The passing of Larry "Bud" Melman
Television has lost one of its great characters. Calvert DeForest, who embodied the strikingly similar Larry "Bud" Melman on "Late Night with David Letterman," died Monday in Long Island, NY at the age of 85. DeForest was with Letterman from the early days of his NBC show in 1982, but was forced to leave his "Melman" moniker behind when the late night host made the jump to CBS in 1993 and NBC claimed "intellectual property" rights on the name. It was DeForest who opened "The Late Show"s premiere on CBS by standing inside the network's famous eye logo and announcing "This is CBS."Rest in peace tonight, Mr. DeForest. We remember your triumphant moment.
Plus, a bonus clip-- Calvert in a bear suit.
posted by CM @ 8:26 PM
1 Comments:
The bit at the Port Authority is still probably the pinnacle of late night comedy. Every night, our half dozen late night hosts try to create goofball scenerios that will produce that kind of spontaneous, unscripted humor. Unfortunately, my computer speed is slow and doesn't do justice to the timing of Calvert's microphone skills.
Another favorite moment with Calvert was at Letterman's 5th Anniversary on CBS (I think) when no one had seen Calvert for a couple of years. At the end of the program they do a montage of his bits set to sad music and then an RIP message appears on the screen before Calvert appears on screen saying (to paraphrase): "I'm not dead yet, you bastards!"
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