Larry Bud Melman's Christmas Fail | Letterman

From Dave's "Christmas In July" special.
(From "Late Night," air date: 7/9/82)

#larrybudmelman #christmas #letterman

Follow Letterman on Social:

Welcome to the Letterman YouTube Channel, home to all your favorite clips from Late Night and Late Show - as well as conversations with the writers, producers and performers who helped make it all happen. These highlights have been artisanally-produced, carefully-curated, and chosen completely at random by an old computer that used to pick numbers for the New York Lotto back in the 90’s.

[dongiller]

The back-story (from 5-19-97 AOL Q&A with Barbara Gaines):
It was July 9, 1982, and we'd only been on the air 5 months or so. It was our Christmas in July special. The Guardian Angels were on singing carols and we had this character, Ed Subitzky, was Santa. Stuff like that.
Calvert was supposed to recite T'was The Night Before Christmas and give out gifts to a bunch of little kids. I put on the prop list that we needed a book. However, I was not specific as to what book. During rehearsal the book wasn't in yet so I just handed Calvert my script. Jude, figuring I had ordered the book, didn't worry about it being on cue-cards. That evening Calvert opens the book and it's a French catechism book—of course Kathleen [Ankers] the scenic designer went and found a pretty book—so Calvert says "Oui vey vous. Oh my God!" I laughed but Jude [Brennan] came running out on the floor and said we're in trouble. After the show the producer Barry Sand called us in his office and screamed at us and Dave came by and said he thought it was really funny so Barry had to stop yelling but Dave said we had a choice—to tell the story of what happened on the air or be fired. So of course the following day we went on the air but they kept the lights down to protect the guilty and then at the end of the segment they put up mine and Jude's resume.

[brianwolters]

I am a huge LATE NIGHT fan and I never have seen this...this is Gold...God Bless Larry Bud Melman!

[justinmacdonald]

This clip is nothing short of a bona fide Christmas miracle

[scott]

Hilarious! Just priceless! Paul Shaffer's imitation of Cher doing "O Holy Night" is another tradition on the show I forgot about. Would love one of those too! Keep up the great work!

[WEPDRabbitEarsTV]

They would never let something this spectacular air now.

[KingpinPadre]

2:08-2:23 is just a masterclass in snark.

[maanveersingh]

Merry Christmas,
To the folks who bring us these joys.

[JoeChrisMorris]

They switched books on him! The fiends!!

[kstepko]

He did the best he could under the circumstances. Bravo, Calvert!

[ronflatter]

There remain unanswered questions about this 40 years later. I trust The Donz is out there somewhere to correct me if I am wrong. First, it really was July 1982 to follow the tradition of the morning show, which was forced to do its Christmas episode in the summer of 1980, because it already had been canceled. Second, didn’t Jude Brennan and Barbara Gaines come on the episode after this to explain that it was assumed Calvert would have “A Visit from Saint Nicholas” on cue cards? The problem was that whomever would have done the cue cards was told Calvert would read the poem from the book he was holding. The book, however, was a prop. It actually contained French catechisms. My unanswered question is this. Was the whole explanation a canard, because it was believed all along that leaving Calvert hung out to dry would be funnier? If so, I believe that layering of the comedy was even more brilliant because of the conspiracy of confusion.

[SYSD]

Was a the night before Christmas, not a creature was stirring, not even a mouse.
And Santy Claus came down the chimney.
So as I was saying before, not a creature was stirring, not even a mouse.
And Old St. Nicholas came down through the chimney and gave out the presents to the children.
And that ended Christmas!
As I was saying before, and it turned out to be a very Merry Christmas!
Ho! Ho! Ho!

[kerryrobinson]

Larry Bud .. a classic. Barbara Gaines was getting it done, still is. 🎅🧑‍🎄☃️🌲👌

[NoellaScott]

Larry Santa Claus Bud reading it for real would’ve been far less entertaining

[w.paxton]

I always thought they'd given him the wrong book on purpose to create live, real comedy. How would this have been funny or even entertaining if he'd just read the story as it was supposed to be?