Backstage at the Tonight Show: From Johnny Carson to Jay Leno

Don Sweeney

Apr 2006 · Taylor Trade Publishing

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This book is a collection of celebrity vignettes and anecdotes from the peak years of the Tonight Show, and includes behind-the-scenes looks at more than two dozen celebrities, including Joan Rivers, Bill Cosby, Frank Sinatra, Ray Charles, Tony Randall, Don Rickles, Stevie Wonder, Martin Short, Liza Minnelli, Ed McMahon, and Johnny Carson himself. With an eye for the eccentric, amusing, or downright bizarre, Sweeney's brief portraits offer a glimpse at celebrity from the other side of the curtain.

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Ed McMahon was born in Detroit, Michigan on March 6, 1923. He received a bachelor's degree in speech and drama from Catholic University of America in 1949. He served as a fighter pilot in the United States Marine Corps in World War II and the Korean War. He got his start on television playing a circus clown on the 1950-51 variety series Big Top. In 1958, he joined Who Do You Trust?, where he met Johnny Carson. When Carson was asked to replace Jack Paar on the Tonight Show, McMahon became his announcer and they worked together until Carson retired in 1992. He also hosted Star Search, the Jerry Lewis Muscular Dystrophy Association Telethon with Jerry Lewis, and TV's Bloopers and Practical Jokes with Dick Clark. He also appeared in several movies including The Incident (1967), Fun with Dick and Jane (1977), Full Moon High (1981), Butterfly (1982), Just Write (1997), and Bewitched (2005). In 1998, he wrote his autobiography, For Laughing Out Loud: My Life and Good Times. He died on June 23, 2009 at the age of 86.