Johnny Carson Was Loved By Audiences But Behind The Facade He Was 'Unhappy' & 'Painfully Shy'

Oct 12, 2023

“The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson” became a television institution during Johnny Carson's three-decade run as the host. Carson himself became one of the most recognizable faces on the small screen and in Hollywood, as he became a part of the American family just as much as a parent or child is. Unfortunately for Carson, his own family life did not have the same connection and joy he gave his audience and viewers night after night. 

According to Biography.com, John William Carson was born on Oct. 23, 1925, in Corning, Iowa to Ruth and Homer R. Carson, who worked as the manager of a power company. At a young age, the young Carson got his early chops as a preteen magician, practicing magic tricks as “The Great Carsoni” from a magic kit he’d acquired. His love of performing would continue into high school and into the military as he joined the Navy during World War II. He would work as a communication officer on the USS Pennsylvania, where he ensigned and worked as a code breaker.

His various characters, sketches, and interactions with the biggest celebrities in film, television, politics, and art, all made Carson a 20th-century icon and earned him the moniker, “The King of Late Night Television.” Comedians such as Jerry Seinfeld, Jay Leno, Freddie Prinze and Jim Carrey all performed their stand-up routines on Carson’s show, helping launch their own careers in comedy.

Although he received a lot of love and adoration when he became a television legend, Carson also experienced a lot of problems and challenges in life when he was younger. Read on to learn more about Carson and the challenges he faced. 

As the host of “The Tonight Show,” Carson was awarded six Emmy Awards, a Peabody Award and the Presidential Medal of Freedom. During the same period that he was cementing his television legacy, Carson also attempted to cement another legacy — as a husband and father. However, his attempts at creating a successful family life were not as fruitful.

Carson’s first marriage to Jody Morrill Wolcott — who birthed Carson’s three sons, Christopher, Richard and Cory — lasted 14 years and was ripe with betrayal and infidelities on both sides of the marriage. According to Glamour Path, the couple's split in 1963 was initially amicable, as both were aware of their extramarital affairs. This was a year after Carson took over the hosting spot from Jack Parr.

In the same year of his divorce, Carson married his second wife, Joanne Copeland. The partnership also ended in divorce, but she received a settlement of $6,000 per month in alimony until she remarried or Carson’s death. Ultimately, Copeland received alimony until the television icon’s demise in 2005. 

Like his second marriage, Carson’s third marriage also started in the same year. He announced on his show’s 10th anniversary in 1972 that he had been secretly married to Joanna Holland. After more than a decade, they also divorced, with Holland receiving $20 million in cash and property. 

Carson’s last partner was Alexis Maas. Unlike his previous partnerships, their marriage lasted for 18 years, until he passed away. 

Speaking to People Magazine in 1983, Carson joked about his marriage:

“My giving advice on marriage is like the captain of the Titanic giving lessons on navigation.”

Carson’s iron wall around his own personal life has left many to only speculate on how close or how distant he was with his sons. However, this wall came crashing down in 1991 when tragedy struck. According to The Los Angeles Times, on June 21, 1991, his middle child Richard, died when his car fell 100 ft down an embankment near Cayucos beach community in California. 

As for any parent, this must have been the most heartbreaking thing to go through. The grieving father delivered his son’s eulogy, in which he said:

“When Rick was around, you wanted to smile. He had a laugh that was contagious as could be. He tried so darn hard to please. ... Probably the most difficult moment of my life.” 

His friend and partner on the show, Ed McMahon commented by saying for a man as private as his friend, it took courage to speak as he did. Then, nine days after his son’s death, Carson lost his friend, actor Michael Landon, to cancer.

Maybe it was the loss of a child at the same time as the death of his friend, or just coincidence, but the next year would be Carson’s final year as the host of “The Tonight Show.” His final show, which aired on May 22, 1992, garnered the highest viewership of his career with over 55 million people tuning in, according to UPI. 

After the show ended, Carson made very few public appearances for the rest of his life. Closer Weekly reported that while thinking about retirement, Carson once said:

“I think I left at the right time. You’ve got to know when to get the hell off the stage, and the timing was right for me.”

The distance from his children can be attributed to the struggle that Carson had when he was younger. When Carson passed away in 2005, his lawyer Henry Bushkin, authored a tell-all book uncovering the unknown parts of Carson’s life. 

Among the revelations in Bushkin's book “Johnny Carson,” was Carson's bitter relationship with his mother, Ruth, who visibly favored his sister over him. Apparently, she never acknowledged the host’s success back then. When Ruth died, Carson refused to attend the funeral, even telling Bushkin “the wicked witch is dead.”

"It constantly got to him. Her, sort of lack of any sort of emotion towards him. And certainly, never giving him the great satisfaction of being the giant star he became," he told Inside Edition.

When pressed further on Carson’s state when he was still alive, Bushkin also pointed out that when people read the book, they would be surprised to find out that Carson is not what he looks like in front of the camera. 

"He would tell you he's not a happy guy. He would tell you, 'My personality is basically unhappy,'" Bushkin recalled. 

Copeland, Carson’s second wife also attested to this, telling Larry King in a CNN interview in 2007 that Carson was “painfully shy” and “very guarded” especially around his family.

The funny facade might have been something that many people knew Carson for, but like an ordinary person, he also got upset. The author of the book “Hope: Entertainer of the Century,” Richard Zoglin, revealed that Carson used to have a hard time working with Bob Hope.

“Carson resented the way Hope could virtually book himself on The Tonight Show whenever he had something to promote,” he wrote, “which seemed to be all the time.”

Are you a fan of Johnny Carson? What can you say about his challenging life? Did you know that he was a troubled soul? Let us know, and pass this on to your family, friends and other Carson fans!