Johnny Carson

by Henry Bushkin

  Like Beverly Hills in the fifties and sixties, it wasn’t unusual in Vegas to see the stars in department stores, buying ice cream cones, or taking their kids to school. The locals left the stars alone, and somehow most of the guests in the casinos grasped that they shouldn’t ask for autographs. Once we were in line at the register at Food King, and the customer in front of us caught a glimpse of Johnny. “Oh my God!” she said. “What are you doing here?”

  Johnny shrugged. “I needed peanut butter.”

  Life during show season had its routines and its rhythms. Opening night was always on a Thursday. Normally Johnny worked when The Tonight Show was on hiatus, but on rare occasions he’d be doing both and would commute by air between Las Vegas and Burbank. Headliners usually worked two shows a night, at eight p.m. and ten p.m. The time between shows was generally very boring. One of my “jobs” was to stay in the dressing room with Johnny during this interval and keep him occupied. Indeed, the only reason he brought me along on all these trips was to keep him company; I was like all those guys on Entourage, except there was only me. And while it usually wasn’t hard to keep Johnny company, managing that one hour between shows was surprisingly difficult. I think it had to do with energy levels—he had been up for the first show; he would have to be up for the second show; he couldn’t afford to relax in between or do anything that would tire him or take the edge off. If we were lucky, there would be something on television to watch. If not, I would try to get him something to eat from the House of Lords, the Sahara’s gourmet restaurant. Sitting in a small dressing room with nothing to say can be a killer. “Let’s not get like Dean Martin and Mort Viner,” I said. “I don’t know how those two guys can have dinner every night and not say a word to each other. They sit like two old ladies.”

  “If we get like that,” he replied, “take out a gun and shoot me.” But it never got that bad.

  Another regular who helped man the dressing room was Stan Irwin, a key figure in the Carson visits to Vegas, someone who knew how to drive away boredom.

  Stan was the essence of old-time American-style show business. Born into a vaudeville family, Irwin had experience in every area of the business. He had been a writer, an actor, a comedian, and an impresario.

  Early in his career, Stan worked the hotels and resorts in the Catskill Mountains—Grossinger’s, Kutsher’s, the Concord (where Carson performed), and Brown’s (Jerry Lewis’s old stomping ground). The Catskills were affectionately known as the Jewish Alps or the Borscht Belt. It was where all comedians of a certain age cut their teeth and honed their craft. It was where Irwin became good friends with another comedian named Jack Roy. Both struggled. The two were drinking one night and decided that things could not get any worse for them, so they traded acts. Jack Roy took Irwin’s act and then changed his name to Rodney Dangerfield, the name of an obscure character on an episode of Jack Benny’s show. The rest is history.

  Irwin produced The Tonight Show for two years in the mid-sixties before Art Stark, and then he left to become vice president and executive producer of the Sahara-Nevada Corporation, where he presided over the hotel’s attractions for almost two decades. Knowing the requirements of every show business job helped him, but the real key to his longevity was that he recognized big talent when he saw it and had the guts to back it.

  In 1964 every one of the Vegas resorts rejected the idea of bringing the Beatles to the Strip; they wanted patrons who were over twenty-one, not screaming teenagers. Never a victim of groupthink, Stan believed that a Beatles appearance couldn’t help but benefit the Sahara, the Strip, and ultimately the city of Las Vegas. He booked the band into the Sahara’s Conga Room. Very quickly the demand for tickets swamped capacity, and he switched the venue to the Las Vegas Convention Center, which ordinarily sat 7,000. Irwin promptly reconfigured the seating to admit another 1,400.

  The band stayed at the Sahara, and the predictable pandemonium ensued, with teenage girls popping up everywhere shouting, “I love you, Ringo!” When the Beatles had to get into their cars to drive from the Sahara to the convention center, Stan and other Sahara personnel had to lock arms to form a human barrier between delirious fans and the Beatles. Only when he felt the surging humanity at his back did Irwin realize that they were holding back a pubescent tsunami. Stan and the Sahara profited handsomely from his gut call.

  Another important member of Johnny’s Vegas circle was Jack Eglash, entertainment director of the Sahara and Carson’s bandleader. Jack was one of the major figures in the history of modern Las Vegas. Starting in 1950, Eglash played in dozens of bands and orchestras, and served as the conductor for many legendary acts. Eventually Eglash became a key lieutenant to Del Webb, one of the moguls who helped build Las Vegas. Jack handled the bookings and talent negotiations for all of Webb’s casino properties in the United States. Noted for an off-the-wall sense of humor, Eglash, a big guy with drooping deep-set eyes, had the perfect personality and authority to manage the performers, their agents, and their families, all of whom Jack had to keep happy. Among the most demanding was the great Judy Garland, who often needed to be hypnotized before she would take the stage. Jack’s hypnotist on call? Stan Irwin.

  In general, Stan and Jack made it a point to be around during the break between shows. When the task was to keep Carson up for his next performance, the prescription was to pack the dressing room with friends. Civilians were seldom admitted, but headliners like Tom Jones, Dean Martin, and Sammy Davis Jr. were always welcome, if only for a few minutes. Stan Irwin was a master at managing these audiences, deftly ushering the celebrity in and then even more adroitly shuffling him out. Usually five minutes was the maximum even the biggest star would be permitted to stay.

  The very first time I was ever in Vegas, I had flown in to talk with Johnny about the prenuptial agreement that Trugman and I had prepared for his upcoming marriage to Joanna. On my first night in town, Johnny arranged for a special booth for Trugman, me, and Bud and Cece Robinson to see Elvis Presley perform at the International Hotel, and I couldn’t have been more thrilled.

  The next night I caught Johnny’s first show. Before the performance, he told me to come backstage right after the show, and I could meet Elvis. It seemed that Elvis would be catching Johnny’s show from the wings, which was the only way he could ever see someone else perform. Think about it. No superstar could ever sit in a show room surrounded by unknowns.

  Almost as soon as I got backstage, Jack Eglash announced that Presley was on his way. Amazing.

  The King came up in one of his classic white rhinestone-encrusted jumpsuits with a matching cape. Without missing a beat, Johnny asked if he could try on the cape. “You know I’ve got this clothing line, right?” Elvis nodded in apparent agreement, being polite without quite knowing where this fast-talking Yankee was going. “We’ve never tried suits with capes before,” Johnny said. “Can I have the name of your tailor?”

  Elvis laughed. “Son of a bitch, Johnny, I can’t do that. The cape is mine. How else will people know who I am?”

  Johnny laughed, and then Elvis continued. “Hey, I hear Freddy de Cordova is now your producer. That son of a bitch directed me in Frankie and Johnny. I liked that cat a lot. Maybe I’ll come visit the show one day.”

  “That would be great,” said Johnny, “although remember not to come on a Thursday. That’s my bowling night!”

  “I’ll keep that in mind.” Elvis laughed and then bid his adieu. “Hey, I loved the show. Got me a date with a casino hostess who my boys are keeping busy till I finish my visit here. Loved the show.”

  I don’t believe Elvis ever made it on the show. Years later, Carson would make a remark that has become one of his most quoted lines. “If life were fair, Elvis would be alive and all the impersonators would be dead.”

  Johnny always had an opening act, usually a female singer. His favorite was the very pretty Phyllis McGuire. She and her sisters, Christine and Dorothy, became known as the McGuire Sisters, one of the top singing acts of the fifti
es, whose hit recordings included “Sincerely” and “Sugartime.” Once a very close personal friend of the mob boss Sam Giancana, Phyllis was then the girlfriend of an oil wildcatter named Edward “Mike” Davis, who owned Tiger Oil Company based in Houston, Texas. One reason Johnny liked working with Phyllis is that she would fly to the site of the engagement in Mike’s Gulfstream, and then send the plane to Los Angeles to pick up Johnny and me.

  Johnny had other openers as well. One day, Johnny got the idea to ask the great drummer Buddy Rich and his band to open for him. Buddy was Johnny’s favorite musician and, with his technique, speed, power, and ability to fashion incredible solos, was arguably the greatest drummer of his generation. Being a drummer himself, Carson was in awe of Rich’s style and command of the instrument. A set of drums given to Johnny by Buddy was positioned prominently and proudly in his home for years—and when I was able to reach an agreement with Buddy’s manager, who happened to be his daughter, Cathy, Johnny was thrilled.

  Buddy opened and was as brilliant as always. He was delivering the goods for Carson’s show, just as we had anticipated. And, better yet, Johnny got to hang out with him, a guy he greatly admired. There was only one problem. Johnny was slightly unhappy with the length of Buddy’s act on opening night. The customary arrangement, which almost everybody seemed to understand, was that the opening act performed for about thirty minutes and the main attraction worked about ninety. Rich stayed on for forty minutes; Carson felt that was too long. “An opener is supposed to warm up the audience,” he said, “not make people restless. See what you can do.” I asked Cathy to speak with her dad to cut ten minutes.

  During the runup to the second show, we were in the dressing room listening through the speakers to Buddy’s hopefully shorter act. Johnny, always fastidious, abhorred creases, and never sat down once he got dressed for a performance. It took him ten minutes to put on his tuxedo and formal shirt with French cuffs and studs, and he and his valet, Jim Brown, had decided to use the start of Rich’s West Side Story medley, which was his twelve-minute-long closing number, as his cue to get dressed.

  We were sitting there chatting when Buddy began his set. The speakers were on low and we weren’t paying much attention. Then after a few minutes, Jim said, “Wait—listen!”

  “Holy shit,” said Johnny, “he’s opening with his closing number!” Sure enough, Buddy had cut the act—by more than two-thirds down to twelve minutes. Fortunately, Johnny got dressed and appeared on cue without missing a beat. After the show, we learned that Buddy, indignant at his reduced time, had quit. I’m told Buddy appeared several more times on Johnny’s show, but the relationship was never the same.

  With Buddy gone, we quickly needed another opener. As it turned out, the ideal replacement was right at hand. The Sahara Girls, a group of beautiful singers and dancers who had been performing as a lounge act, would certainly put the audience in a good mood for Johnny in the main show room. The girls were thrilled since Johnny decided to pay them double what they were making in the lounge. To be more precise, Johnny decided that the hotel would pay them double.

  Another benefit to this change of acts was that Mr. Carson now had twelve gorgeous new friends. Joanna could not have been pleased with the nightly proximity of such dazzling temptation, but that was the thing about Vegas: there weren’t a lot of limits on a headliner in Vegas, but there was one rule.

  No wives or girlfriends in the hotel or casino.

  You never saw a wife on the Strip. It never happened. It just wasn’t done. Maybe Steve Lawrence got a pass when he performed with Eydie Gormé. Even if you were one of the headliners who lived in Vegas, your wife was provided with a sprawling mansion out in the sand to preside over, but she would never visit the hotel. Maybe the protocol was influenced by the old mobster tradition that is part of the DNA of Vegas, the one that dictates that family and work be strictly segregated, but it was made clear early, often, and explicitly that this was the custom on Las Vegas Boulevard: whatever you had to do, leave the wife out. Of course, special occasions were different. Wives and special friends were always expected to attend certain events such as important opening nights and charity events. But they weren’t expected back.

  By the end of the week, the Sahara Girls had so exceeded expectations that Johnny had me give the manager of the girls an additional $10,000 for their work. Meanwhile, he had taken up with one of the lovely young ladies, which put him in a tremendous mood. As for Joanna? “Out of sight, out of mind,” Johnny said with a shrug.

  By this time I had been Johnny Carson’s consigliere for several years. He was still the star and the boss, of course, but the social disparity between us had considerably narrowed. I had been elevated somewhat, in the way Henry II of England had raised up Thomas à Becket. And as with Becket, the king wanted this Henry—Henry Bushkin—to join him in his frolics and his sport. Johnny encouraged me to pick a play companion out of the chorus line. And it was clear he wasn’t going to be happy until I did. He wanted a partner in sin, and soon enough, I acquiesced. Thereafter, while on the road at the Sahara, there was feminine company constantly available for me. This was entirely normal for a star of Carson’s magnitude playing Vegas, but it was not normal at all for a kid from the Bronx. If Johnny was conflicted by any of this, he never showed it. But while I won’t claim I was having an entirely awful time gamboling with a few of the most beautiful women in America, the Faustian pact that this entailed put a serious strain on my real life and my marriage.

  When the performances ended, the night began. For many headliners, that’s when cards, dice, and roulette wheels joined the scene. But neither Johnny nor I liked gambling, so the casino presented little allure. Instead, most of the time after the second show we hung out at the lounge that overlooked all the action. These were some of our best times in the desert. A special table was always waiting there for Johnny, and the waitresses greeted him effusively. We considered them friends—friends whom we tipped generously.

  Carson’s arrival always ignited the room. You could hear the buzz rise and spread throughout the hall. Within minutes, you could see people in the casino edging closer and closer, trying to get a look at Carson and the celebrities who often accompanied him. The civilians would creep all the way to the rail to try to get his attention, and usually for the first few minutes he would be gracious and accommodating, chatting and signing autographs. Once this became a chore, security guards stepped in and prevented further intrusions.

  At his lounge table, Johnny would hold court. Irwin, Eglash, and I were mainstays, with invited guests enlivening the mix. A few hotel executives might gain admission, maybe a few of the right NBC people, other stars who were performing in town, and most important, other comedians, both household names and less-well-known “comedian’s comedians” as well.

  The scene created at these gatherings was beyond anything I have ever experienced, even in Vegas, before or since. Everyone in attendance was supposed to bring new material, and Carson was no exception. Johnny told jokes brilliantly, and armed with great material and freed from television censors, he was hilarious, and he always held his own in the unofficial contest to see who could deliver the night’s topper. Had someone chronicled these conclaves, they would be as celebrated as the witty luncheons that took place at the Algonquin Round Table. These were the funniest moments of my life, and I’m pretty sure they were among the happiest of Johnny’s.

  These sessions often lasted until three or four a.m. or however long it took Johnny to come down off the high of performing in front of a live audience. I was usually ready to drag my exhausted self to bed, but often Johnny was ready to soldier on. Even more than the company of comedians, Carson loved being around musicians, and he often invited everyone back to his house where he and some of the members of the band would play jazz—with Johnny on drums—often until daybreak.

  The journalist Betty Rollin, writing in Look magazine in 1966, described Carson as “withdrawn, and wondrously inept and uncomfortable with
people.” And he often was. But I wish all those who only knew Johnny as shy or cold could have seen him at these occasions. They would have seen him enjoying the company of other people and having the time of his life. You probably can guess how Johnny and I whiled away whatever time remained between rising and show time: tennis. One late afternoon, we went to play on a court at Caesars Palace. We were in the middle of a set when a couple approached to say hello. Johnny politely offered his greetings and went back to the game. As we played, we could hear the loud electric motor on the man’s camera whirring away.

  After a while, we changed sides, and Carson courteously asked the gentleman to finish with his pictures and move on. The couple left, but in fifteen minutes they were back, with the camera once again clicking away. Johnny walked calmy over to the guy—who happened to be quite a bit bigger—and said, “Look, I told you to cut out the camera crap. If you take one more picture, I’m going to take that camera and shove it up your ass—sideways.” This time when the couple departed, they did not return. In all of our time in Las Vegas, this was the only unpleasant incident on the courts.

  The other tennis venue that Johnny and I both loved was at Phyllis McGuire’s house in Las Vegas. Her tennis pavilion was fully equipped with racquets, balls, and even tennis outfits. The staff was always available to assist. Phyllis was a great friend to Johnny and her house offered a refuge when he needed to “hide out.” There were many rumors about a relationship between Johnny and Phyllis, but if it was true, both of them were too discreet ever to let on. Johnny really did like her, and many times he wound up staying at her house for the night. It had 65,000 square feet, featured a seventy-foot replica of the Eiffel Tower, and had steel shutters that could be lowered in the event of a nuclear attack. It was the largest home in Vegas at that time. There was plenty of space for Johnny to get lost in.