hi i'm Caissie st onge i worked at the late show with david letterman from 1993 the start of the
cbs show to 1996. and here are some of my favorite moments from my time there there was a time when
harrison ford was coming on the show to promote his new movie sabrina which spoiler alert it's
about harrison ford and greg kneer they're in competition for the affections of a young woman
and so one of the writers had written a cold open to go at the beginning of the show
where dave and harrison ford were trying to figure out if they were in competition for a young woman
who would she pick and so i was cast as the young woman oh harrison i can't begin to
tell you how much i appreciate you being on the show i'm i'm very very excited to have
you with us thank you so much pleasure to be here dave now you know um you know the movie
sabrina uh the plot is about uh two men in this case happen to be brothers who are interested in
the same woman right yeah and i'm just thinking to myself kind of a funny thing occur to me
i wonder what would happen if you and i were kind of in that role competing
for the same woman i wonder what would happen you know what i'm saying
well why don't we find out all right great why don't we have something boy yes you're one of
my assistants casey hi stacy how are you yeah you asked her all right well what do you think between
harrison and myself well dave is my boss but i would have to say harrison absolutely no doubt
yeah but that's not fair because she knows me there was an episode of the show where lyle lovett
warren beatty and gary chandling were the guests there was a huge standby line for the show that
day and so the writers had the idea that maybe it would be fun to have some people who are there
on the standby line go up to dave's office and watch the show from there and so i got to be in
that bit because i was greeting the kids from buffalo that were sent up from the standby line
so then the idea built because every time someone was a guest on the show when they were done
dave also sent them up to his office mostly what i remember is warren beatty kept picking up grapes
from this tray of snacks that we had and he kept asking me like how do i look doing this
like eating grapes off the grape bunch and i was like you look like warm baby eating grapes like
that's that's the thing that i would watch oh there's casey casey
this is this is uh nick and uh uh kathy they're from buffalo so speak very slowly okay
all right take him in come on take him in suddenly this thing is bogged down unmercifully
just take them in they'll be watching the show thank you very much lonnie thank you that's
lonnie our receptionist look at that office ladies and gentlemen look at wow crackers
are you kids comfy yes is the is the show on the set let's see oh there oh look there here i am hi
they did that didn't they they waved right back to the screen
and then the show was over but then gary and warren hung out in dave's office and then gary
was like you know would be so funny if we hid in dave's closet and surprised him when he came back
and i was like would that be funny i feel like that would scare me if it was my office i probably
wouldn't love it and i was very young and i was like please gary shandling you're leading the
charge on this i'm begging you please don't hide he just kept being like no no it'll be funny trust
me trust me i just went back and i was like you know what i'm gonna do i'm just gonna act like
i don't even care and when i was like okay like if you want to i mean what you know whatever and
then as soon as i stopped being worked up about it it was no longer fun and then i realized gary
shandling was just doing a bit to me he was just trying to wind me up about how he was gonna hide
in dave's closet and then he was like no no we'll go okay so this is one of my favorite stories
another one of my jobs was to make sure that there was hot coffee for dave because uh this is maybe
you don't know he was really drinking coffee all throughout the show so i was bringing some air
pots of coffee i banged one of the pots and it was glass inside so it shattered into a million
pieces and hot coffee went everywhere everywhere and i said oh my god i'm so stupid i'm so stupid
and i didn't know that charles grodin was behind me and he said hey you know what there are going
to be a lot of people in this business that are going to call you stupid don't be one of them then
he helped me sort of pick up pick up the coffee pot and throw it away and uh you know and just
went on his way to go be on the show uh leaving me a better person i don't get to see the shows
but whenever i come on the show i do i do like to watch it uh the night before that i come on
uh so i hadn't i hadn't really seen the show for about really about four months and i wanted to
so i taped it because i'm sleeping but i did watch it this morning and i feel a little uh
awkward here because you you've gone in in a different direction since i was uh since i was
last on and and this and they booked me on this show really about five six weeks ago and i at the
time i just assumed it was like coming on with and you know we've been appearing to you know
i've been like for 10 11 years i did not know that the show had changed its direction and i'm
gonna try the best i can to fit in with the new direction that uh that we've gone in so you know
they're they're they're absolutely uh they're just absolutely out of the laundry there you
don't have to they're fine you know you don't have to they're just you know okay
let's see what i don't know it's uh uh oh boy look at that microphone boy oh boy
now that's exciting that's an exciting i'm awkward at this i'm not that good at that
boy that's really an exciting macro get hold of yourself i'll get off of that
knock it off i'll get off there let me try i know i haven't i haven't enjoyed these so
about about someone who uh who relieved himself in the park i don't know if that's anything
for you at all i don't know stop it all my life i've been a giant fan of prince
prince was coming on the late show and he had just changed his name to the symbol
and i was like trying and i did this a lot trying to play cool like i wasn't a big fan of his
and my main fear is that like if dave caught on that i was a fan of someone that he would like
maybe embarrass me in front of them so prince had agreed to do a cold open and i was like
i'm gonna try to play cool but i'm also gonna try to make sure that i'm there while they're shooting
that cold open i was just out of my mind to be in the same room with prince and dave spit water
toward the camera and then i was like i should get out of here because like it's tight and
also probably because i wanted to go outside of the green room so i could also see prince walk by
prince a person who i had probably imagined a million times what i would say to him if i ever
got a chance to say anything to him walks out of the green room and then just points at the
bottom of my pants and says you got wet and i just stared at the floor and said i'm okay
so that was my one chance to talk to him and i said i'm okay artist formerly known as prince
i'd like you to meet the artist currently known as pinhead one of my jobs when i worked at the late
show was to help dave with his correspondence he's a super old-fashioned guy loves to send a letter a
thank you letter there was a time when the talent department came to dave and said you know we're
reaching out to people that we think will be nominated for oscars we just feel like it would
be really nice if you did some of your really nice letters asking people who haven't agreed yet if
if they would please come on the show to talk about their oscar-nominated films
when it got to nicholas cage's letter i said to dave okay we have to do this nicholas cage
letter what do you want to say and he was so like dave was so just wanted me out of his
office at that point that he was like just tell him thanks for deciding not to be a and coming
on the show and i'm not going to say the word it was a different time it started with a b and
uh you know and he was joking clearly dave was joking it was between me and him so i
wrote a letter to nicholas cage that i felt was in the spirit of what dave wanted to say
but just you know different different wording keep in mind this is a long time ago this is
keep in mind this is also one of my deepest regrets i brought in a stack of letters to dave
and he would always read them and sign some of them and some that he wasn't cool with he
would be like oh okay you need to change this this this and this and like cross it out with a red pen
send me back to redo the letter i sent out all the letters that he signed so a couple
days later he was like oh hey shoot we forgot to write that letter to nicholas cage and i was like
no i think we did write a letter to nicholas cage and he was like
what and i was so proud of myself that it had like gotten out and i was like so on top of it
and i had written like dear nicholas glad you decided to stop being such a woman and come on my
show and dave was like oh no it was like you you cannot have sent this to nicholas cage
this is offensive i love that he was had to tell me a young woman that it was offensive
and i was like oh god and he was like listen you you got to get that letter back like i don't want
nicolas cage to see it it's kind of offensive and i was just like this is it like tomorrow's
gonna be my last day here so i remember i came in early and i was just sort of like
tidying up my area all the better to pack it up when i went in until day of like listen i was
not able to get that letter back uh that offensive letter that i mailed nicholas cage and so then the
mail room called up and they were like hey we have a big delivery for the boss and i was like oh okay
just coming out of the elevator was the biggest arrangement of roses i had ever seen in my life
and uh i took the card and opened it and it was from nicholas cage saying i'm also glad i decided
to stop being such a woman and come on your show and i was like maybe i won't get fired maybe
and so put the flowers out for dave to see huh so funny and he was like well all right
you're lucky it's so many years later and i'm still mortified that i made that
grievous error and dave i'm sorry and nicholas cage if you're watching i am sorry i mean i guess
technically that's the first bit i ever wrote for television but not intentionally so not great yeah
first of all i mentioned at the top of our program that uh i just i really admire you i think you're
great in everything you do and you know what it is and i've said this to other people that i like in
film i think your personality always comes through and that's what's so appealing about you on
screen well and i feel the same way about you no really no no really i've always admired your your
interviews they're hilarious you're the best in the business and frankly that's why i was
terrified to come on for 12 years i mean you're the you were terrified you're the tyrannosaurus
rex a tv i mean it's dave's world yeah and we're all living in it and you're just being silly
but um what do you have there well it wasn't until it wasn't until you sent me this letter
sent you a letter trying to get you to come on the show dear nicholas we're looking forward to
your appearance stop being such a woman take care of your friend dave what what is what do
you mean by this let's see this it could be a forgery yeah i'm sure that i didn't write that
but listen i i love women in fact i'd like to be a grandmother like juanito juanita right over there