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How our Maury won $50
from Johnny Carson
By MAURY ALLEN
of TheColumnists.com
“Here’s Maury!!!”
Nah, just kidding. That guy John Carson--I didn’t know him
well enough to call him Johnny--never did introduce me that way
when he brought me on his show early in 1962.
I was a kid reporter at Sports Illustrated Magazine then and
worked my daily beat out of the Time-Life Building on Sixth Avenue
in Manhattan, just down the block from the NBC headquarters at
30 Rockefeller Plaza.
Rockefeller Plaza had always been one of those emotional New
York sites for me as a kid traveling to Radio City Music Hall
for the great Christmas show and a chance to see those well-dressed
Manhattan babes.
It became even more emotional the Christmas of 1961 when I walked
down the street from our offices with a working colleague, a
pretty blonde named Janet Kelly, for the lighting of the tree.
She forgot her coat in the bitter cold and when I pulled my overcoat
off and draped it over her shoulders, she was damn impressed.
I made believe I wasn’t cold as my knees shook.
I decided then and there to marry the girl and 43 years later
I know that was worth that late afternoon chill.
Carson did a show from that NBC building called "Who Do
You Trust." It was a little quiz show used mostly as a vehicle
for Carson to tell a few jokes, make fun of the guests and act
as if he was the second coming of Groucho Marx. The funny Marx
brother created that format.
One day I saw an ad in the New York Times that persons interested
in being on "Who Do You Trust" could fill out a form
and answer a few questions at the NBC office.
I walked over there one afternoon at lunch hour, forsaking the
usual hangout bar called the Three G’s (don’t ask me
why) and filled out the forms. The questions were a snap. What
was George Washington’s wife’s name? How many homers
did Babe Ruth hit in 1927? They weren’t after Jeopardy
genius guys. They were after anybody.
The idea of the show, except for the Carson gags, was to hear
a question and decide if you or your appointed partner knew the
answer. Ed McMahon would bellow, “who do you trust?”
I thought it should have been Whom Do You Trust?
So after filling out the form and catching the show on television
a couple of times in early January, 1962, I forgot about it.
Three weeks later I got a call at my Brooklyn home. My mother
said some guy from NBC was calling.
He asked if I could make it to the studio the next afternoon
at 3 o’clock. I was supposed to be writing a piece about
the New York Rangers around that time for next day’s deadline.
I wrote fast the next day, slipped out of the office, jogged
down the street to NBC, rode up to the studio and announced my
name. They led me into a small room. Then they called me out
to the main studio.
They introduced me to a middle aged woman. She would be my partner.
Some flack said, “You decide after you hear the question
who do you trust.” That was it. That was the preparation.
I knew that if we answered six questions correctly we would win
a hundred bucks. That was $50 each. Don’t laugh. That was
a big deal in 1962 when your annual salary was $18,000.
We stood in a corner, a guy waved his hand, McMahon started howling
"Who Do You Trust with Johnny Carson" and the small
audience of about 50 howled and applauded. Who the hell is this
guy?
He was smaller than he looked on television. He was very young
looking (37 years old I now find out) and he appeared distracted.
He asked what I did for a living and when I said I was a sportswriter
he made some small joke and the audience, well-trained, howled.
He asked if we were ready to play and then asked a couple of
easy questions.
The lady trusted me on all of them and we had five correct answers
for 50 bucks. Now came the commercial. Carson walked over to
the side, had his brow dried, took a couple of puffs on a cigarette,
checked his jacket in a mirror and watched the director give
him that famous four, three, two, one and point.
Carson made another little joke, the audience howled again (trained
seals sound that way) and asked the last question.
It’s 43 years ago and all I can remember is that it was
something about flowers. The woman, who hadn’t said a word,
suddenly shouted, “I trust myself.”
Carson asked the question. I had no idea of the answer. Neither
did the smarty pants lady. Carson made another joke and blew
us off.
Before we left the stage, some guy came up out of nowhere and
counted out $25 for each of us. No kidding. They paid on the
spot.
I stuffed the money in my pocket and raced down the street back
to my office at Sports Illustrated. My editor spotted
me as I slid back into my desk and asked where the hell I was.
They wanted changes in my story.
Carson wasn’t big enough for an excuse in those days. I
just mumbled that I had a bad boiler but I felt better now.
Nobody I knew ever saw the show. It was on live in those days.
Shoot it and forget it.
When that guy John Carson became the famous Johnny Carson, I
always wondered if playing off me helped his career. It happens,
you know. We all have a moment.
Mine came when I lifted that overcoat over the blonde’s
shoulder. Maybe Carson’s came when he needled a sportswriter.
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Maury Allen became a famous sportswriter, wrote 30 books and now writes for TheColumnists.com on a regular basis. He is still married to that gorgeous blonde and, if rumors are correct, very wisely invested his share of that $50 prize. |
©2005 by Maury Allen. This column first posted on Jan. 26, 2005.
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