As Long As There is Death, There Is Hope

Okay, Okay...I said below that I wouldn't be posting Friday, but I'd forgotten that it was Letterman's 25th anniversary.

When it comes to Television comedy, I've learned that you can actually tell in the room what a writer's "original comedy sin" is. For me, and for a lot of writers my age, that sin--that main influence-- is Letterman by a mile, with maybe a dollop of Carson and George Carlin and Richard Pryor albums thrown in.

Go a little younger than me, and I've caught and appreciated people for whom The Simpsons was the big jumping off point. Or Conan. The Conan thing is strange, since he's so heavily influenced by Letterman himself.

I've yet to work with anyone who was influenced by Leno.

But I've had a great time trading quips and barbs from people who first discovered Peter Sellers. Or Python. Or Blackadder. They bring a different sensibility.

Go a little older, and I get those for whom the genre busting standups were all: Carlin and Pryor, and the first years of SNL.

Then, with some, the wall of formalism creeps in. Beyond the Fringe and the Goon Show both may have been cutting edge for their time, but time's passed them by, now. People getting closer to my parents' age remember Milton Berle and Nichols and May, and I Love Lucy and Dick Van Dyke and Carl Reiner and Mel Brooks' 2000 Year Old Man, and Newhart ...and the list goes on.

It's not that I don't appreciate these comics. I love old Nichols and May, for example. And I'm quite proud of that Complete Dick Van Dyke Show set sitting on my shelf. But your comedy original sin determines where you go first: your go-to's. And in the room, your comedy go-to's kind of define you.

From Carson, I learned the value of letting the other person look funny. That is a lesson that's so important, a lesson that, sadly, often goes unlearned (it certainly has with every Canadian who's ever tried to host a radio show or a tv show here.)

But Letterman was a revelation completely untoward. It's hard to describe what it was like, seeing those early Late Night bits. There was comedy of the absurd, there was the original rise of irony. He was a terrible, terrible interviewer. For people who complain about him today, you really need to see Letterman in those early bits. He stinks. He was irascible, and uncomfortable. He was goofy. He seemed to show no respect to the tradition he was inheriting. Then you realized, if you kept watching, just how wrong that was -- just how much he respected those who had come before.

How to communicate to people maybe a little younger what it was like to have to sneak down and set that first family VCR to tape Letterman each night? The VCR that you begged your Mom and Dad to get mainly so you could tape Letterman -- the original sinner repeating the sin, over and over, with no thought of repentance. The VCR that was as easy to program as the Space Shuttle, and just about as noisy.

Then, later...the fact that after all these years, you can only now finally admit it: Yes, Mom. Yes, Dad. I know I denied it at the time, but my grades in Grade Eleven DID slip because I was up too late watching Letterman. There. It's said. It's out. You were right. Gosh. That does feel good.

As I was sucking up irony and that Letterman sensibility in the dark, I was forging my comic personality; the trip wires that still signify me, that define the pathways into what I will and won't find funny. It was not without cost. Letterman said, "what the hell?" so much, that my constant repetition of the phrase got me thrown off the school announcements by a peevish Christian teacher. Hah! To a one, those high school teachers didn't understand this 'humor,' this irony that we all were sucking up from Letterman like air. The impertinence! We were like ravenous zombies scouring the world for things to make us laugh. Things that were for us. No internet, no 176 cable channels devoted to our tiny slice of interest; no marketers catering directly to us. It was Letterman or teen ski-and-sex movies. That's it.

"That's not funny." Ahhhhh. Good times. So much more than a velcro suit, or throwing stuff off a roof, that is the true legacy of Letterman. It is the thing that made us able to point to our elders and say, "You are square."

I don't mean to be one of those people who say, "Oh the original was better," but there was something lost when Dave moved to 11:30. Not to say the show wasn't still funny. Not to say that I'm not amazed how he can still rear up every once in a while and be very relevant, like his post-9/11 shows or his post heart surgery shows, or when he takes down people like Bill O'Reilly.

But I guess by the time that move to CBS happened, Letterman and the comedy that he wrought was firmly in the mainstream. So of course it seemed less...dangerous, somehow. I mean, when "The World's Most Dangerous Band" changes its name to "The CBS Orchestra," the firmament has shifted, my friends.

Which is why I think like my friend Rob, I was so disappointed that Letterman was so low key in his marking of the anniversary last night. Damnit, this is important!

As much as I might like The Daily Show, for instance, I can't say that the form of what Stewart's doing is revolutionary. Colbert may have more of a claim to that, but even there, to me, nothing touches what Letterman did on NBC. Nothing beats my memory of spending a day riding around in a limo with Calvert "Larry Bud Melman" DeForest. (I did a story on him when I was a producer, following him around on an advertising-driven day when he was doing promo work for Pizza Hut. He was a very nice man. Not as strange as on the show, but don't kid yourself -- not that far away, either.) Nothing beats the time I waited outside 30 Rock, on crutches, for a glimpse of Letterman doing a remote segment. You can see me in the B.G. of the camper van as Larry Bud heads off for Tierra Del Fuego.

One of these days, I'm going to find myself in a room with someone whose comedy original sin is South Park. Or Aqua Teen Hunger Force. And I'll struggle with their go-to's and finding the bridge between us. And that's fine.

So long as it's not Dane Fucking Cook.

Below, a short clip of the guy who was my all time favorite Late Night With David Letterman guest: Brother Theodore. (The title of this post is another memorable Theodore line.) I remember watching this live, and Dave's calm question reduced me to a puddle on the floor. I think my laughter woke my parents up. I think Dave got me in trouble.

Thanks a lot, Letterman. Asshole!







(this post was edited slightly after publication, to fix a couple mistakes and expand a few points.)