David Letterman

Did You Know?

• Letterman appeared in the pilot episode of the short-lived 1986 series Coach Toast.
• He appeared in The Simpsons as himself in a couch gag.
• On June 23, 1980, he was given his own morning comedy show on NBC, The David Letterman Show, which won two Emmy Awards but was canceled on October 24, 1980.

Early life and career

Letterman was born in Indianapolis, Indiana, on April 12, 1947, to Harry Joseph Letterman, a florist, and Dorothy Marie Letterman Mengering, a church secretary. He has two sisters, one older and one younger. Growing up in the Broad Ripple area of Indianapolis, about 12 miles from the Indianapolis Motor Speedway, he enjoyed collecting model cars, including racers. His father survived a heart attack at age 36 when David was young, and the elder Letterman died of a second heart attack in 1973 at age 57.

Letterman attended Broad Ripple High School and worked as a stock boy at a local Atlas Supermarket. He originally wanted to attend Indiana University but his grades were insufficient, so he attended Ball State University in Muncie, Indiana, where he became a member of the Sigma Chi fraternity and graduated in 1969 from the Department of Radio and Television. He later endowed a scholarship for what he called 'C students' at Ball State. After graduating, he registered for the draft and passed his physical but received a draft lottery number of 346 out of 366 and was not drafted for service in Vietnam.

He began his broadcasting career as an announcer and newscaster at the student-run radio station WBST, a 10-watt campus station now part of Indiana Public Radio, but was fired for treating classical music with irreverence. He then helped found another campus station, WAGO-AM 570 (now WCRD, 91.3). Letterman credits Paul Dixon, host of the Paul Dixon Show, for inspiring his career choice after seeing him on television shortly after college.

CBS

When NBC gave the job to Jay Leno, Letterman left NBC to host Late Show with David Letterman on CBS, debuting August 30, 1993, from the historic Ed Sullivan Theater. CBS spent $8 million in renovations and signed Letterman to a three-year, $14 million per year contract, doubling his Late Night salary. Paul Shaffer and the World's Most Dangerous Band followed Letterman to CBS, adding a brass section and rebranding as the CBS Orchestra at Shaffer's request.

Due to intellectual property disagreements, Letterman could not import many Late Night segments verbatim but renamed them, such as the 'Late Show Top Ten' and 'CBS Mailbag'. The Late Show's main competitor was NBC's The Tonight Show with Jay Leno. In 1993 and 1994, the Late Show consistently gained higher ratings than The Tonight Show, but in 1995 ratings dipped and Leno's show consistently beat Letterman's after Hugh Grant appeared on Leno's show following his arrest for soliciting a prostitute.

Notable exchanges and incidents

Letterman maintained a close relationship with Carson through his break with NBC. Three years after leaving for CBS, HBO produced a made-for-television movie called The Late Shift, based on a book by The New York Times reporter Bill Carter, chronicling the battle between Letterman and Leno for the Tonight Show hosting spot. Carson made a few cameo appearances on Letterman's show, with his final television appearance on May 13, 1994, during a Top 10 list segment.

In early 2005, it was revealed that Carson occasionally sent jokes to Letterman, who used them in his monologue. Carson had always believed Letterman, not Leno, was his 'rightful successor'. Oprah Winfrey appeared on Letterman's NBC Late Night on May 2, 1989, after which the two had a 16-year feud that ended on December 2, 2005, when Winfrey appeared on CBS's Late Show in an event Letterman jokingly called 'the Super Bowl of Love'.

Personal life

Letterman has tinnitus, which he discussed on the Late Show in 1996 during an interview with William Shatner, who has severe tinnitus. He has said he hears a constant ringing in his ears. Letterman is a teetotaler and has stated he was a 'horrible alcoholic' who began drinking around age 11 or 13 and continued until 1981 when he was 34. He said that in 1981 he was drunk 80% of the time.

When shown drinking what appears to be alcohol on the Late Show, it was actually apple juice. In 2015, he said he was anxious and hypochondriacal for 30 to 40 years and became calmer through Transcendental Meditation and low doses of medication. Letterman is a Presbyterian, a tradition he was brought up in by his mother. In August 2021, he was hospitalized in Providence, Rhode Island, after hitting his head on the sidewalk and falling unconscious.

He married his college sweetheart Michelle Cook on July 2, 1968, in Muncie, Indiana; they divorced in 1977. He had a long-term cohabiting relationship with former head writer and producer Merrill Markoe from 1978 to 1988. He and Regina Lasko started dating in February 1986 while he was still living with Markoe; their son Harry Joseph Letterman was born on November 3, 2003. In 2005, police discovered a plot to kidnap his son and demand a $5 million ransom, and a house painter who had worked for Letterman was charged.