DATELINE TOOBWORLD: THE DEATH OF PICASSO AND THE TONIGHT SHOW

'I'M DYING UP HERE'

"MIDNIGHT SPECIAL"

BILL HOBBS:

You know that Picasso just died, right? 

CASSIE FEDER:

Good.

BILL HOBBS:
What do you got against Picasso? 

CASSIE FEDER:

Four of the women he was with two committed suicide, and two he drove insane.

BILL HOBBS:

So you're saying the guy has a type.
Can I continue? So I'm reading Pablo's obit.
You know, the guy's a famous artist.
He's got nothing to prove, except, apparently, how much pussy he got.
Listen to this:
"Picasso, 91, died in a villa in France and leaves behind a wife almost half his age."

CASSIE FEDER:
Okay, you've got my attention.

BILL HOBBS:

"In addition to his wife, he leaves four children - one son born to his first wife, the dancer Olga Khokhlova."

CASSIE FEDER:

Not just a dancer, the dancer. 

BILL HOBBS:

Right? 

"And daughter born to his mistress, Marie-Theresa Walter."

CASSIE FEDER:

Since when have mistresses been put in obits? 

BILL HOBBS:

"And another son and daughter both the children of Francoise Gilot, another mistress," 

- for those of you keeping score at home, -

"who is now the wife of biologist Dr. Jonas Salk." 

Fuck you, Jonas Salk. You cured polio? I fucked your wife. 

CASSIE FEDER:

That's not an obit. That's a press release for his dick.

So that locks in the timeline for this episode as happening on either April 9 or 10, 1973, depending on the date of the newspaper.....

From Wikipedia:

Pablo Picasso (25 October 1881 – 8 April 1973) was a Spanish painter, sculptor, print-maker, ceramicist, stage designer, poet and playwright who spent most of his adult life in France. Regarded as one of the most influential artists of the 20th century, he is known for co-founding the Cubist movement, the invention of constructed sculpture, the co-invention of collage, and for the wide variety of styles that he helped develop and explore. Among his most famous works are the proto-Cubist Les Demoiselles d'Avignon (1907), and Guernica (1937), a dramatic portrayal of the bombing of Guernica by the German and Italian airforces.

PICASSO of the TRUENIVERSE

Pablo Picasso died on 8 April 1973 in Mougins, France, while he and his wife Jacqueline entertained friends for dinner. He was interred at the Château of Vauvenargues near Aix-en-Provence, a property he had acquired in 1958 and occupied with Jacqueline between 1959 and 1962. Jacqueline Roque prevented his children Claude and Paloma from attending the funeral.

Devastated and lonely after the death of Picasso, Jacqueline Roque killed herself by gunshot in 1986 when she was 59 years old.

PICASSO in SKITLANDIA

To read more about Picasso, click here.

At one point early in the "Midnight Special" episode, Goldie Herschlag mentions that the "papers cleared Clay over a month ago."  The investigation probably took a couple weeks, so it could have been early February of 1973 when Clay performed 

PICASSO of TOOBWORLD

So with the "Midnight Special" episode happening just after the death of Picasso, that means the "Pilot" episode took place almost two months earlier, probably at the beginning of February.

In the Trueniverse, Johnny Carson was on vacation that first week of February with Jerry Lewis serving as the guest host.  

But we've seen that the televersions of celebrities and historical figures can differ greatly from their real life inspirations:

• Dennis Rodman is an alien.
• Charles Dickens destroyed a race of aliens.
• Mark Twain went to outer space.
• Willie Mays is an warlock.

So this suggestion about Johnny Carson is simple and believable in comparison: 

Carson wasn't on vacation that week.

And because he was going to work the desk, then the line-up of guests would have been changed to accommodate him rather than Lewis.

Of course, whether that was actually Johnny Carson who hosted on the night Clay Apruzzo appeared is another story......

BCnU!