♪ (ragtime music) ♪
Oh, god.
Oh my god. Why?
Oh man.
- (in video) You gotta syked. - Oh no.
(Letterman) You gotta get syked?
You gotta get syked up, yeah.
- (fan engine splutters) - Aaah!
Oh my god.
Ew!
Oh my god!
(movie reel clicks)
(Finebros) What about Letterman do you enjoy?
His personality.
He speaks well, off-the-cuff.
He talks well, he jokes well.
He's very quick. He's very alert.
He had a very direct way of dealing with unusual things.
(Finebros) And why did you not really like Letterman
as much as some of the others?
I liked Johnny Carson and Jay Leno.
I think they're a little bit more funnier.
I didn't think he was quite as funny.
He was pretty folksy.
I like his band though.
Usually, the music was pretty good.
(Finebros) So recently, because he was retiring,
a lot of fellow comedians ended up making statements
about what he meant to them over their career
and some of the other talk show hosts
even said that he was a very big influence to them.
Yes, and Jimmy Kimmel didn't broadcast live that night.
How 'bout that?
He was a very human kind of guy.
He cares about people and that's part of what makes him who he is.
I'd give him credit for being able to do that for all those years.
It's a hard job... five nights a week to talk to strangers.
It's not easy to last that long.
I mean, THAT long-- definitely, he's a legacy.
(Finebros) So he first started doing his late night show in 1982.
What was going on in your life back then?
Oh, Lord. Don't ask. (laughing)
I was married, still raising children.
I was in my forties. I was teaching.
I was teaching school.
(Finebros) So he used to be on NBC after midnight
because he would come on after The Tonight Show.
And who hosted The Tonight Show at the time?
Carson.
Johnny Carson.
(Finebros) How popular was Carson when he was on the air?
Carson was great.
He was the number one guy forever, for a very long time.
You don't realize how much that Johnny and Dave and now Jimmy...
You kind of feel like they're a member of the family.
I mean, heck, you invite 'em into your living room every night.
(Finebros) And when he retired, it became a very big news story
of who was gonna take over and it became Leno versus Letterman.
Do you have any memories about that time period
about Jay Leno versus David Letterman?
Oh, yeah, I really thought Dave Letterman shoulda had it.
I was under the impression that Dave thought he should get it
or would've gotten it and then they went with Jay Leno.
I think it was a surprise more than anything else.
We anticipated he was the one.
(Finebros) So Dave did over 6,000 episodes of the show,
which passed Carson for the most in history.
(Finebros) What is it about Dave that kept him popular for decades?
Well, he's funny.
Ratings. People watched him.
He was off-the-wall.
You never knew quite what to expect from him
and he was a little bit biting.
He's pretty, you know, just really plain, down-home,
or whatever you want to call it.
(Finebros) Do you think any of the current talk show hosts
will have this kind of longevity and be on the air for decades?
No, I think young people probably don't really watch them that much.
I think that people are looking for changes.
Like James Bond, okay?
They do about four or five movies
because that's when they are prime in the life,
that's when you wanna see them.
Once you're past that prime, you know, the hair is greyer,
you got more lines on the face, you don't wanna see that representation.
The potential for Fallon to stay longer is he's very endearing.
You kind of identify with him 'cause he's, like, shocked
and he's all sorts of things and I think that might bode well
for people, or maybe people will get tired of it. I don't know.
Well, they're very well made.
If they have a genuine interest in people
and caring for people, they could last for a long, long time.
(Finebros) So Dave is off the air now.
Do you watch any other late night talk shows these days?
I'll watch Conan.
I do like Conan O'Brien and I watch that show once in a while.
I watch Fallon.
I watch a little bit of Jimmy and Fallon right now.
I love Fallon.
I think Fallon is-- I love him a lot.
- No. - (Finebros) No one?
- No. - (Finebros) Not Jimmy Fallon?
No, who's he?
♪ (upbeat theme music) ♪