Stand-up extraordinaire, Ritch Shydner, recalls one of many sessions appearing on the Letterman Show. Dave Letterman finished up on his long-running show in New York this week.
A DOUBLE KILLING OF THE LETTERMAN AUDIENCE
In the mid 1980’s to early 1990’s I did about eight or ten appearances on Late Night with David Letterman, on the NBC television network, following The Johnny Carson Show.
One such appearance went from almost-didn’t-happen to never-gonna-forget-it.
Another of the other guests was a gray-haired woman pushing a book on how to cook in the wild. She spent much of the pre-show walking around backstage holding a small white bird; looked like a Dove. Everyone petted this cute little bird, including Dave.
The first guest went long and one of the show’s producers informed me that I was bumped. Instead of heading to the airport early for my redeye back to LA, I watched the show in the green room and ate my flight meal of Chinese sesame noodles.
After the commercial, the wildlife chef walked onto the stage where Dave waited by a stove. She announced the first dish, wild dove and pulled a dead dove from her sweater pocket.
Before stepping onto the stage she probably twisted the cute little backstage dove’s neck. The camera caught a close-up of the bird in her hand, its little limp head swinging at the end of a broken neck.
The audience gasped.
David looked at the bird, then into the camera and said, “We’ll be right back.”
The producer who moments before apologetically gave me the bump call, now rushed into the green room in a panic. She stood in front of me and yelled to no one in particular, “Is the comic still here?”
I swallowed a mouthful of noodles, and notified of my willingness to report for duty.
Finding me didn’t immediately ease her pain – she had probably booked the Dove Killer.
She bore in on me, “You gotta do something!”
I thought, “Well I can’t bring the bird back to life…” To say that in her current condition would have been cruel. I knew she meant for me to hose down the fouled audience.
I checked to see if there was any sesame noodle sauce on my face and stepped behind the curtain to be launched.
Supposedly animal acts were always a tough act to follow. My experience that night on the David Letterman Show was just the opposite. People laughed at anything and everything that offered to get the taste of dead dove out of their minds.
After the show, David came to my dressing room with his producer Robert Morton. I don’t remember what he said only that we all laughed a lot.
Guys like that make Show Biz fun.
