Editing Late Night with David Letterman (section)

==Format==
{{More citations needed section|date=September 2023}}
Like most other late-night talk shows, the show featured at least two or three guests each night, usually including a comedian or musical guest.

Letterman frequently used crew members in his comedy bits, so viewers got to know the writers and crew members of the show. Common contributors included [[bandleader]] [[Paul Shaffer]], [[Chris Elliott]], [[Calvert DeForest]] as "Larry 'Bud' Melman," [[announcer]] [[Bill Wendell]], writer [[Adam Resnick]], [[scenic design]]er [[Kathleen Ankers]], [[Stage management|stage manager]] [[Biff Henderson]], [[television producer|producer]] [[Robert Morton (producer)|Robert Morton]], director [[Hal Gurnee]], associate director Peter Fatovich, [[Stagehand|stage hand]] Al Maher, camera operator Baily Stortz, production manager Elmer Gorry as NBC President [[Grant Tinker]],<ref>{{Cite news|url=https://www.nytimes.com/1986/07/27/arts/can-david-letterman-survive-success.html|title=Can David Letterman Survive Success?|last=Collins|first=Glenn|date=1986-07-27|work=The New York Times|access-date=2019-02-25|language=en-US|issn=0362-4331}}</ref> and the "production twins," [[Barbara Gaines (television producer)|Barbara Gaines]] and Jude Brennan. The cramped quarters of 30 Rockefeller Plaza also often played into the humor of the show.

Letterman's show established a reputation for being unpredictable. A number of celebrities had even stated that they were afraid of appearing on the show. This reputation was born out of moments like Letterman's verbal sparring matches with [[Cher]], [[Shirley MacLaine]] and [[Harvey Pekar]].

The show had its frequent favorite guests including [[Pee-wee Herman]], [[Steve Martin]], [[Charles Grodin]], [[George Carlin]] and [[Jay Leno]]. [[Ruth Westheimer]], [[Teri Garr]] and [[Sandra Bernhard]] were also frequently booked, with Garr appearing 32 times, Bernhard appearing 28 times and Westheimer, 15 times.

Because of the creativity of staff writers like [[Merrill Markoe]], Letterman's NBC show, in its first few years especially, had innovative segments and theme shows that were new and different from other talk shows of the time. Some were visual gags that owed a debt to pioneers like [[Ernie Kovacs]] and [[Steve Allen]]. Among the highlights were:

*One early episode showed everything from Dave's eye view with Markoe and others coming at Dave to pitch ideas as he walked onto the stage, and the audience was shown from Dave's view during the monologue and the opening segments.{{citation needed|date=January 2019}} 
*In another show, the picture turned like a clock, eventually being seen upside down halfway through. 
*There were segments where Letterman was dressed in a suit of Velcro and stuck (thrown) to a Velcro wall, a suit of chips and dunked into a vat of chip dip, a suit of Rice Krispies and doused with gallons of milk while lying in a huge bowl, a suit of [[Alka-Seltzer]] tablets and dunked in water, a suit of [[suet]] and placed in a cage with farm animals, etc.{{citation needed|date=January 2019}} 
*Visual segments showing things being crushed by a hydraulic press, thrown through fluorescent lights or dropped off an office building to smash on the ground, were also common.
*Letterman's desk featured a control panel where he could operate a bubble machine, a confetti cannon, "radioactive" steam, a belch of New York soot or strange lighting. 
*When he threw his pencils through the fake window scene behind him, a sound effect of breaking glass was always heard. Occasionally, if sound effects technician Howard Vinitisky was slow in triggering the appropriate breaking glass sound effect, Letterman would mockingly chide Vinitisky for the error (he would also occasionally congratulate Vinitisky when the sound effect was especially well-timed).
*A robotic arm for a while delivered the Top Ten List, and for another week or so, a complicated series of tubes would produce swirling coffee to eventually land in his cup on the desk.
* Cameras mounted on a chimpanzee's back (Late Night Monkey Cam) or on the roof (Roof Cam) would show odd viewpoints of the set and its participants.

Other show format innovations related to the way individual episodes or segments were presented:

*The Custom Made Shows allowed the audience to vote on each part of the hour, what they wanted to see, and the resulting shows had guests talking in high-pitched voices like they had inhaled helium ([[Jane Pauley]] refused to say a word during this, and answered his questions by writing answers on cards and showing them), sitting in dentist chairs or lawn furniture, the theme music replaced by the theme from ''Gilligan's Island'', and an opening montage of the director's vacation photos. 
*Reruns were often [[wikt:scoff#Verb|scoffed]] at by Letterman, telling the audience not to waste their time watching next Monday.  Sometimes the entire rerun would be dubbed into a foreign language for rebroadcast, baffling viewers. 
*Letterman once had a member of the audience host the show and interview guests while he left the studio (ostensibly to search for a missing tooth).
*Letterman hosted the show from his home while waiting for his cable TV to be installed; another episode was done from the production offices upstairs, as the cast claimed they were "too tired" to go downstairs to the studio.
*[[Crispin Glover]] and [[Oliver Reed]] frightened Dave with their nearly violent, confrontational behaviour in their appearances.<ref>{{cite magazine |last1=Unknown |title=Crispin Glover Goes Back to the Crazy |url=https://content.time.com/time/specials/packages/article/0,28804,1879231_1879160_1879235,00.html |website=Time Online |date=13 February 2009 |publisher=Time Magazine |access-date=22 November 2024}}</ref>