The Hixson-Lied College of Fine and Performing Arts hosted members of the Johnny Carson Foundation on campus Oct. 28-30 to celebrate the legacy of Johnny Carson.
Just prior to their arrival, the University of Nebraska–Lincoln announced a $2.5 million gift from the Johnny Carson Foundation to create an endowed directorship for the Johnny Carson Center for Emerging Media Arts. Megan Elliott, the founding director of the center, is the first recipient and will be known as the Johnny Carson Endowed Director in Emerging Media Arts.
Allan Alexander, president and a director of the Johnny Carson Foundation, along with Johnny Carson Foundation board members Larry Witzer and Jeff Sotzing attended the special weekend of events. They met with students and faculty in the Johnny Carson Center for Emerging Media Arts and Johnny Carson School of Theatre and Film.
In addition, the Carson Lecture Series returned and featured comedian Pat Hazell and special guest Teresa Ganzel, a recurring cast member of “The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson.” Ganzel starred in many popular skits on the show as part of the Mighty Carson Art Players.
The UNL Jazz Orchestra, under the direction of Glenn Korff School of Music Associate Professor of Composition Greg Simon, also performed at the Carson Lecture.
“The shadow of the Tonight Show Band looms large in the jazz world,” Simon said. “It started the careers of some of the most important names in jazz, and launched others to a national scale they may have never otherwise seen. To have a chance to celebrate Johnny Carson who was a lifelong advocate for the music and its musicians—was thrilling. It made it all the more special that we could make this music standing feet away from some of Johnny’s closest friends and collaborators. The energy in the room was electric, full of gratitude and togetherness. I’ll never forget the experience, and I know our students won’t either.”
For Omaha native Hazell, appearing on “The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson” was a special experience. He appeared only once with Carson, but subsequently appeared six additional times when Jay Leno hosted.
“I was on near the end of Johnny’s reign, and it was something that, as a kid who grew up in Omaha, this was like an Olympic gold medal for a comic to be invited onto Johnny’s show,” Hazell said. “I was very lucky to have been tapped before he went off the air.”
Being on Carson’s “Tonight Show” opened doors for comedians like Hazell.
“It was a level up from ‘as seen on TV.’ As seen on the Johnny Carson show and to have Johnny’s okay symbol for a comedian opened the doors to clubs and to corporate events and to theatres and touring opportunities and Vegas, and so forth,” he said. “He was very, very generous with young comics having their debut, and he would go out of his way to set the audience up for it. Walking through that curtain was like a portal to the next portion of your life as a comedian because from then on, you are a Tonight Show-approved comedian.”
Hazell said students at Nebraska can learn a lot from Carson.
“Partly in his generosity and philanthropic gift giving, he created the theatre and the emerging media arts center and state-of-the-art access to all kinds of things,” Hazell said. “You don’t have to be in Hollywood or New York to make it. All you have to do is learn your craft, and Johnny learned his craft there. Everybody is lucky that he lived in the area and wanted so generously to give back to what gave him a lot.”
To see more photos from the weekend on our Facebook page, visit https://go.unl.edu/carsonweekend.