Johnny Carson
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50 free Johnny Carson trivia questions with answers — trivia quiz, new questions added Oct 2026.
For thirty years, Johnny Carson was the last voice millions of Americans heard before they fell asleep. He took over The Tonight Show in 1962 and turned a monologue, a desk and a couch into the template every late-night host still follows, then walked away at the top and was rarely seen in public again. This quiz covers the whole story: his boyhood on the plains and his first jobs in radio and local television, the costumed characters and running gags, the announcer and bandleader who flanked him, the guests whose visits became television legend, the feuds, the business deals and the farewell week that tens of millions watched. A few questions follow him into retirement too. It is written for anyone who stayed up for the monologue, for classic TV fans who know the clips from reruns, and for quiz hosts who want a good story behind every answer.
30 of 50 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01Which long-running NBC show was created after Johnny Carson had his weekend Tonight Show reruns pulled?
Saturday Night Live
Saturday Night Live debuted in October 1975 to fill the hole. Carson wanted the weekend repeats saved for weeknights so he could take more time off, which left NBC needing something new to send its stations.
Q 02Johnny Carson's monologue joke about a shortage of which household product set off real panic buying across America?
Toilet paper
Toilet paper vanished from shelves for weeks after the December 1973 joke, because viewers took it seriously and hoarded. Carson apologized the following month.
Q 03Which Muppet filled in for Johnny Carson as guest host of The Tonight Show for one night in April 1979?
Kermit the Frog
Kermit the Frog hosted the full show, with horror star Vincent Price among the guests and other Muppets popping up in the sketches.
Q 04Which Milton Bradley game became a sensation after Johnny Carson played it on the air with actress Eva Gabor?
Twister
Twister was little known until that May 1966 broadcast. The following year, three million copies were sold.
Q 05Which falsetto-voiced ukulele singer married his bride Miss Vicki on Johnny Carson's Tonight Show in December 1969?
Tiny Tim
Tiny Tim wed 17-year-old Victoria Budinger on the air, and the ceremony is among the few moments from Carson's New York years that survive on tape.
Q 06Which announcer and sidekick sat beside Johnny Carson for all 30 years of his Tonight Show run?
Ed McMahon
Ed McMahon first teamed with Carson on a daytime ABC quiz in the late 1950s. A Marine Corps flight instructor in World War II, he was recalled to fly spotter planes in Korea.
Q 07In which film does Jack Nicholson shout the nightly introduction of Johnny Carson through a smashed door?
The Shining
The Shining borrowed the announcer's drawn-out opening call, which Nicholson improvised on the set. Carson later replayed the clip to open one of his anniversary shows.
Q 08Myrtle Young gasped when Johnny Carson pretended to crunch an item from her prized collection of what?
Potato chips
Potato chips that looked like faces and objects were her hobby as a factory inspector in Indiana. While her back was turned, Carson faked a loud bite, a gag TV Guide later named television's funniest moment.
Q 09Which turbaned Johnny Carson character held sealed envelopes to his forehead and gave answers before the questions?
Carnac
Carnac the Magnificent wore a feathered turban and a cape, stumbled on his way to the desk, and laid a comic curse on the audience whenever one of his puns died.
Q 10Which singer brought Johnny Carson to tears by serenading him on his next-to-last Tonight Show in May 1992?
Bette Midler
Bette Midler sang One for My Baby to a visibly moved Carson and won an Emmy for the performance. Earlier in the hour the two had slipped into an unplanned duet of one of his favorite songs.
Q 11Which comedian, Johnny Carson's permanent guest host from the late 1980s, took over The Tonight Show in May 1992?
Jay Leno
Jay Leno had filled in for Carson more than 300 times, and joked that he won the bookings by keeping his fee low while the other stand-ins raised theirs.
Q 12Which teen-idol singer of Diana and Put Your Head on My Shoulder composed Johnny Carson's Tonight Show theme?
Paul Anka
Paul Anka reworked a tune that Annette Funicello had already recorded. Carson wrote lyrics for it that were never sung, which earned him half the royalties every time the theme was played.
Q 13To which California city did Johnny Carson move The Tonight Show from New York in May 1972?
Burbank
Q 21Which host of Tonight since 1957 did Johnny Carson replace at the desk in October 1962?
Jack Paar
Jack Paar bowed out in March 1962, but Carson was tied to an ABC contract for six more months. NBC covered the gap with stand-ins such as Merv Griffin and Art Linkletter.
Q 22In which military branch did Johnny Carson serve as a young ensign in the final days of World War II?
U.S. Navy
The U.S. Navy posted him to the battleship Pennsylvania, which he reached on the very day Japan announced its surrender. He boxed as an amateur aboard ship.
Q 23Which illness did Johnny Carson, a heavy smoker for decades, reveal in 2002 and die from three years later?
Emphysema
Burbank put the show within easy reach of Hollywood's stars, which is why Carson wanted the move. A park across from the old NBC studios there now carries his name.
Q 14In which Great Plains state did Johnny Carson grow up, in the town of Norfolk, from the age of eight?
Nebraska
Nebraska kept his loyalty for life, though he was born in Corning, Iowa. He later gave millions to his old university and paid for a cancer center and a theater in Norfolk.
Q 15Johnny Carson earned $3 a show at age 14 billed as The Great Carsoni, performing what kind of act?
Magic tricks
Magic tricks came out of a mail-order kit he bought at 12. His mother sewed him a cape, and his first booking was the local Kiwanis Club.
Q 16Which late-night host used jokes that the retired Johnny Carson quietly sent him for his own monologues?
David Letterman
David Letterman opened his first show after Carson's death with a monologue made entirely of Carson's jokes, then told viewers who wrote them. Carson's last TV appearance was a 1994 surprise visit to Letterman's show.
Q 17Which comedian did Johnny Carson never speak to again after she left as his permanent guest host for a rival Fox show?
Joan Rivers
Joan Rivers had been his regular stand-in since 1983 and called him her mentor. Her Fox show was soon canceled, and she did not appear on The Tonight Show again until 2014.
Q 18Which bandleader, known for his gaudy stage outfits, led Johnny Carson's Tonight Show orchestra from 1967 to the finale?
Doc Severinsen
Doc Severinsen, a trumpeter, took his nickname from his father, the only dentist in their Oregon town. He had joined the show's orchestra as first-chair trumpet in 1962.
Q 19On which animated series did the retired Johnny Carson voice himself in 1993, juggling a car while singing opera?
The Simpsons
The Simpsons landed him for the episode in which Krusty the Clown stages a comeback special. The writers had first pitched him a part as a houseguest who sponges off the family.
Q 20Which imaginary sports move did Johnny Carson make toward the orchestra to close his nightly Tonight Show monologue?
A golf swing
A golf swing, aimed stage left, was his sign-off to the jokes. Stand-ins liked to spoof it: Bob Newhart rolled an invisible bowling ball at the audience instead.
Emphysema brought on the respiratory failure that killed him in January 2005, at 79. He had once smoked four packs of Pall Malls a day, often on camera in the show's early years.
Q 24Which annual Hollywood ceremony did Johnny Carson host five times between 1979 and 1984?
The Oscars
The Oscars had him as host five times in six years. One critic wrote that the brisk 1984 ceremony found its greatest asset in his return as master of ceremonies.
Q 25Which astronomer and frequent guest did Johnny Carson tease by exaggerating how he pronounced the word billions?
Carl Sagan
Carl Sagan took the ribbing in good humor and titled his final book Billions and Billions. Carson was a keen stargazer himself, owned several telescopes and has a minor planet named in his honor.
Q 26What did singer Ed Ames throw at a cowboy outline on Johnny Carson's Tonight Show in 1965, striking the groin?
A tomahawk
A tomahawk was his stock in trade as Mingo on the TV series Daniel Boone. When he went to pull it out of the board, Carson held him back so the audience's long laugh could run its course.
Q 27Which self-proclaimed psychic flopped on Johnny Carson's Tonight Show in 1973 after the staff supplied their own props?
Uri Geller
Uri Geller could not produce a single feat that night and complained of being pressed to perform. Carson had asked skeptic James Randi how to prevent any sleight of hand, though the plan to debunk him backfired.
Q 28Which comedian played the talk-show host in The King of Comedy after Johnny Carson turned Martin Scorsese down?
Jerry Lewis
Jerry Lewis took the part of Jerry Langford opposite Robert De Niro in the 1983 film. Carson was the director's first choice but declined, saying one take was enough for him.
Q 29Johnny Carson turned down a part in which 1974 Mel Brooks comedy?
Blazing Saddles
Blazing Saddles was one of many film offers he refused; he also passed on the title role in The Thomas Crown Affair. Mel Brooks had been a guest on his very first Tonight Show.
Q 30Which future Price Is Right host was invited to Johnny Carson's couch after his 1991 stand-up set, a rare honor?
Drew Carey
Drew Carey impressed Carson enough in November 1991 to be waved over to the seat beside the desk, an invitation that comedians counted among the highest honors in the business.