http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/news/tv/la-et-0811-carson-20100811,0,272413.story
Here's Johnny, digitized: A searchable database created for Carson's 'Tonight Show'
The search tool for existing footage will be available for professional use, but many clips will also be posted for public viewing.
Matea Gold, Los Angeles Times
August 11, 2010
Johnny Carson is getting an upgrade for the YouTube era.
Carson Entertainment Group, which owns the archive of the late-night host's 30 years on "The Tonight Show," is set to announce Wednesday that it has digitized all 3,300 hours of existing footage from the program and created a searchable online database for producers and researchers.
The library will initially be available just for professional clip-licensing purposes, but the company also plans to release 50 full-format shows on DVD and post a rotating series of historic clips for public viewing on http://www.johnnycarson.com.
The project was spurred by Jeff Sotzing, Carson's nephew and president of Carson Entertainment, who said the continuing high demand for "Tonight Show" clips prompted him to seek a way to make the footage more accessible for both historic and commercial purposes.
"It's amazing to me that even being off the air for 18 years, there's still so much interest in this material," he said.
Carson remains a singular figure because he served as a cultural touchstone during his three decades on the air, said Rick Ludwin, NBC's executive vice president in charge of late-night series.
"That desk and that chair and the couch and the monologue and the band became as familiar as furniture in your own living room," he said. "When any motion picture or documentary wants to put something in historical perspective, they often want to have a Johnny Carson joke from that era."
That's in part because Carson's "Tonight Show" logged more than 22,000 guests during his tenure. "Everybody who was involved in public life seems to have appeared on that show," said David Bushman, television curator at the Paley Center for the Media.
And the wry host, who died in 2005 at age 79, was viewed as a bellwether of public opinion: His jokes about Watergate marked a turning point for President Nixon.
Carson did not originally own the rights to his show, but was eventually able to negotiate full ownership in 1980 during a protracted contract dispute with NBC. At the time, "The Tonight Show" generated almost a fifth of the network's profit from advertising revenue.
Before the digitization project, Carson Entertainment already had compiled a database listing the guests on each show and outlines of the topics of Carson's daily monologue. But if producers wanted to find a mention of a subject or a person, they often had to screen hours of footage, hoping to stumble upon the right reference.
Now a searchable transcript of each show will allow researchers to instantly pull up the corresponding clip by typing a name, key word or date.
"I think it's an extraordinary advancement in terms of using digital media in order to facilitate access of all different sorts," said Bushman, who recently searched the museum's Carson archives for a project on the late New York Mayor John Lindsay. "We had to do it the old-fashioned way. If we had had access to this, it would have been spectacular."
Modern-day television shows are routinely converted to digital now and posted online, but the ease of search varies. Most networks keep internal transcripts of interview programs and newscasts, indexed with the corresponding time code of the footage. Some go further: On MSNBC.com, visitors can view searchable transcripts alongside individual clips, synced to the video. But the comprehensiveness of the Carson library exceeds that of most archives, including that of the current "Tonight Show," which keeps transcripts of Jay Leno's monologues, but not guest appearances.
The digitization process took about nine months and was done by Deluxe Archive Solutions, which works with many Hollywood studios to preserve their film and television libraries.
The video footage was trucked securely from where it had been stored in an underground salt mine in Kansas to a facility in Burbank, where a high-speed "tape robot" transferred each tape to a digital format. Then a team of transcribers logged more than 1 million words of dialogue and tagged each show by key word, guest and musical number.
"We feel we're evangelists out there telling people this is what you are going to need to do in this new era of content consumption," said Tyler Leshney, vice president of Deluxe Archive Solutions. "People don't want to sift through two hours to find five minutes they're searching for."
The more searchable content, the more valuable it becomes, Leshney noted. Though researchers will have access to the Carson library for free, Carson Entertainment will charge a licensing fee to use each clip based on the type of project.
Not every moment of Carson's reign on "The Tonight Show" is available. The original videos from 1962 to 1972 were recorded over by NBC at the time, a common practice then because tape was so expensive, Ludwin said. All that is left from that era are some grainy black-and-white kinescope clips, taken by a film camera pointed at a television set.
But the digitization process helped unearth some original footage thought to be lost, including a famous 1973 clip of Carson pretending to eat dog food during a live Alpo commercial after the dog refused the meal, before thought to exist only in grainy kinescope.
Such moments have the makings of instant viral videos, but Deluxe Archive Solutions took several security measures to ensure that the clips can't be disseminated without permission, including embedding each with a large, yellow "Carson" watermark.
Sotzing said that Carson would have found the digitization project fascinating.
"He was a guy who loved technology and was always interested in watching old shows," he said. "And the ability to get this stuff immediately, he'd love that."
Showing posts with label Johnny Carson. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Johnny Carson. Show all posts
Friday, August 20, 2010
Monday, June 29, 2009
Ed McMahon: A salute to the king of sidekicks
http://www.latimes.com/news/obituaries/la-et-ed-mcmahon24-2009jun24,0,2998712.story
Ed McMahon: A salute to the king of sidekicks
The late TV personality did other things, yes, but his greatest accomplishment may have been his partnership with Johnny Carson. 'My role was to make him look good while not looking too good myself.'
By Robert Lloyd, Times Television Critic
June 23, 2009
Although he did other things in his 86 years, Ed McMahon, who died Tuesday in Los Angeles, will be remembered mostly as the man who sat next to Johnny Carson, except when more important celebrities came between them.
Notwithstanding the dozen years of hosting "Star Search," a role in the 1997 Tom Arnold sitcom "The Tom Show," a high-profile Cash4Gold ad during the last Super Bowl and all that knocking on people's doors in the name of American Family Publishers, McMahon was a professional sidekick, a less-than-equal partner in an enterprise of which he was nevertheless a vital part: Thinking of Johnny, one proceeds quickly and naturally to Ed, who by dint of association was almost as famous as his boss -- I say "almost" to include that fraction of the world that may have seen or heard of Carson but never watched his show.
It's easy to underestimate his accomplishment -- or even to wonder whether it should be called an accomplishment at all. We live in a nation of aspiring quarterbacks, pitchers, lead singers and presidents, where we are told to dream big and have it all. (The vice presidency of the United States is regarded as a rarefied form of failure.) But in a world where everyone is innately a star, what does it mean to settle for life as a mere moon?
And yet, just as the moon plays upon the Earth, animating its tides and its werewolves, the sidekick is not without power of his (or her) own. His very presence is the proof that his presence is required. He may come as a straight man, a stooge, a teacher, an apprentice, a servant or pal, but he completes the star-hero in some way to their mutual advantage -- as a counterweight, an anchor, a witness, a frame for the picture, a setting for the stone. Like Jiminy Cricket, a conscience. Who is Prince Hal without Falstaff, Don Quixote sans Sancho Panza? Little John and Robin Hood, Horatio and Hamlet, Friday and Crusoe, Watson and Holmes, Tinkerbell and Peter Pan, Ethel and Lucy, Barney and Fred, Barney and Andy, Ed and Ralph, Rhoda and Mary, Willow and Buffy, and all those traveling companions to Doctor Who -- unequal, perhaps, yet inextricable.
We may reflexively regard him as slower, dumber, less handsome than the hero he shadows, but in practice the sidekick may be the smarter, funnier, faster, better-looking or more practical one. Less bound by convention or expectation, flexible rather than stiff-necked, he is free in ways forbidden the hero. His life is simpler, his soul less troubled. Ed Norton may be a dimwit, but he isn't tormented, like Ralph Kramden, by desperation and desire. Spock is cooler than Kirk. It seems like the better job.
Not every talk show host has employed a sidekick in the McMahon mold. Merv Griffin had Arthur Treacher, a very tall British character actor who earlier specialized in butlers, appropriately, and, after McMahon, the best of the breed. Regis Philbin played second banana to Rat Packer Joey Bishop on his short-lived 1960s late-night show. But Dick Cavett was a solo act; Mike Douglas relied on changing celebrity co-hosts; and Jay Leno had no one on his couch. Still, it seems a sign of respect to McMahon (and to the institution he served) that when Conan O'Brien took the reins of "The Tonight Show," he had a partner in place, original "Late Night" sidekick Andy Richter.
Ed and Johnny were "as close as two non-married people can be," as McMahon wrote in his book, "Here's Johnny: Memories of Johnny Carson, 'The Tonight Show' and 46 Years of Friendship." McMahon, who was only two years older than Carson, began working as his announcer in in 1957, on the game show "Who Do You Trust?" and accompanied him to "The Tonight Show" in 1962, where they kept on for 30 years.
An uncharitable or undiscerning critic might say McMahon had an easy job: Laugh at the boss' jokes, read a few cue cards, sell a little dog food, cheerfully absorb whatever cracks are made at his expense, slide further down the couch as the evening's guests arrive. (Phil Hartman's "Saturday Night Live" impression of him -- the over-hearty laugh, the booming "You are correct, sir" -- has replaced the actual McMahon in the minds of a couple of generations of viewers.) But the way McMahon told it, that was the point: "My role was to make him look good while not looking too good myself," he wrote, and "to get Johnny to the punch line while seeming to do nothing at all." Carson, for his part, left the air saying, "This show would have been impossible to do without Ed."
There is a kind of genius in knowing how to live with a genius. Did anyone want to grow up to be Ed McMahon? Maybe not. (Though I would rather be Illya Kuryakin than Napoleon Solo.) But they also serve who only sit and laugh -- and cry "Hey-yo!" once in a while. Of all the things Ed provided Johnny, continuity was perhaps the most meaningful: Guests came and went; wives came and went; the world turned. But where there was Johnny, there was always Ed, the witness, the audience, one of us.
Ed McMahon: A salute to the king of sidekicks
The late TV personality did other things, yes, but his greatest accomplishment may have been his partnership with Johnny Carson. 'My role was to make him look good while not looking too good myself.'
By Robert Lloyd, Times Television Critic
June 23, 2009
Although he did other things in his 86 years, Ed McMahon, who died Tuesday in Los Angeles, will be remembered mostly as the man who sat next to Johnny Carson, except when more important celebrities came between them.
Notwithstanding the dozen years of hosting "Star Search," a role in the 1997 Tom Arnold sitcom "The Tom Show," a high-profile Cash4Gold ad during the last Super Bowl and all that knocking on people's doors in the name of American Family Publishers, McMahon was a professional sidekick, a less-than-equal partner in an enterprise of which he was nevertheless a vital part: Thinking of Johnny, one proceeds quickly and naturally to Ed, who by dint of association was almost as famous as his boss -- I say "almost" to include that fraction of the world that may have seen or heard of Carson but never watched his show.
It's easy to underestimate his accomplishment -- or even to wonder whether it should be called an accomplishment at all. We live in a nation of aspiring quarterbacks, pitchers, lead singers and presidents, where we are told to dream big and have it all. (The vice presidency of the United States is regarded as a rarefied form of failure.) But in a world where everyone is innately a star, what does it mean to settle for life as a mere moon?
And yet, just as the moon plays upon the Earth, animating its tides and its werewolves, the sidekick is not without power of his (or her) own. His very presence is the proof that his presence is required. He may come as a straight man, a stooge, a teacher, an apprentice, a servant or pal, but he completes the star-hero in some way to their mutual advantage -- as a counterweight, an anchor, a witness, a frame for the picture, a setting for the stone. Like Jiminy Cricket, a conscience. Who is Prince Hal without Falstaff, Don Quixote sans Sancho Panza? Little John and Robin Hood, Horatio and Hamlet, Friday and Crusoe, Watson and Holmes, Tinkerbell and Peter Pan, Ethel and Lucy, Barney and Fred, Barney and Andy, Ed and Ralph, Rhoda and Mary, Willow and Buffy, and all those traveling companions to Doctor Who -- unequal, perhaps, yet inextricable.
We may reflexively regard him as slower, dumber, less handsome than the hero he shadows, but in practice the sidekick may be the smarter, funnier, faster, better-looking or more practical one. Less bound by convention or expectation, flexible rather than stiff-necked, he is free in ways forbidden the hero. His life is simpler, his soul less troubled. Ed Norton may be a dimwit, but he isn't tormented, like Ralph Kramden, by desperation and desire. Spock is cooler than Kirk. It seems like the better job.
Not every talk show host has employed a sidekick in the McMahon mold. Merv Griffin had Arthur Treacher, a very tall British character actor who earlier specialized in butlers, appropriately, and, after McMahon, the best of the breed. Regis Philbin played second banana to Rat Packer Joey Bishop on his short-lived 1960s late-night show. But Dick Cavett was a solo act; Mike Douglas relied on changing celebrity co-hosts; and Jay Leno had no one on his couch. Still, it seems a sign of respect to McMahon (and to the institution he served) that when Conan O'Brien took the reins of "The Tonight Show," he had a partner in place, original "Late Night" sidekick Andy Richter.
Ed and Johnny were "as close as two non-married people can be," as McMahon wrote in his book, "Here's Johnny: Memories of Johnny Carson, 'The Tonight Show' and 46 Years of Friendship." McMahon, who was only two years older than Carson, began working as his announcer in in 1957, on the game show "Who Do You Trust?" and accompanied him to "The Tonight Show" in 1962, where they kept on for 30 years.
An uncharitable or undiscerning critic might say McMahon had an easy job: Laugh at the boss' jokes, read a few cue cards, sell a little dog food, cheerfully absorb whatever cracks are made at his expense, slide further down the couch as the evening's guests arrive. (Phil Hartman's "Saturday Night Live" impression of him -- the over-hearty laugh, the booming "You are correct, sir" -- has replaced the actual McMahon in the minds of a couple of generations of viewers.) But the way McMahon told it, that was the point: "My role was to make him look good while not looking too good myself," he wrote, and "to get Johnny to the punch line while seeming to do nothing at all." Carson, for his part, left the air saying, "This show would have been impossible to do without Ed."
There is a kind of genius in knowing how to live with a genius. Did anyone want to grow up to be Ed McMahon? Maybe not. (Though I would rather be Illya Kuryakin than Napoleon Solo.) But they also serve who only sit and laugh -- and cry "Hey-yo!" once in a while. Of all the things Ed provided Johnny, continuity was perhaps the most meaningful: Guests came and went; wives came and went; the world turned. But where there was Johnny, there was always Ed, the witness, the audience, one of us.
Wednesday, October 8, 2008
Stephen Colbert is a swinger for Marvel
http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/herocomplex/2008/09/stephen-colbert.htmlStephen Colbert is a swinger for Marvel
Sep 29 2008
Geoff Boucher
Plenty of television comedy stars have hung with Spider-Man, but Stephen Colbert may be the first to swing with him.
Colbert, the master parodist of Comedy Central, shares an eight-page adventure with the world-famous web-slinger in issue No. 573 of "The Amazing Spider-Man," on sale Oct. 15. The folks at Marvel sent over a page from the story and while I can't quite tell what's going on, it's pretty clear that Colbert actually takes to the rooftops of Manhattan with the arachnid hero.
Colbert and his name have been popping up a lot in Marvel pages lately (perhaps too much, actually), following the January announcement by the company's editor-in-chief Joe Quesada that Colbert's faux campaign for president in our world would be mirrored by a genuine bid for the White House within the Marvel universe. The references have been scattered in different issues (a cameo here, a campaign poster there, some T-shirts, etc.) but nothing quite as dramatic as this.
Marvel has always been open to daffy gimmicks like this -- hey this is the company built by Stan Lee, after all.For instance, 30 years ago, "Saturday Night Live" was all the rage so, in the October 1978 issue of "Marvel Team-Up," Spider-Man met up with John Belushi and six other Not Ready for Prime-Time Players (Dan Aykroyd, Jane Curtin, Garrett Morris, Bill Murray, Laraine Newman and Gilda Radner) for a deliriously cheesy adventure. On the cover, Belushi is in samurai mode, but he looks vaguely like Anne Ramsey from "Throw Momma from the Train."
The "plot" has Peter Parker attending an "SNL" broadcast on the same night the evil Silver Samurai comes looking for a ring of great value that has accidentally ended up in the possession of Belushi (yes, that's right, he's basically Ringo Starr in "Help!").
The best moments in the story: Morris dressed up as Thor and the late Radner wondering to herself at one point, "Hm, what's that noise from Belushi's dressing room?" And I'm guessing that on most Saturday nights on the real set, that was a loaded question...
In 1984, it was David Letterman's turn to rub elbows with heroes in the pages of "The Avengers," and the results were even cheesier, with Al Milgrom's art rendering Letterman as an Alfred E. Neuman look-alike beneath a Gary Hart hair helmet. (I've never been a fan of Milgrom, sorry.) Paul Shaffer wore a Captain America T-shirt and Dave help beat the bad guys with the use of a giant door knob.Has Letterman ever had a lamer career moment? I doubt it.
Oh wait, I forgot "Cabin Boy." Sorry.
It was much more subtle back in the Summer of Love, 1967, when Johnny Carson and Ed McMahon popped in a true classic, "The Amazing Spider-Man" issue No. 50.That book had J. Jonah Jameson on the couch of "The Tonight Show" discussing the apparent disappearance of Spider-Man. It was a fleeting cameo with a totally different purpose; instead of trying to pull celebrities into a comics adventure, it felt like it was pulling the Marvel characters into a real world that added energy to the story arc.
So, of course, classy old Carson doesn't tussle with any villains (that issue, by the way, happened to have the first appearance of the Kingpin), he doesn't swing through the sky with Spidey or even try on the clothes of a Norse god for yucks.
And then there's that gorgeous John Romita Sr. cover, which must have jumped off the newsstand next to so many of the staid DC Comics issues of the day.
I'm just guessing that, no matter what Colbert pulls off next month with the modern web-head, Carson and the 1960s Spidey will still be the ones who age best.
Thursday, July 10, 2008
Mortgage turmoil snares Ed McMahon
http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-mcmahon4-2008jun04,0,7909098.story
Mortgage turmoil snares Ed McMahon
Johnny Carson's sidekick has defaulted on millions in home loans.
By Peter Y. Hong
Los Angeles Times Staff Writer
June 4, 2008
Ed McMahon, the longtime sidekick to Johnny Carson on "The Tonight Show," is fighting to avoid foreclosure on his multimillion-dollar Beverly Hills estate.
McMahon defaulted on $4.8 million in mortgage loans with a unit of Countrywide Financial Corp., which filed a notice of default in March, according to ForeclosureRadar, a company that sells default data pulled from public records.
The 85-year-old pitchman for various products, including American Family Publishers, is the highest-profile person to be caught up in the nationwide real estate downturn and mortgage crunch.
"He's not alone. There are plenty of people affected by the weak economy, bad housing market or bad health," McMahon's spokesman, Howard Bragman, said late Tuesday.
Bragman said McMahon fell and broke his neck about 18 months ago and has been unable to work since.
"The ideal situation would be that he would be healthy and able to earn a living to pay for his house," Bragman said.
The six-bedroom, five-bath home on Crest Court is listed for sale at $6.25 million, said real estate agent Alex Davis of Alex Davis Estates, who has the listing. It's been on the market for two years, he said.
It would seem to be an ideal home. The Hilton & Hyland luxury real estate website described the home as a celebrity Mediterranean estate in the prestigious Beverly Hills gated community of The Summit, which overlooks Coldwater Canyon and Mulholland Drive.
"This once-in-a-lifetime offering is full of charm and character. The foreign imported doors and meticulously chosen fireplaces are unlike any other," the website boasts. It also has a master suite with his-and-hers baths and closets overlooking the yard and a sweeping canyon.
But Davis said The Summit has been a difficult area to sell.
"In the midst of trying to sell this property, there were a lot of distractions," Davis said, citing paparazzi who have converged around the nearby home of Britney Spears.
"When we were trying to sell the house one time, there were about 100 paparazzi there," he said.
Another difficulty for the area has been a mold contamination that has plagued a number of homes, including McMahon's and one purchased for the director of the Getty Museum.
McMahon won a $7.2-million insurance settlement after claiming that mold in his house killed his dog Muffin and sickened him and his wife.
According to a lawsuit he filed, the trouble began when a pipe broke and water flooded a den. Mold was later discovered throughout the house. McMahon and his wife, Pamela, blamed faulty cleanup.
"When your family loses its health and your home is a wasteland, that's a colossal disaster," McMahon said at the time.
Both the Hyland website and ChristiesGreatestEstates.com list the property, built in 1989, at $5.75 million. Davis said it was still priced at $6.25 million.
McMahon took out two loans on the property totaling $4.5 million and later borrowed an additional $300,000 against the house, according to ForeclosureRadar. The loans were obtained through Countrywide Home Loans Inc.
A Countrywide spokesman declined to comment, citing privacy concerns.
The Wall Street Journal first reported the story. Though McMahon was in negotiations with Countrywide, the paper said it wasn't clear whether McMahon and his wife would be able to remain in the home.
McMahon was about $644,000 in arrears on the loan when the notice of default was filed, the paper said.
Federal regulators have been urging lenders to ease loan terms, but it wasn't clear if that would happen in McMahon's case.
peter.hong@latimes.com
Times staff writer E. Scott Reckard contributed to this report.
Mortgage turmoil snares Ed McMahon
Johnny Carson's sidekick has defaulted on millions in home loans.
By Peter Y. Hong
Los Angeles Times Staff Writer
June 4, 2008
Ed McMahon, the longtime sidekick to Johnny Carson on "The Tonight Show," is fighting to avoid foreclosure on his multimillion-dollar Beverly Hills estate.
McMahon defaulted on $4.8 million in mortgage loans with a unit of Countrywide Financial Corp., which filed a notice of default in March, according to ForeclosureRadar, a company that sells default data pulled from public records.
The 85-year-old pitchman for various products, including American Family Publishers, is the highest-profile person to be caught up in the nationwide real estate downturn and mortgage crunch.
"He's not alone. There are plenty of people affected by the weak economy, bad housing market or bad health," McMahon's spokesman, Howard Bragman, said late Tuesday.
Bragman said McMahon fell and broke his neck about 18 months ago and has been unable to work since.
"The ideal situation would be that he would be healthy and able to earn a living to pay for his house," Bragman said.
The six-bedroom, five-bath home on Crest Court is listed for sale at $6.25 million, said real estate agent Alex Davis of Alex Davis Estates, who has the listing. It's been on the market for two years, he said.
It would seem to be an ideal home. The Hilton & Hyland luxury real estate website described the home as a celebrity Mediterranean estate in the prestigious Beverly Hills gated community of The Summit, which overlooks Coldwater Canyon and Mulholland Drive.
"This once-in-a-lifetime offering is full of charm and character. The foreign imported doors and meticulously chosen fireplaces are unlike any other," the website boasts. It also has a master suite with his-and-hers baths and closets overlooking the yard and a sweeping canyon.
But Davis said The Summit has been a difficult area to sell.
"In the midst of trying to sell this property, there were a lot of distractions," Davis said, citing paparazzi who have converged around the nearby home of Britney Spears.
"When we were trying to sell the house one time, there were about 100 paparazzi there," he said.
Another difficulty for the area has been a mold contamination that has plagued a number of homes, including McMahon's and one purchased for the director of the Getty Museum.
McMahon won a $7.2-million insurance settlement after claiming that mold in his house killed his dog Muffin and sickened him and his wife.
According to a lawsuit he filed, the trouble began when a pipe broke and water flooded a den. Mold was later discovered throughout the house. McMahon and his wife, Pamela, blamed faulty cleanup.
"When your family loses its health and your home is a wasteland, that's a colossal disaster," McMahon said at the time.
Both the Hyland website and ChristiesGreatestEstates.com list the property, built in 1989, at $5.75 million. Davis said it was still priced at $6.25 million.
McMahon took out two loans on the property totaling $4.5 million and later borrowed an additional $300,000 against the house, according to ForeclosureRadar. The loans were obtained through Countrywide Home Loans Inc.
A Countrywide spokesman declined to comment, citing privacy concerns.
The Wall Street Journal first reported the story. Though McMahon was in negotiations with Countrywide, the paper said it wasn't clear whether McMahon and his wife would be able to remain in the home.
McMahon was about $644,000 in arrears on the loan when the notice of default was filed, the paper said.
Federal regulators have been urging lenders to ease loan terms, but it wasn't clear if that would happen in McMahon's case.
peter.hong@latimes.com
Times staff writer E. Scott Reckard contributed to this report.
Sunday, September 9, 2007
Luciano Pavarotti Dies
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/20623995/site/newsweek/
Luciano Pavarotti Dies
Luciano Pavarotti, dead at 71, sang with such beauty that he beguiled listeners around the globe. Some were opera fans, but most were just fans of his honeyed tenor and outsize personality.
By Cathleen McGuigan
Newsweek
Sept. 6, 2007 - Luciano Pavarotti was one of the biggest opera stars of the last century, but he was much bigger than opera. A lyric tenor whose remarkable voice was so honeyed and brilliant that even non-opera lovers were readily moved by its beauty, he married his natural musicality with a gift for blatant showmanship. Besides his triumphs in the world’s greatest opera houses, he sold more than 50 millions record albums; his arena concerts were packed like a rock star’s; and he would happily sign autographs for his fans for hours. As he aged, and performing on the opera stage became more demanding, Pavarotti and his manager found amazing ways for him become even bigger in the public eye, especially with the phenomenally successful Three Tenors gigs, where he joined Plácido Domingo and José Carreras: their televised concerts were seen by 1.5 billion viewers worldwide. For his charity concerts and albums, “Pavarotti & Friends,” he roped in such singers as Bono, Elton John and even the Spice Girls. Critics may have disdained such commercialism, but with the help of recordings and television, Pavarotti doubtless reached the widest audience of any opera singer in history. Dubbed at various times “Lucky,” “Lurch,” “Deep Throat” and “Lucianissimo,” he took a long time to let go of his career. Like Sinatra's, his farewell tour didn’t seem a final goodbye—but after surgery for pancreatic cancer in July 2006, he never appeared in public again.
Pavarotti died, at 71, where he was born, in the northern Italian city of Modena, where his father had worked in a bakery, his mother in a cigar factory. His father was a tenor too—and Luciano grew up listening not just to his father’s voice but also to his phonograph recordings of such greats as Enrico Caruso. Pavarotti sang in the Modena opera chorus, and when the chorus took first prize at a music festival in Wales, he began to seriously embrace the idea of a singing career. He took lessons, though he never had conservatory training, and it was said he couldn’t really read music. His first big break came when he filled in for a sick tenor in “La Bohème” at Covent Garden in 1963, and he went on to sing the role of Rodolfo in his La Scala debut and in his 1968 debut at the Metropolitan Opera in New York, where, over the course of his career, he sang 378 performances, more than he did anywhere else. In 1972 at the Met, when he sang Tonio in Donizetti’s “La Fille du Régiment” opposite Joan Sutherland, he so magically hit the nine high C’s in a row that audiences went crazy and he was invited to appear on “The Tonight Show” with Johnny Carson. That began the crossover to show business.
“The King of the High Cs,” as his record company called him, lived large and was famous for his outsize appetites—for food, wine, sports. A few years back he hit the gossip pages when he left his wife of 35 years—they had three daughters—for his much younger assistant, Nicoletta Mantovani, whom he married in 2003 (they have one daughter). He sang at the Met for the last time in Puccini’s “Tosca” in 2004. Though most of his great roles were in Italian operas, he was never as big a star in Italy as he was abroad, where his ebullient personality won him a wide legion of fans. His personality overpowered most of his roles; as critics pointed out, his acting ability was no match for his singing. Pavarotti was always Pavarotti—and that’s what his fans loved. That and the beautiful voice, which reached across the world.
Luciano Pavarotti Dies
Luciano Pavarotti, dead at 71, sang with such beauty that he beguiled listeners around the globe. Some were opera fans, but most were just fans of his honeyed tenor and outsize personality.
By Cathleen McGuigan
Newsweek
Sept. 6, 2007 - Luciano Pavarotti was one of the biggest opera stars of the last century, but he was much bigger than opera. A lyric tenor whose remarkable voice was so honeyed and brilliant that even non-opera lovers were readily moved by its beauty, he married his natural musicality with a gift for blatant showmanship. Besides his triumphs in the world’s greatest opera houses, he sold more than 50 millions record albums; his arena concerts were packed like a rock star’s; and he would happily sign autographs for his fans for hours. As he aged, and performing on the opera stage became more demanding, Pavarotti and his manager found amazing ways for him become even bigger in the public eye, especially with the phenomenally successful Three Tenors gigs, where he joined Plácido Domingo and José Carreras: their televised concerts were seen by 1.5 billion viewers worldwide. For his charity concerts and albums, “Pavarotti & Friends,” he roped in such singers as Bono, Elton John and even the Spice Girls. Critics may have disdained such commercialism, but with the help of recordings and television, Pavarotti doubtless reached the widest audience of any opera singer in history. Dubbed at various times “Lucky,” “Lurch,” “Deep Throat” and “Lucianissimo,” he took a long time to let go of his career. Like Sinatra's, his farewell tour didn’t seem a final goodbye—but after surgery for pancreatic cancer in July 2006, he never appeared in public again.
Pavarotti died, at 71, where he was born, in the northern Italian city of Modena, where his father had worked in a bakery, his mother in a cigar factory. His father was a tenor too—and Luciano grew up listening not just to his father’s voice but also to his phonograph recordings of such greats as Enrico Caruso. Pavarotti sang in the Modena opera chorus, and when the chorus took first prize at a music festival in Wales, he began to seriously embrace the idea of a singing career. He took lessons, though he never had conservatory training, and it was said he couldn’t really read music. His first big break came when he filled in for a sick tenor in “La Bohème” at Covent Garden in 1963, and he went on to sing the role of Rodolfo in his La Scala debut and in his 1968 debut at the Metropolitan Opera in New York, where, over the course of his career, he sang 378 performances, more than he did anywhere else. In 1972 at the Met, when he sang Tonio in Donizetti’s “La Fille du Régiment” opposite Joan Sutherland, he so magically hit the nine high C’s in a row that audiences went crazy and he was invited to appear on “The Tonight Show” with Johnny Carson. That began the crossover to show business.
“The King of the High Cs,” as his record company called him, lived large and was famous for his outsize appetites—for food, wine, sports. A few years back he hit the gossip pages when he left his wife of 35 years—they had three daughters—for his much younger assistant, Nicoletta Mantovani, whom he married in 2003 (they have one daughter). He sang at the Met for the last time in Puccini’s “Tosca” in 2004. Though most of his great roles were in Italian operas, he was never as big a star in Italy as he was abroad, where his ebullient personality won him a wide legion of fans. His personality overpowered most of his roles; as critics pointed out, his acting ability was no match for his singing. Pavarotti was always Pavarotti—and that’s what his fans loved. That and the beautiful voice, which reached across the world.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
Posts
