Raymond Siller

Long ago late at night, before Jay, Dave and the Jimmys, there was Johnny, a droll comedian out of Nebraska. A demographer’s dream, he evoked the viewer’s father, husband, son, or funny uncle.

On Johnny Carson’s Tonight Show, talent coordinator Jim McCawley’s job was to root through comedy clubs for fresh standup meat. On a November in ‘78, he suggested I stick around to catch the intense young man awaiting the cue to uncork his initial six-minute chunk before his idol.

This week The Tonight Show with new host Jimmy Fallon returned to its storied birthplace in New York’s 30 Rockefeller Center. Jimmy is talented and likable and closest to my old boss, Johnny Carson, doing characters and sketches. Once again NBC ditched