Never Too Late: The Doc Severinsen Story

I watched this 90-minute program last night on my PBS channel, "Never Too Late: The Doc Severinsen Story." Being of a somewhat senior age myself I clearly remember his run as band leader and featured soloist on the old Johnny Carson Tonight Show. I thought he had died ... until I came across this TV show.

Seeing this was also a natural for me as I too am a trumpet player since childhood, however I never loved it as much as Doc did so I gave it up 20-some years ago during my 50s. I had never given too much thought to trumpet playing longevity but paint me as very surprised that Doc can still play at such a high level in his 90s.

But he works at it, except for a recent hospital stay with pneumonia that almost killed him, he goes to the gym three days a week and works with a trainer particularly to keep his "core" strong, the strength needed to play trumpet the way he plays it. The fingers and lips are important but without exceptional abdominal strength it just won't work out very well.

In addition to solo performances he plays with a small group and also does clinics all over, and after several marriages has settled in with what they term his "partner", Cathy Leach, also a professional trumpet player. It seems that only traveling professional trumpet players can understand and accept that type of life.

The program also features a number of old clips particularly of Doc's interaction with Carson on the show, and some commentary about the very loud outfits that Doc regularly wore. This is an excellent program to show who Doc was and now is and find myself wondering how much longer he can keep it up. Will he still be traveling and playing when he turns 100 in less than 7 years? I wouldn't bet against him.

"Never Too Late - The Doc Severinsen Story" (2020 release; 85 min.) is a documentary about the life and times of legendary trumpet player Doc Severinsen. As the documentary opens, we hear the Tonight Show's opening theme as we see footage of an 1980s episode. Jonny Carson can't stop commenting about Doc's colorful outfit: "Like Walt Disney threw up on you!". We then go to "Saturday night in the Northeast Four Decades Later" as Doc is performing with a big band. The current Tonight Show's house band he Roots' Questlove comments that "Doc set the standard and he made my job easier." At this point we are less than 10 minutes into the documentary.

Couple of comments: this is co-directed by TV veterans Kevin Bright and Jeff Consiglio, who were given pretty much unfettered access to Doc while filming this (it appears in 2019, pre-COVID). The documentary brings a good mix of looking back at Doc's many accomplishments in his career, spanning the better of 7+ decades, and looking at the latter days and today. The one thing that will stay with you after seeing this is how amazingly energetic Doc remains to this very day. "We should all be so lucky if we live into our 90s", comments Guestlove, and he is 100% correct of course. "He was a MUSICIAN," comments fellow trumpet player Chris Botti. "The trumpet is a jealous mistress," is how Doc himself puts it, and he certainly doesn't seem to have any plans to slow down. Along the way we get to know his intricate value of making The Tonight Show starring Johnny Carson the success that it was, as we get tons of archive clips from that golden era of the late night talk shows. Perhaps most surprising is how the film makers decide to showcase a very personal side of Doc in the last 15-20 minutes of the documentary. Just watch!

"Never Too Late: The Doc Severinsen Story" premiered last Fall at several film festivals, and it premiered on PBS (as part of its American Masters series) earlier this week, which is where I caught it. I have to day this was quite enjoyable all around, as I really didn't know much about Doc (other than his part on the Tonight Show). If you are a fan of Doc Severinsen or of the Tonight Show (Johnny Carson era), I'd readily suggest you check this out, and draw your own conclusion,