Ed McMahon Takes a Tumble

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Ed McMahon Takes a Tumble

Tue., Mar. 8, 2005 11:15 AM PST by Josh Grossberg

It's been a bumpy few days for Ed McMahon.

The former Tonight Show sidekick spent some quality time in a hospital after injuring his head in a spill at his Beverly Hills home and sustaining a mild concussion, according to his publicist.

"Ed tripped and fell in his house in Beverly Hills and gashed his head open," says Susan DuBow. "He received several stitches and sustained a mild concussion."

McMahon took the tumble on Friday. He wound up marking his 82nd birthday Sunday in his hospital bed surrounded by friends and family, according to DuBow.

But Dubow says the TV personality is "feeling much better" and had been held at the hospital mainly for observation given his advanced age. He was allowed to leave Tuesday.

"I feel great and now I'm going to celebrate my 82nd birthday properly," McMahon said in a statement. He plans to have a big barbecue party, according to DuBow.

McMahon, whose trademark "Heeeerrre's Johnny!" introduced Johnny Carson for three decades on NBC's Tonight Show, recently returned to the Burbank studios to reminisce with current host Jay Leno about Carson, who died Jan. 23 of emphysema at age 79.

McMahon also emceed the talent search contest Star Search the prototype for American Idol. He tag-teamed with Dick Clark to cohost TV's Bloopers and Practical Jokes in the mid-'80s and was a regular on Jerry Lewis' annual Labor Day Telethon benefiting the Muscular Dystrophy Association.

McMahon has cut back on his workload in recent years, though he still makes the occasional TV appearance (he played a 'toon version of himself in a 2003 Family Guy episode) and odd commercial.

(Originally published Mar. 7, 2005 at 1:55 p.m. PT.)