Name: Tom Selleck on Letterman, May 23, 1985
Uploaded: 2017-07-23T03:29:03.000Z
Description: Watch the stand-up comedy video 'Tom Selleck on Letterman, May 23, 1985' from Don Giller on Comedy Buff. Published 2017-07-23. Transcript available.

Watch the stand-up comedy video 'Tom Selleck on Letterman, May 23, 1985' from Don Giller on Comedy Buff. Published 2017-07-23. Transcript available.

And now a message from Tom Selleck and David Letterman.
Hi. You know, when we play private detectives on television, we look pretty
good on our Hawaiian shirts.
You might even say we've started a fashion trend.
Well, that's true. But lately, we've heard some pretty disturbing news.
Apparently, American stores are currently being flooded with knockoff, cheap
imitation Hawaiian shirts.
They're not from Hawaii.
And let's face it, in many cases, they're not even shirts.
Yeah. So don't buy Hawaiian shirt knockoffs.
And don't watch this man's television show.
What the hell are you doing?
I'm sorry, David. I've been under a lot of stress lately.
Thank you very much. Thank you very much, Paul.
Thank you to our wonderful studio audience.
Let's get on with the scheduled program, shall we?
It's certainly a pleasure to welcome my first guest to this program tonight.
He is the star of a series on another television network.
The program on which he is the star is called Magnum P.I.
Please say hello to Tom Selleck.
Yeah!
Thank you, Tom. Nice to see you.
Thanks for being here.
Go ahead.
Yeah.
Pretty nice. You like that, I would guess.
Yeah, I like that a lot.
Yeah, yeah.
That was very nice.
Now, this was just a joke, wasn't it?
Sure, it was just a joke.
Now, do you know Bill Cosby?
I think I met Bill once a long time ago.
Actually, I'm glad you asked that question because everywhere I go now, people
are trying to turn this thing.
You know, we're on the air at the same time.
Right.
There have been actually things printed in newspapers, magazines, that you two
are having some sort of a battle or a feud or you don't like each other.
Yeah, and that's, I mean, I met Bill and I think he's a real gentleman.
And I sent him a note.
I sent him a note to try and kind of diffuse all that.
But, no, I don't want to start anything because, no, he's a very nice man and
he deserves his success and it's a good show.
But, you know what, I think maybe people are under the false impression that
just because his show is doing so well that your show is doing badly.
But your show is not doing badly at all, is it?
It's not doing as well.
As it was before he went on the air.
But it's still doing very well, isn't it?
Yeah.
How well is it doing?
Well, it's doing pretty good.
It's still a big show, isn't it?
It's a big show.
It's a top 20 show instead of a top 10 show right now.
Well, the top 20 that you'll be on for years, won't you?
Yeah, we finished about, I don't know.
It's up to them, whoever they may be.
But, no, we finished, I think, I hate to quote the ratings, but we finished
about 15th for the year.
That's about where we ended up.
Yeah, but we were three or four of us.
We tied a couple of weeks with Dynasty, and then we had it.
Did you?
Yeah, with that.
Kind of.
Now, I found this very interesting.
Do you think we've peaked?
Who?
You and me?
Oh, no, our show.
You're going to bail out on me.
No, we're just getting hot here.
No, the show is, no, I think better than ever.
And I think, you know, if anything, you're younger looking than you were when
it first went on the air.
And I find it more exciting now.
I don't know what you've done, but it's, you know, more exciting, more
stimulating intellectually as well.
Have you ever watched our show?
I see it.
I see it.
I see it.
I see it.
Not as often as I'd like.
I have all these personal problems, but I see it when it first went on.
Anyway, I find it interesting that while you're in the East, you're doing
something besides show business kind of things.
Tell the folks what you've been doing all week.
Well, if I walked out, kind of funny.
I'd pay to see that, can you think of it?
I've been playing volleyball.
This is kind of my outlet, and I play for the Outrigger Canoe Club.
Now, what kind of a, this is an organized tournament?
Yeah, this is the national championships.
It was in Long Island this year.
Is this a professional team?
Well, no, no, no.
This is amateur, but I play for a club in Hawaii, and we won the national
championship the last three years in a row.
So we were defending national champions in the 35 to 45, but it's still very
competitive.
What would that be, Tom, seniors?
That's called men's seniors, yeah, but it's very competitive.
See, but I didn't do anything for a month because I was in London doing a two-hour
episode of Magnum PI for next season.
I love it when you leave the country.
Thank you.
Anyway, so I was really out of shape, but the team said they kind of needed me,
and it's a great outlet for me.
Now, where did you get interested in volleyball?
Have you been a player most of your life?
I played at USC, and I used to play on the beach in California, kind of two-man
volleyball.
And then I didn't do anything for a long time, and when I went over to start
Magnum in Hawaii, the Screen Actors Guild went on strike.
So I was out of work for about three months before the show ever started, and I
started playing volleyball with some of my friends over there, and I started
playing again.
And what's the most important thing about it?
Is it spiking?
I know so little about the game other than it's very exciting to watch.
Well, for me, it's spiking.
It's spiking.
I mean, no, no, that's what I, that's my job.
Yeah, explain that.
Well, I'm what they call an outside hitter.
I don't, my forte is not really, you know, when they serve the ball over the
net, you kind of pass the ball up to your teammates, and I'm not always that
accurate at doing that.
So my job is to hit the ball over the block, over the net.
Oh, you do play right at the net?
Yeah.
And I, and I'm a spiker, and everything was going really well.
I was, I was kind of out of shape, but I was playing on adrenaline, and we won,
when I got there, three straight matches and got to the finals of the national
championship.
That's great.
And we got to a, we, we tied the other team and had to play one sudden death
game for the national championship, and I made a big mistake, Dave.
Which was?
Well, um, it's one of, you know, if you've ever played sports, you just kind of
replay things for the rest of your life.
Well, I'm trying to get this out of my system.
It's going to haunt you for a while, apparently.
It is, it is, because I got a set, and, you know, you use, a set means a setter
sets a ball up.
And you're ready to put it away.
And you're trying to spike it, and you're hitting usually against two or three
guys with their arms up, you know, trying to block it.
Well, nobody tried to block the set, which doesn't happen very often.
And it was very close to the net, so I decided to hit it straight down, which
would have given us a lot of momentum.
And I hit the net with my hand.
Ooh, ooh.
Gave them their 14th point, and you only played a 15.
So it's possible that I may have been the goat.
Yeah.
Well, it sounds to me like you choked, if it'll make you feel any better.
Yeah, that's what it sounds like to me, too.
Who was the winning team?
You didn't mention the winning team.
Chuck's Steakhouse and Nick's Fish Market.
You don't laugh.
It's a hyphenate.
No, it's not Chuck's Steakhouse and Nick's Fish Market.
It's Chuck's Steakhouse slash Nick's Fish Market.
But it doesn't mean you're playing a bunch of busboys and waitresses.
No, no.
These guys are big, senior men.
Were Chuck and Nick at the games?
Chuck was.
Chuck was.
I didn't see Nick, but these are big guys.
They used to be All-Americans.
Yeah, this is actually a terrific game.
Anybody who's watched the Olympics knows this is a very physical and demanding
sport.
Well, it was until I started describing it.
Oh, you're fine.
I mean, volleyball was on the upswing.
You're in good shape.
Yeah, whatever.
What we're going to do here is do a commercial, then we'll be right back with
Tom Selleck.
Thank you very much.
Tom Selleck is here, and Roseanne Cash will be here later, and also Kenny the
Gardner.
Tell me, was this the first movie that you were in, the human aspects, no, the
mental aspects of human responsibility?
That's exactly correct.
Your first film.
Yeah.
Now, was this a feature?
No, this was an Air Force training film.
Yeah.
Were you in the Air Force?
No, I was studying business administration at the University of Southern
California at the time.
They keep applauding when I say that.
A lot of business ad fans here.
Must be.
Anyway, no, it was an Air Force training film, and I got this part in it.
I played Airman Pickens, and it was the first dramatic role that I ever had.
Well, tell us about the Airman Pickens.
What was the...
Well, I don't remember a whole lot about him.
I didn't do a whole kind of personality breakdown and everything for him, but I
do remember, I've
always remembered my first line, which was, it was a training film for Air
Force psychiatrists,
so I visit an Air Force psychiatrist, and my first line was, I don't know what's
wrong
with him, sir.
I don't want him to get in any trouble, but I think something's bugging him.
Now, that's all I remember about that film, Dave.
So, Airman Pickens sounds like he's ratting on a buddy, doesn't it?
Yeah.
It's like, there's been some trouble back at the barracks, and...
I couldn't, at the time, you try and learn ways as an actor to get out of those
holes,
but I don't think I got out of that particular one.
I ratted on them.
Do those pay well when you're doing those?
Paid about minimum, which was about $150 at the time.
Yeah.
And you were also in the film Coma?
You got some of my biggies.
Well, now, Coma was a pretty big film.
Coma was a very big film, but I was, you didn't see it.
No, I saw that.
That's why you don't remember me, because I was dead most of the night.
I was, I had a couple scenes at the beginning, and...
Were you Airman Pickens again?
No.
I was...
In more trouble at the base.
I was Sean Murphy, and actually, it was a big part in the book,
so I kept lying to producers for the whole year after I did the movie,
before it came out.
I said, I did Sean Murphy.
They thought I had a big part.
Actually, my kidneys and my body was in it more than I was.
They cut me open, and it was terrible.
Did you expire early in the film?
In the first five minutes, Dave.
But then the remains was with us throughout the rest of the feature.
I had to reappear, and it was very important that the audience remember me,
because when Jean-Ve Bourgeau, I hope I pronounced that right,
runs into this room in a moment of terror,
and she was the nurse at the hospital where I was, before I died,
when she runs into this room, she and the audience have to recognize my face,
and I'm laying on my stomach, my face like this.
And my back was completely opened up,
and they'd removed my kidneys and sold them to someone rich.
And you had to play dead for what length of time at the most?
Well, on camera, probably about a minute.
Yeah.
That's probably not too tough.
That's very tough.
Oh, it is tough.
No, you have to hold your breath, Dave.
But for a minute?
Well, I didn't know.
The cameraman said I was very good at it.
Yeah.
He said I was one of the best stiffs that they'd ever seen.
Now, I hope that was referring to my dead part of the picture.
Yeah, as opposed to when you were actually doing lines.
Sure, yeah.
Had you been sick long?
No, I went in for...
Just a check-up.
The point of the film was I went in for simple knee surgery,
and these people were killing people to get their organs.
Yeah.
Well, that's no good.
Yeah.
They shut that place down, didn't they?
Yeah.
They finally did.
Tom, you know, you were really sweet to me.
A long time ago, you called me on the phone about a year ago,
and you were very nice because we had been asking you,
would you ever like to be on the show?
We'd love to have you as a guest.
And you were very considerate to call me up and said,
I'll do the show as soon as I can work free of my schedule and come east.
Well, I wanted to.
But at the time, you mentioned a little something else.
You said, when I come on the show, I want to do something else.
Tell the folks what you'd like to do, and I guess we're going to see it.
Well, I said I'd like to do something stupid.
Yeah.
And you said you've come to the right place.
That's right.
I remember that phone call.
So I spent a couple months trying to figure out what to do.
Actually, what I'm really after here is a late-night sponge
and a collapsible drinking cup.
I hope you're not out.
No, we haven't.
Well, I don't want them yet.
Where's the sponge?
No, no.
Anyway, it's just I didn't know what to do,
and then I thought of this thing, the wonderful world of boat travel.
The wonderful world of boat travel, all right.
And it's a little journey that I can take you on.
It's like another training film.
Yeah, it is.
It's kind of come full circle, really.
All right.
Since...
A little one-man demonstration?
Do you need help with this?
No, you have to watch.
Okay.
I guess you go right over there.
I'll stay here.
Is it okay if I stay here?
You want me over there?
I may need you.
I'll come over.
Okay.
Just to talk to in between.
All right.
The wonderful world of boat travel, ladies and gentlemen, as presented by Tom Selleck.
Well, first of all, I have to say that this is not my trick.
This is Doug Hogan's trick.
Oh, yeah.
Yeah.
Well, he's a friend of my brother Dan's.
What does Doug do?
Doug, I don't know anymore.
He does this.
He did this at my 40th birthday party, and that's where the inspiration comes
to.
This is kind of a salute to Doug Hogan.
Yeah.
Now, it's a series of three things.
You have to use your imagination here.
The first thing is, if you can imagine yourself in a little rowboat with about
a two-and-a-half
horsepower motor on it, just kind of cruising out in the morning at dawn to
fish in the middle
of the lake.
Going after grouper.
Are you really going to do this?
This is a major star, ladies and gentlemen.
A really big star.
There's water in here.
Yeah, water.
Okay.
This is a little rowboat.
A small rowboat.
Yeah.
At dawn.
Yeah.
Two men in the boat.
Two-and-a-half horsepower.
Needs a lot of air.
This really is stupid, isn't it?
It's good.
Okay.
Well, if you'd ever do it, maybe we'd find out.
Unbelievable.
Unbelievable.
Unbelievable.
Slow motion instant replay is Tom Selleck, The Wonderful World of Boat Travel.
Let's take a look at it again.
There he is, ladies and gentlemen.
Now, there's more.
There's more?
Oh, yeah.
Oh, there's more.
Do we have time for the rest of it?
We have time for it.
Of course we have time for it.
Sure.
I can do...
Should I do my two or my one?
Whatever you want to do.
Oh, okay.
I need a little prop for this.
This is a...
This is a seaplane taking off down a flowing river at dawn again.
And you said this would be stupid.
I said this would be stupid.
Okay.
This is the seaplane getting ready to take off down a river.
That's right.
And this is not doing justice to Doug Hogan.
No.
Of course, if we'd had Doug Hogan, he'd be here.
But we couldn't get him.
Very nice.
Is that it?
No.
There's one more that takes a great deal of technical skill, Dave.
That's it.
I'll give you a brief introduction.
It's a submarine with a full complement of sails.
A submarine.
All right.
Going out for a six-month journey.
All right.
Going out looking for the missing crew of that boat.
Probably under the polar ice cap for a long time.
But they're just cruising out.
Maybe out of San Francisco Bay.
Here they go.
Tom Selleck.
One more.
Yeah!
Very nice, Tom.
Have a good season.
We'll be right back.
We'll be right back.
We'll be right back.

Tom Selleck on Letterman, May 23, 1985

And now a message from Tom Selleck and David Letterman.
Hi. You know, when we play private detectives on television, we look pretty
good on our Hawaiian shirts.
You might even say we've started a fashion trend.
Well, that's true. But lately, we've heard some pretty disturbing news.
Apparently, American stores are currently being flooded with knockoff, cheap
imitation Hawaiian shirts.
They're not from Hawaii.
And let's face it, in many cases, they're not even shirts.
Yeah. So don't buy Hawaiian shirt knockoffs.
And don't watch this man's television show.
What the hell are you doing?
I'm sorry, David. I've been under a lot of stress lately.
Thank you very much. Thank you very much, Paul.
Thank you to our wonderful studio audience.
Let's get on with the scheduled program, shall we?
It's certainly a pleasure to welcome my first guest to this program tonight.
He is the star of a series on another television network.
The program on which he is the star is called Magnum P.I.
Please say hello to Tom Selleck.
Yeah!
Thank you, Tom. Nice to see you.
Thanks for being here.
Go ahead.
Yeah.
Pretty nice. You like that, I would guess.
Yeah, I like that a lot.
Yeah, yeah.
That was very nice.
Now, this was just a joke, wasn't it?
Sure, it was just a joke.
Now, do you know Bill Cosby?
I think I met Bill once a long time ago.
Actually, I'm glad you asked that question because everywhere I go now, people
are trying to turn this thing.
You know, we're on the air at the same time.
Right.
There have been actually things printed in newspapers, magazines, that you two
are having some sort of a battle or a feud or you don't like each other.
Yeah, and that's, I mean, I met Bill and I think he's a real gentleman.
And I sent him a note.
I sent him a note to try and kind of diffuse all that.
But, no, I don't want to start anything because, no, he's a very nice man and
he deserves his success and it's a good show.
But, you know what, I think maybe people are under the false impression that
just because his show is doing so well that your show is doing badly.
But your show is not doing badly at all, is it?
It's not doing as well.
As it was before he went on the air.
But it's still doing very well, isn't it?
Yeah.
How well is it doing?
Well, it's doing pretty good.
It's still a big show, isn't it?
It's a big show.
It's a top 20 show instead of a top 10 show right now.
Well, the top 20 that you'll be on for years, won't you?
Yeah, we finished about, I don't know.
It's up to them, whoever they may be.
But, no, we finished, I think, I hate to quote the ratings, but we finished
about 15th for the year.
That's about where we ended up.
Yeah, but we were three or four of us.
We tied a couple of weeks with Dynasty, and then we had it.
Did you?
Yeah, with that.
Kind of.
Now, I found this very interesting.
Do you think we've peaked?
Who?
You and me?
Oh, no, our show.
You're going to bail out on me.
No, we're just getting hot here.
No, the show is, no, I think better than ever.
And I think, you know, if anything, you're younger looking than you were when
it first went on the air.
And I find it more exciting now.
I don't know what you've done, but it's, you know, more exciting, more
stimulating intellectually as well.
Have you ever watched our show?
I see it.
I see it.
I see it.
I see it.
Not as often as I'd like.
I have all these personal problems, but I see it when it first went on.
Anyway, I find it interesting that while you're in the East, you're doing
something besides show business kind of things.
Tell the folks what you've been doing all week.
Well, if I walked out, kind of funny.
I'd pay to see that, can you think of it?
I've been playing volleyball.
This is kind of my outlet, and I play for the Outrigger Canoe Club.
Now, what kind of a, this is an organized tournament?
Yeah, this is the national championships.
It was in Long Island this year.
Is this a professional team?
Well, no, no, no.
This is amateur, but I play for a club in Hawaii, and we won the national
championship the last three years in a row.
So we were defending national champions in the 35 to 45, but it's still very
competitive.
What would that be, Tom, seniors?
That's called men's seniors, yeah, but it's very competitive.
See, but I didn't do anything for a month because I was in London doing a two-hour
episode of Magnum PI for next season.
I love it when you leave the country.
Thank you.
Anyway, so I was really out of shape, but the team said they kind of needed me,
and it's a great outlet for me.
Now, where did you get interested in volleyball?
Have you been a player most of your life?
I played at USC, and I used to play on the beach in California, kind of two-man
volleyball.
And then I didn't do anything for a long time, and when I went over to start
Magnum in Hawaii, the Screen Actors Guild went on strike.
So I was out of work for about three months before the show ever started, and I
started playing volleyball with some of my friends over there, and I started
playing again.
And what's the most important thing about it?
Is it spiking?
I know so little about the game other than it's very exciting to watch.
Well, for me, it's spiking.
It's spiking.
I mean, no, no, that's what I, that's my job.
Yeah, explain that.
Well, I'm what they call an outside hitter.
I don't, my forte is not really, you know, when they serve the ball over the
net, you kind of pass the ball up to your teammates, and I'm not always that
accurate at doing that.
So my job is to hit the ball over the block, over the net.
Oh, you do play right at the net?
Yeah.
And I, and I'm a spiker, and everything was going really well.
I was, I was kind of out of shape, but I was playing on adrenaline, and we won,
when I got there, three straight matches and got to the finals of the national
championship.
That's great.
And we got to a, we, we tied the other team and had to play one sudden death
game for the national championship, and I made a big mistake, Dave.
Which was?
Well, um, it's one of, you know, if you've ever played sports, you just kind of
replay things for the rest of your life.
Well, I'm trying to get this out of my system.
It's going to haunt you for a while, apparently.
It is, it is, because I got a set, and, you know, you use, a set means a setter
sets a ball up.
And you're ready to put it away.
And you're trying to spike it, and you're hitting usually against two or three
guys with their arms up, you know, trying to block it.
Well, nobody tried to block the set, which doesn't happen very often.
And it was very close to the net, so I decided to hit it straight down, which
would have given us a lot of momentum.
And I hit the net with my hand.
Ooh, ooh.
Gave them their 14th point, and you only played a 15.
So it's possible that I may have been the goat.
Yeah.
Well, it sounds to me like you choked, if it'll make you feel any better.
Yeah, that's what it sounds like to me, too.
Who was the winning team?
You didn't mention the winning team.
Chuck's Steakhouse and Nick's Fish Market.
You don't laugh.
It's a hyphenate.
No, it's not Chuck's Steakhouse and Nick's Fish Market.
It's Chuck's Steakhouse slash Nick's Fish Market.
But it doesn't mean you're playing a bunch of busboys and waitresses.
No, no.
These guys are big, senior men.
Were Chuck and Nick at the games?
Chuck was.
Chuck was.
I didn't see Nick, but these are big guys.
They used to be All-Americans.
Yeah, this is actually a terrific game.
Anybody who's watched the Olympics knows this is a very physical and demanding
sport.
Well, it was until I started describing it.
Oh, you're fine.
I mean, volleyball was on the upswing.
You're in good shape.
Yeah, whatever.
What we're going to do here is do a commercial, then we'll be right back with
Tom Selleck.
Thank you very much.
Tom Selleck is here, and Roseanne Cash will be here later, and also Kenny the
Gardner.
Tell me, was this the first movie that you were in, the human aspects, no, the
mental aspects of human responsibility?
That's exactly correct.
Your first film.
Yeah.
Now, was this a feature?
No, this was an Air Force training film.
Yeah.
Were you in the Air Force?
No, I was studying business administration at the University of Southern
California at the time.
They keep applauding when I say that.
A lot of business ad fans here.
Must be.
Anyway, no, it was an Air Force training film, and I got this part in it.
I played Airman Pickens, and it was the first dramatic role that I ever had.
Well, tell us about the Airman Pickens.
What was the...
Well, I don't remember a whole lot about him.
I didn't do a whole kind of personality breakdown and everything for him, but I
do remember, I've
always remembered my first line, which was, it was a training film for Air
Force psychiatrists,
so I visit an Air Force psychiatrist, and my first line was, I don't know what's
wrong
with him, sir.
I don't want him to get in any trouble, but I think something's bugging him.
Now, that's all I remember about that film, Dave.
So, Airman Pickens sounds like he's ratting on a buddy, doesn't it?
Yeah.
It's like, there's been some trouble back at the barracks, and...
I couldn't, at the time, you try and learn ways as an actor to get out of those
holes,
but I don't think I got out of that particular one.
I ratted on them.
Do those pay well when you're doing those?
Paid about minimum, which was about $150 at the time.
Yeah.
And you were also in the film Coma?
You got some of my biggies.
Well, now, Coma was a pretty big film.
Coma was a very big film, but I was, you didn't see it.
No, I saw that.
That's why you don't remember me, because I was dead most of the night.
I was, I had a couple scenes at the beginning, and...
Were you Airman Pickens again?
No.
I was...
In more trouble at the base.
I was Sean Murphy, and actually, it was a big part in the book,
so I kept lying to producers for the whole year after I did the movie,
before it came out.
I said, I did Sean Murphy.
They thought I had a big part.
Actually, my kidneys and my body was in it more than I was.
They cut me open, and it was terrible.
Did you expire early in the film?
In the first five minutes, Dave.
But then the remains was with us throughout the rest of the feature.
I had to reappear, and it was very important that the audience remember me,
because when Jean-Ve Bourgeau, I hope I pronounced that right,
runs into this room in a moment of terror,
and she was the nurse at the hospital where I was, before I died,
when she runs into this room, she and the audience have to recognize my face,
and I'm laying on my stomach, my face like this.
And my back was completely opened up,
and they'd removed my kidneys and sold them to someone rich.
And you had to play dead for what length of time at the most?
Well, on camera, probably about a minute.
Yeah.
That's probably not too tough.
That's very tough.
Oh, it is tough.
No, you have to hold your breath, Dave.
But for a minute?
Well, I didn't know.
The cameraman said I was very good at it.
Yeah.
He said I was one of the best stiffs that they'd ever seen.
Now, I hope that was referring to my dead part of the picture.
Yeah, as opposed to when you were actually doing lines.
Sure, yeah.
Had you been sick long?
No, I went in for...
Just a check-up.
The point of the film was I went in for simple knee surgery,
and these people were killing people to get their organs.
Yeah.
Well, that's no good.
Yeah.
They shut that place down, didn't they?
Yeah.
They finally did.
Tom, you know, you were really sweet to me.
A long time ago, you called me on the phone about a year ago,
and you were very nice because we had been asking you,
would you ever like to be on the show?
We'd love to have you as a guest.
And you were very considerate to call me up and said,
I'll do the show as soon as I can work free of my schedule and come east.
Well, I wanted to.
But at the time, you mentioned a little something else.
You said, when I come on the show, I want to do something else.
Tell the folks what you'd like to do, and I guess we're 