How many tweets have you favorited? How many pictures do you have on your phone? In the digital space, we can all be gluttonous hoarders, but in the physical realm, holding onto something takes more than want-to, it takes space and sometimes it takes resources — two things (maybe three things) that CBS apparently didn’t feel like committing to the majority of the pieces that made up David Letterman’s Late Show set and studio. Because according to a stagehand’s comment to the New York Post outside the studio where a crew was tossing bits of late night comedy history into a dumpster, “It’s all junk now.”
You remember The Late Show, don’t you? Kids, CBS didn’t always air a re-run of The Mentalist at 11:35 p.m., but when Letterman said goodnight to us for the last time last night, the clock started ticking down towards the September 8th premiere of Stephen Colbert’s version of the show in Stephen Colbert’s version of The Ed Sullivan (hey, maybe we should rename it after Dave… ) Theater. So I get the need to move in a vigorous way, it just feels like grave robbing so soon after the finale of something that lasted for 22 years and which meant so much to so many — including CBS.
And speaking of the people that Letterman’s show meant something to, isn’t it feasible that a horde of comedy nerds would have gladly went into that theater with tool belts and bank cards to raid it for its treasures while throwing money at whoever was taking? Maybe that’s impractical and maybe this is all ridiculously sentimental. The spirit of the show didn’t live in the set’s model bridges and the studio seats. It lived in Letterman and it’s available to us whenever we can find clips and rerun episodes of Letterman’s comedic exploits — though not on CBS at 11:35 p.m. anymore, because now that’s The Mentalist‘s time to shine.
(Via New York Post)
