Letterman by Jason Zinoman

Author:Jason Zinoman
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: HarperCollins
Published: 2017-02-28T16:00:00+00:00

9

THE TWO DAVES

Steve O’Donnell was sitting in his office in Rockefeller Center when he saw a magazine advertising a top-ten list of eligible bachelors on the cover. It seemed arbitrary, as these lists often do, which gave him an idea. And thus was the Top Ten List born.

Randy Cohen recalled its origin differently. He saw a list in Cosmopolitan of the ten sexiest men over sixty and thought it absurd, but inspiration struck and he brought the idea of a top-ten spoof to the rest of the writing staff, who kicked around ideas, and out emerged the Top Ten List.

After polling the Late Night writers, O’Donnell’s theory had more supporters, but Cohen’s had a rather important one. In a television interview, David Letterman said that the Top Ten was Cohen’s idea, although that does not end the discussion. “Dave gives credit to Randy, but he doesn’t always know,” said Barbara Gaines, Letterman’s longest-tenured employee.

There is also a third theory. Jim Downey, the head writer whom O’Donnell replaced, says he was its real creator, even though he left the show years before the Top Ten List premiered, in 1985. So how could a writer who wasn’t even working on Late Night at the time come up with the idea? Downey said that after he left and moved to The New Show, he wrote a list of jokes called “The Top Five Causes of Death of College Students in Fort Lauderdale,” which appeared on the show.

It was not a top-ten list, but the concept was the same. Downey said that Jeff Martin, one of the Late Night writers as of 1985, called him to compliment this idea, which Martin then brought to Late Night. And so the Top Ten List lurched to life. It sounded far-fetched, but when I approached O’Donnell with this alternative history, he, remarkably, withdrew his own story and threw his support behind Downey.

So that would seem to settle it, except that when you ask Jeff Martin, he denies calling Downey at all. He gives credit to O’Donnell, who, as it happens, won’t take it. Are you lost yet?

That you can fill up a third of a top-ten list with the varying origin stories of the Top Ten List illustrates the importance of this comedic conceit. No one, for instance, argues over authorship of Small Town News. But the Top Ten became a staple of David Letterman’s talk shows for three decades. Two books of Top Ten lists made the bestseller list. Letterman read Top Ten Lists during his hosting of the Emmys and the Oscars. It became his signature.

What matters more to the history of the show than who came up with the idea is how it evolved. The first lists were absurdist satires of these lists that even at that time were a media standby. On Late Night, the first list was “Top Ten Words That Almost Rhyme with ‘Peas.’” The top three were: (3) Nurse, (2) Leaks, and (1) Meats. Another was “Top Ten Keebler Elf Euphemisms for Death.

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