Bill Burr, for the last few years, has seemingly become many comedy fans’ favorite comic. And talk to a well-respected comedian about who they think is doing well and they’ll no doubt say Bill Burr.

So it’s no surprise that Burr impressed on Late Show with David Letterman last night. Don’t believe us? Check out the evidence below.

Here’s a little Late Night television history lesson. There once was a man named Johnny Carson; he was the host of The Tonight Show. Joan Rivers was good buddies with him, and was his official fill-in.

Rumor has it, that around that time, NBC was drawing up a list of names with possible replacements for Johnny after his retirement; and Rivers wasn’t on it.

With this knowledge she jumped at the chance of having her own late night show after Fox asked her to host one. Joan told Carson what she was planning to do, and apparently he didn’t like it. They never spoke again, and because Carson was so highly respected and considered the king of late night, Rivers felt all the hosts of these programms had unofficially banned her.

And what does this whole fiasco lead to? Great late night television almost two decades later! Joan Rivers was on The Late Show with David Letterman last night explaining how she felt exiled by all the hosts, even let out a nice little jab at Leno. Check it out.

In yesterday’s Modern Love column in the New York Times, television producer Clay Graham writes about a comedian/actress he briefly dated. The best part about the essay, is that he never names her.

So we had fun trying to guess who it could’ve been. Some of the clues are laid out for us; others, we had to unearth. We know this comedian performed on Late Show with David Letterman between the years of 1995 – 2003; she’s “petite,” has brown eyes, wore heels, miniskirt and tailored jacket on the Letterman episode on which he first became smitten. Graham describes her comedy as “vulnerable” yet “dirty.” We also know from the story that she is now married.

Here’s our guess: Wendy Liebman.

Why? Liebman typically dressed this way on television appearances during the specified time frame; she’s been on Letterman a lot; she’s 5′2″ (petite) and, finally for sure has some dirty, albeit late-night television-friendly material yet still maintains a kind of girlish innocence in her delivery. And Liebman is indeed married now with two children.

That’s all. Just a guess (we’re not saying we’re right… we’re happy to be proven wrong), and a bit of fun. Check out a clip of Liebman on Letterman after the jump.

Read the rest of this entry »

Awesome TV programming alert! Make sure to catch The Battle for Late Night on A&E this Tuesday, April 27th at 10pm EST. It’s a two hour documentary on all the behind-the-scenes action from the beginning of late night television until today.

The doc will focus on everyone from Don Rickles and Johnny Carson, to David Letterman and Jimmy Fallon. The show will focus on the drama and business aspects of what goes on behind closed doors in one of the most popular formats in television history. And yes, Conan and Leno will be discussed. The show will also explore the successes (David Letterman) and failures (oh, hey there, Pat Sajak) of just about everyone who’s made an attempt in late night.

The special is scheduled to air two more times; check out the listing info here.

It’s common wisdom that some of the best comedians are outsiders, standing at the fringe of society lobbing critiques inward. But it’s also common wisdom that white, tall, blond, Catholics are not outsiders, at least not in America, at least for another year or two. In fact they’re pretty much the norm. But Jim Gaffigan, the platonic ideal of whiteness itself, has made a career out of proving just how outside the inside can be. I spoke with him after a show Saturday night in Jerusalem’s accurately named “Comedy Basement.”

Gaffigan came up in the New York comedy scene, so performing for an audience made up of 99 percent Jews isn’t really new for him, but performing in the birthplace of monotheistic religion is a bit different, especially for Gaffigan who covers a range of biblical stories in his stand-up, and was here with his family on religious pilgrimage.

Being on vacation, the show was laid back, and his already characteristic glottal fry (that swallowing your own voice syndrome that your grandmother may have chided you for in seventh grade was kicked into overdrive. He also eschewed his inside voice conceit almost entirely (perhaps because the Midwesterner it usually refers to wasn’t in this audience?), but he still brought his full attention to the crowd, with some classic material, some new material and a range of jokes and segues specific to the Middle East.

Gaffigan’s appreciation for the setting was evident right from the start, as he began with a rousing “Thank you, thank you, wow it’s like my bar mitzvah! it’s gonna be weird doing this not in Hebrew. Chag Sameach,” but his self-described geo-political dorkiness really shone through over the next few minutes as he rattled off a string of Israel-centric jokes, talking about the Israeli breakfast (”there is no meat, but to make up for it we will offer every other food possible”), his heritage (”as you can tell by looking at me, I’m an Ethiopian Jew”) and Israeli demographics (Eilat is like the Jersey Shore of Israel”).

In an interaction with a pale blond audience member he got a big laugh just by saying “so you must be Sephardic,” adding, “I never thought I would be able to use any of this information.” For those of you without the context to judge, I swear that all these jokes are dead on, and with Saturday’s audience they hit hard.

Read the rest of this entry »

Last night, both David Letterman and Stephen Colbert faux-bragged about the fact they now own the Apple iPad. We expected it from Colbert, since the man’s been relentless about plugging Apple products on his show unofficially in order to get free stuff; we know for a fact that he once gave his entire staff personalized iPod Touches.

We have to say, we loved the way both hosts treated the iPad, Letterman and Colbert similarly adopting a love-hatred for the seemingly redundant technological advance. If you haven’t seen the clips yet, we don’t want to blow the surprises with words. So, take a look below and let us know who’s iPad treatment you liked better. Enjoy!

On tonight’s Late Show with David Letterman, hugely popular but less physically huge as of late Ricky Gervais shares his theories about fat people. Warning: fried chicken story also included. Check out the entire interview tonight on Letterman at 11:35 pm EST. Enjoy!

Tonight on Late Show with David Letterman, Luke Wilson talks to Dave about his new movie Death at a Funeral, which also stars Tracy Morgan. It’s getting to be that Tracy is such a “force of nature” as Luke describes him, that the man doesn’t even have to show up to talk shows for us to crack up at his antics.

In the below clip from tonight’s to-be aired episode, Luke, who plays Tracy’s best friend in the movie, tells a story about how Tracy was scoring phone numbers from girls while they were shooting scenes. Just like last week’s video of Tina Fey impersonating Morgan on Dave’s show, this is a must watch as well.

Ok, not like that. But now that our pseudo-sexual headline has captured your attention, here’s the video of Ms. Fey’s appearance on Letterman, doing her impersonation of Tracy Morgan. Bonus: Tracy’s got some smooth pick up lines; Tina explains.

On tonight’s Late Show with David Letterman, the big man welcomes Jimmy Kimmel to the guest seat. Not surprisingly, Letterman thanks Kimmel for all he’s done ripping apart Jay Leno during the Great Late Night Clusterfuck of 2010 (our term, not his).

What we found most hilarious, is Dave’s quick aside to Kimmel, saying that he’s still in the game to lay into Leno, despite Jay having already taken over the new Tonight Show. Shit, we hope he’s not just joking. Check out the clip below and tune into the Late Show tonight to see the interview in full.

UPDATE: Seems CBS is having some trouble with the embed code for this clip. If you don’t see the video load below, check it out here.