I FEEL the need to start with a confession ... I watch way too much television. Or that is, I used to, but chiefly late at night for release from a day of much emotional and intellectual effort. After writing up my patient notes and revisiting the issues of their therapy work, I'd turn on the TV for the news at eleven. I followed this with the nightly talk show which for many years meant Johnny Carson.
I regarded him then - and continue to do so now - as the best interviewer I have ever seen. He consistently brought out the best in each guest, sometimes over the resistance of a celebrity determined to make a fool of him or herself on national television.
When the person interviewed was a non-celebrity - just plain folks whose quirky invention or pet or project brought them on the show - Carson saw to it that whatever joke was made, it was on him, not them. And all the while quickly coming up with the one-liners that made the show funny in the first place. And then he left. I stopped watching until a few years ago after I came here and found daily re-runs of David Letterman's Tonight Show. Now he's gone, too. A number of critics have weighed in to compliment Dave (like them I felt a sense of familiarity), mostly for his quirky sense of anarchy. While I suspect that most TV talk show hosts are like Johnny - most alive and witty before the cameras, tending towards social isolation off-screen - Dave became far more intimate, perhaps because of forces beyond his control.
Viewers learned of his cardiac problems and heart surgery and later, alas, his romantic excursions with staff members (for which he quickly apologised on air, calling his own actions "creepy"). We viewers were introduced to his mom, and heard stories about his son. Dave was, as Johnny had been before him, the butt of all these joking stories.
One thing everyone remarks is that Letterman had no great awe of celebrity, including his own. His call-out of then US presidential candidate Senator John McCain for standing the Letterman show up in favour of an interview by Katie Couric made not only great television but brought McCain back to grovel suitably. The road to the White House, it was clear, led through the Letterman show. His farewell was the best indication of his qualities. He took pains to say thank you on camera to what seemed several dozen of the people who made the show possible for its 33-year run. Then he introduced his wife and son and thanked them for being his family. And, as a concession to Dave's son, he introduced the boy's friend seated next to him. It was a bravura performance worthy of the man, heartfelt but unsentimental.
