Latenighter.com Founder Jed Rosenzweig

Welcome once again to the Letterman podcast. My name is Mike Chisum. All right. I believe this is the first time it might someone can correct me if I'm wrong, but I'm pretty sure this is the first time that we're shooting uh an intro in real time before an episode is released due to current events that have uh transpired. Uh it is currently 12:27 a.m. in the the Pacific Standard Time Zone. Um earlier today uh a bombshell announcement was uh was dropped which might be the biggest announcement in late night television uh certainly in the last 10 years but um the biggest announcement ever and that is that is that uh of course Cold Play uh has a kiss cam scandal. No, not Cold Play. Colbear, Steven Colbear has been cancelled and uh CBS has announced that uh after his contract expires in 2026 that uh the show will not continue. In fact, the franchise will not continue. The Late Show franchise is going to be shut down. The house that Dave built is going to be shut down.

And uh there's a bunch of irony here. The ir irony is today's episode is going to be the founder of late nighter.com, Jed Rosenwag. And it and I mean I'm I'm delighted to have him. When you hear the intro to the to the show that was shot a couple of weeks ago, uh you'll you'll hear why. and and and and uh but ironically today um you know earlier today around 4:30 uh late nighter.com put up the story and many other many many many many other outlets of course reported on that as well about CBS making this bombshell announcement. Now they cited financial reasons for this.

Okay, Steven Colbear is number one um you know at the house that Dave built. They never had a franchise at 11:30 and that was something that was very important to them. Obviously, regimes and leadership change, mediums do change. I get that. However, if they're going to still continue to be a television network, not having a late night show after 30 years plus of building not only a brand at that time for that network in Late Show, but one that competed against the Tonight Show and handily so with Steven Colbear over this last 10 years since he took the mantle. Um, that's a big move. That's a big move. And and and I'm I'm I'm I'm probably out of my depth here uh because as you all know, I am dafted. But um I I'm an educated daft. And uh my phone immediately started blowing up. I was at uh mixed martial arts with my granddaughter. Uh not me, she does it. She's seven years old.

and uh and and and and I was watching her prepare for a jiu-jitsu tournament that she's about to uh go into and my phone just started vibrating like crazy and of course I saw the news. Um, I went back and I've gone back and forth all night with all sorts of people. Uh, people who are in, uh, you know, the Letterman world, of course, that have become friendly with me. Uh, but people outside of that as well, other podcast hosts, um, you know, radio people, people in that that I that I talk with. And, uh, um, I happen to be uploading this episode and, uh, I was I'll name drop. I was going back and forth with Robert Morton. Um, I'll name drop because I I love Morty and I'll drop his name anytime that I can. And uh and I said, "There's no feeling like the feeling of uh uploading an episode that's going to be stale the moment it hits the internet uh broadcast airwaves." And he said, "Buddy, you got to shoot a live intro." And he was exactly right. And so that's what we're doing here.

Um because it's ironic, you know, Jed and I have a phenomenal conversation. Um, and uh, and it's actually a little bit bullish and optimistic about the late night genre. Um, and it's a lovely conversation. It's fantastic and uh, but it doesn't talk about this and this is ripped from the headlines and obviously a lot of people are going to be reporting about this in the next few weeks. Um, details are going to come out. Is the timing merely coincidental? I don't like tribal I don't like creating tribal tribal divisions. I really don't. I don't like polarization um and how it's we been weaponized in in in this world.

It might be the Canadian in me. I just wish everybody would get al would find ways to to um collaborate um rather than compete. Uh but at the same time, I mean, this merger that's happening with uh CBS Paramount um or Paramount and and and Sky Dance, um you know, there have been articles over the last couple weeks and like go go check out the news archives in late nighter talking about our Steven Colbear and John Stewart's days numbered. a lawsuit from Donald Trump against CBS naming Colbear, all of that that I mean many I think myself included um thought to be frivolous. You know, Steven Colbear has has really really made a lot of bones in um making fun of that administration. Um, I would argue that he made fun of of of of the other administration for the last, you know, in the last 5 years as well. But boy, um, one has to wonder if free speech is under attack from this. It's the number one show in late night and it's being cancelled.

And not only is it being cancelled, they are erasing the franchise. I find it hard to believe that they're going to just give it back to the affiliates at 11:30. Again, what do I know? I'm a dunce. However, I want to be talking to some people uh over the next few weeks here that aren't dunes, that know a lot about this stuff and and and uh I'm going to c certainly strive to do that and if appropriate, we will invite them and maybe talk about it on this show as well. Um I'm very sad about this. I'm very sad about it. Uh because again um you know you go back and you read Bill Carter's Late Shift, the idea that CBS uh you know with with with David Letterman and his team at the helm uh created this unprecedented franchise um you know 30 plus years ago and uh 33 years ago I guess and and and the idea that it wasn't just Dave that it could be transferred over to somebody and that somebody uh could go and be number won in late night for CBS.

I don't know. I I I I I I just to me that and and not just me. There are a lot of people who have reached out to me. Um you know, all three fans of this show reached out to me and are heartbroken and uh I'm I'm I'm just It's a sad thing. It's a sad thing. This is something that we've you know, it's like uh I don't know. It's like your favorite band disbanding. um because you know the record label has uh made a change of some sort and and and it's just it's a it's it's um it's hard to quantify uh for me especially when you look at all of these other external circumstances. I mean, there are US senators right now uh that are questioning the timing. Um, and it's just this is one of those things that uh that is it's a monumental moment and I'm grateful for this show, for all the people, the community that we've created that that people that want to talk about this. I'm certainly we're going to be talking about it uh in the weeks to come. Um takeaways. Number one, don't blame Conan. I I just think we shouldn't blame Conan about this. I I don't know.

Uh somehow there's going to be a way to find out about it. And I if if if Jay Leno is behind this uh so help me God. Um yeah, I hope you enjoy this episode uh very much. I certainly enjoyed the conversation. Jed is such a great guy and um maybe we can have him or or somebody from Late Nighter uh come on sooner than later and we can talk about these uh these events that are happening real time right now. But, uh, step back two weeks before any of this was announced, you know, a couple weeks ago, and enjoy this fantastic conversation, um, about the founder and the genesis of lateer.com. Please enjoy episode 171 of the Letterman podcast. All right, y'all thought that I might be fibbing. This is proof right now. The Lettoman podcast, we have one sponsor, one sponsor only, but it is Rupert G and the Hello Delhi. Thank you very much for sponsoring our show, Rupert.

It's my honor, Mike.

Welcome once again to the Letterman podcast. My name is Mike Chisum. All right, I am very excited about today's guest. Uh, I know I get excited about all the guests that come on this show because I love doing this show. No, I love conversation. I love conversation in the world of uh David Letterman, of course, David Letterman Company. Um, and I love the conversation around the culture that it's created and and whatnot. Well, today's guest is somebody who's actually furthering that culture of of late night as a genre. Um, in fact, I would even say a guardian kind of keeping it alive. There are so many of us out here who love this genre. Um, you know, I I think it's a form of art within an art and late night is such a cool for me. It's it's it's it's intertwined with my DNA. uh when my uh you know neuroplasticity was at its stickiest, the late night stuff that was happening in this world, of course, Letterman, you know, being the top of the heap of that, but all of it, everything that was happening, you know, back in the day, uh you know, the happenings of the day, Arsenio Hall and and and and of course the late night wars, Bill Carter's book, all of that stuff, Larry Sanders show, all of that stuff. There are so many of us out there who love this stuff and really have um man a real emotional connection to it.

Uh the guy that I have on here not only has that but he is doing something about it um in an unprecedented way. the founder of lateener.com, Jed Rosenwag, is on the show today. And I gotta tell you, it is such an honor to have him on here. I've talked about him before. Uh last year when I went down to uh California and came back up again, I I went and I visited Jed on the way home. And I talk about that visit um a little bit during that episode. And I wanted to be as respectful as possible. I didn't really go into the conversation too too much, but uh you know, Jed um he has a piece of of Letterman's uh original set uh from the Ed Sullivan Theater in his living room, and it's so cool to see it. He gave me a piece of the Ed Sullivan Theater floor uh when I visited him that day.

We had just this awesome, easy, simple, such an easy conversation about him and about what he sees with late nighter.com and and and and what he's doing to gather all of the people who love this thing that we love so much. And and and you know, you go to lateer.com. I go there every single day. There's always news on what happened on the late night shows, what's happening behind the scenes. Uh lots of Saturday Night Live stuff of course as well. And and really at the end of the day, uh it's a place for those of us who love this stuff uh that we can go to. Now, I want to say this. Jed doesn't I swear to God, he did this for me out of pity. I And I and I'll take it. Hey, I'll take pity. I think I've I've shown very very much over my time doing this. Oh, yeah. I'll take pity. No problem at all. Um he doesn't do these things. He doesn't do interviews and podcasts and things like that.

um and yet he has broken through um you know any trepidation he might have had and we had a really cool conversation. I wanted to know what brought him to this point. How did he get to the point where he could f um be the founder of something that I just and so many other people find um as such a valuable resource um you know with lateer.com. Highly recommend going there putting it put it in your save list. Um, you know, it's where Bill Carter is writing these days. And I mean, he gave Bill Gart Carter a place to write. Mark Malov, uh, hosts the Inside Late Night podcast. Um, and and and you know, Jed is doing the Lord's work. Man, I am so grateful for the work that he and his team um, all the people who are contributing to the site uh, as writers, as content creators.

I I my gratefulness towards him cannot be understated. We go through his entire uh career as to what brought him to this point. And it's fascinating. It really is. He got to be uh front seat uh had a front seat uh you know trends setter for the infancy of the internet and how people would interact when it came to entertainment and things with his start at Yahoo and and and we go through all of that. And he is an unabashed uh Letterman fan. He likes this show, which again is crazy to me. Um, that somebody of of of his position and who he is, his history and whatnot would take time to take his very precious time to spend listening or watching this show. And I just appreciate that. And I appreciate everybody who does that, by the way. Um, but the fact that Jed uh put aside, you know, trepidation and things like that to be on this this show here, it means a lot to me. It means the world to me. And I just really really hope uh you enjoy my conversation with the founder of lateer.com, Jed Rosenbagen.

Jed, I am really, as you know, I have been really excited to have this conversation with you from the very beginning. I know you probably are a little still baffled by it. Uh but I'm grateful. Uh after our first actual conversation, I realize that in some ways we are brothers from another mother. Um the first thing I'm going to say to you is thank you so much for preserving this thing that we have uh this love for, which is uh late night television, late night programming, the lineage of it, uh the people, the characters, all of that. I want to thank you so much for that. But the the thing that I'm going to say the most as a Canadian who for decades tried very hard to find places where Bill Carter wrote things. You have given me a source for that. So I want to say thank you for starting late nighter.com and thank you for agreeing to come on the Letterman podcast today.

Thank you for having me and thank you for all that you've done. I actually have you to thank for the the fact that Bill is is a part of Late Nighter because it was I'm a longtime listener and viewer of your podcast and when you had him on the first time, I don't remember when exactly that would have been,

he at one point mentioned that his CNN contract was coming to a close and that he was looking for a new place to hang his shingle. And I was like, that was my tip off that perhaps we we had the opportunity to work with with Bill. And from there, late nighter was born. So, it's all thanks to you. Cheers.

Okay. You you and I have had a few conversations, including in person at your house. I don't think you've ever told me that before. If if you have, I have blocked it out. Probably uh some sort of I don't know what's the opposite of trauma. Delighted blocking out. That is crazy. I had no idea. I had no idea that was the case. Oh my gosh. Well, yeah. Mike.

Oh my gosh. Every every single time I see him, like I go to late nighter all the time, of course, and I hope everybody else does. Late nighter.com, optimize for your iPhone, the whole nine yards. Go. Just it's it's such a great site, but every single time I see one of Carter's stories, I just devour it ravenously. And it's just there's something about that guy and I thought about it the other day. And don't get me wrong, you got um Degan and some of these other people. Mark Malov's inside late night podcast as part of late nighter. Please everybody go and and listen to uh that as well. But the thing about Carter, and it occurred to me after talking to him when he wrote The Late Shift, The War for Late Night, and his other ones, but but he wrote them like they were thrillers. And I think when Bill writes about this thing that we love so much, it's got to be the passion that comes from him, but he writes these things like they're a thriller and they really entrance and get people involved in them, including the stuff he does for you.

I'm so thrilled to have him be a part of late night. is really he he is our north star and everything we do, you know, aspires to be as engaging as as the stories he writes for us and that, you know, the the enthusiasm and appreciation for late night that he, you know, exudes from from from himself whenever he writes, whenever he talks about late night, like he's first and foremost like you and I. He is a fan of of what this time period has been historically uh and the special relationship that viewers have with it just by the very nature of the time that has aired and the personalities involved. Thrilled to work with

Oh man, I I can imagine. I want to get into uh because you alluded to it, the passion that you have for for for this genre. I want to talk about Saturday Night Live, of course. Um, but I want to set the context a little bit because I didn't realize that I was a fan of something that you were a part of, uh, before before I knew who you were, uh, High Def Digest. And I know that, you know, I want to talk about that a little bit, but before your foray into the idea of melding entertainment and digital media together. Did that start at Yahoo? Is that where is that where things started for you? I first so you know I went to art school, studied film like I I was really my my parents are both all three of them my stepfather as well visual artists and so I kind of came to the internet as a someone who was was really passionate about video and television. Uh, and I had always wished that I had come of age in the ' 50s at a time when TV was still experimental and being developed.

And when the internet came around, I had a friend who had done a who had started in New York City online calendaring company called Webcal. Bruce Spectre is his name. And he at the time just to make a living I was shooting corporate research videos cuz I had a background in video production uh and he said hey you know would you be interested in a part-time job working for this website essentially doing data entry.

Sure. And so I I started doing that with him and one of the partners on that site uh uh uh taught me uh how to uh code HTML ROI. Lovely man.

Shout out to Raj.

Yes. And I really enjoyed like once I had learned HTML, you know, I discovered that you could take any web page online and, you know, rip the source code and kind of create your own version of that. And so I became kind of the front-end uh uh HTML uh developer for uh a portion of the webcal site called EventCow. AU came around in 1998 and ended up acquiring that that uh site WebCow and I was living in New York, born and raised in New York, never had any intention of leaving the city, but they at that point, you know, I I I basically they offered me a job at Yahoo, you know, offered to to pay for my relocation with a one-year commitment, and it seemed like I'd be foolish not to. Were they in Silicon Valley at the time?

Yeah, they were out.

That's a big That's a big change for a New Yorker. That's a big change.

Yeah. And I really I could thought it was just going to be a single year and it ended up being seven years before all was said and done. And what was fun about joining since it was 98, um Yahoo was still a relatively small company. They were at a place where if you were passionate about a certain subject area and you could kind of prove that that you were capable, uh, they'd let you run your own product. And so eventually I found my way to Yahoo Movies and Yahoo TV where I led our production teams there and building out what were kind of, you know, the little verticals within uh, the larger beast that was Yahoo at the time.

Well, hold on. You talk about it being a beast. Like I I want to I want to set context there. I remember when the with the um the internet the worldwide web not tnet but the worldwide web startup but we were still into the dialup before DSL and whatnot. Um and this is before the rise of Google for the cool kids. Yahoo was the search engine of choice. Yahoo. You talk about a giant like in those early days of the internet. Yahoo was the go-to and and and the idea you know it's funny you say I wish it would have grown up in the 50s and I could help roll out some of these things while television was experimental. you kind of got to see that with this genre that you loved in this new medium that was still experimental at the time. You talk about a right place, right time? That is a really neat place in history to kind of put yourself at the forefront of technology during a time of extreme innovation. That do you ever look back at that and go, "Wow, you talk about right place, right time. That's where I was." You ever think about that?

I I felt it at the time. It was thrilling to be there. It was enjoyed the work. I enjoyed the folks I was working with. We really had a front row seat to that stage of of the the internet. There would be folks like Maline Albbright when she was Secretary of State visiting and that's just the the first random person that that comes to mind. But it was was the center of the internet universe for a time. And it was, you know, what was fun about working for a company like that at that time was, you know, this wasn't something that the folks who worked there studied to do there. There was no such thing as the worldwide web as it as we now know it when most folks were in high school or college going in there. And so we came from all kinds of different backgrounds. And it was just it was it was a thrilling time and space to be in the valley. And again, like I I I never imagined living outside of New York. And then, you know, by the time those seven years were up, I I could not believe that I'd had that experience.

Yeah, that's

so I was up in in I was living in San Francisco and computing down to Silicon Valley uh uh for the 5 years and then we moved down to Los Angeles uh cuz I was doing the was working for Yahoo Entertainment and we moved our operations down to Santa Monica um which is where I met my wife and we ended up in Seattle and now Portland. But I've forgotten your question.

No, you you answered it and a couple other ones as well that I now don't have to ask which is great. when you're down there now, you obviously love all of these mediums that you talk about, television, all that. We didn't even talk about prime time or we will, but but but you love these mediums still. You're a late night fan. You love the things that the people, the dozens of people who listen to this show love all of these things, the ins and outs and all of that. And yet you have this job, coding, technology, and now you find these two things that you have that are melding and you're actually in Los Angeles, kind of the epicenter, one of the epicenters of show business. Did it get fun at that point? Did you get a chance to start like was there bucket list stuff that was kind of coming true without even you trying to you know just by doing the work was was that a part of your job?

Oh for sure. I mean, you know, it was first of all, it was fun throughout, but there were, again, you know, this has nothing to this has everything to do with the power of Yahoo at the time, but you know, an example at one point, I think you may remember that that William Shatner had a deal with Price Line where he was their spokesperson and I think in exchange like he owned a piece of Price Line in exchange for this relationship that he had with them and and Marlon Brando heard about this and decided that he wanted to do the same thing. And so he called Yahoo, like called the switchboard and said, "Yeah, I I want to talk to uh Jerry Yang, who was the co-founder of Yahoo and went on to be the company's CEO at one point after I left. He was a face of Yahoo. And Jerry then passed him probably didn't believe that it was Marlon Brando.

But for whatever reason, uh because I was I was in charge of production for movies and TV at Yahoo, it was decided that I was the one who would talk with Marlon Brando. And so I, you know, had a series of phone conversations with with Brando, not entirely believing that it was him in a while, feeling like someone was was punking me, but then went down to uh this was when I was still up in in the valley. Uh went down and and met him on on one occasion down in at his home in uh uh Beverly Hills. Uh uh you know that's certainly whether it's a bucket list or you know it's it's not the type of thing I ever imagined that I would be

Godfather on two. Yeah. Yeah. You don't you don't expect to get that call.

Yeah. And that really you know like that that was the very tip of the iceberg when it came to the unique opportunities that came my way just by association with Yahoo at that time. So that's incredible and I'm certain that if you did take a journal or were a journaler at that point, some of the things that you experienced are just uh mind-numbing. Now, at the same time, I know a lot of people in tech, my wife actually has a has a has a tech startup and I understand how things go. People a lot of people sometimes have things off the side of their desk. Was High Def Digest one of those things that was running off the side of your desk or did you end your association with Yahoo before you started that?

I did end my association with Yahoo. We had done some some stuff at Yahoo like we knew that there was so this was 2005 2006 when DVDs were where an awful lot of money was being made uh in distributing DVDs and the movie studios were looking for places to advertise their their wares and at Yahoo we never really cracked that that nut. We tried Yahoo movies at the time was the the most trafficked uh movies site on the web and we tried to out a section for DVDs and you know I think the reality is is that uh by the time movies hit DVD you've kind of heard all you would need to know about a a film and so there was never really a kind of editorial wein for us from a movie's perspective but as I was my wife's a and we were moving up to Seattle and Yahoo by then had become a different type of company much larger certainly much more corporate.

I was going to say corporate. Yep.

Um and so I was looking for the next thing and I had met a gentleman through my work at Yahoo named Peter Brachie who knew all there was to know about DVDs. I was fortunate enough having worked at Yahoo at the right time to be able to just at that point consider what do I what do I want to do as my next big thing really what I wanted to do was to work with people who I admired and try and craft you know kind of greenhouse some web ideas that would hopefully become self- sustaining like what I really enjoyed doing at Yahoo was building new sections of our product and so to this day Like I really enjoy starting from scratch, you know, trying to identify a subject area and and building something that that hopefully, you know, there's a business model there and the project itself can at some point kind of, you know, cook on its own fumes to mix my metaphors. But I thought there was an opportunity to work with Peter.

He was interested. He collaborated first to build a site that was expressly about DVDs, then as uh high def. It was just around the time that the HD DVD and Blu-ray formats were emerging and there seemed to be a lot of interest a lot happening in that space. So we transitioned. We launched uh High Def Digest in I think it was April of 2006 and it quickly like it just became by stroke of luck. It became the place where folks who were passionate about uh uh the emerging formats uh started to gather. uh you know we we we it was both a content site and a community and uh uh it ended up growing very rapidly and ultimately within I think about 2 and 1/2 years later my wife was pregnant uh we were kind of looking at the next chapter of our lives uh and uh somebody else uh uh had expressed interest in acquiring the site and so I was able to you know just hand it off to them and I'm thrilled that it continues to this day. I was one of the people by the way. So, so again to provide context

acquired the site,

not the acquiring the site. No, the the other part the part person who uh enjoyed being into the site and I do believe actually I was part of the community at one point back in the day again to provide context. I mean you you think about with Yahoo, okay, it's the culture and the culture is movies and things like that. Well, with High Def Digest is that's when you kind of start delving into a very large subculture within that larger culture and I was certainly a part of it. I will not let anytime we do any sort of downsizing in the house. I have gotten my DVD/B Blu-ray collection down to a level where I will never let any of them go because they're the ones that have the special gems that that commentary that you will never find anywhere else that and and back then you you think about I'm the kid who bought I I there are there are records of of things that I bought on vinyl, moved to cassette, moved to CD, and then moved to digital and they have gotten me every single time. It translates to movies, I don't know how many copies of the Star Wars trilogy I've ended up buying over the years, the same content but just different, right?

And so when a new version of one of these things that I love so much, whichever one it might have been, whether it was a Kevin Tarantino movie or a Kevin Smith movie or or or or whatever, or you'd see uh the first time DVD release of a movie, you're like, "Okay, is this the one I'm going to buy or in 6 months, are they going to release the one that I really want to buy?" And and that was a lot of stuff to sift through. and me and all of my friends on Tuesday, the first place we were going was the was the the media shop, whatever our local media shop was. Tuesdays were a big deal for us and we wanted to know what was coming out on Tuesday. High Def Digest gave us that edge and it let us know these things and it went into the behind the scenes of some of these special editions that would come out and it was an incredibly valuable site. Like I can't tell you how much I loved that site and knowing the pieces of information you guys would go and mine and find for us.

You know, I got to ask you though, Jed, like it's so interesting. One of the thing when I talk to a lot of I've talked to a lot of creatives in my life for this show as well, of course. And the idea, the nut that is hard to crack is the idea of someone being a creative, but then trying to monetize or to put commerce and connect the creativity with commerce. You seem to kind of had a had a knack to being able to uh to do that.

Is that something that you've ever thought of? Because you are a creative like you you are you have these roots, visual artistry and and things like that. You certainly certainly love these art that come out, whatever they might whatever format they might come out in or media they might come out in, but you also have this business sense as well. Has that always been the case or have you just been really really lucky with the timing or is it a combination of both?

I think really really lucky with the timing. you know, I enjoy having a problem to solve. And so, you know, with High Def Digest, the, you know, at the time, online ad revenue was not really enough to sustain a site like that. And so, you know, we did some experimenting and and, you know, the because we became

a de facto, you know, just

the go-to

one of Yeah. one of the primary sources for absolutely information about Blu-ray and and HDVD discs and people who were you know we became because we were announcing you know when when discs would be released we became the window through which folks were pre-ordering discs on on Amazon and at that time Amazon had an associates program where you would get a substantial uh piece of of every sale if you refer the consumer to them. So it became a much more profitable business than I had ever envisioned thanks to Amazon.

Yeah. And just the way the winds were blowing, you just happened to be

built your sale right at the time the storm was about to come,

right? Yeah. And so it was,

you know, I it was not a stroke of genius. It was recognizing, okay, we're you know, I'm not able to to make this site self- sustaining by by advertising revenue alone. And so what else can we do? And you know, we threw a lot of um different things at the wall, but that ended up uh luckily for us being the thing that stuck.

Yeah. Well, it was a really good one and I'm grateful to it to this day. When I when I first learned about Late Nighter and I wanted to Okay, who started this? And I looked back and I saw you were associated with that. I was just like, "Son of a bitch." Okay, that's very cool that that that was the case. Now, um Okay, so high def goes away. How long had you been thinking about this idea of curating again subculture?

So, I I took about 10 years off while we were raising our young children and then came back to the web around 2016, 2017. and my return back to the like kind of similar to what I was describing with with High Def Digest. Uh there was another fellow whose work I was just a huge fan of. His name is Norman Weiss and he had a website called tvdtattlele.com. Uh that existed as a standalone website going back to I think the year 2000. Uh and you know I think at at one point he was able to make ends meet just through online advertising. Then that bubble burst and he started essentially writing TV tattle as a column for a couple of other outlets. First hit hitfix hitfix hit flick then I think TV insider and his you know through the time I worked at Yahoo and beyond I was obsessed with his column. I would voraciously read it every day over lunch and he around that time had stepped away from his column at TV Insider and I was really missing it and so I approached him and said hey I'll just like don't worry

I'll give you a platform I'll give you a platform you know don't worry about it being a business so much you know we'll figure that part out and so we relaunched together tvtattlele.com which and kind of in a roundabout kind of way led to the birth of late nighter as a you know it was so just to back up here a little bit TV is this highly curated uh kind of global view across the web of what critics and and folk columnists folks who write about TV are saying on a daily basis your your one-stop shop for kind of uh the best most critical takes on on the state of television on on any given day. And that that's how I was introduced to um you know most of the folks who contribute to our sites today because they were writing elsewhere. And at one time you know every local paper in the country had a TV columnist uh pumping out content on a daily basis that was often really compelling and was not reaching folks beyond their you know specific region. TV title especially in the early days was you know place where you could really get this global view you know he continues today if the white lotus has just aired its finale he's going to give you an overview of what you know the 15 top critics across the country had to say about it

very handy

and I think that everybody's writing about television these days you know whether it's Newsweek whether it's uh the New York Times you know especially you know at that juncture which was kind of like the peak of peak He it was just any entertainment writer, any outlet that was trying to gain Google's algorithm was tapping into that. But then I've had a personal passion for late night television for uh as long as I've been allowed to watch television, which was going back to when I was uh I had parents who did not allow me as a child to watch TV.

So I basically was introduced to television uh at the age of about 13.

Yep. and gravitated to late night uh first through uh Saturday Night Live and then through uh to Letterman and like to me it was where the most interesting stuff was happening on television and still is to a large extent.

I couldn't agree more. I just got to ask with the SNL and I and I want to talk to you a lot about SNL because I know how much of a how much you enjoy it and then there's also the generational aspect of it that I want to I want to get to here in a moment, but who was your cast? Was it the original cast or was it like who was your who was your cast that you were introduced to SNL to?

So I was introduced my first SNLs were during the Dick Eversole years. Uh okay.

Eddie Murphy, Joe Piscopo, that whole crew like I started watching around 1984. Uh and then uh living in New York, uh had the uh uh great fortune of of being able to go on standby and and actually uh uh uh go to quite a few tapings over the

One of my questions is how many do you think you went to?

Uh at least I would say maybe 15 over the course of like 15 to 20 over the course of about three years. It was, you know, kind of brutal, a little less brutal than I believe it is today. But, you know, you you would get there around 3:00 in the morning on a Saturday morning. You'd wait in line in the the lobby of of Rockefeller Center for 6 hours. They'd hand out the stand, buy tickets, you'd come back later that night and hope that you get in. And because I was going at an era where I would say kind of the the heart of the period where where my friends and I were were going to the the show on a semi-weekly basis.

Yep.

Was uh kind of 86 through 87.

Yep.

Which is just after Lauren Michaels had come back to the show uh and the the now famous uh uh weird year.

Yeah. uh uh was not a particularly securing tickets on standby was was not all that hard during that period.

But you watch that change though as Carvey and Hartman and Hooks and like they all just started to really expand the thing again and and you know within a few years Wayne's World's making a couple hundred million dollars at the at the box office again. It's not that long from when you were doing that. So you saw the show go you you we talk about es and flows. My goodness, you've seen a lot of different es and flows in your career in all sorts of different areas. And SNL certainly is one of them when you when you got your entry point, but at the same time, when you're that age, at that time, you don't know it's the weird year. You don't know that Michaels has come back or whatnot. And yet still, it feels like you going there, you wouldn't have gone more than once if there wasn't that magic, that whimsy. And it feels like, you know, your your your glue was still sticky at that point. And it just sort of solidified into into your subconscious core memories. Is that is that is that accurate?

Yeah. I mean, there's no more exciting show to see produced than SNL, you know, and and that was, you know, I I would, you know, I I I can't express how thrilling it was as a kid who was, you know, obsessed with the show to be able to see it in real time every week and to, you know, engage, you know, with cast members and, you know, such a different time, but, you know, to be able to, you know, sneak up there. Uh when we were waiting in in line early in the morning on a Saturday morning, some, you know, folks would let us in and we could, you know, just wander around the the the the studio. It was it was an extraordinary experience for a, you know, uh 14, 15, 16 year old kid, which is what I was at the time.

Absolutely. Did you see um were they all shows or were some of them dress rehearsals or combination?

We did a mix of both. Like we got to a point where we were so dieh hard that we would go to both. So

that was an option for you that you could actually get to both.

You could get two tickets. Each person in line at that time could get two tickets. And so if you and a friend went in and one got, you know, two dress rehearsal tickets and one got two live show tickets, you could you could split it.

My gosh. and and knowing okay so one of the areas I think there our brains are similar on a night that you could see both at once the fascination as to see which sketches got cut from dress and getting out at whatever time the uh you know 1:30 say it's 1:30 whatever time it is that you get out onto the streets of 30 Rock and you're trying to go back and forth on which ones were in the dress okay oh yeah that one happened in the dress and this one didn't have like there was a lot of that right

for sure yeah yeah I mean there there there sketches that get cut there are lines that get changed was uh um yeah, you know, and and it feels like that at that time these were not things that folks were tracking. You know, there weren't Reddit groups and and for that matter Wall Street Journal uh uh uh uh writers who were covering this kind of stuff. It it existed within that world and without within that world alone. So, it was it was great fun to bear witness.

Yeah. You think about like I think about bands that I love and and and before the internet whenever I would have a band that I loved and somebody would slip me a bootleg of one of their shows somewhere and and and it's like okay this is this is the little dialogue they had with the audience in between this song and that song and I saw them in concert with the same set list but this one here was special because of this one event that happened because someone who threw a shoe on the on the stage or whatever it was. It's kind of a little bit like that like there's this it's not going to be known otherwise. Now it seems that everything gets known, gets put out there and and and it's and it's but the cutting room floor stuff, the stuff the process of it for people like myself and I think you as well, the process is equally as fascinating. I got to see Kimmel a couple days before I came and met you just over a year ago. I I got to see Kimmel and and not only did I I enjoyed the show of course and but I was more I I looked more into what was happening. At one point he was interviewing Chris Pine and I was looking more at the things that were going on around it and more fascinated by that. I imagine there was a lot of that for yourself and for for that group of friends that you were with.

Oh yeah. You know there there was again there there's nothing more thrilling than seeing that show come together. And you know I've I've again living in New York and and being really into this stuff. You know, I went to a lot of uh Letterman tapings and you know, I saw the Cosby Show and you know, Kate Nally, which was uh produced out of the Ed Sullivan Theater. And

none of them were as thrilling as as SNL. Yet, it was always I I was I I had and have an kind of unending uh fascination with uh uh what it takes to make television.

Yeah. What's were some of the uh early Letterman stuff cuz I mean again I I don't mean to have buried the lead but I I'm so fascinated as to what has brought you to uh have founding late nighter. Uh, but that being said, when I came over to your house, we talked a lot about Letterman. Like, you're you're a letter you are a Letterman fan. And and and and I'm curious, you got to see some of that late night stuff. I mean, my word. Any any core memories that that that pop out of of late night memories from back in the time that you got to see live and in person?

You know, I I would say I I did not really go to see I did see a couple of of late night with David Letterman tapings, but it was not until he moved to CBS and I was in my 20s.

Yep. where I probably went to a half a dozen tapings over the first couple years that he was at CBS because there was a period of time where it just seemed like it was relatively easy to write in for tickets,

which is crazy because it was the peak. It was the peak of Dave was everywhere. That story was again late shift the late right around the late shift time is what you're talking about and and and crazy crazy stuff that you got to see

and it was just such a you know it was the center. It it was thrilling as a Letterman fan because he was at the the center of the entertainment universe, you know, and it such a big show, you know, I think he's he's described it as as a, you know, a circus. It was just so heightened yet Dave was still Dave, you know, like I I I would say that that the the the core memories that I have of Letterman was have to do with with his influence on me as a you know awkward teenager

uh who you know saw in him someone who had the ability you know who who seemed in a world that was so superficial, appeared to be genuine, was having fun with television in a way that that other people weren't, you know, that didn't that there's so much of um TV that that just feels like it's folks coloring by numbers, right? And and he was he was really he and his team were doing really innovative things. And as a teenager, that was super exciting. like you know SNL was was kind of my my gateway drug and then Letterman became kind of the person from which and I think this is true of a lot of people of my generation you know from which I you know like 20 30% of my personality is just Daveisms you know

yeah mine too

it's uh uh it it you know and so it was for the longest time late night with David Letterman felt like it was this this thing that existed did in, you know, for those of us who happened to be up at 12:30 or who were taping it and watching it at, you know, 6:00 in the morning, which is what I was doing.

And then, you know, uh, I kind of fell out of, you know, I went to college and and fell out of it for a bit. And then, you know, I I graduated from college in in May of 93 and and moved back to the city. So, I was there, you know, in in September of 1993 for uh that first stretch of of shows and it was just it felt like, you know, that this thing that had been my little secret all of a sudden, you know, was the biggest thing in entertainment and it was super thrilling

that way, too. Uh, and it's funny, this analogy has been used a few times on the show here, but the idea it's it's it's when you love that band and it's you see them in the in the in the garage and then you see them in the maybe the local armory or whatever it is and and and you're like, man, this is really special. This is really special. And then suddenly they're stadium touring and they've blown up and there's a percentage of that audience that goes into the, you know, that that Gen X, oh, you're a sellout kind of a thing. And then there's a percentage of the audience that's like, wow, I can't believe it's become this. and what felt like a secret club is now everybody is either in on it or has heard about it at least, right? And and that's a that's that's a thrilling feeling for me. I I I love that as well.

But you go back to those times where it was, you know, I I I there's a couple of guys that I went to to to to junior high with and we would walk by each other in the hallway the next morning after a Letterman and we weren't even really in the same friend group, but we all knew that we both knew that we liked Letterman and we just do this little like if something funny on the show happened the night before, something where there was spontaneous, things went off the rails, whatever it was, a special moment, and we just kind of look at each other and do the little nod. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

That was great. Right. And just kept walking. That was always it. Letterman very much had that. And for those who saw it explode like that, the explosion was that much more spectacular. And you were there for it. You were in New York for it. I I talked to Rupert. If there are stories that I get Rupert to tell me, it's of those first few years. It's just because think about from his perspective, right? He's got this little sandwich shop that may or may not make it. And suddenly, like you say, the circus comes to town and moves in right next door and everything changes forever. A magical, magical time. Um, and and obviously it's stayed with you. Now, let's fast forward. We're at the point here where I want to I want to talk about late nighter. I want to like and I want to talk about your boy because at the end of the day, I I love the idea that part of this spawned from yes, life experience. Yes, you know where uh where you know, as you say in Canada, you're not where the puck is.

You see where the puck is going a little bit. You have this love for these things. You've got a bond of SNL with your son, which I thought was just fantastic. Needless obsessed. Is he obsessed with SNL? He loves SNL the way that you did or or more so

I don't want to uh uh he is very into Saturday Night Live.

Yeah.

Uh and we started watching together a couple of years ago.

Uh and yeah, he got very into it and he he had long been suggesting to me that there should be a uh late night version. And so it really like it came from him and his uh uh passion for Saturday Night Live. Uh and obviously our shared passion like it's it's been

fun to uh you know I now live in Portland, Oregon

and uh uh you know we don't have the ability to to go and see the show in person and yet you know there's now there are so many avenues through which to kind of get a a peak behind the scenes. Um and that is from you know from whence late nighter came and you know like so he he's into SNL he's he's become really into all of the the late night talk shows as well and it has been fun to produce a website that is as much for me a you know 53year-old who is you know nostalgic in some ways for the the late night of old but to also be programming to the not that there are a lot of 14year-old y old kids who are really into this stuff. Y

uh but to know that there are, you know, to be thinking looking at it through his eyes is is great fun.

Absolutely. I I mean my granddaughter is my is is my life. She's my everything. We spend I see her five days a week and I'm already at the point she's just turned seven and I'm already at the point where I'm showing her very specific Letterman videos that are as far as I'm concerned for a seven-year-old lowhanging fruit stuff that will make her scream with laughter cuz she knows the Letterman pot like she kind of she knows a little bit. She about it. She knows David Letterman's name very well because the name gets thrown around in my circles all the time. But I'll show her some of these videos.

Beware. No.

Yeah. Exact. Yeah. Exactly. But still watch some of these clips and to hear her laugh at it. I mean, I hope like I hope beyond hope that there is some way that I can share that connection with her in some way, shape or form. Even if it's her liking the new version of whatever Late Night is going to move into, if that ends up being what it is, okay, fine. But you actually got the connection with the same show that you love and and whatnot. And what a what a cool bonding to have with a kid or or or or a family member. That is a beautiful beautiful thing. That is certainly not a given that is going to happen. You know, there's five or six things that my dad wish I would have gravitated into and I didn't end up, you know. So, that is really cool that you two can can bond towards that. I was going to ask before you started Late Nighter, had you crossed paths with Mark Malov before?

Yeah, I was I was a big fan of the Carson podcast, right?

Oh, of course. Yeah. Yeah. And so we we had we I was a Patreon supporter of of his and we had had a few conversations about when he was wrapping up the arson podcast doing something else. And you know like Late Nighter is very much excuse me another opportunity for me to work with folks who who whose work I admire. you know, hopefully, you know, uh uh giving h having a single place where where one can find both Bill Carter and Mark Maloff and and others who have expertise and passion for this space kind of lifts us all up. So that that Mark is is uh really, you know, I would put him up there with Bill Carter as one of the leading voices thinking about late night and writing about late night in his new book.

Yep. uh and uh uh uh you know he has the ability much like you do in podcast form to translate his own personal enthusiasm for the time period into really compelling content.

I appreciate that everybody if you want to like like don't get me wrong this is you know this is a podcast it is if you want to listen to a really really awesome podcast listen to inside late night with park. It is so good. And then like you said, I thank you for for for referencing that. We've talked about it lots on this show, but the Carson podcast. And I mean, by the way, for those who are Letterman afficionados or one who ones who want to be, there's a lot of crossover in the Carson podcast as well into the Letterman world. A lot of folks, folks who have been on this show have also done episodes on the Carson podcast back in the day. When Mark wrapped up, I believe he wrapped up um in March of of 22 and we started in April of of 22. It kind of it kind of it was cross-sectioned very very well and he was on Jay Ryan's show and then Mark ended up we connected at that point. He ended up being one of the early guests on our show as far as I'm concerned.

He's a guy that gave our show credibility. So if you want to blame somebody, blame Mark. But Mark Malov is a phenomenal phenomenal guy. He's a guy who tries to um he's an encourager and that's one of the things I love about Mark so much. I'm I'm one of the big believers. I believe comp um collaboration kicks the crap out of competition. I I really really do and and he's a collaborator. He's a guy that says, "Yeah, go do this." You know, here have you talked to this person? Have you thought of this? Have you thought of that? He's really um a special special guy and I'm I'm I'm again grateful that you have provided a place uh for him for him to have an outlet and again like Bill Carter, it's just it's such a cool thing. Um you also did it at a time where it was moving right into the SNL50. Now we're kind of uh looking back on it. You and I talked about it when I saw you this time last year. uh kind of wondering a few things or whatever. Boy, did NBC in this current time, place, um the landscape of entertainment, how everything is shifting from the Olympics to the end of SNL50. As far as I'm concerned, that network hit a grand slam home run with the documentaries that came out around SNL, the buildup, including how they finished the season.

I just thought I thought they did an absolutely spectacular job of executing um a landmark event while everything is shifting the way that it is. Would you I I'm certain you agree with that.

I do. Yeah. I mean, they they eventized the anniversary, you know, and from what I understand, this is their model. You know, they're going to be doing the same thing next winter with the Olympics and the Super Bowl, which will also happen to be on on NBC. Um, and you know, it went beyond, you know, the, you know, they managed to stretch it out over the course of the entire season for Saturday Night Live. You know, I know that it was, you know, everybody, you know, is sounding the death nail for broadcast television, but it was, you know, they they managed to draw huge audiences for the anniversary show season itself, I think, is is up, I know, is is up year-over-year by, I think, 30%. Uh that's unheard of where broadcast television is now of uh you know was the most profitable SNL season of all time which you know when you consider the state of of broadcast television today like it was really well played and well executed the it was that anniversary special the homecoming special you know I'm biased I love the show but

uh I you know I I can't imagine either uh being better produced, you know, like it was just they they had, you know, the all stars working on these things and it showed like the she talent on display was extraordinary.

Yeah. Like I mean the documentaries, the people who did the documentaries were all again the best of the best of the best and it it did show. That's right. But the idea of and it's going to be interesting. This is one of the questions I wanted to ask you about the business of late night. I'm glad we did this. I'm glad we got the intro out of the way and and if and if and if and trust me, it's gone fantastic as far as I'm concerned. I I'm so grateful and I love this conversation, Jed.

It's kind of say I don't think anybody else is listening at this point, but

I do not care. That's fine. That's that that is fine with me. It can be a show for one and I'm down. I I love it. But here's the business part of of of late night. Now, I've talked to Carter the idea of uh I think the last time maybe he came on, we talked about the idea of the appointment and the appointment television still works whether it's a Super Bowl, whether it's the Oscars, whether it's and and in a way late night can be that, you know, the monologue recaps that you guys do and things like that. I I I do believe that the time and place of, you know, uh, Big Orange, as I like to call him, down south, when Big Orange does something, I want to know what the what the guys and gals on late night want to say about it, right? And and and what their take is and and where the writers come up with uh the angle to go and skewer um, you know, whatever it is that's happening out there. So, so, so in a in a small way, it's the monologue.

Then there's also of course still the machine of we are I mean even Letterman for that matter was involved with promotion because the lion share of the A-lister that gets people to to to maybe who aren't dieh hard fans to tune in is going to be that appointment of Tom Cruz just came back on Letterman for the first time in seven years things like that right so there's always been these little appointment things that have been part of late night SNL then went and took it a step further and they created partnerships with brands and had advertising and the the cast members would be part of you know the Volkswagen commercials with the Californians and and many others. It was very very well it was very very meticulously triggered and and and went up. You think about this with late night folks. Do you have to go you have to do something?

No. No, the dog just wanted

Oh, good. Okay. Okay. So, you think about this with late night shows and Dave I don't think ever would have done this but I wonder if to solidify late night if that's what it's going to need to be. Are we going to need to see Seth doing commercials in between the the the you know guests and things like that for for for things almost like a throwback to when television first started where it was very specific advertising for specific products in one show. It's it's it's interesting how SNL incorporated some of the old to make this stuff happen. And I wonder if it is going to be a playbook to keep Late Night alive moving forward.

It very well may be. Obviously, it was really successful for SNL and there's, you know, like I think late night has traditionally been a time period where folks innovate, right?

Yeah.

Some of the the most interesting kind of out ofthebox programming ideas have come out of late night. So, it it only flows that, you know, as the business itself struggles to adjust to the shift that they would begin to experiment there. And you're certainly seeing that, you know, Fallon and Seth Meyers as well. They're all doing what we call on our site. I think they they call them brand activations. We call them sponsored content. Coar has done some of it himself.

Absolutely.

But it's uh you know, it is it's the type of thing that you get the sense that um Letterman and Carson, you know, would never dain to do. Yet I feel like each of these guys are doing it in their own voice and in a way that feels organic to their shows and you know it it's it is a uh that there's a model there whether it can backfill for the millions of viewers who are no longer watching on broadcast. I think we're seeing that that no it can't. But it's uh it's some of the more it is something that we cover on late nighter because I think it's some of the most creative stuff that's that's happening in late night today.

Absolutely. I couldn't agree more and it's it's it is it is going to be very interesting to see how how things adjust even more and when if things are scaling back when that scaling stops because you know the whole thing about late night back in the day was you compare late night to a show like say I don't know I'm just going to pull I pulled LA Law. I don't know why I pulled LA Law, but I'm pulling LA Law. So, LA Law is on TV and it costs X amount of dollars to produce. Well, a late night show that doesn't just have at the time probably 25 episodes, I guess, of LA Law, 25 episodes, um, you know, they have way more and it's yet still way less uh from a cost to produce. But now we're seeing things scaling back, scaling back, scaling back where late night shows, which were the cheap shows um to produce, now you know, you're seeing Seth lose his band. you're seeing after midnight going away and and and the Byron Allen thing that's actually very frustr uh very uh interesting I should say as to as to what's happening there.

You know, I was very saddened about that obviously cuz Dave is the one that opened up the 12:30 time slot to to another late night show on CBS and the expansion that's happened now as the expansion kind of contracts a little bit. It's interesting to see where that's going to stop and what causes that to stop and if there is, like you say, a problem-solving ability from somebody who can come in and say, "I'm going to figure out another income stream for these shows. What it could look like, what that might what that might entail." Very, very interesting time to be observing this stuff. Obviously, there still is an audience for this stuff, which is why you guys are are doing what you're doing. I want to ask about um are there things that you would see for late night or I I saw as you guys got going we talked about before the show about a year and a half ago I guess is how long you've been in in in play at the time of this episode right about a year and a half.

Yep.

Okay. Yes.

Is there anything that you are um do you have any white whales when it comes to late nighter? Is there something that uh you can talk about? It's like yes I would really like to see us do this or have this a different section. Are there things that are expanding that it's moving into that you can see that it's uh going to expand? uh evolve into I should say

the the model for late nighter in many ways uh is this site TV newser that was started by Brian Stelter who's uh gone on to like he I think he's back at CNN but it was a very kind of uh industry focused site still is uh on uh the business of television news and I was big fan of that site. Still am. What they do uniquely is they work closely with the the the TV uh news networks uh whether they're on cable or you know NBC News, CBS News, ABC News, and they they've kind of become a more of an insider view of what's happening in that industry. They do a lot of, you know, how the sausage is made kind of stuff. And that was always my my hope and vision for where Late Nighter would go, where we would develop, you know, relationships with the shows, where they would peel back the curtain and share with us the kind of stuff that you often see around FYC Emmy consideration time where we talk about why the show chose to do this, what goes into producing one of these sponsored content pieces. And that that has been it's been difficult for us to get there with with uh the PR departments that that manage the the late night.

That's where it stops is the PR departments. I've got a I've got a few guests who have told me they they're coming on the show and I get stopped at their PR person for whatever reason. That that that really is a wall sometimes, isn't it?

Yeah. It's a real struggle. So you can speak with folks, you know, and we we know that folks who who work on the shows are, you know, reading the site are, you know, fans of the site and we too have had that experience where, you know, they want to talk and then we talk with the PR rep and they're like, "No, we're not, you know, one of the networks PR reps says, you know, we don't do we don't look behind the curtain." And that, you know, I I I hope that moving forward because we really, you know, we are champions for late night. We want to see more late night. We think that it's a really special time period. We think that there are so many great stories to be told. And yet, you know, for the most part, we're limited to observational stuff when it comes to present day late night. You know, we can can do the the how the sausage is made pieces for things that happened in the past with folks who are no longer working for a given show.

But I I I think that there's as a consumer of this type of journalism, I personally would love to read these stories and I think that there's an opportunity for the shows to benefit there as well. So I would love to see more of that type of stuff on our our Yeah, I mean, you know, there are any number of directions that, you know, depending on on which day you get me, you know, I'd love to see us doing more video content. I would love to be, you know, doing more programming for social media. We've got a partnership with the Saturday Night Network, which is another podcast that is in deep with SNL and led by John Schneider, who is their on air host and the founder of of their operation.

And not one of the Dukes of Hazards,

not that John Schneider, this no age for for our Canadian John Schneider as well, actually. But they've really managed to build a community around SNL fandom and I would love to be able to to mirror that for uh late night rift large.

Absolutely. Oh my gosh. like building a community I think is is of course you know the the part when you were talking about as the rise of of all the things that uh you built in the past. Obviously one of the X factors that uh threw the monkey into the the monkey the monkey wrench into the machine was social media and and the idea that you know if you get a robust social media following whatever platform you you know whether it's it's contained within yours or running alongside in another platform you have that obviously that is a huge momentum gainer for you. Just to go back to what you were saying about the about the to me it's shortsighted that these PR departments but ultimately their bosses the ones who say yeah no we're not going to pull back the curtain of the current day shows again are they problem solvers that are looking for a solution to the everchanging landscape.

To me, that is a silver bullet potential right there is is is you if you can get that again that subculture that subculture that wants to go behind the scenes that wants to know what the deleted scenes are, the stuff that ends up on the cutting room floor, the things that part the the the part where the process excites them. You ignite that group. That is your most passionate group of of of enthusiasts or fans. To me, that is very shortsighted. Just to go back to that point that you were talking about like gosh you guys could be a tool to help keep this thing alive if if done right. You know you could have departments in late night in late nighter that are uh relational departments for every late night show that's out there. You know I just I but you know you see that of course I'm preaching to the choir when it comes to that and I'm I'm certain that there are times where you're pulling your hair out in frustration to that.

It can be frustrating, but it's also, you know, I I think that, you know, it breeds creativity, right? Like we need to find other other ways in and there, you know, there are, you know, there are I've been gratified that there are are shows like Have I Got News for You, which is on CNN. They've been really cooperative with us. We've done some really interesting things with them. There are some pathways happening and we're still a relatively young site. I also get the there is a lot of there's so many outlets out there and I like I get that the PR departments and the shows themselves are holding on to as much control as they can.

Yeah, I get that.

It is what it is.

To shift a little bit, part of part of this timing wave thing that you seem to have done well a couple of times and I feel like there's a potential to do it again is the idea of streamers getting involved trying to crack the code of what late night could be for them. I personally, and I I'll say this, there are people who have reached out to me in private and they completely disagree with me. I love everybody's live. Like, I think everybody's live is fantastic. People are like, "Oh, there's these awkward moments." Yeah, yeah, yeah. I know. I love every single one of them. Every second that goes by. That's that awkwardness is there. I absolutely adore it. I think it's fantastic. You guys have considered Everybody's Live a late night show, which I'm so grateful for. Uh that that that's great that you guys give them some coverage. I think I think what they're doing there is spectacular.

the streamers cracking the code could be the next thing because you know you look at the numbers that they're getting. I love the way Neielson's reporting things now and it's interesting to see you know what what Andor's numbers have have been or Handmaid's Tail or some of these things that are out there as that's sort of taking over and becoming what the mainstream really actually is. It's the actual mainstream versus the you know the traditional whatever you want to call it. I don't know if I have the right vocabulary for that but I think you understand where I'm coming from. I feel like this genre that we love so much still has so much potential to make a mega splash where the eyeballs are. Um curious if if if you agree with that and then also just yeah your take on everybody's live. I'm glad you guys on late night are considering that a late night show.

Very. Yeah. Well, it airs at 10 10 p.m. on the the east coast.

It is. Yeah, that's true. And it's obviously cra, you know, like it it it is a it may be a um funhouse mirror, but it is, you know, like it's it is a, you know, it certainly resembles a late night show. I mean, I think there's a I think that the streamers have had a difficult time. They've tried many times to do late night styled shows and and it has not really caught on. And you know whether or not you know I think everybody's live has certainly got the kind of chattering class uh uh talking and you know I think that's that's in part a function of just Bellainy himself who I think is brilliant but I also think it's because the show is innovating on the the the model. I think it's it's uh you know that I I've heard Melany and we've covered this as well.

You know their approach is yes they produce a live show on Wednesday nights but they're also producing a show that exists in the Netflix catalog and they're thinking about that for to for viewing at any point in the future and they're thinking about that as they produce the show.

I think that the fact that it it was was aired live gives it a vitality that I wish that some of the like I I do think that that one of the great advantages that the broadcast networks have uh and Bill has written about this really eloquently is the fact that people tend to watch these shows in real time or close to it versus the streamers where it's you don't quite know what when you don't have that mass of people watching at literally the same time unless they're they themselves are doing live uh programming which they're doing and so you know we would love to see uh the network shows going live you know I think that there's there's a real opportunity there I realize it's it's a uh it's a lifestyle choice right like

100%

yeah I think everybody's life has been mana from heaven for those of us who are passionate about who who come at late night from a Lettermanesque background where you're, you know, nothing sacrosanked. Uh, you know, if something's not working, we're going to acknowledge it and try and make that art, make that the entertainment. I think that there's a real so much of I was talking to someone not so long ago about when you used to watch Letterman or Carson there, there were jokes that would fall flat and they would that would become the joke. I I think that, you know, having my son and I went to New York and attended every late night show that's in production there last summer.

Yeah.

And they hype up their audiences so much that if a joke falls flat, you wouldn't know it from watching the show. And it just like it all feels very transactional, at least when it comes to the the the monologues. And you know, it is I think there's there's a comfort in that as a viewer, right? You don't have to think about was that funny or not. it's programmed for you and if people are laughing, you know, it just feels like the the role is being played out. But it was really refreshing to have a show like everybody's live that felt like, you know, not only was it living in the moment in that it was airing live, but this was not a passive experience in any way for the people involved, for viewers. It was really exciting and I hope it's coming back.

I hope it is, too. I'm I'm curious about it because like my wife and I have watched it a couple of times and and the reason my wife watches it, she loves John Molain. Like loves him, right? So I'm like, I'm going to watch this and I and I pop it up. I've not watched any of them live, including the Letterman episode. The Letterman episode was when I was I was closest to watching it live. I was an hour and a half after it it finished. Uh but I I I uh I've watched them all and and every single time that I have watched them and the phone line comes up and it says, of course, you know, recorded an earlier time or whatever the whatever the disclaimer is. Every single time that's happened, I'm like, "Oh, I would have called. I wanted to call in. I wanted to I like I want to watch it live." Like, I I really do want to. However, I've enjoyed every single episode not having watched one of them live. And And I think you're exactly right. It does feel more organic. I used to love sitcoms and and and uh and don't get me wrong, even, you know, Big Bang Theory and things like that, the traditional sitcoms that in the modern age have How I Met Your Mother, uh that that have in the modern age kind of still worked. I did feel like there were times where if you could see clips of the sitcom and then the audience was taken out of it, would I be laughing?

Probably not once. And and it becomes this plastic sort of manufactured machine-like process that Letterman really never felt like like and that's one of the with Letterman, one of the things that I am trying to figure out with the lens that I now have on is looking at the moments that seemed spontaneous but were not. Mhm.

And vice versa. They mastered that. That was one of the things they mastered. I've talked to a bunch of the segment producers will not come on the show because they know that one of the questions I will ask are what are lines have you slept swept, you know, over to the guest that comes out. You know, many times the guest comes out and sits down on Dave's Dave set and Dave asks a question or whatever and the person says something and then Dave, you know, spikes back or vice versa. Dave will say something and that person will make a joke and it will well that of course is a line that was fed to them by a segment producer who could have been a writer. some who did become writers and and that was cool but it seemed spontaneous at the time which goes back to what you were talking about how the enjoyment that we would have that spontaneity that would be there when the spontaneity is not there something is lost everybody's life seems like nothing but spontaneity and I think that's one of the things that I enjoy about it so much I wanted to uh we're going to finish up here pretty quick because I want to be very very you know thank you you've already gone longer than what we we said we were going to go so thank you Jed I I I can't thank you enough for doing this are you keeping up with my next guest did you watch the Caitlyn Clark episode yet?

You know, I have not watched the Caitlyn Clark episode. Been meaning to, you know, I I love watching the evolution of Dave. He went from being, you know, like I I spoke about how when I was a an awkward teenager, he was a kind of, you know, a model for someone who was also at least presented himself as, you know, an outcast uh and, you know, who had no patience for superficiality or the uh the trappings of entertainment, the entertainment business. And then he evolved into, you know, an extraordinary, not that he wasn't this to begin with, but a broadcaster, like someone who was, you know, kind of not unlike Regis Filin, who you could just kind of put out there and he would speak from the heart in a way that uh uh, you know, is clearly genuine,

authentic.

Yeah. which is so funny because, you know, he had this this reputation as this, you know, sardonic, you know, uh um wise ass back in the day. And you know, I I think it it made when he was, you know, in his later years able to, you know, tell stories about his family life all that more special because you knew that he was, you know, as so many uh put it, you know, he he had no he was not a he was not comfortable talking about these things.

Not the most most vulnerable guy in the world, was he?

Right. Yeah. And to me, my next guest is an extension of of that. You know, I I love that he, you know, he didn't go the Carson route and he didn't, you know, just, you know, he doesn't hang out on his yacht and enjoy the the company of the the Bob New Harts or whatever, but that's the extent of it. You know, like he's clearly seems to enjoy being on television on his own terms these days. And as a lifelong fan, that's really thrilling to see. and you know he has this genuine interest in the folks who he chooses to to interview on on my next guest and that too is really great to see in a world where you know there continues to be a lot of kind of transactional interviews taking place.

Yeah. I and I don't know the exact inner well I know I I know some of the inner workings of how guests are chosen and and subjects are chosen for that but but one of the things that Rick said Rick Sheckchman said to me before we started this show when we were just talking about Dave was that you want people who want Dave to like them or whatever one of the things they just they don't just want Dave to like them they want him to be curious about them because when Dave is curious about something it leads to a whole bunch of fascination because he will ask questions that are fascinating and he'll bring out these different angles, these different things. Like I think about the YouTube special and and and I mean I' I've liked you too. Gosh, they were one of my like when Rattle and Hum came out in elementary school that got my attention and then I was the kid when Actong Baby came out. I was just like I it melted my mind when that album came out. So I've loved you two for a long time. I go and watch this thing on the Disney Plus special that they did with Dave interviewing um you know Bono and the Edge and then going in Dublin.

the way that they presented it, you could tell there was some genuine curiosity there and it showed. And that was what Rick always said. Rick always said, "Oh, he's a very like there was a chance where I could have almost I was this close to kind of connecting with Dave. It didn't end up happening." But he the advice that he gave me was he's an extremely kind man. He'll be very very kind and if he's curious about you, he'll ask you all sorts of questions. And um that's the thing that I love watching on my next guest when he's curious about his guest. like when he had Lewis Hamilton on for example, you know, and and and you know how much Dave is is is a racing afficionado or loves racing and and and then, you know, owns a racing team and all this sort of stuff. I love that very much. I love seeing Dave, you know, to the point where he's getting Lewis Hamilton to spray him with champagne at the end of the at the end of the episode. I love that. I love that Dave is doing that right now.

And yeah, could not agree more. Jed, is there anything that you wanted to say coming in here? And I again, everyone's got to understand, I've asked Jed for a long time to be on this show, and I honestly think that he has come on because of pity. Uh, but I I'll take it. I'll take pity. I don't care. I'm just so grateful. I'm so grateful you've done this, Jed. And I'm grateful that I have line where I can every once in a while reach out and poke you and and we can go back and forth on things. Is there anything else that you would kind of thought? You don't do very many of these. Have you done many of these? Is this

Nobody asks me. So, thank you for asking and I apologize for my long- windedness. And you know it it is hate hearing you know I've I've given a few interviews about the site that uh are textbased. Uh it I'm you know to read myself quoted uh is a painful experience. I I don't speak in complete sentences. Half of the things I say don't make any sense. So uh thanks for putting up with me. Uh, if there's one thing, you know, I we didn't talk at all about Letterman TV and the work that um

Walter and team

Walter Kim does to keep the the flame alive for the old shows. And I don't have a Samsung TV. My my in-laws do. And my son knows how to, you know, we'll go over there for dinner and he knows exactly how to draw me out of a conversation. All he has to do is fire up the the Samsung TV and I'm sucked in. and he enjoys it too, which is is really great to see. It's been great fun, first through the the work that Don Giller had done and now through the work that that Walter Kim is doing to see this stuff have an afterlife. And for so long, it felt like late night television was just this disposable thing that airs once or twice, you know, if it's if it happens to be make the cut as a rerun

and then goes away. And yet, I think there really is a um uh it's really engaging for for those of us who lived it and beyond to get to experience it again. So, my hat is off to them. I'm grateful to them and grateful to you for building a community around fellow Letterman afficionados. And you've been a great help to us as well in in reaching out to some of your past interview subjects. So, thank you for being a liazison.

I appreciate that. Anything that that that that I can do to help you guys, I will do happily. and uh and anytime. Absolutely. Thank you for saying that. Um yeah, Walter and team and by the way, Walter also peanut butter manufacturer as well. SAG peanut butter. Get it in the New York area. There you go. Walter Kim's uh you know. Yeah, I'm allowed to say that. Walter said that I can say that he's behind SAG peanut butter and he is. So anyway, if you live in the New York area, go find it. Ask Roert where you can get it cuz he's the one that sent the behind the time. He's grinding peanut butter. He's

and grinding content out of the Letterman archives, uh which are vast. I I had the same thing. I don't have a Samsung TV. Um, and I know a lot of these clips end up on on on YouTube with the best of and things like that or or or whatever, but um I've been spending a lot of time with my mom lately and uh and and I was up there uh for three full days last week where I actually stayed up at her house for three days and my mom actually does have a Samsung TV. And so for the first time I said to her, I said, "Hey, do you have the Letterman channel?" And she goes, "Oh yeah, I know where that is." I'm like, "Really?" Cuz my mom doesn't have email. Like so I was surprised by this. But yes, fired up the Samsung TV Plus and and we popped it on and the first thing that we saw were some of the bumpers with the, you know, the Dave's face, stylized bumpers and stuff. The way that they move, I'm like, "Oh, this is cool." We watched the damn thing for 3 hours.

We we ended up My mom's laid up a little bit. She's um she's on crutches right now, so she's laid up. But we watched it. I just wanted to see what it kind of looked like cuz I've watched a lot of this stuff, right? And but no, three hours. We just kept going and going and going. went through some highlights of of of of stupid human and stupid pet tricks and then it went to uh best of Norm Macdonald was on and whatnot and and while the best of Nor McDonald wasn't, you know, the the completionist version that Don Giller has on his, which I have watched, you know, before, I love the way that they bite-size these things to make it um to make it digestible. Walter and team are doing a phenomenal job. Of course, that's what how how how you would finish things off is by by complimenting them and whatnot. You're a classy guy, Jet, and I just appreciate the heck out of you. I hope our paths cross more and more and more and more.

And if there's a way that we can circle and somehow collaborate on other things, uh, that would be an absolute pleasure for me.

But at the same time, I'm just so grateful to know you. Thank you for doing this on behalf of all of us who love this stuff, all of us who are in this subculture. Thank you so much for spearheading late nighter.com. And I I can't I can't tell you how much we appreciate it as as a as a fan base. So, thank you so so much, Jed.

You're very kind. The feeling is mutual. Thank you for your time.

Awesome, brother. All right. Uh, hey, hold on, hold on, hold on. One sponsor, one sponsor only at the Letterman podcast, and that is Hello-Delli. Go to hell-delly.com. Rupert's still the guy at hello-delly.com. I know there's still the official Letterman store as well, so you can go there, but they have different stuff on their stuff on their sites. So, if you want official Late Show with David Letterman merchandise, go to hell-delly.com. prepared and and and sent by hand by the legendary Rupert G himself. If you ask him really nicely, he may add onions to your order. Thank you so much. This has been another episode of the Letterman Podcast with Mike Chisum. Coincidentally, I am Mike Chisum. Thank you and good night. Overcoat and underpants.