From The Vault:The night Jack Paar walked off “The Tonight Show” The Kenner Star September 2011

HEAR JACK PAAR'S ACTUAL WALKOUT SPEECH AFTER THE "READ MORE" JUMP IN THIS COLUMN!

        With Jay Leno and David Letterman, the Princes of late night television, its hard for my kids to realize that title was held by Johnny Carson for more than 30 years before Jay and David.  For Baby Boomers, (anyone born toward the end of World War II), the King of Late Night wasn’t Johnny Carson. It was a guy named Jack Paar. 

    Jack was named the host of “The Tonight Show” when Steve Allen’s tenure ended in 1957.  While Allen was funny, Jack Paar was funny... and controversial.  He was not afraid to take on the biggies, like the most feared show biz columnist of the time Walter Winchell or even Ed Sullivan.  But his biggest fight was with his bosses at NBC.  On the evening of February 11th 1960,  Jack Paar walked off “The Tonight Show.” He left because NBC had censored a joke from his show the night before. The joke was about a  British lady and a water closet. The joke wouldn’t shock a third grade class today but NBC thought it was offensive and chopped it, all four and a half minutes of it. As a teenager, I saw that show and wondered why NBC all of a sudden cut away to a five minute newscast. I knew something had to be up.
    I remember staying up late the next  night to see the show, as it had been on the news that Jack had walked out. America knew this before the show aired at 11:15pm eastern, because, a couple of years before, they had started recording the shows in the early evening using a modern marvel called videotape. 
    Paar was on for about five minutes when he said, “I’m leaving “The Tonight Show.” (Audience sighs in shock).  “There must be a better way of making a living than this,” and he got up and walked off leaving sidekick Hugh Downs with 85 minutes to fill. The walkout caused a sensation. It was all people talked about for three weeks until Jack finally came back after NBC apologized.
    What was the big deal about the joke? The joke, itself, was mild, even for 1960.It has been printed many times in the following years, but there is apparently no recording of it anywhere. More than likely the honchos at the network just hit “delete.” In fact, the show on which Jack made his triumphal return does not seem to exist either.  Most of Paar’s “Tonight” shows were taped over by the network so the tapes could be used again. Gives you an idea of the mentality of the executives who made the decision to cut the joke. Well, I guess your curiosity must be hanging by a thread right about now wondering what the heck all the fuss was about, so without further ado, here’s the joke America never heard:


        "An English lady, while visiting Switzerland, was looking for a room, and she asked the schoolmaster if he could recommend any to her. He took her to see several rooms, and when everything was settled, the lady returned to her home to make the final preparations to move. When she arrived home, the thought suddenly occurred to her that she had not seen a "W.C.", (short for “water closet”, British for bathroom).  So she immediately wrote a note to the schoolmaster asking him if there were a "W.C." around. The schoolmaster was a very poor student of English, so he asked the parish priest if he could help in the matter. Together they tried to discover the meaning of the letters "W.C.," and the only solution they could find for the letters was  "Wedding Chapel." The schoolmaster then wrote to the English lady the following note:
        Dear Madam:   I take great pleasure in informing you that the W.C. is situated nine miles from the house you will occupy, in the center of a beautiful grove of pine trees surrounded by lovely grounds. It is capable of holding 229 people and it is open on Sunday and Thursday only. As there are a great number of people and they are expected during the summer months, I would suggest that you come early, although there is plenty of standing room as a rule. You will no doubt be glad to hear that a good number of people bring their lunch and make a day of it. While others who can afford to go by car arrive just in time, I would especially recommend that your ladyship go on Thursday when there is a musical accompaniment. It may interest you to know that my daughter was married in the W.C. and it was there that she met her husband. I can remember the rush there was for seats. The newest attraction is a bell donated by a wealthy resident of the district. It rings every time a person enters. A bazaar is to be held to provide plush seats for all the people, since they feel it is a long felt need. I shall be delighted to reserve the best seat for you if you wish, where you will be seen by all. Hoping to have been of service to you, I remain,  Sincerely, The Schoolmaster.”
    On March, 7th 1960, Jack, having calmed down in Hong Kong for two weeks, returned to the show to the largest (legitimate) ovation any host of that show ever received. He came on stage, looked at the audience and stated, “As I was saying when I was interrupted....”  (Huge laugh).
“When I walked off I said that there must be a better way to making a living than this. Well, I’ve looked, (laugh builds), and there isn’t. (Another huge laugh). Jack was back. 
    For the past several years I have searched for video of his actual “walk off.” There was nothing online and the Paar DVD collection only has the last few seconds of his statement. Those seconds do not contain his opening comments, nor do they include an announcement from NBC prior to the showing of the program.
          While there is no video of Jack’s walkout, some enterprising person, God bless him, has found the audio portion of that momentous event and has recently put it on You Tube. Forget the “Real Housewives of Fill in the Blank..”Jack Paar’s walk out and his return was real reality television. Here it is.