Name: "Why We Edit" Collection on Letterman, 1983-92
Uploaded: 2020-03-23T04:51:55.000Z
Description: Watch the stand-up comedy video '"Why We Edit" Collection on Letterman, 1983-92' from Don Giller on Comedy Buff. Published 2020-03-23. Transcript available.

Watch the stand-up comedy video '"Why We Edit" Collection on Letterman, 1983-92' from Don Giller on Comedy Buff. Published 2020-03-23. Transcript available.

"Why We Edit" Collection on Letterman, 1983-92

Thanks, everybody.
You know, Dave, I don't know.
I guess Rickles really, really summed it up on the telethon.
He introduced Jerry at the beginning of the telethon.
At the very beginning of the show.
Don Rickles came out?
Sure.
When he said about Jerry in heaven, he is going to be one of the key guys.
And I think that we can apply that.
I would say that about you, baby.
It's an old...
You are going to be one of the key, definitely, also.
Thank you very much, Paul.
One of the key guys.
That's an ancient biblical expression, isn't it?
Yeah, I think you find key guys in the Old Testament, I believe.
There were the wise men, and then there were the key guys.
And then the disciples, and on and on.
But the key guys were...
And they shopped at Manny's Music right here.
A lot of time, folks, one of the questions people ask me on a regular basis is,
is your television program edited?
And when this question comes up, I can only scoff and say,
no, no, there is no need to edit our television program whatsoever.
But lately, under more tough questioning, we have been forced to change our
story.
So tonight, we are going to show you the reason, and it's always with good
reason,
that this program is edited.
Periodically, things do go wrong.
Every talk show host's nightmare, boy, it's mine, is offending a guest.
And this does happen occasionally, and as a result, you have to take a few
things out.
Watch the monitors.
And the project you're currently involved in, Edwin, is another NBC white paper.
What is the topic of the white paper this time?
Oh, ooh, ooh, put this, but don't handle that any more than you need to.
Oh, I'm sorry.
We, we, we have a new man making the coffee.
Jeez.
I didn't write the introduction.
These are written days in advance.
They're written for me.
Even in my own daily speech, I don't use the phrase lowlife.
Please accept my apology.
Now, sometimes what seems like a perfectly good idea turns out badly,
like the time I brought my lovable dog, Bob, onto the show.
It's all right.
No, don't worry about it.
No, well, he'll be okay.
Easy, Bob.
That's a good dog.
I bet he smells your job.
Don't worry about it.
Come on.
Now, when you're booking about a dozen guests a week to be on this program,
you're always going to have a couple of slip-ups.
You don't play tennis professionally?
No.
Have you played at all?
No.
Have you ever been to a tennis tournament?
No.
Who booked you for the show, do you?
I don't really know.
Hi.
If you've just joined us, we're here with someone who, until a few minutes ago,
we were positive, was Andrea Yeager.
Where are you from?
Fransomia.
Ma'am, do you think you could give us a hand here?
Have a seat.
Ask him who told him he could be on the show.
Do you speak Swedish?
They want to know why you are here, who has invited you to come here.
They don't know why you have come here.
Do you understand what I'm saying?
It's not Swedish.
It's not Swedish.
Oh, it's not Swedish.
It's not Swedish.
It's not Swedish.
It's Swedish, though.
Yeah.
Okay.
I don't know.
And, of course, every now and then, something completely unexplainable will
happen,
and we've had to edit a few of those out.
I was under the impression that liquid nitrogen is a very volatile chemical.
Well, it's cold.
It's not exactly volatile.
Yeah.
But dangerous for kids to be handling it.
Pardon me.
Excuse me.
Excuse me.
Do you have to do that now?
Well, it's going to take about half an hour for the coals to get hot enough.
Yeah, but we're right in the middle of the show, and I was wondering if you
could do it somewhere else.
Well, I tried earlier to do it out in the hall, but the security guard was
giving me a hard time
about it.
Well, I'm sorry.
That's not my problem.
You can't do it here.
Well, it's going to take a while, and you're going to be the first one to
complain if the coals aren't hot.
I have no idea how that happened.
Many people ask me if audience rowdiness is ever a problem.
Well, we have great audiences, but occasionally it'll happen.
Yeah, by the door.
You.
Yeah, right.
You know damn well what I'm talking about, Tommy.
And finally, finally a guest will come on with a bad attitude, and I'll lose my
patience.
This will happen occasionally.
It's fine.
Okay, these are all reasons that we have had to edit our show in the past.
Jay Leno will be coming out here in a couple of minutes, so come on back after
you're going to play.
Thank you very much.
Thank you.
Thank you very much.
Welcome back to the show.
She was nice, wasn't she, Paul?
She was nice, huh?
Was she ever some kind of chick, let me tell you.
She was really, really a nice person.
Those of you familiar with the workings of this program know that most of the
time we tape our show without pauses or interruption,
but there are those rare occasions when we do have to go back and edit a show.
Sure, it takes time, effort, and some expense, but it is necessary if we want
to maintain the seamless professional quality that has come to be synonymous
with late night.
Let me show you some videotape that never made it on the air, and maybe then
you'll understand better why we had to edit these things out of the show.
Take a look now, won't you?
For examples, sometimes we have...
I'm sorry, what have I done wrong here?
Oh, this will all be edited out, so there's no problem.
Oh, I see.
For example, sometimes we have to edit the show because of an innocent slip-up
like this one.
So, whose idea was it to build the garage at a luncheon meet?
Oh, my sister's.
Your sister's.
Now, was there... Did you have to go downtown and get this thing zoned and
approved by the building code and that kind of thing?
Oh, my God, it took hours.
Your date?
Yes, Hal.
The holster.
Oh.
You can put that out, Captain.
Sure.
Had to edit that right out.
Now, metal tip safety shoes and monthly hearing tests have kept our accident
record low, but I'm sorry to say, it isn't yet perfect.
Now, here's a scene I'm glad no one had to see.
So, these are the things that Bill Wendell brought in that we were talking
about, and we're not sure exactly what they are, but take a look at the detail
work on these.
Bill, can you bring the camera in here a little more closely?
It's really so...
Sorry, Dave.
I didn't see him coming.
He came from nowhere.
Oh, my gosh.
Are you...
Hey, doctor.
Son, just stay where you are.
Don't move your arm.
Don't move it.
Is he going to be all right?
He's a very lucky young fellow, Dave.
He'll be fine.
Oh.
Now, darn it, you kids.
I've asked you a hundred times, do your bicycling in the hallway.
Please.
Of course, we also have a duty as broadcasters to protect the public from
reckless expressions of irresponsible ideas.
What's up, Dave?
Just about all your sponsors are guilty of what I'm talking about.
Sears and Roebuck, why, they've been doing it for years.
So is the Ford Motor Company.
And Kraft Foods, God, those guys are real devils.
Even with an alert production staff monitoring every aspect of the program,
there are always problems.
And we still haven't exactly figured out what went wrong here.
This man isn't drunk, Dave.
He's dead.
Dead?
Yeah, judging by his condition, I'd say he's been dead for at least 48 hours or
so.
Maybe longer.
No kidding.
What, his heart?
No, it appears that he drowned.
Here, take a look.
Oh, yeah.
See?
I'll be darned.
Some salt water in his eye around there.
Yeah?
Well, thanks for coming by.
Sorry, there's nothing I can do.
Yeah, all right.
And like any TV show, we've got a lot of technical equipment here to deal with.
And you can be sure that we have our share of little foul-ups along those lines.
And this was your first film as a director, wasn't it?
Yeah, I'd done some commercials before.
This is my first feature-length film.
Yeah.
I wonder if you could explain some of the important differences between
directing a commercial and directing sentences.
This is the third time this has happened, and I'm getting plenty tired of it.
If this is ever repeated, there's going to be big trouble.
I'm awfully sorry.
We'll get it straight in that in a second.
So, just a few reasons why occasionally we have to edit the show.
We'll be back.
Bill Zack will be out here, so come on back.
Thank you, Paul.
Welcome back to the show, folks.
You know, we're getting darn near the end of 1983, and we thought tonight would
be a fine time to reminisce and reflect
and show you some of what we consider to be the highlights of the year past.
And I think the first thing, we're sort of talking about dogs tonight,
and the first thing that stands out in my mind is the night that a lady and her
dog appeared on a segment we call Stupid Pet Tricks.
And, well, things kind of got out of hand, and I think once you take a look at
this videotape, you'll remember what I'm talking about.
What is Shannon going to do for us tonight?
Well, Shannon's going to roll over and say bye-bye.
Shannon will roll over and say bye-bye.
Now, do you need any help with this?
Yeah, if you can just step away and wave bye-bye to Shannon.
Like I'm leaving and saying goodbye.
Right.
Okay, all right.
Shannon, Shannon!
Easy, easy.
Hold on.
Just a little bit of a little bit.
Come over.
And then we had to get a Russian psychic in here to take over.
Then there was the time when things weren't going too well in my own personal
life.
My private life was kind of all fouled up, and frankly, I'd forgotten just how
far I'd let myself go until I looked at this videotape.
It's certainly been a grueling tour.
Do you have any idea what it's like in opening a new book?
Ooh.
This is my first book.
So you've only written one book?
That's right.
Well, I think we all know how painful that can be.
Tell you what, we'll be right back.
Uncanny resemblance, wasn't it?
You know, we've had all kinds of different regular features on the show,
and I guess one of my favorites over the last year has to be male models say
the darndest things.
Take a look.
My name is Tim Bradhall.
Tim, how long have you been a model?
Oh, about four years now.
Now, Tim, you must have heard what people sometimes say or maybe know what
people think about the male models,
that the work is really easy, and you guys are paid an enormous amount of money,
and all you're really doing is just kind of standing around.
Now, is it a difficult job?
No, not really.
It's pretty easy.
Pretty easy.
Oh, boy.
Well, there you go.
It certainly is true.
Male models sure do say the darndest things.
Good night, everybody.
Thanks for watching.
Thanks for doing this, Tim.
Nice to meet you.
Thank you very much.
Good night.
You know, every night we get almost 300 people in our studio audience,
and they're always pretty nice,
but for one reason or another,
one or two audiences seem to be more memorable than all the others.
Watch closely.
Were there any stars who didn't want to include their personal phobias and neuroses
in your book?
Only a few.
Most seem to be pretty interesting in my project.
I've listed their mortal fears,
and where it applies,
I've listed their delusions and fantasies.
There are a couple of celebrities with multiple personalities,
and if we could just take a minute to read from this list of out of...
Excuse me, just a second.
Excuse me.
Pal, could you have the pages pass out the cough drops, please?
I'm awfully sorry.
It's been like this all winter.
The worst cold and flu season I've ever had.
And finally, one date I'll never forget in my whole life.
Paul, I think you'll remember this.
This was November 14, 1982.
That's when something went wrong in the control room,
and the entire show was broadcast from a parallel universe.
Several hundred feet below the surface of the earth,
the pressure was building and building and building,
until finally the life-supporting chamber could withstand it no longer.
And there was a massive implosion,
which resulted in many, many injuries.
And now I must speak to our own Paul Schaefer.
That was a terrible monologue.
I should be the host of this show.
I don't understand it either.
I don't know what that was.
We've got to 