Name: David Letterman/Tom Snyder Press Conference, August 9, 1994, Full
Uploaded: 2017-07-01T05:23:28.000Z
Description: Watch the stand-up comedy video 'David Letterman/Tom Snyder Press Conference, August 9, 1994, Full' from Don Giller on Comedy Buff. Published 2017-07-01. Transcript available.

Watch the stand-up comedy video 'David Letterman/Tom Snyder Press Conference, August 9, 1994, Full' from Don Giller on Comedy Buff. Published 2017-07-01. Transcript available.

David Letterman/Tom Snyder Press Conference, August 9, 1994, Full

.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
Thank you.
I knew this would be fun.
What a turnout.
So what are the ticket prices, too high?
Thank you very much.
All right, folks, let's shatter the suspense once and for a while.
As for once, CBS rumors are actually true.
Tom Snyder will be the host of the Late Late Show.
CBS delighted, and yes, it is true that it was David Letterman's idea.
We had, at an earlier date, considered a variety of bizarre options.
That's what network weasels actually do for a living.
You know, how many network executives does it take to screw in a light bulb?
I don't know what you think.
Does it have to be a light bulb?
That's what we do for a living.
David, once David suggested Tom Snyder, despite what you've heard, we
immediately ditched the idea of anything else and never again talked to anyone
else, never discussed with anyone else.
I had lunch with Tom Snyder on April the 20th.
He ate chicken and a small dose of soup and a lot of fruit, and he met Larry Taysen
for the first time.
And we all concluded that David was, as usual, absolutely right.
Tom was the man.
We have, I think, selected a remarkable broadcaster whose range and versatility
are even less of a secret than this announcement.
And one of the reasons we've done that is there is no substitute for
intelligence, experience, and quality to succeed on this network and to follow
David Letterman, a tough job in itself.
David Letterman is awash with talkers, but short on great listeners.
It's awash with celebrities, but short on substance.
So Tom is a Renaissance man, we think, with an insouciance that connects him
directly to Dave.
We'll look that up later, Tom.
We certainly will.
We'll define it later, too.
In our case, Two's Company and Late Night, and I think these are two for our
future for a long time, and I couldn't be more delighted.
And now I'll ask the man for all our seasons, and particularly for the last 12
months, the extraordinary David Letterman.
Thank you.
Thank you very much, Howard.
Give me an idea how important a gathering, actual ice water, ladies and
gentlemen.
I was just, I'm still kind of amused with something Howard told me before we
came out here.
He was explaining to me earlier how the loss of NFL football really wouldn't
hurt the network.
I'm still enjoying kind of a chuckle over that one.
We've been here in the Ed Sullivan Theater for almost one year.
It'll be a couple of weeks we will have been here.
Started our brand new show at CBS one year ago, August 29, 1993, and shortly
will have completed somewhere over 200 shows one year.
Tonight, I'm announcing that I have decided to return to NBC.
They have a spot open for me immediately following Greg Kinnear, and I couldn't
be happier.
Thank you very much for your thoughts, your prayers, and your blessings.
In 1970, one or two, I was working at a television station in Indianapolis,
Indiana.
Then it was the ABC affiliate, WLWI, Channel 13.
And one of my responsibilities there was to work as the booth announcer.
And every half hour, every hour, I would do public service announcements.
I would read commercials.
I would mention the call letters of the station, give the time, introduce the
news, so on and so forth, and log all of the commercial spots that ran.
And because I was a kid and because I was just out of college, my working day
began around 4 in the afternoon.
And if everything went all right, I would be done by about 12.30 or 1, 12.45.
And I would be home a little bit after 1, and it was, in those days,
frustrating because there was no cable TV, there was no satellite, really.
And there was just three stations in Indianapolis, and two of them had signed
off, my station, of course, and the CBS station, which then had nothing on at
night.
We fixed that, didn't we, Howard?
I should say I worked.
And I got to go home, and the only thing that was on television in those days
at night was the Tomorrow Show, which followed the Tonight Show with Johnny
Carson.
It came on the air about, I believe, 1 a.m.
1 o'clock.
And I think I saw the first show that Tom Snyder did from Burbank.
Tom sitting there in a chair, talking right to the camera.
And as you know, the impression you get when a man is doing that is that he is
talking right to you.
And immediately, I recognized this as being a very smart, very resourceful,
very natural communicator and broadcaster.
And I believe, as I've told Tom over the years, I probably am one of those
people who saw 80, 85 percent of all of the television shows he did as the
Tomorrow Show.
And then things come and go as they do, and I packed up my pickup truck and
moved to Los Angeles and was lucky enough through, I guess, some mistakes and
misfortunes and just, as I mentioned, dumb luck,
to be offered a television program that was called Late Night, which replaced
Tom's show there at NBC.
It had undergone some changes, sort of dramatic changes in the format, and Rona
Barrett.
And for one reason or another, through mishandling, mismanagement, Tom was let
to slip away from NBC.
And as we started our television program in February of, was it 80?
February of 81 or something?
82.
82.
Thanks, Tom.
Welcome.
Don't ever correct me again in public.
The most trepidation that I felt beginning that new project was that there
would be no Tom, that people would be disturbed, that people would miss Tom,
and that was my biggest ongoing fear, that we had bumped somebody who had
established for himself a natural position not only in broadcasting,
but in the popular culture of the day.
And from that job, Tom, I guess, worked at Channel 7 here in New York City, and
then ended up doing a very entertaining radio show for three, four years, Tom.
I don't want to correct you, sir.
And I believe that, again, I listened to nearly every one of those shows.
And through it all, and up now to and continuing on his television program at
CNBC, I always found the man first and foremost entertaining.
I found him intelligent, and I found him, as I mentioned earlier, a gifted
broadcaster and communicator, which is endlessly appealing to me.
So now, if you think in these terms, for me, in a small measure, we have come
full circle here, and we are able to afford Tom a position which I think he has
earned and certainly deserved,
which is to be, once again, a fixture on network television.
Ladies and gentlemen, here's my good friend, Tom Snyder.
Tom, stand up and stand up and take a bow.
Tom, Tom Snyder!
Ladies and gentlemen, Tom Snyder!
You know, I just have the feeling that my leg has really been pulled here, Dave.
You know, jeez.
Anyway, thanks, folks, for coming over here.
I, you know, this is truly incredible.
You know, a year ago, this was no more in my mind than it would be to jump off
the top of the Empire State Building.
And all of a sudden, here we are tonight.
And I just, I want to thank all of you in the press.
I mean, you and I have been together for a long time in radio and television.
And since this first appeared, I believe, in Mr. Bianculli's column in the
Daily News back in January or February of this year,
most of you have written about this idea.
And thank you for saying it seems like a pretty good idea.
Not all of you agree, and that's okay.
And I hope that once we get on the air, you'll give us a chance.
But really, I've read the articles that you've written about this idea and
about Dave and about me and about CBS.
And I'll tell you, you have truly floored me with your kindness to me, and I
want you all to know that I truly appreciate that.
I thank Mr. Stringer and Mr. Tisch for their kindness to me and listening to me,
for David Letterman, for his friendship.
And there are only two reasons that I leave the very comfortable quarters at CNBC.
And by the way, I thank those people there, Roger Ailes and Tom Rogers and Andy
Friendly and the other people at CNBC who have been most gracious and kind to
me
in allowing me to listen to Mr. Tisch and to Mr. Stringer and to Morty and to
Peter LaSalle about this project called The Late Late Show.
And so I thank them for that.
And as I told them, the only reason, you know, I'm not doing this for the money,
and I'm not doing it to go back on the network.
I'm doing it for two reasons.
The first reason is late-night broadcasting at CBS.
I've loved late-night since I did it back in the 70s at NBC.
And the second reason is the profound friendship and respect that I have for Mr.
David Letterman, who has been kind to me and a stand-up friend for going on 15
years now.
You know, I think David Letterman was on The Tomorrow Show back in the 1970s
with Meryl Marko and with Harry Shearer, as I recall, and there was somebody
else there.
Billy Crystal.
Billy Crystal, I think.
And it was he who changed my life when Brandon Tartikoff called me into his
office one day in late 1981 and said, we have come to an agreement with David
Letterman.
So I thank him for his friendship and his kindness, and I thank you all for the
nice things you've written about me, and we will all be pleased to answer any
questions you have.
Thank you, folks.
I didn't introduce Peter Tartorici.
If there's anyone in the room who doesn't know who Peter Tartorici is, that's
Peter Tartorici looking smooth, a recent father.
So be nice to him, and of course, Peter LaSalle, another Peter, and of course,
the indefatigable Robert Morton.
Now it's worth a cab ride, ain't it?
Tom, when does the new show start?
In wintertime.
Late winter this year.
How does the forum differ from other people?
You know, we just put this together recently, and if you look at what I do for
CNBC and what I did for NBC pre-David Letterman, that basically is what I do.
And that, if I have a strength, it is that, in being able to conduct
conversations that are informing and entertaining with people on a one-on-one
basis.
And in the conversations that I've had here with Robert Morton and Peter LaSalle,
I don't see that changing very much.
What you see on CNBC in terms of an 800 telephone number, in terms of this
being a live program at 12.35 a.m., in terms of it being simulcast on the CBS
radio network, I think it will make it a very exciting broadcast.
But I think the basic core of that show will be Tom and the people that were
lucky enough to get to come in the studio out in Los Angeles at 9.30 at night.
Thank you very much, folks. Good night.
When they say you're late winter, does that mean they're letting you out of
your contract early at CNBC, or do you have a start date at all?
Well, it's early December. We have got a specific date, but it will be before
Santa Claus.
Before which, sir?
Santa Claus.
Oh, very good. Yeah.
Tom, you've talked to so many people over your long career. Is there anybody
left interesting to talk to, and if there is, who are they?
No, they're all good. We've done them all.
They're people that we probably haven't even heard of yet. I mean, you know,
people, a year and a half, two years ago, who was Heidi Fleiss?
A year and a half, two years ago.
Oh, you know who she was.
Come on. You, you do.
Please, yeah. Oh, yeah.
What have I done for...
You're starting already.
I never should have put you on back in the 70s. I left you outside, you know.
And especially with David, do you think that, you know, that trend of younger
is better has been a little bit misguided?
As far as, like, hosts, everybody seems to be, like, under 25, the MTV
generation, et cetera, et cetera.
And the question is directed to whom, ma'am?
David, and then, you know, I'd like you to respond to it.
Does experience count?
I think experience certainly does count.
I think it's good and bad that television is one area where you don't need
experience to get a high-powered position.
But, and I don't know how you view me, but, you know, I'm 47 years old, and I
don't look at Tom as being a guy who's however old Tom is.
I just look at him and have always looked at him as somebody who's very good at
what he does.
And that's the extent of it for me.
That was the sum total of my thought process on th