David Letterman 1980

[observer9670]

This was a prototype of the show Dave would launch at 12:30 AM on 2/1/82. The only thing different is the bandleader. In his book, Paul Shafer joked that the reason he wasn't on Dave's morning show: "I don't do mornings". At this time Paul was on tour as musical director of Gilda Radner's one-woman show. This show was cancelled a few weeks after this clip. Dave went back to California, resumed guest hosting the Tonight Show until NBC came up with Late Night for him.

[smurfornge]

Still making an inside joke about an audience member when he first walks out, 32 years later.

[cats3300]

I attended a broadcast of this show. I was walking past the entrance to the NBC Studios in NYC. There was an NBC Page on the street offering tickets to the show. I took a ticket and went up to the studio. It was an experience, especially with Edwin Newman doing the news. It's unfortunate that the show didn't last.

[TheUltraFem]

John Tesh??

[hadou31shakkahou]

my eyes hurt so bad.

[at1212b]

wow, thanks for posting this! Amazing to relive the ol days. Especially the good ol ones.

[MrZoomar64]

Is that John Tesh @ 1:12?

[tommyrock69]

I remember watching this show. I also thought it made no sense to be on in the morning. It was a bit too raw.

[fgldnglbs]

There were only a couple of things I remember from the Morning Show: Talking with a family by the name of Carkhuff who sailed around the world and decided to come back to civilization; a phony helpful hint involving the removal of lint with barbecue sauce. I could almost swear the young lady in that piece was Julia-Louis Dreyfus.

[msdemos]

"Frank Owens and the symphony orchestra" ???

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So, no Paul Shaffer (never saw Dave's morning show) ???

[hariseldon59]

@msdemos No, Paul was not involved with Dave's morning show. At this point Paul had just completed five years with the original Saturday Night Live band and was playing piano for Gilda Radner in her one woman Broadway show. Paul became Dave's band leader when Late Night premiered in 1982.

[straycatttt]

I remember thinking at the time how unfair it was they cancelled him and thought that might have been his last chance. Glad I was wrong. The morning slot was a bad one.

[xxxHeyZeusxxx]

Paul looks a lil different

[ReneeNme]

@xxxHeyZeusxxx He just has a dark tan : )

[MrDetwaa]

how come people are better looking today than then???? I don't mean the clothes and the hair. I mean the faces. Evolution in mere 30 years????

[fivesecondsonly]

Dave did "Headlines" or Small Town News WAY before Jay Leno!

[DAL1989]

Does this ever bring me back...

[bigarv65]

Holy Crap I remember this!  I watched these with my Grandma, and even back then we could tell Dave was...special!

[MrJacMac1986]

I remember watching Daves morning show that summer break of '80. I was 12

[lukasnummer1]

Jay even stoled that thing with the newspaper...

[krklafej]

Hes morning show dos'nt have a fancy New York Backdrop behind him like hes Late Night shows

[MarkGauvreau]

Wow, he used to be funny.

[Snoopies622]

Thanks for posting!  This clip got better by the minute.

[bobbytomorow]

fuck i love 1980

[melly918]

That is definately John Tesh

[RedHouseFilmsdotcom]

So David Letterman invented "Headlines" long before Jay Leno.

[at1212b]

@RedHouseFilmsdotcom Leno invented nothing.. its well known in the industry that he copied all his bits from somewhere.

[nx01alpha]

And the genesis of "Late Night" and "Late Show" is formed....

[Tirakia]

Thanks!

[misterspiffy2008]

RIP Mr. Newman.

[thenose69]

Loved this show. Never missed an episode during the summer of 80 in spokane. Then it was replaced by Richard Simmons. To this day, I despise Richard for replacing dave:P.

[jimbobago]

@thenose69 Maybe that's why Dave hates him, too.

[bashbrannigan]

The Pork Queen!

[tacomadavid68]

I hope that Steve Martin sings King Tut.

[noahf67]

Wow, thanks for posting this. I was in the eighth grade at the time and obviously

unable to be home to catch this. Wasn't too thrilled about that. Great fo finally be able to see it...! At the time, I'd wished NBC could've move the Dave show to

3 or 4pm. Later I heard such plans existed but were scrapped.

[DesiluTrek]

I remember seeing his show that summer as a kid. As I laughed I also thought that funny sardonic attitude didn't make him a good fit for a morning show. He started "Late Night" in my freshman year of college and I was urging friends to try the show with this guy who had had a funny daytime show. Loved Dave back in the day when he had more of an FU attitude about "show biz."

[wannawatchu66]

Boy, the memories this brings back! Hard to believe it was 30 years ago. Looks like a lot of you never even knew this show aired. Frank Owens at the piano, Edwin Newman with news updates, Rich Hall and Edie McClurg were regulars, and I remember Dave's "ship whistle," though he may not have blown it by this time like he did earlier that summer (late June) of 1980. I see that this was taped off of Sacramento's Channel 3 (KCRA-TV).

[bigblueplanet]

It was a simpler time back in the days before color television.

[DoNtBaGtEhMuSiC]

@bigblueplanet

It's in colour, it's just a cheap and old school colour TV :P

[yaywhewclips242]

i remember it was on @ 11 am?? And "Grace" from Farris Bueller (name??) was a regular on the show. Her character lived 'outside every small town in America'. I know I don't get it either. He also has daytime fireworks 4 July fourth i thought that was funny.

[wannawatchu66]

9 to 10:30am. You're thinking of Edie McClurg. She also did a character on the show as herself "75 years in the future."

[GD29]

@proken58 i wonder what happened to frank owens and the band...they must have heard of dave's switch to late night about two years later...were they asked to join? did frank or dave think it wasn't going to be a good fit?

[MegaObserver1]

@GD29 One of Johnny Carson's edicts for the Late Night show was that there not be a Tonight Show-like band. Dave asked Johnny if he could have a 4 or 5 piece rock band instead, and Johnny said "OK". Dave then went after Paul Shafer. The two had never met, but Dave was very impressed with Paul's work on camera and in the SNL band. Dave said that getting Paul was a huge deal for Late Night.

[GD29]

@MegaObserver1 whats an edict? and also, the frank owens sound is NOTHING like the johnny carson sound....carson's band is more jumpy swing, finger-snapping jazz while owens definitely has a more calm, smooth jazz feel to it...probably to fit the tone of the morning show where people only want peace, subtly, and caffeine....late night comes at a more rebellious hour thus the perfect fit for the rock sound....how do you know all of this info anyway?

[RolloSmokes]

@GD29 Frank Owens and the band later showed up on "It's Showtime at the Apollo" for the first five or six seasons of that show ('86-'93 or so).

[joebradio]

I remember watching his show much of the summer that year -- and the only thing I could think was "this stuff is good, its just on at the wrong time of day." Guess I called that one right...

[cosmotcat]

@joebradio

I so agree with that. I used to watch this show and really enjoy it - but I thought it was just way too good and 'smart'(?) for the standard morning drivel that was TV on in the mornings even back then.

[hariseldon59]

@statman06 Yes, Dave's morning show was indeed broadcast in 1980. I was in college at the time and remember it well. You can't quite make a case yet for Dave hosting his own show as long as Johnny, since Dave hasn't continuously had a show since 1980. The morning show was canceled in late 1980 after about six months on the air, and Late Night with David Letterman didn't premiere until 1982.

[QBCNetwork]

The talk show that killed 1/2 of NBC game shows. Glad he moved to late night.

[caddyshack12190]

thanks for uploading

[SnorkelNose]

Was that John Tesh in the audience???

[SpacemanEddie]

This is one of the legendary TV shows of all time. Live, unpredictable. Memorable line: "Ladies & Gentlemen, I think we have a fire." Think the theme song was "Land of Make Believe". (Paul was on SNL at the time).

[spacegeek]

This is cool history, according to Dave this morning show was filmed in Studio 6A, then ofcourse later went to "Late Night with David Letterman, then to Conan O'Brien" now....its The Dr. OZ Show man, time flies lol

[stephenmyers99]

Gold....have never seen this stuff before, thanx for posting.

[thelatebrianjones]

I was going to say the same thing- he was doing the news on WCBS/ 2 in New York back then

[RatDog0218]

This is when I started watching Dave... Love it!

[AccordionManiac]

Not that bad.

[kdk7]

man, this is great. i started watching late night within a few months of it's first episode (and watched almost every episode after), but had never seen the (in)famous morning show. good to see he had it from the very start, even if the morning audience didn't get it. wish i'd seen it back then, though i was probably a bit young for it at the time. thanks so much for posting!

[surfocaster]

Thanks for this!

[MrMatteNWk]

Damn, Small Town News all the way back from the daytime show!

He obviously stole that from Leno. :)

[GD29]

@MrMatteNWk its actually the other way around considering leno didn't have his own show til 1992....

[bhayes06]

I can see why Dave didn't last on daytime; his humor has always been perfect for late night.

[RollTheTapeHal]

Tune written by Michael McDonald.

[bluebear1985]

Ah, the show they scheduled that replaced three really good game shows, then was off the air after a few months. Only NBC could get away with something like that.

[damron13]

David was always funny, lol. Now I see why he's the highest paid late night talk show host in history.

[wmbrown6]

So now we see where Bill Wendell's association with Letterman got started.

[GD29]

@wmbrown6 i heard he stopped working with letterman because he got "tired" of it or wasn't "into" it anymore...is that true? this was 1995....two years into letterman's cbs show and oddly enough it seemed like a handful of people left the show at the time: morty the producer, hal gurnee the director, bill wendell, and maybe more that i can't think of....

[wmbrown6]

@GD29 - Let's not forget, Wendell was in his early 70's when he hung up his Letterman mic. He only did one other thing afterwards, an Old Navy commercial, prior to his death in 1999.

Let's also not forget that John Tesh was a reporter at WCBS-TV in New York at the time of this show, so I doubt he would've been in the audience . . .

[GD29]

@wmbrown6 all the john tesh i don't really get since ive never seen the guy frequently...it was kind of surprising to know that he was both a musician and one of the former hosts of entertainment tonight......according to wikipedia, if im not mistaken, wendell died in 1997 but hey it IS wikipedia so i could be wrong....did letterman do a bill wendell tribute on his show?

[Kohntarkosz]

I don't remember when Bill Wendell died, but I know it was quite a few years ago. If I remember correctly, he stayed with Dave from the morning show through the entire run of Late Nite, and the first few years of Late Show. Eventually he retired in like 95 or 96, maybe, then a few years later, Dave made an announcement on the show that Wendell had passed.

[GD29]

@Kohntarkosz does anybody have the show where dave announces bill's death? i think the current announcer (alan kalter) has a lot more of a comedic personality than wendell ever got which is odd because he seemed like he could've been given stuff....

[Kohntarkosz]

Well, I don't think Bill Wendell really did the kind of stuff that Kalter does. If I remember correctly, he was very much just an announcer. Occasionally, he'd do things like lampoon the announcements you used to see on TV, like if a show gets pre-empted for an important news story ("We interrupt our regularly scheduled programming..."), etc. But I don't think he did the kind of clowing around that Kalter does. I personally don't care for the comedy bits with Kalter, though. I liked Bill better.

[GD29]

@Kohntarkosz really? i actually get a kick out of kalter's comedy persona because it goes against everything you would normally expect from an announcer (maturity, professionalism)....celebrity interviews, the sexually driven messages to female personalities, it's all brilliant stuff...but hey, your opinion is as valid as mine...id like to see dave have a normal conversation with kalter on the air sometime just to see what he's really like cuz that comedic persona is obviously scripted...

[usa02]

0:01-0;03, that is Casey Kasem voicing the NBC ID.

[robatsea2009]

yes

[SounzNice]

john tesh at 1:15?

[robatsea2009]

If not then that is the best John Tesh lookalike you could ever hope to see

[timanny1]

@robatsea2009 That's gotta be him. John Tesh was a reporter for WCBS-TV in NYC at the time. He could have been there just to watch the show, or he could have been there to interview Dave or Steve Martin.

[nightfly776]

Yes, very MUCH John Tesh, who was with NBC/New York at the time.

[wmbrown6]

@nightfly776 - Actually, Tesh was a reporter at WCBS-TV (Channel 2) in New York at the time of this show.

[TELEVISIONARCHIVES]

@SounzNice Yes. I was at that taping