene Vincent song-- I think it was Gene Vincent.

"Be-bop-a-lupa, I don't mean maybe," and then he would look at the camera, you know, and of course it was completely out of context, but those were the actual lyrics of the song.

(hollering) (narrator) Steve Allen wasn't just creating a show, he was inventing an entire genre.

Nearly all his ideas have since been assimilated into the DNA of late-night television.

For example, one night, short on material, Allen started reading actual letters to the editor from daily newspapers.

(Steve) All right, first one's from Manhattan, it says, "I would like to know where Zack Mosley, who writes Smilin' Jack, gets the idea that people can talk while kissing."

(Jay) It's kind of where headlines comes from, from Steven Allen reading letters out of the daily news.

"And Mr. so-and-so says, 'By golly!'"

And he would read the actual letter and they were very funny.

(peppy music) (narrator) In addition to the goofiness, Allen also knew how to play the straight man to a cast of players who all became famous in their own right.

(Don) This is Dave Winkly in Chicago, Illinois, with a diamond expert conducting a diamond inventory.

(clattering) (laughing) -Now back to it.

-Your name, sir?

♪ (laughing) Sir, I--I can't understand how a man can forget his own name.

It isn't easy.

My name is L.L.

Morrison and I'm a television director.

(laughing) ♪ Retired.

(chuckling) Temporarily.

(Steve) Mr. L.L.

Morrison, tell me, what does the "L.L."

stand for?

"Lots o' Luck."

That's the trouble with the children of today: Too many parents out walking on bridges when they should be home applying a little discipline.

(Jay) "Well, tell us, Mr.

so-and-so."

You know, he would do whatever it was and play the straight man, and then crack up halfway through the bit.

That always made me laugh.

(Steve) I'm sorry, sir, but isn't there some kind of a-- (guest) Shut up!

It was like matriculating in a graduate school, uh, for comedy.

And welcome to the wonderful world of violence-- (laughing) (shattering) Everybody was funny and Steve gave everybody whatever they wanted.

Do you need five minutes?

If a guy got on a riff, he would just sit back, and then the laugh, his laugh keyed everyone's laughter.

(laughing) (narrator) Steve Allen wasn't just funny.

(laughing) (soft jazz music) He was also extremely intelligent, deeply concerned about social issues, and the author of more than a dozen books.

He would come to a party at my house and be standing by the fireplace recording.

He was always writing.

-Hi, Steve.

-How are you doing?

Things are jumping here tonight.

(narrator) Long before anyone else, Steve Allen's Tonight Show offered a regular platform for African-American performers.

Allen didn't see himself as a crusader.

Rather, he just wanted to showcase talent, regardless of color.

(upbeat music) Allen was an especially big fan of jazz.

His list of guests reads like a who's who of jazz greats.

Lionel Hampton.

♪ Cab Calloway.

Count Basie.

(mellow jazz music) (indistinct singing) ♪ -The prediction.

-Steve Allen may have been the most versatile performer in the history of television.

But the label of talk show host didn't quite fit.

It's true Allen had guests, but conversation wasn't his goal.

That refinement would be left to another pioneer: Allen's successor on Tonight.

(contemplative music) ♪ (frequencies buzzing) (pleasant music) Young Jack Paar liked to talk.

In Jackson, Michigan, in the 1930s, there was only one way a young man could earn money by talking and that was on the radio.

Paar was one of-- one of the very, very best interviewers of all time, of all time.

He really looked at you and he really heard you.

Good morning, good morning, my friends.

(narrator) Paar's star rose quickly.

By the early 1950s he was in New York hosting game shows and morning shows.

(Jack) Come here once already yet.

Uh, somebody wrote in.

(narrator) But he had yet to find the ideal venue for his talents.

Meanwhile across town opportunity was brewing.

(cars honking) At the time CBS was trouncing NBC on the all-important Sunday night ratings thanks to perennial favorite Ed Sullivan.

NBC had just one big gun to aim at Sullivan: Tonight Show host Steve Allen.

And so Allen moved to prime time opposite Ed.

But first it occurs to me that there might be some people who don't know that Ed Sullivan is on this time.

Do you know that Ed is?

There might be one or two of you.

He has a wonderful guest list-- have you seen the ad in the paper?

Have you seen the ad with all the people -he has on there?

-With Steve Allen in prime time late night was in flux.

NBC tried new hosts, new formats.

Nothing worked.

(upbeat music) Finally in July of 1957, the network would give it one more try, handing the reigns to Jack Paar.

This newcomer was nothing like Steve Allen.

In fact, he wasn't like anyone else on any show.

♪ When critics say, uh, "Well, Paar doesn't do anything.

He doesn't sing, he doesn't dance, he doesn't-- What does he do?"

I think that they're being a little unkind.

You could mention, if you were fair, that I'm always on time.

(chuckling) (narrator) Paar knew his strength was conversation, boundary-pushing conversation.

(Elsa) ...boring composer, I'm sorry to say.

(narrator) So there were no wacky stunts or goofy characters on Paar's Tonight Show.

Instead, people talked.

It was emotional, controversial, and always spontaneous.

(Jack) What do you do for exercise?

(Oscar) I stumble and then I fall into a coma.

(laughing) And now here's Jack.

Doing that program was kind of like riding a bronco, you know, as a opposed to riding a nag because you never knew what was gonna happen and it did every night, you know?

That was--that was exciting television.

(applauding) (Dick) The suspense each day, "What's he like today?"

All of which went into making Jack the most interesting personality the screen has ever seen.

(Jack) May I just ask you personal questions about... (narrator) Unlike most later talk shows, Paar's guests were not pre-interviewed.

Instead, the conversations flowed with Paar's momentary whims.

Fun for the audience, but a challenge for the guests.

With Jack and all of a sudden you would say something in conversation and he would pick up on it and take a turn either way over this way or way over that way, and you had to follow along, you had to go wherever he went.

If you veer away from the expected answer and create something else, then you've watched the guest spark to it, and he feels better and looks better and is a better-- is a better host for it.

So I think the guest has got to keep the host interested.

(Jack) Where'd you decide to do this?

-This is something new.

-Well, I've been in the forest and the-- (Jack) You've been on-- you've been on 3rd Avenue, that's where you've been I think.

(laughing) (indistinct remarks) (vocalizing) (Jack) Took me 45 minutes to get that in there.

(Jonathan) Oh, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, in the forest we don't care.

(laughing) I would be rowing on a character.

A lot of times it would take me a little while to row.

If I were doing Maude Frickert, you know, uh, well, I just, uh-- give me a chance to get into the character.

And his patience would--boy, it'd just go out the window.

If things weren't happening in other words, right away, "Okay, let's forget Maude, let's go right to the sissy Indian.

The sissy Indian?

I want you to understand that.

I believe in being fair here.

(Jack) Be a surgeon, be a surgeon candidate -and create more enchant.

-I was just -beginning to believe.

-I--you'll do as I say.

(narrator) Paar soon developed a stable of go-to guests, like Elsa Maxwell, Dody Goodman, Florence Henderson, Betty White, and Phyllis Diller.

I was so good with him.

We were so good together.

If Jack Paar liked what you were doing, you know, the rest of the guests could come back the next night.

And I gotta tell you, one line just got him.

And I'm the same with comics.

I'll--I'll take one line and think, "Oh, I love this person."

The line he just loved was I said, "This isn't hair, these are nerve ends."

(chuckling) (Jack) Uh, I have a little girl, 9, and your little boy is 9.

(Fidel) Yes, 9, too, yes.

(narrator) Paar's success wasn't just the result of good conversation.

He was a personality who knew how to grab headlines, often by lashing out against his critics, picking fights with the powerful.

Ed Sullivan is going back to cracking his knuckles again, that's noted.

He had fights with Ed Sullivan and it all was front page, and he was television's biggest star.

He played the innocent guy and I would always question how innocent this guy was, you know?

(contemplative music) (narrator) Paar's feud with newspaper columnist Walter Winchell marked a major turning point in American media power.

No one had ever dared criticize Winchell because a few lines in his column could destroy a career.

But when Winchell disparaged Paar in print Paar fought back and mocked Winchell repeatedly on the air.

I mean, I--I can't very well attack Winchell, there's nothing left to attack, he wouldn't have said that, you see.

But I imagine Mr. Winchell sitting there making notes with his crayon.

(laughing) ♪ (narrator) Paar's criticisms effectively ended Winchell's career.

The tables had turned.

Now TV had the power.

He was very, very smart, but he was very emotional, and I think what you saw was pretty much-- pretty much Jack.

(typewriter clacking) (narrator) Paar's most famous outburst came in 1960 when NBC censored one of his jokes.

The next day Paar turned the slight into a national story.

(Hugh) I came to work and the halls were filled with lawyers and reporters and everything.

And I went and I found Jack had been, uh-- he was dressed right and he had had makeup and everything, and he said, "I'm leaving the show."

And, uh, I said, "I hope not, Jack."

And he said, uh--yes, he said, "I've really--I've had it and I'm gonna depart."

And I--I said, "Don't let them drive you off of your own show.

You're the-- you're at the peak," you know.

And he said, "No"--he-- he couldn't be talked out of it.

There must be a better way of, um-- (chuckling) ...making a living than this.

I thought, "Maybe there's a punchline.

He's gonna come back in through the curtains and do--" And he didn't.

(narrator) As Paar disappeared overseas, the press obsessed over every detail, every rumor.

Would he return?

Weeks passed.

(Jonathan) We had a little, um, get-together and he said, "You know, pal, I-- I don't know whether I-- I should come back."

"Well, what is your vice?

Don't be a cry baby 'cause you're making a lot of money, see.

So the guy out north at Topeka who's making, you know, a fast $7,500 a year and he has to sell his equipment to cut back and stuff.

Uh, don't--don't be a cry baby.

Just--just go out there and just have a good time."

(applauding) (whistling) (narrator) Six weeks after leaving Tonight, Paar did return.

(applauding) (sentimental music) As I was saying before I was interrupted-- (laughing) (applauding) (narrator) Despite his return, Paar's intense style couldn't be sustained for the long term.

In 1962, he left Tonight for good, but Jack Paar's legacy is secure, setting the course for television talk.

...having run out of fresh, exciting, new ideas to bring you myself, I feel I should give somebody else a turn.

And I would tell him over and over again what he meant to me and how he helped me and how I admired what he had done, and he--he--you know, he was-- he--he didn't wanna hear it, but he did wanna hear it, and I told him over and over again what a wonderful broadcaster he was.

There's no--nothing like it anywhere else in television before or since.

A combination of neurosis and wit and curiosity.

♪ (narrator) With Paar's exit imminent, NBC executives were deeply concerned.

♪ There was no Jack Paar clone in waiting, but the choice they finally made would forever change the landscape of late-night television.

(laughing) ♪ (uplifting music) The wide open plains of Nebraska are a good place to raise a boy.

Plenty of room to play, have fun.

And that Midwestern boyish charm never left the state's most famous son, Johnny Carson.

♪ Johnny's first step into the world of show business came at age 12 when he discovered a deck of magician's cards.

The tricks came easy, but the real challenge was mastering the audience, engaging them with the spoken word, the monologue.

That was the key to entertaining.

♪ (mellow music) At the University of Nebraska Carson wrote his thesis on comedy, dissecting the structure of Jack Benny's famous routines.

♪ Years later he'd get the chance to explain it all to Benny in person.

-Well, there is one more thing.

-Well, then tell me, tell me, I mean, don't keep anything away from your idol.

(laughing) -Out with it.

-Well, as long as I'm being constructive, Jack, this I have to tell you.

-Mhm.

-Now you may not-- you know, you may not realize this.

-Yes.

-But every move you make, your--your delivery, every little inflection that you have is exactly the way I work and I don't think it's fair.

(laughing) (contemplative music) (narrator) Back home, in 1951 Nebraska, the winds of ambition were blowing Johnny Carson westward.

♪ After college he took his chances on California.

♪ Within a year Johnny landed a low-budget local TV show produced in a basement studio.

(announcer) Carson's Cellar!

(peppy music) Thank you very much, everybody.

(narrator) The inventive half hour didn't get high ratings, but show biz insiders loved the show.

And tonight we've got a variety of things on the Cellar.

Did you see the game yesterday?

Television, the UCFC, USC-UCLA.

(Betty) Back in those days, you know how teenage boys have long wrists and their bones haven't-- they haven't quite settled.

That's how young he was.

(upbeat music) (narrator) CBS saw Carson's potential and gave him a national prime time variety show.

New styles are coming out, there's nylon, orlon, and dacron, and a fellow tried to sell me a suit the other day, was made of 100 percent Saran wrap.

(laughing) Well, don't laugh, you can keep sandwiches right in the pockets.

And tonight Mel is going to try to set a new world record.

But before he tries for that record, I'd like briefly to interview him.

♪ Mel, good to see ya.

(laughing) What do you think the chance is gonna be you'll break that record, Mel?

-Oh, pretty good, Johnny.

-Well, wish you the best of luck, Mel.

(Barbara) To Bobo.

(narrator) One of Johnny's first sidekicks was a newcomer named Barbara Eden.

(Barbara) To Baba!

He was wonderful with comedy sketches and that's what I did with him were the--were the sketches, and, uh, I could be silly and he could laugh at what I was doing, and you know, it worked very well.

I have other plans.

Ready, baby?

(laughing) (narrator) But the ratings sagged.

Carson would later reflect that prime time required too much structure and preparation.

It didn't play to his free-wheeling strengths.

His career drifted for more than a year.

Then, with no other options, he went to New York and took a job hosting a daytime game show.

-It was a comedown... -Johnny Carson!

(narrator) ...but it was work.

-And, uh, Ed, who's first to--?

-I guess they're all set.

(narrator) For the first time Carson had a chance to do interviews and ad-lib with guests.

(Johnny) Things are picking up around here on the show.

(narrator) He was good at it and Who Do You Trust?

became a hit.

Johnny Carson had found his niche.

Do you have any time for hobbies or anything?

-Just a butcher.

-A butcher?

(laughing) And he had this interview and that's where all the comedy of Johnny Carson came out.

Now you're a real butcher you know what I mean?

(narrator) Carson's star was rising again.

NBC asked Johnny to replace the exiting Paar, but Carson turned down NBC's offer.

Maybe he felt it was just too--too much work involved, uh, too much strain, uh, too difficult to do, you know, the nighttime thing.

(contemplative music) (narrator) When Carson declined NBC's offer to host The Tonight Show NBC went to plan B.

They asked Bob Newhart, Jackie Gleason, Joey Bishop.

All said no.

♪ So on a rainy March day in New York NBC invited Carson to Rockefeller Center and gave him one last chance.

(rain pattering) ♪ This time Johnny agreed, signing on to fill The Tonight Show vacancy.

But there was still one big problem: Johnny had six more months on his CBS contract.

(peppy jazz music) ♪ NBC's stopgap solution was to fill the void with guest hosts, making the summer of 1962 one of the more unusual in late-night history.

♪ The Tonight Show staff, including writer Dick Cavett, stayed on to prop up the parade of 17 different hosts who filled the chair.

Most were mediocre.

(Dick) One was so bad and we hated him so much that after the second day of his blowing all our jokes and then complaining they weren't funny, I went downstairs and bought a Bennett Cerf joke book and we copied jokes out and handed it to him, and he didn't seem to know the difference.

♪ (narrator) One fill-in host did excel, winning over America from the moment he stepped on stage: Merv Griffin.

Thank you very much.

(narrator) Griffin had only minimal TV experience as the host of a daytime game show.

But he mastered the talk show role almost instantly.

He was really good and he would've been as good as Carson, I suspect, had he gone in that direction.

We're gonna present to you a sneak preview... (narrator) But after his first five minutes as a live talk show host, Griffin wanted to quit on the spot.

His producer pushed him back onto the stage.

And I said, "Uh, I don't know how to do this.

Just--I want my game show back.

I don't know what--what to do."

He said, "Merv, it's unbelievable.

Get back out there."

And I went, "Whoa."

I went back out and then sat down and did my first sit--sit-down interview, which obviously worked very well, and the whole show was a scream.

Merv knew just what he was doing.

Uh, I mean, he came out and he knew how to do it and he did it and he played it full energy and brightness and intelligence and all those things.

But then the true test came.

I walked to work the next day 'cause I didn't live too far from NBC.

As I walked down the street, every taxi driver was yelling out and truck drivers.

"Merv, hey, that was great (muttering)!"

I go, "Wow, I guess that's fame."

-Hi, Kate.

-How are ya, dear?

-What are you suffering from?

-Oh, oh, nothing, -from a little exhaustion.

-From beauty.

(Merv) But from beauty mostly.

(narrator) While Merv was on the air winning over America, Johnny was getting more and more anxious, unsure if he had made the right decision.

(contemplative music) Just before his premiere NBC scurried him off to Las Vegas to clear his mind.

Carson's manager called Johnny's old friend Jack Narz.

(Jack) I flew into Las Vegas and they had a room at the Sands, and, uh, Tom said, "You know, Johnny's getting The Tonight Show.

He's gonna do The Tonight Show and he is scared to death.

He's a nervous wreck.

And we thought that maybe if the two of you were together for a weekend, you could kind of calm him down and you know, just-- just be friendly with him you gotta make him-- put him at ease."

(narrator) But the Las Vegas strategy didn't seem to work.

When Carson finally made his premiere, he was still nervous, uncomfortable.

His first couple of weeks were rough and acts--and were comics staying backstage and saying, "This guy isn't making it."

Uh, it's almost impossible to believe that now.

(upbeat music) (cheering and applauding) (narrator) The problem was resolved within a few months as Carson gradually caught his stride and settled into the job he was born for.

Did you read the paper today?

Senator and Mrs. Kennedy are expecting their 10th child.

I understand Ethel Kennedy is demanding a civilian review board.

(laughing) (applauding) (man) Johnny made it work.

Johnny made everything work.

That show was Johnny from the get-go.

♪ (applauding) -John!

-That's just the way it works.

(narrator) Early on Carson believed that the best way to survive on Tonight was to make the show seem relaxed and unrehearsed, to not overly exert himself.

That meant putting the focus on the guests whenever possible, help them out, let them shine.

(Dean) How long do you have to wear that brace?

(Johnny) Not very long.

(laughing) Johnny knew how to jump in when a guest was bad or when a guest was quiet or wasn't doing well, and when a guest was doing really well Johnny knew how to just lay back.

He would sort of guide you, you know, in the direction that he thought would work best for you.

That--that's the one thing that I always appreciated about him, you know, he-- What he really wanted you to be on his show, he wanted you to be good and he loved being the straight guy.

He loved being the straight guy.

That--that's what was-- made it so much fun.

I asked you about this before and I think they thought you were making a joke, the fighter pilots.

-You were a pilot, right?

-Oh yes.

I fought the whole war in Oklahoma.

(laughing) And if you think back, and I'm not mad at anybody or anything, but just remember, there was not one Japanese aircraft got past Tulsa.

(laughing) (applauding) (upbeat music) ♪ (narrator) Carson's Tonight Show soon became America's favorite party.

♪ And anyone Johnny invited could become a hit overnight.

His star-making power was unprecedented.

Over and over Carson offered young talent a shot on his stage.

After seven minutes, they were famous.

(chuckling) In from the front of the coach comes this guy.

The guy, he's had a few.

And as he approaches the section where the woman was with the baby he stops and he's staring, like that.

(chuckling) And the woman-- the woman's watching him, she's watching him from the corner of her eye.

She says to him, "What are you looking at?"

The guy says, "I'm looking at that ugly baby."

(laughing) He said, "That's a bad-looking baby, lady."

(laughing) "I bet you save a lot of money with that baby."

(chuckling) "You don't have to hire any baby sitter.

Nobody's gonna bother that kid."

(laughing) (Arsenio) There was a time when Johnny would put on a comic and it would change his career, it would break him if he was on The Tonight Show, his life was, "Pshoo."

(host) The radar tonight is picking up a line of thundershowers which extends from a 0.9-mile south-southeast of Chester, Pennsylvania, along a line and 6 miles either side of a line to a 0.8-mile north-northeast of Secaucus, New Jersey.

However, the radar is also picking up a squadron of Russian ICBMs... (laughing) ...so I wouldn't sweat the thundershowers.

(laughing) (applauding) Johnny always wanted you to do well.

You know, you'd hear the "ha-ha-ha," you'd hear him laughing in the corner with Ed or he'd poke Ed or he'd hit the table, and of course this is a cue to the audience, "Oh, this--you were accepted."

(narrator) Johnny Carson's favorite part of The Tonight Show.

was the monologue.

But the Hudson is bad, it is really bad.

Uh, I went over there, I saw a fisherman today.

He turned his back for a second and his worm made a break for it.

(laughing) I mean, that's-- (applauding and cheering) (upbeat music) (narrator) Carson didn't invent the talk show monologue.

That honor goes to Jack Paar, but Carson made it his own thanks to an inborn grasp of American values.

He understood what folks back home would laugh at and he knew what boundaries not to cross.

But the rains have triggered a whole new wave of ads, which are rather interesting.

Saw one today says, "Girl with wet rumpus room..." (chuckling) ♪ "...wishes to meet man with sub-pump."

(laughing) ♪ He had a great common touch.

He knew exactly what was too much, what was naughty, and what was dirty.

He had a great sense of that.

I mean, if you heard the monologue, you pretty much knew what was going on in the country, what the feel of the country was.

That's absolutely true, to compete in the Olympic Games first the woman has to qualify to make the team, then the go to Montreal and have to prove that they are a woman, and they--they are subjecting the women athletes up there to a--a sex test to prove that they are actually-- They have two ways of doing it, uh-- (laughing) Let me, uh--now let me--let me-- let me point 'em out.

You may have yours, I got mine, uh-- They can either take the physical examination by a doctor, or they can go on a date with one of our Congressmen.

(laughing) (applauding and cheering) ♪ (narrator) Under Carson, The Tonight Show monologue gained tremendous power.

And I probably shouldn't say this 'cause we missed-- we had the Vice President on the--you know, Hubert Humphrey on our show.

(narrator) A joke by Carson could end a political career.

But Johnny never seemed to have an agenda.

He made fun of everyone in power, yet he had limits.

There were lines Carson would not cross.

When Richard Nixon was apparently stumbling around the White House with a drink in his hand, you know, just falling apart, uh, he said, "You know, no more Nixon jokes, 'cause he's a sick man and we just can't do that."

(narrator) Like Steve Allen, Johnny developed a series of sketch characters and regular bits.

Floyd Turbo, Art Fern, and Carnac.

(Johnny) Carnac is attempting to divine an answer while you're sitting here giggling.

-Well-- -May I have silence, please?

(Ed) Yes, you've had it many times before.

(laughing) (applauding) (Ed) No rehearsal, you know, we didn't rehearse anything.

We just went ahead a did it and, uh, those were great times.

(cheering and applauding) (narrator) By the late 1960s, Johnny Carson had become a national phenomenon, the most popular person on television, and the best paid.

But off stage Carson was something of a mystery, a shy man who tried to stay out of the limelight.

Johnny was a very shy guy.

He was a very private person.

He had absolutely no use for small talk.

At a party he would be in a corner talking to Ed McMahon, if he went at all.

I felt sorry for Johnny in that he was so socially uncomfortable.

I've hardly ever met anybody who had as hard a time as he did.

(narrator) But shyness should never be confused with weakness.

Carson knew exactly what he wanted from each person on the show.

When he arrived on the NBC lot everyone knew who was in charge.

We're over there playing and thinking, "Nobody's listening to us, nobody's paying any attention."

And then I get a little note from Freddie de Cordova that says, "Johnny said, 'Don't ever play that song again as long as you live.'"

If you didn't hear anything from Johnny Carson, you were doing a great job.

That meant that you were doing it just the way he wanted it, 'cause if he didn't like it, he certainly expressed his dislike and changed thing.

And he majored in Logic in college, so he could really handle himself in a verbal confrontation.

In fact, he would tell ya, "Okay, you wanna argue about it, you pick the side you want," and he'd take the other side and just demolish you.

(energetic jazz music) ♪ (narrator) Success like Johnny Carson's breeds competition.

Over the years more than a dozen challengers popped up on other networks and in syndication.

♪ One of the first was the man who almost got The Tonight Show himself, Merv Griffin.

♪ Born the same year as Carson, Griffin was a big hit on Tonight in the months before Johnny took over.

In the late '60s, CBS slotted Merv directly opposite Carson.

And he played everything so that he got maximum laughs and double.

He just knew how to do it.

Merv, there's no going back, right?

(Merv) Oh, Jane, don't say that.

(narrator) Griffin handled celebrity interviews with skill.

But he differentiated himself by also booking controversial antiwar figures and building theme shows around taboo subjects, an idea regularly ridiculed by Carson.

And so Johnny used to go on in his monologue and he'd say, "Hey, everybody, be sure you tune in Merv right opposite me tonight.

He has on seven Lithuanian nuns who wanna be proctologists."

And the audience would scream.

But little did he know that, you know, people came over and the ratings would jump.

(Joey) And the guard on the side of the cells were walking by watching him all day.

(narrator) ABC mounted its own challenge to Carson in 1967 by installing comedian Joey Bishop and his sidekick Regis Philbin.

Joey Bishop was a terrific comedian, a great counter-puncher.

In other words, whatever you threw up to him he could make a joke out of that.

He was very, very good at that.

(narrator) A counter-puncher needs a setup man, and so Bishop would coax Philbin out onto the stage during the monologue.

Soon the opening minutes became a two-man show.

He would bring me out to tell him what was gonna happen on the show, but eventually it became more than that.

It became-- I knew what he wanted.

He wanted to be fed the straight line 'cause of his counter-punching.

(narrator) The unique monologue wasn't Joey Bishop's only innovation.

His show was shot in Los Angeles, which meant a steady stream of Hollywood guests.

Turned out to be quite a good show, but never did it get the rating that ABC wanted, you know.

Johnny was tough competition.

(mellow jazz music) (narrator) After a few years ABC abandoned Joey Bishop and replaced him with a very different challenger, Dick Cavett.

If you don't laugh, stay tuned anyway.

It might help our rating.

I think I said, "It's a great job for people who haven't had a nervous breakdown but would like to see what it feels like."

I don't know what you-- what the pros do in a case like this, but my shoe is untied.

(chuckling) Will you excuse me?

(drum roll playing) Oh, that's exciting.

There, thank you.

(narrator) Cavett's show featured a broader range of guests than his predecessors, from old-school favorites like Groucho Marx to youth culture icons like John Lennon and Yoko Ono.

(Dick) You've said you-- somewhere you said you'd like to be forgotten, but now you say you'd like to go out and perform again, -so you can't really have both.

-Well, I can still be forgotten when I'm dead, I don't really care what happens when I'm dead, if that's what you mean.

(cheering and applauding) (narrator) Perhaps Cavett's most enduring episode was a 1971 debate on the Vietnam War featuring two veterans.

Nixon-supported John O'Neill and an antiwar activist named John Kerry.

These acts are contrary to the Hague and Geneva Conventions and to the laws of warfare.

Kerry was persuasive.

The White House was furious and blamed Cavett.

The President's secret tapes revealed his anger.

(ominous music) (narrator) By the end of 1972, Dick Cavett and Merv Griffin had both left late night.

Johnny Carson would reign without serious rivals for more than a decade, until a fresh competitor finally came up with a new angle.

And it dawned on me, "There is an entire world of entertainment that had been ignored by The Tonight Show."

(narrator) Arsenio Hall's late-night venture was an immediate hit, aiming at a younger urban audience.

I didn't want Johnny's audience, I wanted the children of his audience, and that's how I remained friends, or that's how I remained not hated by the Carson regime, 'cause they knew their numbers weren't gonna change.

I was gonna bring people to television that weren't watching.

(narrator) By the time Arsenio hit, Johnny was already planning his retirement.

(upbeat music) A new generation would soon take the reigns, but they were building on the shoulders of giants.

And everybody when they start out they're gonna be different, they're gonna put the chair over there and the desk up here, but eventually it comes down to this, this basic format, you know.

People like to close out their day with some humor, some laughs, and see some figure that they admire, some performer that they like.

I think it'll go on forever.

(narrator) Together this small group of entertainers created something new, setting the templates that still endure.

(sentimental music) He was television's biggest star.

You have to be careful, they dry your sinuses and you know, and your, uh-- What are these things, sinuses?

Not adenoids, what are these?

-Fingers.

-Fingers, yes.

(laughing) (Betty) And you'd come on and you didn't have a clue what you were gonna talk about, and we would just take off and somehow you-- you get into a dialogue and it would be-- it would be fascinating.

(Dick) All of which went into making Jack the most interesting personality the screen has ever seen.

♪ (Florence) He would come up with all these-- these crazy, wild things.

I think he was brilliant.

Seriously now, all right, here we go, now-- (cackling) (Pat) He laughed--he laughed till spittle came out of his mouth.

I mean, he just-- he loved that kind of stuff.

He would do whatever it was and play the straight man and then crack up halfway through the bit.

That always made me laugh.

(laughing) ♪ So on the way down the steps I said, "Johnny, how do you see my role down here tonight?"

And he looked at me, he said, "Ed, I don't see-- know how I see my own role.

Let's just go down and entertain the hell out of them."

And that was the greatest advice I ever could get and that's what we did, I mean, that was his attitude.

That's what he did for 30 years, he entertained the hell out of them.

Johnny was America, he was the Midwest.

Johnny was great 'cause he never lost his sense of proportion.

(cowboy) You can smash it against a man's head -and he won't even feel it.

-Like this.

(laughing) (Ed) In my opinion, he's the best thing that ever happened to television.

He is a superstar, not just one of the good talk show hosts, and he made something out of that job and that show that no one else ever did or ever will.

(cheering and applauding) (narrator) It's a format that remains solid to this day... (applauding) ...an art form sculpted by a small group of talented performers in a class by themselves.

♪ (cheering) They are the pioneers of television.

♪ When our show comes to an end the show is over, we have it timed out to a science.

I simply say, "Goodnight," and that's it.

So thank you very much for being with us and goodnight.

More?

Goodnight.

(laughing) Goodnight.

(laughing) Goodnight.

(chuckling) Goodnight.

(laughing) Goodnight.

Goodnight.

(bright music)