Name: Murray Walker on Letterman, September 30, 2002
Uploaded: 2021-03-15T01:08:29.000Z
Description: Watch the stand-up comedy video 'Murray Walker on Letterman, September 30, 2002' from Don Giller on Comedy Buff. Published 2021-03-15. Transcript available. Another request. In honor of Murray's passing.

Watch the stand-up comedy video 'Murray Walker on Letterman, September 30, 2002' from Don Giller on Comedy Buff. Published 2021-03-15. Transcript available. Another request. In honor of Murray's passing.

Our first guest tonight stars on the very, very popular television program
Everybody Loves Raymond.
She has also written this brand new book.
I'm guessing that's the wrong book.
I've got it right here.
Right here.
Motherhood and Hollywood.
For more than 30 years, here's a British guy.
Well, this will be good.
Okay.
Our next guest was the voice of Formula One Racing,
and this is his new autobiography entitled Motherhood and Hollywood.
It's called Murray Walker, unless I'm very much mistaken.
Here's broadcasting legend Murray Walker, everybody.
Welcome to the program.
Were you in Indianapolis yesterday for the United States Grand Prix?
I was.
Well, you know as well as I do that what Formula One, which is supposed to be a
world championship, needs is America.
That's right.
And we've been to all over the place.
We've been to Watkins Glen, we've been to Dallas, we've been to Detroit, we've
been to Long Beach.
That's right.
But Tony George, the owner of Indianapolis, and therefore the Indy 500,
fantastic event, decided he was going to have an American Grand Prix at Indianapolis.
The first one was two years ago.
And it's been a gigantic success.
Huge, yeah.
I mean, there is nothing like it.
Nothing like it.
Let me ask you a question.
You talk about how success it was there in Indianapolis, but this is a global
sport, and the men who compete in this sport everywhere are heroes, really can't
walk around unmolested.
They come to this country, well, I know, for a lot of us, it would be a dream
come true, but they come to this country, and they're anonymous, more or less.
Yeah, Michael Schumacher, who is the ultimate hero, five times world champion,
he comes to America simply so that he can walk around and, as you say, not be
molested.
It's very strange, isn't it?
But talking about differentness, and it could hardly be more different from
Indianapolis, but we used to go to Watkins Glen.
Upstate New York.
Upstate New York, and it was a time when the maple leaves were turning, and it
was all absolutely beautiful.
But there's a thing called the bog in Watkins Glen, which is a very marshy area,
and there are some very rough, tough people who go there,
and they started a tradition of pushing old cars into the bog, and watching
them sink, and it was great fun.
And it escalated through the years, and the old cars became new cars.
And the last year I was there, David, there was a party of Canadian tourists
who had come from over the border in a large coach.
You got it.
That's exactly what happened.
The whole coach went into the bog, complete with all their luggage on it.
And just before the race, they were going around throwing sticks of dynamite
about.
And I thought, this is no place to be here anymore.
And that's when they moved it.
Let me, do you mind, I don't want to embarrass you here, but I have a list of
things, of phrases that you have coined in the course of your 30 years of
broadcasting.
I thought you might go around.
And they're fascinating.
With half the race gone, there is half the race still to go.
Now that seems, that seems obvious.
It's logic.
Yeah, yeah.
There's nothing wrong with the car, except it's on fire.
Thank you.
You know, the nice thing about these, they mean everything and also absolutely
nothing.
You know, interesting combination of things.
Handing flashes are the obvious.
Yeah, that's right.
The gap between the two cars is nine-tenths of a second.
That's less than a second.
He's in front of everyone in this race, except for the two cars in front of him.
And then this one, I believe this one is your favorite.
The car in front is absolutely unique, except for the one behind it, which is
identical.
Lovely.
And these come about because you're commenting on an ever-changing landscape,
and I would guess that thoughts come in and go out in a different way.
David, I'm commentating for two hours on end about a 200-mile-an-hour sport,
which is ever-changing.
I stand up to commentate because, as you probably know, I get very excited when
I don't.
I walk about the box, and I'm pointing at the screen.
And it's very difficult to get excited when you're sitting down.
It's much easier to do it when you're standing up.
And sometimes the words just come out in the wrong order.
That's right.
Let's talk about stuff that happens in the booth.
Normally, when you were working, there would be a former driver as your expert
commentator.
Was there ever trouble? Did you ever have friction? Anything unpleasant happen?
Just a bit.
There's a very famous Formula One driver, world champion, called James Hunt.
Your longtime partner.
Yeah, I was in the box with him for 13 years.
And to say that James and I were oil and water in our early days would be a
masterpiece of understatement.
Now, I used to stand up in the box getting excited, and James would sit very
languidly.
And I talk a lot.
And you had two big egos in the box because you both want the microphone.
We only had one microphone.
We had to pass it from one to the other.
So I am in full flow on one occasion, and James thought I'd said enough.
So he just reaches up for the microphone wire and gives it an enormous tug.
And it flew out of my hands into his, and he came in.
And I actually had my fist back.
And I looked across, and the producer was going, so I didn't.
You don't want to hit him, no.
Let's see, tell me a story about Ayrton Senna.
A story, I mean, I'm sure you knew him, I'm sure you were friends with him.
He's, you know, one of the greatest drivers who's ever lived, a great...
Three-time world champion.
Great.
Yes, that's right.
And the way you pronounce his name, or the way you should pronounce his name,
is Ayrton Senna.
And when he was in Formula 3, which is one of the lesser categories in Britain,
that's what I always called him.
But over the years, I started calling him Ayrton, like Cockney-like, Ayrton Senna.
And so we get to 1994, and over the winter, I'd been looking at tapes I had
done of the old days, and called him Ayrton Senna.
So I thought, I really should start calling him Ayrton Senna again, which I did
in the first race of the season.
And I had a storm of abuse and vilification from the British public.
Why don't you call him Ayrton, like the rest of us?
So in the second race of the year, I started calling him Ayrton.
Now, we arrive at the third race of the year, and I'm having an interview with
him.
And this is a big man, earns a hell of a lot of money, won a lot of races.
And I said, well, Ayrton, third race of the year, you're 20 points down behind
Michael Schumacher.
Are you worried about it?
What happened to Ayrton, he said.
Incredible man.
I said, how did you know?
And he said, I keep in touch.
Great man.
It's a...
Thank you.
Very, very entertaining.
And of course, if you're a motorsports fan, you'll absolutely love it.
But I think for people who know very little about the sport, there's also
interesting things in there.
Because it's just about you and your life, and it's been a wonderful experience.
I had an interesting childhood, David.
My dad was a professional motorcycle racer.
I was in the Army during the war.
And I fought with the American 101st Airborne Division in Holland.
Good for you.
And I was very proud of that.
Thank you.
I was in a tank regiment, and my regiment did the link-up with the Russians on
the eastern zone.
And our first contact with the Russians, the mighty Russian army, was a
captured German BMW sidecar outfit
with a private riding the bike, an officer on the pillion, and a woman soldier
in the sidecar.
Oh, man.
Yeah.
And subsequently, I got into...
I started racing bikes myself, and I wasn't as good at it as my dad.
And so, you know what they say, those that can, do, and those that can't, talk
about it.
So I started talking about it, and I got an audition with the BBC, and the rest
is history.
Well, you've done a great job.
Congratulations on a lovely career.
Thank you very much for being here.
Thank you.
Murray Walker, everybody.
Thank you.
Thank you.