Featuring Shannon Eis, who appeared on Late Show more than many movie stars, and introduced David Letterman to dozens of new toys!

I'm am Paul schaer I'm will Lee and you are watching the Letterman podcast welcome once again to the Letterman podcast my name is Mike Chisum okay this one here is a fun one for me it's gonna be a fun one for everybody don't get me wrong but it's a fun one for me because um this represents this guest tonight represents uh world's colliding for me back in the day as a viewer of Late Show with David Letterman um some of you know I think I don't know if I've talked about on the show here some of you who have gotten to know me uh outside of the show here know that I'm actually a bit of a toy collector uh I love my action figures I I I've loved them since I was a little kid and I've got some some some some Collectibles but also like stuff I break out of the box and like hang up at my office and things like that I've got a lot of I've always had a love for toys and and and the group of people that I used to watch le show with David Letterman with a bunch of guys in our early 20s U we liked action figures we we were kind of action figure nerds we like GI Jo's and we like Star Wars and we like all sorts of different um action figures we subscribed to a magazine back in the day called toy fair and um the gal who's going to come on here today um used to write for Toy Fair she uh Shannon ice is her name and we became aware of her because in the early 2000s on Late Show with David Letterman they started doing a segment with Shannon ice she would come on and she was a toy expert um and it never really was clear as to where her expertise in the toy industry lay but she was a toy exper expert that would come on and talk about uh either toys for the summer or toys for the holiday season toys that were in and Dave would go and play with those toys and it would be hilarity uh the most famous example of that segment is probably Dave driving around in a big cupcake car driving around the stage and that was done um you know closer to the end I think that was done 09010 something like that and then Dave took the cupcake car drove it into the Christmas tree that year that was during this segment with Shannon and uh I'm so delighted that she would take time to come on and talk a little bit about it this is a time in her life that meant a great deal to her and it was cool and and and through the episode um reveal some stuff that she went through um and and what the segment meant to her you'll have to watch the segment or watch uh the show here uh to figure that out what that is but boy it's a there's some there's there's some real uh heartfelt Beauty in this episode here talking about this we're really really excited that um Shannon is still around doing what she does um in the way that she does it now um but yeah just super grateful to have Shannon on here we have one sponsor at the Letterman podcast that is hellodd deli.com rert g may not own the hello Deli anymore but he does have hellodd deli.com go to hellodd deli.com for any Late Show with David Letterman merchandise hats t-shirts mugs all of that beautiful stuff in the meantime here I hope that you enjoy this week's offering of the Letterman podcast featuring our very special guest former toy expert Shannon ice okay Shannon this is this is a big deal for me having you on today um for a variety of reasons um I am a I'm a I'm an action figure nerd I've been collecting action figures for years and years and years I told you just off camera beforehand um we uh my friends and I used to buy toy fair magazine every month and we used to just we loved following the industry um and and and enjoyed it very very much and then suddenly this other thing that we loved David Letterman suddenly this gal starts showing up uh sometimes twice a year 19 appearances you made that toy expert and we're like oh my gosh who is this G and what did she do how is she in the toy industry and how did she end up on Letterman and now I get to finally get some of those answers Shannon welcome to the Letterman podcast and I cannot wait to start uh asking you for stories between now and your future appearances thank you so much for coming on here well thanks for having me this is exciting and it's it's great it's a great flashback and well worth the conversation I think it was such a fun ride um how did you get into the toy industry originally what was your role and how did you get connected with the crazy circus that is Late Show with David Letterman yeah I'll try to talk in some sound bites because they can definitely go on my background is an education and psychology and within that I studied an area called pedagogy which is the different ways that children learn and we say in the toy industry that CH play is a child's learn that's how they learn that's their job that's how they create social connections create physical you know small large motor School connections at very early ages and um but I started off teaching and honestly High School teaching um and then kind of got like drawn off the path One Summer um when I didn't have a teaching job uh very early on and was asked to like do some PR work uh and I was like what I remember asking the general manager of this hotel property what's PR and um but that was like okay this could be a fun way to fill the summer and it ended up becoming Communications becoming something that I really loved I'm a writer at heart um and so I got kind of off my path of working with youth and working on youth related programming and curriculum but I was learning something new and I went into this corporate world that I never expected to be a part of uh and then one thing kind of led to another and I got the option to move to New York and when I moved to New York uh with my husband uh I had to start looking for a new job I'm like well if I'm going to do public relations or Communications I want to do it in an industry that is focused on children so I'm going to make that change so I applied to only jobs in New York that were focused on children's products children's issues regulatory things and I stumbled upon on a role for assistant communications director uh very young to have a title like that but inherited a wonderful boss and Terry Bartlett um who uh was going to teach me kind of what that meant and how I was going to work within the industry so the group is called the toy industry Association it was actually called something else previously but we evolved to that in my first year and this is the regulatory body that represents the interest of um companies that produce play things um not juvenile product things like cribs and high chairs that's the juvenile products Association they have very different regulatory oversight body but toy industry which also has its own regulatory bodies in the US that oversee how the products are shipped how the products are made do they rate the age of the toy appropriateness and things like that as well or they produce the guidelines so they work with these different government agencies to say this is what is safe pedagogically speaking for an infant for a one-year-old and a lot of this is things like small parts as you can imagine the length of string all those things come into age gu lines which ultimately develop how toys get made right not just how they're marketed and how they're packaged all of which have their own safety details but how they get made and so um so I started working with the toy industry Association which owns and operates Toy Fair the actual annual event um that is the Gathering and it used to be the once annual Gathering where the buyers across retailers around the world would send onto the Jacob Javit Center in New York City and take a look at what the next season toys are so the toy fair is held in February Y and um and it is for purchasers buying toys to fill their stores for the following holiday season and even that sometimes is too late sometimes they start that shopping process the year before so huge huge venue tens of thousands of vendors really interesting you have the big guys like Mattel the video games you have Lego and then you have this whole second floor which are those inventors which to me is what kept me so passionate about the toy industry these are the folks who have the ideas what if a kid could have fun doing X and so what you also saw happening at toy fair is the bigger toy companies shopping for their next great ideas from these smaller guys who have tiny tiny booths some of them were just a tabletop or a laptop um trying to get their ideas visibility trying to get them produced manufactured or get them sold and so I loved that balance of the Giants anchoring the industry because there had been a lot of consolidation when I was in the industry Hasbro had a lot tell hkin salite spin spin um Master entered the uh Market when I was there um and then you had these smaller guys really fighting it out you know we say on the bottom floor but that's metaphorical and real it was the bottom floor of toy fair so most of my job every year was that uh and it was a huge communications platform lots of morning television show to talk about Trends to talk about safety standards but then the rest of my job was doing a lot of what can sometimes be unfortunate work which is the recall work the harm work so if there's a you know we we dealt with this with several companies small parts that were magnets that came off toys and children swallowed them while some of this can be par parent supervision you know oriented some of them can be design product oriented I spent a lot of time dealing working with those companies and dealing with media to navigate those safety issues which put me on TV a lot almost always in crisis mode almost always and so one day after a particular very challenging segment on 2020 with John stasel um I got a call or my boss rather got a call from a producer at Letterman at the late show named ell Tower she is still one of my friends um and she uh said hey we saw this woman on air talking about some like you know sad toy thing can she do anything fun and if you've ever met Aliana this is exactly how she talks we saw her talking about some sad thing could she do anything fun and so um and I was like I don't know can I do things fun i' never done fun things before so she was just like telon producer television producer like grab some things off your desk and come down here and let's just see if we can get you to do anything fun so I literally like grabbed some random toys my desk was covered in toys as you might imagine got in a cab went from 23rd Street to 52nd Street and wearing whatever I wore that Tuesday like whatever and um and ended up on stage with the lights and the film you know everybody's in there uh and they're like all right pretend I'm Dave and they had some interns this would have been rehearsal time and and we're already at the stage where Dave's not literally just like that okay so that the very next day it was like Tuesday we got the call Wednesday I went over there at like I don't know one o'clock and I remember they'd already done their stage rehearsal for the show Taping that night and they had wedged me in so like the light crew was there the camera crew was there and they were just really looking like can they Envision what something like this on stage would look like right and from what I understand the goal was Dave didn't want to be sitting behind his desk anymore you know he wanted he preferred human interest a th% to everything else um he just wanted to be up and having interesting fun kind of unexpected conversation that's the style of his comedy right and so um while he's very planful very well read he he kind of wants moments where he can be caught off guard and that that is like the magic of working with Dave to see what happens and fills that space and so I go over there with like toys and like a shopping bag and they put them on this table and they have me pretend with this intern as if I'm explaining to them how this toy works the intern's doing like just you know intentionally some of these Dopey things where he kind of doesn't get the basics of how a toy works and and we just do this thing for like 15 minutes and then they come over and they take the mic off me and they're like thanks so much we'll let you know you know if it works we've never done a toy thing before but we'll let you know and then I get a call back saying we we want you on air on Thursday and I just hadn't I still don't think I processed what that meant and um and so Thursday I went over at the time they told me and they did my makeup and hair I wore it I wore to work that day and I did my first holiday segment with Dave um in December um and 2003 and I remember like just like am I this I feel impostor syndrome just impostor syndrome like am I supposed to be doing this like I only do crisis my communications focus is Crisis and um um and it was I I don't get star eyed I've never been that person you know part of just being in New York does that to you but um I just remember being like the last piece of advice that someone gave me in his crew before I went on stage was don't try to be funny just be you you know Dave Dave is funny I'm like cool because I don't think I could be funny if I tried right now be the straight person yep yeah and just like you be your expert he's not going to try to be the expert he's going to ask you questions just answer them there I I would love to tell tell you Mike that there were hours and hours of auditions and rehearsals there was not oh no no it was like were are you available Thursday at two okay qualified um but that's the magic like okay so so so to bring it back to the how how big of a like did you know very much about the show about Dave at that point I mean obviously you know he's one of the biggest celebrities in the world the you know one of the two uh major late night television programs on one of the two major networks obviously that stuff you knew but did you know very much about Dave throughout the years kind of a thing know that old late night had toy segments but they never really had one like this like were you aware of some of the stuff or was it all kind of freshed perspective no I'm a generation that grew up with late night so I had mad respect for it ah and I knew Dave was just like you know an icon um but I didn't have the I think the great thing about this and Rachel mow said this one she said she doesn't watch news programs before she goes on air because she's afraid that she's going to unconsciously say things about a topic that she's going to report on and I I remember thinking I don't have I have no no context no context I'm like it is what we make it you know and but I think the thing that worked is we had really great like intellectual chemistry um and much so um and it's funny thing is to note I didn't have kids at this time so I'm out here as this kind of expert talking about pedagogy and play and you know foreseeable misuse the way that we think kids are going to use toys based on the way they design and the way they usually end up you know um projectile most toys become a projectile most toys with Dave became a projectile um but like I remember thinking like okay I felt like my expertise was good before I got on the stage now I'm on the stage and I think people think I'm a bigger expert than I am like total imposter syndrome you know um I know I know it well my friend I know it well but I'm like I do know how kids play I have been around this industry and thousands of inventors and thousands of makers and designers and and I and I know how to talk about play right and I know I know how to make it how do I make it interesting for a late night audience which is not my usual audience my usual audience was Morning Show audience very different um you know and so uh so I wasn't talking to like parents who needed to know that this was a a worthwhile investment you know I'm talking to a man who loves to talk to predominantly 20 to 40 year old males that's who predominantly watched late night at the time and um and I'm trying to think like what would make this interesting to them and that is just all the things that you would inadvertently do with these products you know the kids of wouldn't obviously do so you know kind of let him lead I gave the expertise on how it was made and what it was designed to do and I I remember leaving there going back to work because you know normal day and um and then the show aired the next day because we used to tape Thursday and Friday shows on Thursday yep uh and then several years later we moved to taping the Friday show actually on Monday on the Monday points but there was always one day of double taping so it didn't air until Friday night and then on Saturday is when my phone started blowing up and and I was like okay people liked that it was it was definitely unexpected to be in the seat and and then they called back and said hey we think you want to do that again and uh and then we did moved into summer toy segments as well which was always chaos um but that's kind of how it started Shannon that's the thing like this is the thing you were 19 times you you appeared on this thing uh some of the years where and it was it was 03 right to the end right till uh the last one uh 20 2014 yeah and then and then there was some some summer ones mixed in there as well I mean you appeared on Late Show with David Letterman more than a lot of A-list movie stars like you had a lot of appearances on this show and and it feels you've already answered a whole bunch of questions as to how you just you kind of got it you you you you you understood the role um the not being funny thing is very very interesting to me uh because Dave if you look back into the annuals of of of of late night and and even I think early early Late Show there were times where Dave would do segments where he went to the toy fair you know and let's see if we can get some found comedy he was kind of the man on the street type thing he did like kind of the old um like I think the toy industry with the comedy industry I think many times is exactly how you started this thing where it's like okay let's do a sketch or a a play on toys that have been recalled and I mean certainly s SNL did it early on uh late night they did it early on too here are some of the toys that are not appropriate for kids that kind of a thing that you know have people out and all that but what they added to it when they added you to this and I love that you this was one of the questions I have for you on the card here um the idea that you were kind of added later on in life to the same trajectory that segments like stupid human tricks or stupid pet tricks or like and for Le show it was you it was kid scientists a couple other ones that would yeah and inventors that you know people who would get Dave from behind the desk to interact with with with normal everyday people and the ones who tried to be sort of hams were kind of back but you just uncomfortable to watch wasn't it when folks were trying too hard you're just like let Dave do thing yeah there's a there's a justos here too which is very interesting um is that Dave uh didn't like to be surprised uh you know like things that were spontaneous many times uh looked spontaneous but they weren't but there were a few times in the show in its history where no the spontaneity is is legitimate and I pretty sure yours is one of them um there were a couple things for safety that we would rehearse and he would come out and rehearse like when we did the zipline across the stage um The Cupcake the cupcake I mean I have to tell you an interesting thing and probably just weird I um you know I had both my kids while I was in air with Dave and um I also had breast cancer while I was in air with Dave and so the year of the cupcake car I had um had my double myectomy I was in treatment I was wearing hair coverage um and they constantly were like hey if you're not ready don't come on if you're not ready don't come on and I'm like you know it'll be good for me it gives me something to work towards I was in a lot of physical therapy to use my arms again the whole thing and um this first segment back after my double myectomy and all the things was the cupcake car segment so he came out during rehearsals because that was a huge prototype like that I can't believe they were selling that thing based on that it was literally like cardboard on the inside and it was in the Neiman Marcus catalog that's how they found it um and I remember I couldn't lift it I I mean I couldn't I couldn't raise my arms above this I couldn't hold more than one pound in both hand and it was this huge lid that went up into the air and I remember in rehearsals I was like even with his stand in I'm like I we can't Wing this I need to know how this is going to work because it's not going to be funny on air he's expecting me to lift it up so he can crawl in and I can't lift it like we're just going to be both sitting there looking at a stupid cupcake car um and so uh so he you know he just parti anticipated when especially in th in those rehearsal moments when it was really important to get it right there was a pogo stick moment that we were going to do we ended up pulling the pogo stick because of how it went in rehearsal um and so like there were moments when he's like yeah I don't want to ring this I don't I don't want to Wing this let's let's get it right and the cupcake car is a great example because we had a plan it went thoroughly Off plan which I think is the beauty of that segment very much so but it it mean it didn't go to plan at all and uh but it was it was great and I remember for me personally I obviously had been ill you know that year and um you know he and his team sent flowers and were checking in on me and it's like this man is busy he's got a lot going on that was a tough year for for the production and the team and like in the middle of something I get this like flowering card from him and it was like that was that was lovely so when it came time to like hey do you even do this segment I'm like I feel like this segment is supposed to be that moment where I turn around and get my life back together and start and you know and just prepare for something in the future because at that point I hadn't been you know and the cupcake will forever live in my mind it's like okay that's the moment I stood up right again went on air and Dave put me back together you've absolutely blown me away with this um Cancer's one of those things you and I have Shar you know you know I don't know each other that well but we have shared I've told you my granddaughter and how my granddaughter is my everything uh we spent six months at BC Children's hospital with her she's she's a Survivor uh when she was 18 months old and and um you know so so I got to ask you this we're going off course here but we're going to stay off course because this is important you rang the bell like we're years later now I mean gosh we're we're we're 10 11 years outside of that moment that we're talking about here all clear we're all good you're still we all good good you know you got to stay vigilant um but you know well all good 2009 I rang the bell and you know just like I I actually rang it after that segment I was still in treatment during that segment um so I rang it after that segment but yeah been all clear thank you for checking and oh I'm so happy to hear that and I'm glad we get to to to mention this here right now because uh there are people out there my wife and I wrote a book uh about our our experience with our granddaughter and and that was our way of trying to we want to talk about this stuff it's an uncomfortable thing but you can talk about it to help people who are going through this stuff and help support them and and and and as you know it can be uh cancer is one of those times that can be it can be lonely there's a lot of downtime with cancer uh people who are in your life uh seeming when things are going great suddenly sort of disappear but then a group of people that you maybe didn't consider would kind of grow up like flowers in your and you find your tribe at that point um I'm certain I'm saying some things to you that are common that happen with our family as well yeah you know one of the things that was interesting about that time was like I remember when I made the decision and I had to work with my physical therapist to like make sure I could physically do the segment because they they could be very demanding um I remember like we in our rehearsal but then also right before we went on air Dave said you know just as we're standing there do you want me to mention it and I was like no I don't think I do I wasn't like no no no I just remember thinking it would be really great to feel normal in this moment so since people saw me last you know which was the summer um I've been through this hell train right and I remember him just checking on that honoring that and then I watched that segment back and I don't watch other segments but that segment felt particularly chaotic yeah I was like I need to see what the world experienced when they watch that um and I remember thinking oh my God I look normal I just remember thinking like how cool that was because nothing had felt normal for months to your point and to like to be able to get on stage with him and have fun and play and have that like awesome chaos be like a turning point back to a new version of normal um it still stands out you know as part of my recovery and so um you know that was part of like how what that show did for its people like I were loving to me as I was one of its people and uh it was just special in that way God damn it sure puts in a new perspective to the word play like you use that word and and and you got to go and be normal and and and and have that beautiful thing that is play that so many of us adults desperately in this time and place polarized cultures and all that sort of stuff that we have boy isn't play important and you got to experience it in a way that was extremely important that night because that was it was chaotic but it was so fun and I mean you knew that what Dave was going to do like that's that's that's old old school Letterman done at the time you know the things that he would do d would go do crazy things back in the day the Alka-Seltzer uh suit the cereal bow that that kind of stuff there's a car like a cupcake of course he's driving it of course he's going into the Christmas tree of course that's GNA happen but we need to see it play out and you got to to play there the idea that you got to feel normal that night um adds a dimension to that particular segment which is a very famous One it made the it made the final Montage um you know and and and uh boy have you added a dimension to that what a cool moment and that was before the go karts right because the go-karts was another driving driving segment that was a chaotic one too on the street oh gosh go-karts were dripping go-karts and he drove that into the Christmas tree in the studio yes yes yes yes yes and he um we also did the zipline in the Christmas tree which was it was always the goal was take down the Christmas tree as you know so H or you know put Paul's life in danger which was a regular theme as well it muched to Paul suarin but he was always game he was always he was always game uh and he I don't you probably know this having watched the show every time I came out he would play Ice Ice Baby it's on the card still to this day my kids last names are ice obviously so it's it's still a thing that happens to them now my my my son walks out on the basketball court Ice Ice Baby comes on so it's it's pretty funny it is stuck with us and and it's moved down to the kids too that is that is precious yeah Paul we've had many members of the band on here and whatnot and one of the things we love to celebrate on here is the cleverness of the the play on music for people um you know and oh oh just still to this day Nobody Does it Like Paul like nobody his ability to and you know he sat in rehearsals so he he had a sense of okay here here's what to expect and granted 20% of what we could expect actually happened but he was he was a planner like he has a such a production mindset Paul that whole band that they want people to experience the full moment and not have music be a reaction to the Moment Like Music so quickly became a moment and they're just so many instances of that of just I I would be dying on stage laughing at what Paul was doing in real time in response to it just so such good he music was his wit it's a superpower that was actually a question that I had here um or or a version of what you just said is is the rehearsal versus because it was you did come in I thought maybe you had the tail end of Dave doing rehearsals you did have a chance to have Dave do a couple rehearsals as you as you mentioned with a few a few things however the vast majority of your segments it was either the sangles or it was was the uh the new version where Dave didn't do rehearsal correct he watched rehearsal he watches oh yeah watched everything but but he's a plan absolutely but you know I think once they got more comfortable with me and how and knowing that I could plan be planful about how things worked and how we'd move from one thing to the next and how to use the space like we had he had an intern who eventually became one of my producers Ryan um who was the same height and size as Dave and almost the same weight so that's part of what we had to plan for was like the actual physical mass of Dave and will it do will it work with this thing that we want to show on camera like the go-karts and other things pogo stick and um and so and he would watch rehearsal and you would get feedback and sometimes you'd have to go back out and do something different based on that and I think that's fine like that just that is a trust fall right like they're they're okay with you doing this thing and most of rehearsal is like will the will the electrics on the thing work it's not about will they work it's like all the other mechanics of the segment and so um so it was like for me I most of the time didn't especially those last few years uh he didn't have to come to rehearsal and our rehearsals got down to like nine minutes and so so my question was were they fun and funny or were they more textbook and then you had to figure out the X Factor of okay for the actual show like we know the mechanics of this thing and now here comes that X Factor which is Dave and his wit and his reaction the the the reactions that either look spontaneous or actually are spontaneous is he going to throw you a curveball because that's the other thing so many folks have talked about the curveballs that he would enjoy throwing at people to take this the quotequote straight person off the game re yes curious if there were a lot of those for you or not i' say 90% or more was spontaneous like he came to rehearsal it was a mostly Tech reason he needed to be there like is this thing going to work does he want to understand how it works before he crawls into that thing right um and it was mostly Tech rehearsals were not like a time for like laughter and joking there was no script there was no like Shannon think about how you would do this it was like let's play how this thing should run okay let's play how it'll run if something doesn't work on this table um and it was it was business it was it was the business of running the show getting the lighting right getting my body right my mic right how do I need to be how does the electricity components need to work um and it was that part was business even when he was part of it it was definitely like we they want the show is a well oiled machine and rehearsal is necessary to have the machine run um like I don't remember re laughing at all in rehearsals and that's not a bad thing you know it's a job and so I remember thinking like the things that are keeping me up about what could go wrong rehearsal is the time to address them yes and um and sometimes they got fixed in rehearsal and sometimes they didn't you know but like but it was the time of like handle the things that are that are sort of keeping me up keeping the producers up and how do we work through that in a way that Dave can see we've solved those problems when you watches rehearsal so um that was another question I had and and and I mean you know the cancer part uh aside one of the questions I had for you is okay 03 you remember the feelings uh of of of of nerves and all of that sort of stuff by the time you get to 14 um is that nervousness still there the last show I mean I the sentimentality must have been through the roof for you at that point I mean it sounds like you're not just a regular you know occurring segment on the show it sounds like you're part of the family at this point which is not surprising at all there's many other folks who are in similar circumstances as you who absolutely felt felt that way that that you were part of the Late Show family and whatnot um were you nervous the last couple times and and I would love to talk just a little bit about that last that last show like I mean we've talked a lot about Darlene Love and her last appearance on uh that Christmas episode you're last segment uh doing the holiday toy segment that must have been an emotional time for you you know it was a little bit unknown because they were still negotiations with CBS I mean I think we all had a sense that that would probably be the last holiday toy segment but there was this open-ended like maybe next summer there would be one but I knew in my heart that holiday was how I wanted to end it you know because that's how we started um you know I would say I have this Affliction that my boss has since told me about I don't get nervous that is not a compliment it I mean being nervous is your body's response to being in tune and being ready you know and being able to see things coming you know coming at you from behind I I don't have that so the good thing is I would walk out on that stage at Ed solivan theater and had no nerves you know um could just be still and be what I needed to be to respond and you know help help Dave land the magic that he lands so I I didn't have nerves in the way that I think most people do I have had nerves since then about other things you know but uh on TV I never did not when I was doing morning I during my time there I signed a contract with CBS and I also did morning television um for what was then CBS This Morning and um and I just didn't I didn't have that sense of nerves what it felt like especially those last few segments was like walking on the stage and being greeted by an old friend and I know Dave has real friends but like TV friend yeah best friend on TV that's absolutely knew you know he knew my kids names he asked about them off camera he you know see him in the hallway he was always walking around the hallway with a sweatshirt and his carpenter shorts like um you know you see him in the hallway back and back in the offices and it was like he cared about you he cared that he was always gen he would see me and be like oh my God yes you know we're doing toys again like he he knew when he saw me that we we were going to have fun and so that unlocked this sense of playfulness with him um and uh so for me it was like being greeted by a friend and sometimes I didn't see him until we were 30 seconds before live like literally Mike G get on stage and he of course he knows the show he's watched rehearsal he knows I'm there but he would immediately like pick up right where we left off and you have that 30 seconds before the segment you have about 30 seconds after the segment and like that could be the bulk of my time with him most of those segments and and other than what you saw on air and that's okay like we don't we don't need to hang out on the weekends like that like the chemistry the connection around love for play and wanting each other to show up well and have a great time on air it was the natural connection um and just super respectful of my family and his son is actually about four months older than my son and my daughter um so uh so his partner and I were pregnant at the same time and so I was on air and I was very pregnant um that summer both times both my kids I was on air in the summer segment I was very pregnant and um and so you know for me it was just just uh you know he he was part of like just my life and in that way of just my life continued off camera while I was you know performing on stage with him so um but that last one I think I had the sense of like this might be my last time doing this I brought my kids to the show a few times sometimes they would go to just come do Tech checks with me not on stage but in the office we would deliver products our house was filled with these products I had whole working space where I was testing things to figure out how they might work on air so they were always so mad that I had to take all the toys they loved to the studio but they came several times their favorite thing about the show was not actually the show it was the cookies in the green room still to this day they're like we miss the cookies from the Late Show green room um but like that you know that chance to like be a part of that they still have like deep acute memories of that and so I brought them that last Christmas um and they realized this is Mom at work act right you know and I was on with Adam Sandler that we had i' had been on with Adam Sandler several times and so he knew them when he saw them and so he saw them we were all in the elevator and you know they're having their their like kind of annual chat with Adam Sandler and uh you know for them that was bigger the life like they they super love his movies but um but like for them it you know and for me that last time was about sort of making sure you know it felt special for all the people in my life who had supported me to be able to do this because it's a lot of work and they lose me for weeks at a time as we're getting segments ready and so um so that the last one was special for me for some different reasons I can totally see it um I got to be honoring of your time I know we're getting close to you've got you've got some family commitments here um you know but you're willing to let come back and let me pick your brain on some stuff okay that's amazing I'm gonna ask you one last little question about uh segment producers how many segment producers did you have along the way like Ryan uh was he was a stupid human tricks um and and and he would do a lot of the human interest uh segment producers was he basically he wasn't your first one was he basically he was my intern he was my intern my he started as an intern my second segment my first producer was Eliana y um Ryan was her intern y um and then when Eliana left Brian T who is now oh you had Brian I was gonna ask if you had Brian or not who's now the executive producer of The View um and with you know having a has beautiful life with beautiful girls and and um such an awesome human so so talented and smart he became my he was the sports producer before that so he and Aliana were like you know back toback she did a lot of the human interest and those things and he worked on Sports and so Brian inherited me uh and we kind of built the rest of it together Ryan came on is like our go-to so we were like the triangle the three of us Sheila was in the mix a little bit but Sheila Rogers yeah really yeah super hands off but just always just a huge champion of the segment the best hair in Show Business uh know especially someone off camera she's so great awesome Soul she's just an awesome awesome Soul like such such great energy in her um and so it was mostly like Brian Ryan and I so I still say Brian and Ryan to this day like Brian Ryan Brian and Ryan um and so Ryan was in uh basically a video cabinet that been converted to his office had no windows it was an old closet and it's where all the toys lived uh and so it was the two of us until the end and then I think the last segment maybe the last two um but I'm pretty sure it's the last one Ryan fully produced oh that's cool that's good to know yeah I love I love The evolutionary stories of folks career um in in in in this thing we had Janice Panino on who ran um HR for for for worldwide pants and and and um I asked her to tell me some of the stories that touched her more like like people who grew into whatever she won't do it because they're all like her kids like from the interns um and and and the the coordination uh people all the way up to the people who became producers but Brian teda you look at the Ascension that he had from where he started to how he ended up and and where he ended up in in his career it's just so cool to see um I love that you're a part of this family and this and you you you talk just like you're one of the people who were there uh the entire time this is so great to to talk to you and to get to know you and to say thank you for the uh for everything that you've done for us the viewing audience um your segments were amazing and they really really were and again those 20 somethings that you were talking to I was one of them and me and a group of group of guys who loved Toy Fair magazine we loved this stuff we loved you know the way that action figures and toys um had evolved the the way that they had it was becoming a very different very big industry and and and you kind of attached those two things that we love so much so thank you for that um when did you get out of the toy industry what are you doing now and uh do you have something public where you want people to connect with you or or not like what what are you doing these days you know uh I am I'm I continue to work in Communications and so when I I ended up having to move to California for my my husband's job and so we but I split my time between New York and California so I still work in Communications I actually work with very expensive toys now I'm at pelaton which is a fitness technology company how long you been there uh two years wow you've seen incredible incredible growth at this wow yeah sure yeah I'm a big belie I mean since leaving there since leaving um the East Coast I've worked in a lot of Silicon Valley and wor a lot of CEO Founders um and so I was at Yelp working for the CEO founder for several years then went to Google and spent several years at Google um and then went to Airbnb where Brian was the founder and so I've been at pelaton where I also started working with the founder now a different leadership team but um for me pelaton was a big part of what helped restore me physically I was a very early adapter and really just started like thinking about like physical health um a little bit better and taking care of myself in different ways which sometimes cancer can force but I hope that people have that opportunity without cancer um and so for me it was a love brand um and it was a big part of my Wellness journey and not just the bike but all the content and the instructors and the and the ability to really focus the attitude the energy used the word energy earlier like in this yeah yeah so I so when I got the call like hey company's got some challenges are you the type of person who runs in the burning buildings that was literally my interview and as you can tell I am a person who runs in the burning buildings so that's what I do apparently so I uh I said yes so I've been there for two years um and uh for me it's the ability to product story tell and obviously user story tell and um those types of things so I'm I'm excited that job is based in New York so I spend my time back and forth between California and New York because I have one more kid to graduate high school in one year and then um you know hopefully he's going to play ball on the east coast and uh when we'll be back to back to New York so I still spent my time between California and New York I've been doing it for quite some time and it's exhausting so do you still follow toys at all I do quite a bit so many friends still in the toy industry um I you know I continued be impressed by these well I mean look there's a huge Disney takeover of play and Disney takeover of entertainment and so you know but really protecting things that are non Tac and I sound like such an old person right now but we now know so much about what happens if we put real technology in kids hands too early that's where my background comes in around pedagogy they need tactile play we need to kind of protect it and like even engineer it in more ways now than we ever had before because once they come off of tactile to fully technology engineered play they don't go back and so so it's that age compression coming down how they're playing coming down screens even if they're passive screens screens around them not screens in front of their face are such a bigger Factor Now Children's ability to maintain attention for long periods of time is at shockingly low levels this is screens this is because the content switching on screens is instantaneous almost that they can't long-term hold concentration on a task like Checkers you know so it's uh so even to this day I still play board games with my family um still try to do those logic and reasoning games I have this wood puzzle in my dining room that is going Cube that's destroying my will to live right now but I will solve it um and so like for me I I care about play in like deep ways um and even if it's just literally the beach playing in sand which I still do with my older teenage kids if I the other day I was like hey I'm tired of looking at your faces on your devices let's go look for banana slugs we live near a redwood forest here banana slugs everywh I don't know if you know what a banana slug is yeah on the East Coast big yellow things um but like they will always put down the phone to go find banana slugs so it's different types of play but it's still important at all ages to drive that sort of tactile Hands-On motor skill play in addition to all the really great Tech powered play that we see um I feel strongly about that and um still continue to contribute to different sources that are kind of reporting on it my my academic expertise is somewhat expired because so much has changed in this field in 20 years but as a parent and as an advocate for play I I believe it's it's huge and what you didn't see on Letterman is us like plugging in a thing and passively staring at a screen you know what you saw was things that can or maybe should not be thrown being thrown um but all the things you know uh and so it was really about he had a deep belief and and this was again before he even had kids but even as he had a young son he had a deep belief that we need to encourage Play It's how kids learn so the only video game thing I think you ever showed was the um it was the year the PS3 came out with yes it was it was but it's the interactive it's just like the Wei like like again I think Nintendo helped uh you know kind of reinvent the wheel again when they came out with the Wii and then Sony followed and all of that stuff because now we have people interacting and playing in different ways but there's still a physicality to it trying to combine the two elements of of of play but that's the only video game or closest thing to a video game I think you guys ever think everything else was the opposite we went to CES to your point we to go to trade shows we went to CES with a crew a couple years we went to Vegas and just filmed some stuff you know and then they came back and did a package segment but we went to CES to do that and it's just harder to show what that play experience is like if a single person is having it behind a screen in the set of go Goggles or whatever it was there's still plenty of craz craziness at CES and toy fair to show but I remember that particular year it's like everything was about the television screen and like that's just not good TV to watch things that people are doing on TV you know it's like so um but I think play has changed a lot in that way and so um you know as the interactive piece gets moving you saw Lego for instance do amazing things with Bionicle like talk about whole intersection if you can imagine this thing you can build it and then when you scan it in and upload it to our system we're going to program and make it move for you it's like the the way that Lego is ahead a lot of that in this really traditional tactile play was fascinating and I think spinmaster did a Fairmount with that as well and obviously Hasbro and Matel with Hot Wheels did some really cool work as well in the space so um and then you so on and so forth Barbie you've seen all the the mega Brands doing it now um but how toy designers come out of like toy design school and use technology is still so if you haven't had someone on your program from the fit toy program that would be very interesting oh man i' would love i' I'd love that that's a re program it's amazing it's and they the folks that they have in there it's a small program but these are the types of forks folks that we should continue to talk about because they they get the pedagogy training about what play should be like and then they design design for that at different ages it's super cool well it's a big industry too like I mean I think one of the maybe maybe multiple of the of your episodes they talked about you know back then it was a 20 billion dollar industry not not including video games like and and I see it like okay as a 48y old dude who happily funded the haslab Ghostbusters proton pack you know like they're they're crowd they're crowdsourcing these huge massive you know you know Alpha consumer type toys um you know for people my age now they're crowdsourcing it and then two years later okay here you go here's your Star Wars razor Crest that you can build on your own but to me that is so much better than getting a new Star Wars video game or whatever because you're you're going back you have to put this thing together you have to do these things even if it's a quote unquote model or act you know action figure that you're you're putting up yeah it's it's using different parts of the brain and going back to this thing about play and the Nostalgia and all of these amazing things the toy industry is it's fascinating watching it evolve yeah and it's got a lot more to do because kids are going to keep changing so you know um i' love to see how they're how they're looking I've not been in the Toy Fair halls for many years I go to Comic-Con uh which I love but that's a very different experience it's a very different experience but the creativity you know sort of rolling out of that those spaces is phenomenal as well so you have to go and I want to be very I want to be very you know uh cognant of your time so you'll come back on and we can talk about this I would love to maybe cherry pick two or three of the segments um and and come back on like there's a couple of lines that you said that I'm just like cuz I know that segment producers used to always help with hey it might not be a bad idea to say something like this at this point here and not but for you some of those lines that came out were really really clever but it doesn't feel like they were produced I would like to kind of go through some of the segments with you at another time if possible be interesting to know what those are they they literally never messaged me ever and it was it was like like if something could go wrong with the product tell Dave to do X but it was more about how to get Dave to make the product work but nothing everything else is just like fly by the seat you are an outstanding Communicator um the fact that you don't have your own podcast never mind the fact that you don't do a ton of these is astounding to me because you are absolutely uh a communicator of the highest level um Shannon I want to say thank you so much for taking time out of your out of your schedule your family life to come on the Letterman podcast here it will not be the last time and uh did you have anything that you want to say to your uh you know your your your family at worldwide pants oh oh my God great I just am so I still even this far gone you know 10 years after such an incredible privilege I am still called out on the street it happened a couple weeks ago with my daughter and um and it's like you're the Letterman girl like I get that a lot you're the toy girl from Letterman I it happens on the subway it happened to me in Europe like it is I mean I've changed my hair a little bit but I I'm definitely 10 years older than I was but like that is a source of Pride for me and it's like and it feels like a cult like following you know because you know there's an audience for lot ofman and everybody else was maybe doing something else and so um it's still such a privilege to be associated with this show it is a huge source of Pride for me and I love telling the story of how it happened and how they found me and total obscurity like the definition of obscurity and so uh no just thank you for the chance to talk and look forward to sort of diving into some segments I'm like a little scared and also excited a little scared hey you didn't even get scared to go on Letterman I'll take that as a compliment no it's gonna be a lot of fun obviously we're we're good at this uh and it' be great to have you I'll uh I'll I'll hit stop now and I'll say we can say our goodbye privately okay so I'll just do a little quick outro we can say our goodbye privately and we'll go from there okay um okay this is why we do the show obviously this is uh we love to deep uh to do deep dives into the and delve into the corners of uh what made this the greatest body of broadcast work in history that of David Letterman and Company Shannon ice obviously a huge contributor to that especially the last half um of of of Dave's tenure in network uh late night television uh we have one sponsor one sponsor only with the Letterman podcast and that is the hellodd deli.com Rupert may not own the hello Deli anymore but he still owns hello dasi your only source for Late Show with David Letterman merchandise official Late Show with David Letterman merchandise mugs cups hats all the other things that you would like go to hellodd deli.com and get yourself a piece of late showa with David Letterman history 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