‘The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson’ welcomed the great comedian Redd Foxx. Redd is introduced, and the curtains are raised as he drives into the studio in a dune buggy that is black and red. It is one of the most memorable entrances in Carson’s history.
Johnny loves the entrance and laughs. Redd gets out of the car and shakes hands with Johnny after he turns off his car engine. Johnny asks if he drives that often. Redd says he drives it every day and wouldn’t want to go anywhere any other way.
Redd says, “It won first prize last year at the Las Vegas Dune Buggy Derby.” It is clearly a customized car, and Ed McMahon asks, “What’s it good for?’ Redd says, ‘A couple miles a gallon,” and the crowd laughs.
He said he customized it in a particular way, and he can’t explain it, but it involves many chemicals to make the car look like a leather and velvet finish. Johnny asks if he can’t tell the story because it’s illegal, and they both laugh.
They get into a conversation about how there was an article written with Redd, and the writer was going to write ‘Pork roast’ instead of ‘Roasted Pork,’ a term more commonly used in the black community.
Redd says it could mean something entirely different depending on how you say things, and many phrases originated from his community. Redd says, “Oh yeah, so ‘Right on’ and all stuff like that. ‘Hey now’ and ‘Fuzzy wuzzy.’”
Then Redd says, “It’s just people. I don’t look at no color of people. If everybody was blind, we wouldn’t have no prejudice.” They both agree, and the legendary Redd Foxx left his mark on ‘Carson.’
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