Andrew Buss and the Conan/Letterman Oral History

hey this is Gabe ablon and you're watching the Letterman podcast welcome once again to the Letterman podcast my name is Mike Chisum all right tonight we got Andrew bus Andrew bus is a writer uh I again another one of these people who I uh have given the moniker a brother from another mother I just I think the world of this guy um has written a pile of oral Histories on certain subjects and I love the oral history I I talk about it with him my favorite book on Letterman um is Scott Ryan's book the last days of Letterman which is a um you know an oral history of the last six weeks of the show phenomenal book um Andrew has written many different uh um versions of of this type of um style of writing these oral histories are just are just tremendous and uh he's done a bunch of them on different subjects uh like the jerk uh like Gremlins 2 Scott Pilgrim versus the world um these are these are projects that I love um you can find him on consequence of sound you can find a writing for late nighter where he did an oral history of the infamous Madonna incident on Letterman um just a really great guy um he's an Andy cman historian I mean and those who have uh weathered their way through uh the this show uh knows how much I love Andy calman and so we to talk about that a little bit um and then of course we talk about uh Late Bloomer which was his peace and Vanity Fair the oral history of when Conan O'Brien took over uh late night um and uh very very cool oral history um on that in Vanity Fair highly recommend it go read it um this guy and I just he he has dove into his passions uh properly he became the the um uh a partner U but a mentee um of Bill zi you know and and and we talk about this book a lot uh it's just a really great it's a great conversation and I really like this guy now a couple things uh he was going to come on here last week but he had pneumonia and he's still suffering from the pneumonia a little bit and I we just said hey let's do this it'll work it'll be good you know um but he he wanted to do this so bad last week and he had a fever and all that stuff so he came on this week not only did he have the you know lingering effects of the of the pneumonia um thing as he's healed but he's also in fire Zone La 2025 um you know what do you say I mean candy and I the other night we're just uh we just just want to say we love our friends in California um we have a few of you who are displaced and potentially have lost your place um and and we love you and uh for those in the thousands like you who are in that place we just want to um say um we're thinking of you and we feel helpless watching this but please know that there's love um and we'll help how we can uh so anyway um please enjoy my uh conversation with Andrew bus uh Andrew I uh I'm so excited to do this with you I feel like just from your body of work and the admiration I have for the things that I have read that you and I are brothers from another mother I totally totally believe that that is the case um I am so kind oh and I have um when I have Envy for people There's No Malice or jealousy to it's a kindness It's a it's it's a puppy dog kind of Envy um you know excited for the dog that has the bone that I would love to have the projects that you have worked on I just want to I just want to go over some of the ones that are highlights to me of course we're going to talk about the Vanity Fair article on on on Conan's first uh you know his first night and then the the turning point that thing is awesome I loved it so much um your late your work on late nighter consequence of stound vanity faret you rate for that um you're an Andy calman historian right there I mean I'm I'm such a huge Andy calman fan you worked with Bill zi we just did it we just did an episode recently on the Carson book that finally finally came out posthumously but then you've got these other projects that all of which I my heart is attached to Scott Pilgrim Clerk's the animated series The Jerk Gremlins 2 Zoolander Freaks and Geeks did you just decide to be a WR and just immerse yourself in the things that you love how did you go down the path uh to to to building the career that you have and I mean I think you might be the king of the oral history of of current pop culture uh how did this happen man it's great to meet you it's great to do this how did this happen so great to meet you thank you so much that is so kind um great way to start off the day but um it really yeah I mean you hit the nail on the head it really is just finding the things that I love and um it you know I mean no one was you know knocking on my door asking me to do a Clerk's the Animated Series oral history no one's asking me to do that stuff um I mean what had happened was with the oral histories I had been doing some work uh for years um i' had been working at the laugh button i' had been working uh I had done a piece for uh vulture on the time that Saturday Night Live went to Marty GR that was a lot of fun to do um and then what had happened was around 2019 I pitched an AirHeads oral history to consequence of sound and the editor there Michael Rothman who's um become a very dear friend he's great dude um he said you know I would love to do this um go ahead and you know go out and do that so I did that one that was so much fun to do and then I just kept working with them and over the course of of a year and a half I think we did like nine of them yep over a consequence and that's when I did the jerk and then High Fidelity and then I did Clerk's animated series and then Gremlins 2 I did the Freshman the Marlin movie y such a good movie and then um Scott Pilgrim I'm trying to remember what were the others um we did one on Thief and then I did uh Freaks and Geeks as well so I did so much over a consequence and then before moving over to VY fair and doing super bad and um uh Zoolander and then of course the Conan one but yeah I mean it really is just finding the things that I love and just kind of going down the rabbit hole with it I mean the oral history format it it's exhausting while I'm doing it y um but there's nothing like it when I can look back and be like okay I did this right like one of the greatest feelings in the world it's like you're a Prophet this is exactly one of the places I want to go down first the oral history uh book versus the typical type biography um I've been you know I love all the books on Letterman that have been out you know I love zinman's book of course I worship kind of Bill Carter and and and what he did with Le shift and things like that but I have I have uh said right from the start my very very very favorite book on on David Letterman is Scott Ryan's book the last days of Letterman which is an oral history hisory of the last six weeks of of of Late Show um and and and written in that oral history format my favorite Saturday Night Live book is the Saturday Night Live oral history book that that that that one that came out I guess it's well probably 10 years ago now my gosh yeah phenomenal phenomenal book um oral history versus biography um how did you find your way down that rabbit hole as a writer and and and to you um I believe it is a harder experience Scott Ryan certainly he's written a bunch of them on Twin Peaks and some of the other ones he's told me how much more difficult it can be to do the oral history than than than a straight up uh you know biography uh type style what was it that led you down to that style of writing well I mean I had always been fascinated with it the Saturday Night Live one growing up um was huge I mean that book I read so many times and what I realized at a certain point it was just something I always wanted to try and um I went to film school um and one of my favorite aspects of go to film School of course I love the you know I loved the screenwriting aspect that's what I wanted to do I originally wanted to be a screenwriter but I also fell in love with editing and oral histories are editing I mean it is editing rather um when you're going through just being able to take 10 people's stories and create one cohesive story there's something really fun about that being able to work with have just you know a blank page and have 10 different Recollections of the same thing and then create one from those 10 different things I mean it's just it's exhilarating when again when I get to do it right and um it's exhausting and it's so tiring and um you know there are times where you're banging your head against the wall thinking why do I keep doing this to myself this is not this is just so you you back yourself into a corner but I always managed to find out way out I don't know what it is like there's always just kind of a little way out that maybe I hadn't thought about when I started the discovery factors I'll do some of these and I'll find things that I never would have imagine like the clerk's cartoon I knew the story going into it so it was helpful but then there's some where I had no idea like High Fidelity I didn't know the story going into it I found out the story as I was working on it so it's just it just it depends it's a caseby casee thing and there's so much fun when I get to stand back and read it and I I get to kind of remove myself from the equation because you're looking at everyone else's words in a way um there's a few things I want to get to based on what you just said but one of the things you said uh was was when it can be done right and I'm very curious as to your perspective as to what that means is if when it can be done right versus not so much it just depend like I mean there there's definitely oral histories I've done where I look back and I mean it's the people that you get um I've always said that in order to do an oral history you need a the director the writer the producer um the best ones have all three y but I can get away with it if I have one of the three it but it depends on who it is like you need someone that can serve as your go-to like kind of in break brick glass in case of emergency type thing so like that's so important and I've had so many of those and so the best ones and the ones when they are done right are when I have someone like that and I've done them where I don't have that to fall back on and then I will come in more as as the narrator or occasionally like I did a Phantom of The Paradise one uh recently and I didn't have that I didn't have the producer writer or the director and it was the first time I never had any of them um so what I had to do was I had to use a historian on Phantom of the paradise to kind of help me fill in those blanks and then I also filled in the rest of the blanks and I still made it work really well and I'm still very proud of it um but I mean it's just it's such an essential part of it that maybe most people wouldn't realize you need someone to help you serve as the narrator that makes a lot of sense uh Scott um Ryan who's become you know good friend uh now he talked about with last days of Letterman that was it was Shey Shey was his go-to guy um and and he was the guy that he called to more than anybody uh to fill in little details about things that other people said when he maybe didn't want to go and talk to that other person again hey can you can you give this some color can you round this out a little bit and instead of having to put in uh you know some of his narrator notes to connect the these things he just would either put in another shecky quote or um you know it it would help round that out that makes a lot of sense you would say it that way um so my curiosity about what it is that you do um you did the article on late nighter uh about the Madonna uh Letterman the the the infamous Madonna KN um yes you know with Letterman and and and that was that was lovely because again on this show I've had many of the people that you talked about there but but even people who weren't in your article have been on and uh on on on our show and talked about that and I just I read that article and it had such a um a life to it because it kind of does seem like a documentary but on the page it's it's it's it's the people um and it's such a beautiful beautiful part of the process now the part of the process that I'm in love with when it comes to podcasting is exactly this part here and I'm curious when you do your interviews with people how much do you love that versus the editing is it all equal do you find that you've gotten stronger as kind of an interviewer over time um I'm I'm I'm really curious about that because some of the people that you interview to do these oral histories it is literally a laundry list of the people that you would love to have a conversation with if you're a conversational list um and and I imagine just like myself I get better at it over time uh you've gotten better at it over time that that's safe to say that that's the case yeah I mean I I've done probably with all the oral histories because you talk to a lot of people for those I'd say I've probably done I mean I have done over 300 interviews I would say at this point and um which is so tiring when I think of how much I've done with those but I mean when you the more you do it obviously you do get better and it like you know I'm I'm nervous I still get nervous sometimes with certain people especially there's definitely an intimidation factor I I'm uh working on one I can't talk about yet but what I can say is I was talking to someone the other night and we spent an hour hour and 45 minutes on the phone and I still felt intimidated talking to this person not because they were the biggest name but because of their body of work it really depends on who it is that you're talking to and um it just you know you develop skills and one of the one of the most important things I developed from or I learned from watching Bill's Amy for all those years was um not so much how to be an interviewer but how to be a conversationalist how to put the person you're talking to at ease how to um manage and navigate those situations to make them comfortable and um I got to watch him um in Action a couple of times and he would make the person talking you feel like the most important person in the world and there's such a skill to that and um you know it's something that I'm so lucky that I got to see him do it but also it came natural to him because he was naturally the most Charming person you could imagine like let's go back let's go back here because because you had a special relationship with him I want to know um first off to to to to give the viewers and the listeners uh who might not know who bill is um who is Bill but how did you con get connected with him in the first place and what was your role with him absolutely um bill was a um he was a um he was a journalist he was an author he was within the 80s and the 90s 2000s he did so many um celebrity profiles um he did what is so unique it wasn't your standard celebrity profile everything he did had a bit of an edge to it there he was able to kind of um parody The Format while he was doing it in the greatest way I mean he was naturally this gifted writer um he interviewed David Letterman of course um I'll mention him first but he did all the cover um stories for Rolling Stone and Esquire during that time um everyone from Madonna Eddie Murphy um Dana Carvey um he did Sharon Stone of course Warren batty I mean it just goes on and on the people that he interviewed and um then of course he wrote books he wrote books on man kofman he wrote books on um Frank Sinatra Johnny Carson would um was the great white whale of his um that he finally was able to um conquered that interview in 2002 um for Esquire and then he wound up spending you know the last 18 years of his life um working on a book about Johnny Carson so and by the way if you haven't read Carson the Magnificent uh especially for people I say this to people all the time um you know the magnitude of the star that Johnny Carson was um during our teenage years and and and before that of course you know my my my father's years growing up he was the biggest star the world and a lot of people don't realize that I believe that that that that Bill's book is actually a phenomenal entry point uh for people who may may not know because it's not a textbook uh style biography it was clearly written by somebody this is where where I love about this book my my favorite part about it uh because I identify with it is he kind of puts his fan first forward he does and and many times that doesn't happen when biographers write on their subject they they if if they do have personal regard for it many times they hide that or they mask it he does not do that in this in this book and you can read the book and know exactly how Bill felt as he was writing the book and that is so rare um and um he really I mean he revered Johnny Carson and you can feel that in every page of that book and it I think think it's so important to what that book is um and that's why I love that book because you can really feel the passion for the subject material leaping off the page when he's writing it um and it's done in a style that's you know nobody writes in anymore like it it just like it's so sorry um the nature of kind of writing biographies has changed so much because you know our attention as readers have changed since he started working on the book y so it's kind of a time capsule of a certain time and um I want to go back and finish um yeah please do um your question before and um by the way I did I do not think I did him Justice um trying to explain who he is I've never really had to audibly kind of explain I I've had to explain who he is times over the years but it's always difficult because it's just it's like trying to put him in a box is so tough like he was so many things like as a writer like there's I mean every he's one of those writers where everybody can take little different things out of reading his work yeah like you know you could read it for this aspect or that aspect um for me I always loved um the details he was the most detail oriented writer that and that's why it's so tough for his style to be replicated because no one else could do what he did um I was lucky enough when I would send him things sometimes um he would send me notes um I on the vulture thing in uh particular he sent me notes and his notes were just so fantastic um it was the and um is that how you got connected with him is that how you got connected with him originally was was was he saw your writing he connected that way or how did how did that happen I connected with him when I had only written one article ever like I had done next to nothing I had done nothing actually I I was just fresh out of film school I was 21 years old um and or I think I was 22 by that point and um Andy Kaufman Carol who I'd gotten to know because I was working on a project towards the end of my time at film school I wanted to do an Andy Coffman project that never came to fruition but um she after knowing her about a year and a half uh introduced me to Bill I remember we had dinner at his house it was me Carol her husband um her son Jason Mike Thomas and Bill um it was just a great dinner I remember um and that night um first time i' had ever met Bill we were talking and he's like you know I think you know I think you should come by the uh house and I have a bunch of Andy stuff and you know I think it's time to kind of give someone the keys and so he gave me all his Andy stuff um to hold on to not to keep but to hold on to and um and just to help me with the project I was working on and it was so incredibly helpful and then that day he's like well you know I need someone to kind of help me with the stuff I'm working on and um he' asked me to kind of come in his chief editorial assistant he used to call me and um yeah I spent seven years um working with him as his right-hand guy and and um you know it was everything you could imagine like it was all the trans like I did all the transcribing but also it was so much more it was just getting to pick his brain and you know sit there and you sat under a Wisdom Tree for seven years I did and it was I mean we would like it would be everything for you know I would watch him a couple times I didn't get to do it very much but I got a couple times to see him um to be there when he was doing interviews um my favorite was he um was interviewing um she is uh recently passed away but uh he was interviewing the Chicago Legend uh that was Chili Pepper um she was a drag queen and you're familiar okay yeah um yes and we I remember he was interviewing Chili Pepper at the um in the lobby of the Ambassador East right adjacent to the uh pumpr room so that was the first time I ever got to see him do an interview in person was chili pepper and that was always fun uh getting to be a fly on the wall for that one and then afterwards um I was walking back to my car bill went one way and then Chili Pepper was going the same way I was and it was a f minute walk but I can't tell you how much I laughed like it was just one of the strangest experiences but I and then I was with Bill when he did an interview was sha helper which was one of the last interviews he did she had funded IO um the old what was improv Olympic became iio in Chicago um yeah and so that was I think that was the last interview he ever did and I was there with him for that and um again this was was during a period he hadn't been working on the Carson book really when I knew him because it had kind of been filed away waiting he was waiting to get better and unfortunately he never really did yeah um I'm really grateful because we had heard about this book like like like like that's the thing people who were enthusiasts of this genre I heard of it yeah yeah we knew that it was coming we knew the deal was there it was it was it was it was done or or or in in well in process anyway you know we knew that he had the last interview with Johnny and spent time with Johnny after the fact which is fascinating uh to to you know to those of us who who who uh were hoping um as Johnny said in his final address to everybody that he would find a project and come back and and and and uh entertain us or or or spend time with us in different ways uh he never did and and um and we knew that bill was kind of the link to that time afterwards you know and and uh so when the book came I was very very excited um it was funny at my local bookstore the day that it came out um you know uh there was four people that were there and and and it's funny because you know all four of us were like oh this is like it was like we're in the same Club kind of like growing up as a letterman fan growing up as a letterman fan with with with late night um you always knew who the other Letterman fans were in school and and uh I just I love that that kinship that's there and uh I certainly certainly recommend the book I I'm um I just love the fact that you got to have the mentor mentee relationship with a guy like this and and and I mean you know you're carrying his Spirit on with what it is that you do um including the enthusiasm the enthusiasm for your projects I read the Vanity Fair um oral history and you know it's been a year and and one of the things that that uh you you were always a guy when that article came out originally I was like I want to talk to this guy and then of course life and all all sorts of and and then I saw that you posted you said it's been a year and I can't believe it's been a year since this thing came out and and and uh to give context uh I highly highly highly recommend um that uh Late Bloomer is what the article is called that that everyone would go um anybody who likes the Letterman uh Conan transition period and likes learning and studying about that this is a phenomenal phenomenal way um Viewpoint to look at these events the Vanity Fair article Late Bloomer it's called um Andrew bus oral history it's a year it's about a year ago that it came out and you got a chance to talk to and I just want to I just want to throw this out there really really really quick here um of course uh you know uh okay Conan Jeff Ross Lauren Michaels David Letterman of course um Andy RoR uh Janine grao Sarah Silverman Max Weinberg Robert Smigel Lisa C um you know you talked to dino Bob and and Bob Bob Odenkirk the writers Paula Davis from Talent Jeff Garland Jim pit who did the music like you talked to all of these people about that time period um phenomenal right there just the conversations I have conversation Envy of you right now that you've had conversations with these people the first question I do want to ask though was there anybody uh who you wish you could have gotten that you didn't get not not for that one I got everybody I really wanted um there was one or two people that I were trying I think I think the only people that I tried to get that I didn't get were um oh it was the it would have been Drew Barry Moore and H John Goodman were the only two because they were in the first episode makes sense but those were the only ones um I can't think of anybody else that I and and by the way I um who knows what their memories would have been um yep and I was kind of like you know it was a small part of their history versus a bigger part of everyone else's history that I talk to um but yeah those are the only ones that I reached out to you that I didn't get for the piece everybody else I reached out to um were game to participate uh anybody hesitant in they came in along the way I know that happened with Scott with his book sometimes that probably happens for you right you get a project you don't think you're have somebody and you get them later on I mean there's people I wouldn't say they were hesitant I mean there were people that took a while to schedule I mean the whole interview itself took a while to schedule I mean all the interviews themselves took a while just because the writer strike um yeah this was in the middle of the strikes I pitched it right before the strikes and it took us until you know everyone was given a clear with the writer strike that it was okay to um yeah and that wasn't until the fall so it was a couple of months that we couldn't do it because of the strikes but finally we were given the clear to do it once the strikes were over um but yeah that was a big that was very difficult um kind of hurdle for it but yeah nobody was hesitant and some scheduling is easier than others um Letterman happened late in the game I remember um Lisa cudro happened really late as well um oh interesting that happened I think she was the last interview I did I think I did her her interview on a Friday and I turned it it on a Monday I'd like to say yep and she's interesting because I did her interview on on a Friday and then Matthew Perry passed away the next day on that Saturday so that was really um gives you the Willies yeah I know yeah it was yeah um I know and that was such a tragic loss I remember that next day just yeah was horrible I love every every pretty much every narrative from Conan's camp that has talked about this um this amazing uh uh you know event in entertainment history um Lisa's always mentioned and I I always find that really really Charming that that Conan and Lisa were both you know um you know friends in an improv group together grinding it out together as they were both kind of moving up um figuring out who they were and where they were going to fit in entertainment history and it all happened at kind of the same time um their Ascension and and and it's so Charming to me that these two friends um no pun intended um and I'm really grateful like like I smiled really big when she was included in in the article I remember reading that because I just love that you know Lisa is there cheering him on and and and and and the day that he did his uh um you know his test show on this on the on The Tonight Show set you know she was part of that and trying to figure out you know wardrobe and thing you know I just I love Lisa's piece in that and I'm glad that she was included in there um absolutely so how did this assignment was this something that you were like this was a this was all you and you pitch fair and they said yeah let's do it go for it and uh yeah and I give them a lot of credit because I'm not pitching something that is right kind of on the nose like it I'm pitching um what I really love to do is hyperfocus things I love hyperfocusing things I'm it just it brings me so much joy I'm not doing an oral history of koob Bran's late night career because that would be daunting I'm not doing it on his L on his on late night because that was 16 years that would also be daunting um the story of how he got the job is very interesting of course and unparalleled to anything else but I was fascinated I'm like it doesn't end there it doesn't end when he goes on the air I know that he fought for years and by the way even after the oral history only covers a yearh it doesn't cover the next year and a half two years after that that he was still struggling it wasn't until the third anniversary which right before the anniversary they had a brand new set once you see them with a new set that then you realize that okay things are kind of safe once they spend money to redo the set you're like okay these guys are going to be here a while but yep I mean it was touch and go the Tom shes reversal which um I'll talk about really quickly which is you know he wrote horrible reviews of the show in the early years they were just you know talked about how horrible the show was and this would have been September 93 and I think in the fall of 95 it took two years y I think he was the first one to go wait a minute this is the best show comedy on TV right now and I'm sorry like I and corrected he did and this was a time when critics held a lot of weight in TV especially he him like he held so much power with um what he did um you know basically um people would turn to him and turn to him in the Washington Post um and I mean he had all that power and he was able to go and just say I was wrong these guys are doing the best comedy on TV right now yeah and um it's really remarkable that that's when things started to change and um with so with the I'm so sorry I think CAU on a tangent no no no no actually what you're talking with Tom shells it was very very important uh we had uh David B and kulie on last week and and one of the questions I asked him like we brought up oh I think it was on C I think it was on camera we actually brought up I brought up shales and his reversal with Conan I said have you ever had any of those in your career and we went down that path to me that was um you know these TV critics back then again people don't necessarily understand that because social media has open it up and everybody has a voice and and and there's so many voices out there and it's hard to but back then there were a lot of trusted voices you know Bill Carter was one being Coy was one Tom shales Tom shales might have been you know the biggest one in in in many people's worlds and he did this massive about face when it came to Conan and it huge that was a huge thing when he did that I got to talk to him many many years ago about it um and um yeah I I talked to him a couple times um we we we would message a bit during this one period but um yeah I I talked to him many years ago this you know it's probably going back nine eight nine years ago at this point but I remember talking to him about the whole thing but I think what were we talking about before I think we're talk I think you would asked me um just kind of how it came together yeah no well I'm glad down this path because this is where this is where Dave comes into the conversation like I'm really glad you to this this is exactly uh one of the things I wanted to make sure we hit today because yes the Tom shs thing was uh probably from a broader perspective the big moment but for me as a viewer back I like I loved I love but having Dave on the show yeah because I loved late night I felt that they continued and you you did a great job hitting this part in the oral history too about uh how um how how how do we call it late night do we still call it late night NBC is like yeah you're calling it late night we're building a franchise here so here we are these guys who want to come which is interesting they they knew they had a franchise but it was only one guy yeah like that that's what's fascinating to me like it's not unheard of that they changed the name of the show no like that idea was to me it was never like oh my God how dare they change the name of the show it was an 11-year run under one guy with one personality very very very uh late could have been him like I get what they were doing and it worked by the way late night is no longer just associated with David Letterman um which by the way I think is I think is for the best because it allows Dave to be associated with himself not one franchise exactly so I think that's important that these franchises that he created he created two insane iconic franchises but I think it's important that they live on without him because then he can get all the credit for what he did not the name of the show I totally agree with everything that you just said um uh Carter talks about that in late shift um you know it wasn't The Tonight Show and he tried in the in in in the war for late night he tried to say it again it wasn't The Tonight Show it was were you on Johnny Carson last night have you ever been on Johnny Carson have you ever that's the you know that's that was the magic was the host was um you know and and of course but but at the same time when you're a corporation a broadcast company like NBC you're like no no no it is a franchise and we are going to keep this trainer moving although I do also understand the flip side with the Tonight Show being its own thing and um I understand obviously I understand the appeal of what that show has meant to so many people that have wanted to host it especially in the Conan side of thing I definitely understand the appeal of what that show means especially is association with Carson absolutely both Dave and Conan like like they were uh transfixed by the franchise they the dream was the host of The Tonight Show you know but but us as as enthusiasts of this stuff we we don't really care and I mean as Conan proved as he went over to TBS and then now as his as his podcast Empire is just growing and growing it's so good the fans don't care the fans care about the person but I do understand um the historical significance I mean AB Letterman podcast you know that's that's it's all about Nostalgia it's all about these things and and the balance of this is very very interesting I thought that Conan and Company uh Smigel I would put him and Jeff Ross up at you know the Brain Trust um Lauren Michaels as well I I thought they did a phenomenal job of creating something completely new but still was late night as opposed to what The Tonight Show was I thought that they did a great job of keeping the spirit of what Dave did probably because of the zaniness even though you know other devices were removed and clearly it was a very different show um but I thought that you know if you're looking at Late Night with David Letterman if someone else is going to host late night as a franchise I thought they did a very very good job living up to what late night was absolutely and what they did that was so interesting and I think it worked so well is they went in there with their sensibility knowing exactly what the show is going to be from day one their idea of um let's um make it silly let's do peewee's Playhouse Vibes let's do this VI like they knew exactly this is what we're going to do um where um you know take away kind of the awareness of it and have Conan play the straight man to everything that happens around him have him steering the ship um not kind of doing a wink to the camera the commitment to it I think that was so important to carving out what the identity of that show is and what's so interesting is you know I mean these guys just took the assignment so seriously and that's why it worked because it's not like the network was like come in and do something completely different come in and do like the network kind of just gave them the keys and um yeah I mean there look there's things that they wanted to do that um they definitely had to um find out how to produce a television show while they were doing it yep um but I mean what's so fascinating is if you look at that first week of shows they did mhm they did these are some of the things they did from day one were they did the first thing they ever did was a bit called actual items and that's a bit that they would do for years and years and years which was kind of a parody of what of headlines of head of J Leno's headlines yes um where they would take where instead of finding real headlines they would say these are absolutely real headlines and they were the most insane clearly comical things you could think of it was really good the next day they did Clutch Cargo they had they had smel doing Clutch Cargo um y I think I think Clinton was the first one um oh yeah I mean that's the one that comes to mind whenever you think of that bit that's the one that comes to mind Clint yeah Clinton Schwarz a was another one Bob do it was the 90s y um yeah I mean they did those and then um in the year I was just gonna say didn't they do they did the year 2000 yeah I mean all of these things they did within the first year went on to become Staples of his career if they made it like all these things they did became Staples of his late night career and it was all in the first week so these guys came in with they already were defined by the time they went on the air so what you just said though I mean when you think about how we're comparing the two late night franchises from Dave to what you just said the commonalities are are astounding um you know they're going to learn how to produce a show on the fly yeah check that I mean certain with the morning show with Dave that that was a a big part of that learning curve but still when they moved over to late night same thing we're going to do this learn how to do this on the fly but also you think about things that happened within the first you know little while of of Late Night with David Letterman stupid pet um you know uh my my my good friend Steve Wier you know he wrote the uh he wrote the gag he first off introduced Calbert to Forest he only lasted with late night for a year but he introduced Calvert to Forest Larry Bud Melman um the the the the the the card going through the window the glass breaking that was um a mailbag SE segment which by the way very beginning at the very be and then they had these things that went through the entire franchise the same thing happened with Conan in late night in its infancy as well and I just think that that comparison is the comparison Late Night with David Letterman they were learning right on the Fly just like they did with late night with C O'Brien they give they give them that chance to do that some bits uh original bits um that happened the mailbag which is where the very first you know uh card through the glass with the sound effect of the glass breaking that happened very early on stupid petrick's very early on a lot of these things very early on as they were finding their voice and then things that would go through the entire franchise they were given latitude to do that um I do want to talk about Dave coming on the show because I remember of course that was when I loved late night right away uh with Conan O'Brien I I I thought it was fantastic right away I love the zany the silly the P's Playhouse as you as you talked about there but there was a lot of tumultuousness I remember people didn't take him seriously there was a whole lot of uh you know things but then when Dave came on as a guest that night was absolutely um spellbinding and I mean if I had a chance to talked to Dave about events in the past um that is one thing that I would certainly certainly want to talk to him about because that night was electric um you being able to talk to Dave about that first off do you do most of your interview viws via the phone or online or do you do a lot of them in person and was Dave I assume Dave was on the phone uh Dave was on Zoom which was not expecting um I expected it to be on the phone yeah I do most I would say 90 99 5% almost exclusively um on phone or Zoom um not very often in person um I've done occasional ones in person um more for the books really um but less less so much for the VY first stuff but anyway um yeah so Dave I was trying for weeks and weeks to get um and then um finally it came together um I yeah I remember so they're like he'll do it over zoom and I'm like oh my God that's even cooler and what's really interesting about it um is so there was a whole set like it was a buildup just to seeing Dave like there was something so iconic just about that moment when I get to see him for the first time on Zoom it it just it it stands out in my mind what it was was so I it starts with me and the publes talking in the serum room and then um Dave's assistant joins and it's her for a second and then she calls out into the kitchen in the background um that was you know just had natural light but it looked pretty dark in there uh she's like Dave are you ready and he's like yeah so he walks out and kind of emerges out of the kitchen almost as if he's making a grand entrance and then he sits in the chair and it was just the coolest move and um and you know I got to talk to him for 20 minutes and I mean he's one of those guys that I just never thought that I would interview like yeah um I mean for some reason Conan and I always had a feeling I'm like one day I'll cross paths with him because Conan was my late night guy Conan was uh and absolutely no disrespect none whatsoever I I admire so much about David Letterman and what he did with the format oh yeah when I say Conan's my late night guy that's because that's who I grew up watching yes but then the you know when you get to a certain age I went back and I discovered the the genius and the artfulness of what Dave did and I discovered the same with Carson and Johnny so I was going to say we have a lot of folks who who who who latched on to this show right away who are just dieh hard day fans who have done the same thing they've discovered Carson uh because of that because of the reverence that Dave had for Carson because of the similarities yeah and and the same said with Conan and Dave yeah I mean Conan has so much reverence for both of those men like it so that was part of it as well was learning well this is the guy these are the guys that shaped the guy that I like so I might like them too so then you go back and you watch and um I remember yeah I mean watching in probably around right as YouTube was um coming around I that's when I first started watching old uh clips of Letterman from the 80s from The Late Night show and that's when I would discover like you know I one of the earliest things I saw was him dropping stuff off a building I remember that was the early ones and just thinking I'm like oh this was on television this is crazy that this was that that people were tuning into television and just watching a guy throw things off a building like it was something so magical about it um and then of course it's you know and then just sorry no no worries covered stupid petrics and everything else but um but yeah so with Dave I got to interview him and it was so much there was something about it what I realized that I didn't expect going into it was when I'm sitting here and I'm talking to him I'm like oh there's something about him that I just wanted to I I just want I was hanging on every word and I didn't really I wasn't it wasn't intimidation but talking to him I realized this guy immediately you realize why just the the effortless charm of him and just why so many people wanted to sit on a couch talking to him and I immediately realized what it was even though I'm the one doing the interviewing I I just became transfixed by listening to him tell a story and you got the story and if you read theal history all the Letterman all the beats that you would want to have are there including Conan and Letterman's uh going back and for that was my favorite part that absolutely my favorite part him telling cuz Conan um in the first interview I didn't have a chance to go into that stuff and then I sent an email a couple days later I'm like hey can I talk to Conan again about this stuff and his assistant's like yeah of course so Conan and I talked about all the Dave stuff and I remember telling Conan that day I'm like I'm really trying to get Dave because I'd love to have his take on it um and what he say good luck I I think no I think he I told con I'm like we're working on it it might happen um and I think he said something like well there might still be some smoke coming out of the Vatican yet that um I think that was this response what a great line okay so here's my question so you hit the Beats which is great because that moment uh again the the the essay uh I won the essay like that's my favorite part of that I loved that so much and it was the moment where came back and and you nailed that moment you nailed it perfectly so my question is you got you got the Beats but did Dave turn around and start interviewing you because one of the things that I've heard with many of the people who have talked to Dave is that he ends up becoming curious about the person interviewing them and asking them questions about about them and sometimes they don't get what they want to get because he kind of takes over a little bit did you get any of that no not so much um within the me of the interview although at the beginning he definitely he' asked me he's like so had we talked before that kind of thing so he wanted to know a little more about that and then Dave and I talked about Bill at the very beginning that that meant a lot to me um I brought up because Dave had given me a quote I never talked to him but he had given me a quote when I was working on the Vandy Fair p on bill um he had given me a quote he was kind enough to do it uh and um so I thanked him for that and then he told me um the story about how when Bill had interviewed him the first time Dave was worried that he sent him back to Chicago with nothing um and Dave's like I thought that I just ruined I'm like this poor guy I sent him back with nothing and um of course that was not the case but yeah um you know I was talking to him about Bill and then he and then Dave said I remember Dave said I think his dad or it was Dave's dad and Bill's grandfather were both both in the um Flor business they were friends yeah da so Bill grandfather and Dave's dad were friends and there's a photo that I've seen of a group photo and the two of them are side by side and it's kind of circled you know Dave's dad Bill's grandfather I mean there was a connected just this connective tissue to those two guys um aren't those the best feelings in the world like when that happens that's the stuff that's precious to me those little where you don't think there are coincidences and those just little magical kind of serendipitous moments and what I loved is that Dave remembered all of it I remember that he that that meant something to him I I texted Bill's daughter um afterwards and I got very emotional uh just that you know Bill made an impact on Dave that you because that would mean the world of the bill and um yeah I it would mean the world that he made an impact on someone like Dave Bill new but at the same time you know they hadn't talked in many many many years so um getting to talk to him about B meant a lot I was G yeah absolutely I can I can see why that would mean so much to you that's precious it was and but the Conan thing yeah when we were talking about Conan I the other part of it that I loved is that Dave remembered beat by beat that conversation with Conan sitting on the couch and look he probably hasn't seen it since it happened I don't think he goes back and looks at and stuff so that was all muscle memory and he remembered exactly kind of how it went down and um that was really memorable and there's one piece I do want to bring up that Dave told me that I never knew that excuse me by the way let's let throw the audience in on this you're coming off pneumonia you're coming off we were going do this a while back and then you had walking pneumonia you poor guy I did yes I'm yeah um a week glad you're better now thank you yes um but anyway um yeah Dave was telling me um this thing I had never heard which I love so much which is he which is there was about a two or three week period or no it wasn't week I think it was months because oh no it was it was well what do when did the CBS show start 93 or do you know the August of 93 August okay so there was a couple of weeks where you could watch David Letterman 11:30 at night on CBS yeah turn over to NBC and see him at 12:35 on NBC so you could watch him backto back on two different networks because they were running reruns because it was their their deal because they didn't have because con wasn't on yet and I Dave told that to me and of course in his fashion he's like oh boy that's what everybody wants more me um but I he told me that I that fascinated me I didn't make it in ay fair but that always stuck with me I'm like like just that is unheard of yeah to to host a two television shows on competing networks yeah simultaneously well and and I mean you know NBC would be stupid not to they have the rights to do it they'd be stupid not it's the biggest story in entertainment time when he mes they'd be stupid not to until you know uh yeah it makes it makes so much sense that they would do it so crazy though like he his own lead in he was yeah like you could literally Channel Surf and still see him like it just I there's something about that I love man minutia um yeah uh in in details of course talking about Bill earlier and how he was so good at being detail oriented the details of that yeah delightful um I uh I I I I know that oh man I hate that we have 10 minutes left um so here's the deal uh if I have to cut this next part out I'll cut this next part out but I'm I'm super curious you're involved the Andy calman doc we've talked about this a little bit on the show because you know there are details that are out there we know that it's done we know that they're like in in in different a different phase now where the phase basically distribution and and getting all that stuff figured out that's that's kind of out there right now you were involved in the Andy calman doc which I'm so grateful to hear yes after years you know years ago you were handed kind of the keys things uh come back around and you get a chance to work on this what I would say probably you know probably one of the greatest projects of your life I know it's certainly one of the greatest projects in my life and I'm not involved in it so I can only imagine how you're feeling about it what's so great world pants worldwide pants is is is is is part of this when you and Dave talked had you already been part of the doc like was that one of the connections that was made is yes I'm working on this dock that you guys are a tangentially a part of I I did bring it up yes okay okay yeah so um and we can say that we're not we're not breaking I can I I can say I that I brought it up to him um basically my general rule of thumb is um I because it is an ongoing project I will talk about any I I can talk about it very broad strokes and that anyone knows reading the press release if it's in the press release I can talk about it so till it comes out and when it comes out you are coming on this show and we're gonna go deep on Andy C I will oh and that's the thing like I could talk about Andy for days and I've got so much information about Andy just lodged in my head like I mean I've seen everything he's done I've seen things that people haven't seen listen to things I mean um yeah there's so much out there um and to me the idea of you being able to actually have a conversation with Dave about Andy is also uh just as precious I've got a I've got a shot um on the set here this is the shot right before La was about to get up and smack a Calin in the face it's signed by Jerry because I actually have a um I have a I have a connection to the pro wrestling world and so because of that connection I actually had a chance to talk to Jimmy Hart uh one night the mountain South Jimmy Hart and and Jimmy he was quotee unquote they call it in the business married he was married to Andy calman which means they would do all of these shots down south when Andy was learning the art of professional wrestling they'd be in the South and they'd be going from Arena to Arena he rode in the car with Jimmy and they went to graceand together and they they spent and so Jimmy who's used to answering questions about you know Bret Hart or Hulk Hogan and all that when he came and worked for my promotion I literally got three and a half hours of Andy Calin stories of being on the road with him and absolutely it was it was it was fascinating because you got thisy who goes so deep into an art form and and and wants to you know create this Persona and and and create reaction with people not necessarily laughter but reaction it could be anger it could be whatever he wants to take an audience in the palm of his hand and kind of play around with them and and and the Very definition of a performance artist I love Andy calman um what what was your gateway how did you because you're younger than me you're a Conan guy you're not like what was your giveway to Andy calman uh um it was it was just I had always I don't know I think it was because I was such a Saturday Night Live fan I was very familiar with Andy's um kind of history with Saturday Night Live and I was fascinated um and with the idea of what he had done and then I think at some point I had seen like a biography special on him and then um I'd watch man on the moon um and then I started you know in the this was you know I would have been a teenager so I think by that point we had just gotten the Netflix DVD service so I would get you know the DVDs of Andy's of some some of the stuff that Andy had done some of the DVD releases from over the years um so I just started watching whatever I could find on Andy and then YouTube of course I started watching a lot stuff on YouTube and I became fascinated with them when I was like 15 because I think there's something so sorry about that I think there's something about that age yeah 15 16 years old where you start there's something about that Angy part of your brain where you start to to just challenge things and Andy would kind of challenge not in a antagonistic way although with the wrestling he could be antagonistic sure um or with Tony Clifton what he would do is he would challenge the idea of what was entertainment yeah what it could be and that is what I latched on to as a kid and then you know over the years I've start my favorite things about Andy now are his playfulness when he does those things I love the playful of Andy um there's an such an innocence to him I and I think people always want to know was he crazy was he this was he that um there's two quotes that I always use um turn to um to describe who Andy was the first was in a book by Julie heck and the book and by the way Bill Z's book on Andy lost on the fun house lost on the fun house is one is the book on Andy if you want to know who Andy was read that book that book when I discovered it when I was 16 that was my introduction to Bill it told me so much about who Andy was um so anyway Julie hect wrote a book that had bunch of transcripts of her conversations with Andy at one point she was talking to Andy's mom Janice and she was trying to get a good read on Andy and Janice had told her with Andy it's all about fun he won't do it if it's not fun and that when I read that told me immediately who Andy was um everything he did whether was the wrestling Tony Cliff him whether it was Mighty Mouse everything he did was about fun it was about what was fun to him and what he would hope other people would enjoy like I mean people saying oh he didn't care if the audience liked him or not he cared to a degree he knew what he was doing was fun for him and he just you know I mean he does what any Entertainer would do which is hope that the right people find his stuff and um I mean it was true though I there was that part in that didn't care but also he did care like right like any Entertainer cares and um but you know it's a better story if you build him up to be this guy who he didn't care it's a better story but um was there a second quote yeah okay yeah Mar would um her her description of Andy was always that he was just a sweet Jewish boy from Long Island and I feel like that sums him up too I feel like that tells you exactly who Andy was and it's not it strip away you know everything that you know about him you can boil it down to that and that was the heart of him was his heart and people I feel like forget that they they f look he was such a genius with what he did with you know he was so multifaceted um but at the end of the day I mean there is a sweetness to him that allowed the audience to want to go on this weird insane Journey with him you there had to be a lovable quality to him that he absolutely possessed I think that's why I was was attracted to him in the first place is because I love kindness kindness is one of my favorite things I felt the same way about Paul Rubin I felt I felt the same way I I I I felt that that was just the kindness that he had was a Gateway absolutely yeah and and and because of that kindness you will follow him when he's doing the wrestling and saying things that are completely unkind but there's still a bit of a glimmer in his eye yep yep when you know he's playing you know he's fooling we're going to go deep about this when the doc does come out I just I hope that the the the documentary Gods the distribution Gods the entertainment Gods smile on us and we get it sooner than later I cannot wait for this thing um Andrew thank you I I I can't thank you enough for doing this uh we're gonna do this more right we can like I want oh my god of course now there's so much we didn't go to um I can talk so much about Conan I mean the thing with Conan is like I we barely scratch the surface um I mean so much that I can talk about with with that guy and um me too I'm a huge I'm a huge uh O'Brien uh uh Enthusiast as well so we could definitely absolutely I think he's the best like I I really do and I mean just like the body of work 28 years to go from a show that nobody thought would stand a chance he had week to week renewals yep and then he lasted 28 years on the air and now I mean he's just as like there's people that think that he's hit like there's people that didn't watch his show that are massive fans of his podcast you think about team Koko really kicked into gear when late shift 2 happened in 09 010 that was when it's it's crazy he needed that moment just like Dave not getting the Tonight Show Conan almost in a way for his own legacy needed that moment to move off into that trajectory that made him just his own I've talk and I've talked to Andy Kaufman's sister about Conan she never watched him on late night she never watched his TBS sht she never watched any of it she loves his podcast yeah there you go and she's like I love him so much and I'm just like there's something about him like that podcast is the best I feel like the podcast is you get to realize who he is without the cameras and you get to just hear his playfulness again I love playfulness and he is one of the most playful guys out there he'll just go on a r and here's my Envy you've got a chance to talk to so many of these people and so many of the people that are on the list that I have that you've talked to we didn't get a chance to talk about I can't wait for the next time that you come on the show absolutely anytime you want me while this is happening the wildfires are happening in La so I'm going to say to you uh we're all hoping and praying for you last night my wife and I sat on the couch oh my gosh well I've got so many friends down there and and and I know folks whove lost their homes and it's so brutal I hope that it is I I can't look away like it's one of those things where you know as soon as we're done here I'm gonna go back to watching the news and I did it all night I didn't have to evacuate luckily I have friends that did I I I I know people that have probably lost things and it just it's devastating absolutely I mean yesterday there was a cloud of smoke above my apartment um I looked outside and I just saw smoke and I'm far from the Palisades and this was before the Hollywood fire started yeah exactly watching the Hollywood fire yesterday and then the studio city fire I'm just like it got close I'm about 20 minutes from running Canyon and I've got stories about hiking running Canyon with Kevin Smith I mean like I I so Kevin's the first person I thought of about which yeah I just saw as we were starting Kevin's okay but I've to know Kevin a little bit I've got lots of stories about him but I can't wait to talk about that with you too bear is driving car um how can that be how can that be thank you buddy I appreciate this so much we'll be in touch and and please keep me posted as to how you're doing make that you're safe thanks Andrew I appreciate you so much man absolutely thanks for bearing with me oh anytime peace and love and we'll talk to you soon perfect thank you Mike okay brother bye- bye all right bye all right uh we had a hard out on that one see Andrew and I as you could probably tell he and I could go hours and um and and and we've texted back and forth since then saying yeah you know what we can't wait to do this again uh I just appreciate him so much anybody I've always appreciated this these are people who would be on these late night talk shows as guests you know people who go and chase their dreams and something cool happens I look at a guy like Andrew and it's like oh man yeah and couldn't happen to a nicer guy I just really appreciate that about him uh the Letterman podcast has one sponsor one sponsor only that is hellodd deli.com go to hellodd deli.com um I I just saw somebody in uh uh uh Rob Kat's Letterman fans group just exclaim that they they found hello jelly.com not through this show not through other things but they found it somehow and they got it someone ordered them a shirt and there was an email exchange and it was with rert himself and he was flabbergasted by it that story tickled me pink this week um so anyway hellodd deli.com uh Late Show with David Letterman merchandise uh from Rupert G himself this has been another episode of the Letterman podcast with Mike Chism coincidentally I am Mike Chism thank you and good night overcoat and Underpants