This is Bloomberg Business Week with Carol Masser from Bloomberg Radio. You're listening to Bloomberg Business Week. I'm Carol Masser. Excited to wrap up our day in our week and to have back with us. I kind of say I kind of needed this this week. It's been a little crazy back with us. Uh. It's comedian, actor, writer and author Paul Riser. He joins us once again on the phone from Los Angeles. Hey, nice to have you back with us.
How nice to be back. I have my mug, I have my Man About You mug still on my desk. I'm just gonna let you know, well, we have a deal. You know, I know. I'm really sorry about the emmy. Yeah what I That's why I'm calling, okay, because that was that was your doing. That was your fault. No it wasn't. But we had a deal. Let you win. We're gonna do a picture. I'm gonna I'm gonna be able to hold your emmy and you're gonna get to hold the Man about right. That's right. I'm so sorry.
It is my fault then for not having one. All right, Well, I'll try and find some sort of reasonable substitute. Well, I think you might win for this next project. I gotta tell you, I looked a little bit at it. Um tell us about what you're up to you right now? Well, this is an interesting little journey. UH. I created with a buddy of mine, my friend David Simon. We created a show called There's Johnny, which is UH debuting on
on Sunday on Peacock and it's a weird thing. Well I'll talk about the show, but it's weird because it's it's not quite debuting. It was on another platform. We we we did it two years ago and it was on very quietly so to not disturb anybody. Was not particularly promoted. Just a hint, don't do that. You want to disturb people. You want to make sure you know. You know. That wasn't my decision. They decided they didn't want to bother anybody.
But um, you know, I had always thought that once the show was on streaming, well let's just be there and people will get to it whenever it's always there. And then I found out a few months ago, I go, hey, There's Johnny is no longer up. I want it just because they had apparently a two year of contract of UH deal. So anyway, So it sort of fell into
the ether. It was nowhere, and it was this summer Peacock was launching, and I said, well, this is a show that if any show belongs on Peacock, this is it. It takes place, there's Johnny takes place in nineteen seventy two behind the scenes of the Tonight Show with Johnny Carson.
So literally, the Peacock is in our opening credit. It takes place, it's it's in NB shot in NBC hall NBC hallways and stuff, and uh, extra icing on the cake that since we shot this two years ago, uh, one of our wonderful, wonderful stars, Jane Levy, has gone on to become a big star for an NBC show called Zoe's Extraordinary Playlist. So we call the people a peacock. We said, you know, you have this wonderful star and
Jane Levy, she's also in this show. I'll bet you people would like to see it, and luckily they went, yes they would, So they're putting on which you know, it's one of these sometimes when the shows die, they just die. But this was so good that I it felt it was worth the extra effort to fight for it. I have to say in our planning meeting when we're talking about and that you were going to come on and talk about it. We all watched the trailer and and caught some clips of it, and we all were like,
this is really good. I mean, first of all, it takes us back to the seventies, which was such a kind of iconic era. There was so much going on. But it's also and you must have loved working on it as a comedian. I mean, Johnny Carson is you know, kind of the gold standard in terms of, you know, what we thought about when it came to comedy or really created the world that we live in today. Yeah,
very very much. And I'm all, you know, my class of comedians, my generation, we that was the goal to get on Johnny and for all of us getting on that first time was like the huge reward and it was also the currency that everybody else could understand. So you know, your parents went, I guess my son's not a total loser, and because we just thought he's staying up late and making no money, but he was on the Tonight Show and Johnny liked him, so he must
be okay. But what we did, it's very You're right, it's a very interesting time. Seventy two was, first of all, just when Johnny Carson moved the show from New York out to Burbank and it took on. It's almost like it became in color. Then you know, it's suddenly took on a new life. And it also coincided with the beginning of the comedy scene in the comedy clubs, the Comedy Comedy Store and the West Coast and what we did, uh,
and you know, it's really kind of unique. And we have we partnered with Carson Entertainment Company UM for the rights to use the clips. We have some way little clips of episodes of his, of actual broadcasts that are in our show as part of our show, because we're behind the scenes and they're putting us some when you see, we need to get George Colin, and there's George Colin, and there's Johnny and so for me, you're it was
absolutely a treat to go into the vault. We had this wonderful exclusive access to the vaults, and I would say, well, let's just pick out my favorite. So let's go get George Colin, Boom, Albert Brooks and Steve Martin and it's an interesting thing because for people of a certain age who remember Johnny fondly, it's a lovely way to revisit
and see pieces of the show. But it really ultimately has nothing to do with the show, because it's really about this eighteen year old kid right Lands, you know, through some silly accident, ends up working there and he meets his twenty five year old wonderful Jane Levy, who just makes his head explode. Good. She's unlike anybody he's
ever met. Paul Riser still with us on the phone from Los Angeles, of course, comedian, actor, writer, author, author of several books, and he's talking about the show he co created. There's Johnny. Uh and it starts streaming on Sunday, November. First, forgive me if I called it the Johnny Carson Show. It's based Well, no, as you said, it's kind of the backdrop in the in the background, which is such a cool part of it. I have to say, Paul, it's also kind of neat as you do dig back
into the seventies. Uh, the fashion, the sexism, you know, women not pay the same as men like you have some you really get into it. Yeah, you know, it was it's hard. So many things was so different. I mean it's forty or fifty years ago, but almost fifty years ago. And uh, you know, there's a great scene where Jane Levy goes into Our Boss with Tony. Tony Dan's as the only guy who plays an actual person. He plays Johnny Carson's producer, Freddie Dakordova, and he's brilliant
at it. But there's a scene where she goes in and she complains that she just found out that her her colleague, who's a male, gets the has the exact same job. It makes twice as much and it doesn't seem fair. And you see Tony goes it's not what fair? What do you mean? And Paul, I'm just going to never changes. But it was at that moment it was so foreign. That's like, I don't even understand the question
why would it be fair? Like let's start their um, you know, and uh so yeah, And it was Vietnam and our lead character is his young eighteen year old whose brother is this all American kid who goes to Vietnam, and uh, it doesn't go well so that it impact everything and the part of the fun of the show was taking this really sweet innocent kid played by Ian Nelson.
He's his eighteen year old kid fresh off of farm and threw a sort of knuckle headed misunderstanding ends up working the tonight sho so for him to see suddenly Hollywood and sex, drugs, rock and roll, and women who women who see therapists, and and women who are just you know, you know, chew chew up men for for fun. Um, it's a whole new world. So we get to enter this beautiful, complex world through his uh, innocent eyes, which was a lot of fun to write. Listen, what were
your memories of your first time on Johnny Carson? I? You know, I did it. I did it many times, but the first time I did it was it was a moment that we had all planned for, you know, or dreamed of. We didn't planned for it, but we worked towards it. So it was an interesting, weird feeling because he got there suddenly. He didn't feel surprising. It felt like, oh, okay, I have and I have envisioned this so many times, um, but it was it was.
It was certainly a turning point for every comic. Your first time on Johnny is such an accomplishment and and for me I don't remember ever thinking of anything beyond that. Like that was a far as I could picture down the road of whatever success might look like, get on the Carson Show and then I don't know. Um, but you know, Johnny was such a big part of our
lives as comics, but as America, just for America. He was in our living rooms, you know, and and in our bedrooms at eleven thirty at night for thirty years in a way that as great as Jimmy and Jimmy and and and Steve and and Conan are um, it wasn't the same. He Johnny was singular. He sat on that throne by himself and uh and we also it was when in the very beginning, when you couldn't record it, you had to stay up right, so it became it became part of your life and and like and you
remembered it. So when we were doing this show, there's Johnny, and I was pulling up clips of George Carlin and Albert Brooks. I remembered them even though I hadn't seen them in forty fifty years. Whatever I was gonna I remember this because I stayed up late and it was important to me. So it was really a different time in culture just and how people watched uh television and how we related to people in the stars. And there was a reason Johnny was on top for thirty years.
He was singularly talented. Well, it's interesting that you say that to like, I mean, it's an era where there were three networks essentially, right, three major networks, and you were you know, you watched one or the other. I was just quick googling. And I think they said at that at the Peaky it's something like fifty million viewers. Like to get your head around that, and everybody the
next morning would talk about what Johnny talked about. Yeah, and he also, you know, he had so many skills and attributes, and he was a host, a really a genuine host in a way that it seems almost antiquated now. And he also he avoided politics. You know, he was very comfortable. He straddled straddled the world in a great way. I mean he was hip, you know, hip people liked him, and very conventional rural you know he was he was Nebraska and he was also New York. He was um
and you never knew his politics. We would have an episode where somebody does you know, slips in an anti Nixon Joe and the producer gets incensed and said, how dare you you know you don't know Johnny, Johnny, do you have any idea what Johnny Carson actually thinks. No, that's right because he doesn't tell you, and it's not. But nobody's a business and he that was part of
his appeal that everybody came to the tent um. He would poke fund and you know, a Democratic and Republicans, but gently it was never really um pointed and that level of um diplomacy that kind of is really does feel like a bygone era and it's it's refreshing to see when you watched Johnny go, oh, do you remember when things seemed simpler and and he kind of did you know, he kind of did put you to bed every night you took, you know, whether you were watching
or just had it on the background. Johnny was how you round it off your day and the world seemed a little better and you had a couple of jokes to start your morning. And remember Johnny joke last night, and uh, it was a big deal. It was a big deal. So I'm thrilled the show is getting in
a second life. Well, like I said, we've been talking about it, uh here at Bloomberg because it really just seems like such a nice, what a great piece of content to like kind of come out of this time, Like you said, it's a different, different era, but it's just it's really fun and to see somebody come from like you said, somebody who wasn't used to the big cities and then be on a show that he would watch,
it's just a really cool thing. How much did you do did you need to do research into the show to kind of put it together, kind of understand the behind the scenes, and we just have about a minute left. Yeah, we well, we partnered with Carson's Company and which is run by uh fellow named Jeff Sting who was a producer on the original Tonight Show and was Johnny's nephew.
So he got us access to you know, the blueprints to the set and so and you know what cameras were used, and we would check everything, did they where would a guy stand? Where would Johnny saying? Where would the producers stand? So we we kept it as authentic as we possibly could, and and uh, we we wanted to be vigilant and we were all sort of reverential
about keeping it real. Well, I have to say we wish you good luck with it, and um, I hope you come back and let us know how it's all going, and you're working at you come by and I will hold up your coffee log, give it up any list, Okay deal, I'm going to hold it to it. You'll get that and you deserve it, all right, Be well. Paul Riser, comedian, actor, writer and author. Check out coming
to Peacock on Sunday, November one. It's called Theer's Johnny, and check out the trailer because it really looks like a fun show to watch.