On Wednesday night’s “Late Show With David Letterman,” the host gave his audience a taste of his vocal stylings with a clip of a routine he and actor-comedian Steve Martin prepared for CBS’s upfront presentation.
“The guy who owns CBS, Leslie Moonves, called me about six weeks ago,” Letterman explained. “And p.s., don’t spread this around, but they were a little panicky because this was right in the middle of all of that Charlie Sheen stuff, and they were just dizzy. … So (Les) calls me up and says, ‘We want to open up the presentation with a real blockbuster, a real bang. You know, get people in a good mood, get them feeling good, get them feeling great and then everything will be fantastic.’”
That’s when Letterman, Martin and band leader Paul Shaffer joined forces for musical number. Moonves, who is actually president and CEO of CBS, even joined in the fun. After Letterman and Martin worked on their routine, which primarily involved sing-shouting “It’s gonna be a big, big season” and swilling giant martinis, the bigwig came through and announced that the act was cut from the upfront fun.
Of course Moonves’ cut call was just for the sake of comedy. In the end, the video was part of the opening for Wednesday’s fall preview at Carnegie Hall.
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