David Letterman…First Monologue, First Show
February 1, 1982, Late Night premiered with a cold opening featuring Larry “Bud” Melman delivering lines as an homage to the prologue of Boris Karloff’s Frankenstein, followed by Letterman coming out on stage behind a group of female dancers – the peacock girls. After a brief monologue, the very first comedy segment was a sarcastic tour of the studio. The first guest was Bill Murray and here is that historic segment.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZNplNAjlEz8
Monologue
Wow, talk about repressed memories… I now remember seeing this!
I’ve got this recorded somewhere myself
We couldn’t watch this in Philly. The NBC affil KYW didn’t carry it for about 6 months. The first time I saw his show was when I was on vacation in Longport NJ and was able to view in on WCMC Ch. 40 out of Wildwood NJ
I remember when he had a daytime showw as well
I was running master control at WCMH, the NBC affiliate in Columbus the night this aired, and was looking forward to seeing Dave’s premiere all day. It was the perfect ending to my shift!
Back before he became an extreme left-wing nut job.