A chat with Gerard Mulligan
Gerard Mulligan has spent the majority of his professional career writing for David Letterman. Dating from the morning show and running well into the Late Show run, Mulligan provided jokes for Dave’s monologue, as well as making occasional on-camera appearances — including a memorable night where he played Hillary Clinton (the effect of the wig and dress was somewhat muted by his full beard). Now enjoying retirement, Mulligan talked to Letterman Memories via text message about his time with Dave.
Letterman Memories: Just wanted to follow up on the theme of our Twitter account, and now blog. We started it from a pure fan perspective, feeling like Dave retiring is, for lack of a better word, momentous. So that’s our first question: Does Dave’s retirement feel momentous to you? Or have you already gone through your five stages of grief?
Gerry Mulligan: I wouldn’t say grief. I think Dave’s really going to enjoy time away from TV. I know he loves spending time fly fishing with Harry in Montana. I left 10 years ago because I got tired of having to know whom Miley Cyrus is dating. Also, as Merrill Markoe said, coming up with material for the show was like chasing a truck downhill.
Sounds like you were more relieved to leave rather than emotional. Is Dave retiring emotional for you?
Not really. And I was emotional when I left, because the show was such a big part of my life. But David retiring, not so.
Do you ever watch the news and find yourself thinking up jokes even though you don’t have too?
All the time. So I write jokes and tweet them (@gerardmulligan1) – just doesn’t pay as well.
Which brings us to some of the holes in your bio. We couldn’t find much online. Did you move on to other projects after Late Show?
No. I was asked to leave show business.
It was kind of a consensus thing.
Another filling-in-the-bio question: How did you meet Dave / get to work on the morning show?
One of my best friends from San Francisco moved to L.A. and started dating Dave. I moved to L.A. and soon started writing for Dave when he guest hosted The Tonight Show (1978?). In 1980, Fred Silverman at NBC decided to give Dave a morning show and we all flew east.
Was there a conscious effort to make the monologue jokes different from Johnny’s? Did you write for Dave’s “voice?”
Absolutely. Not to differentiate from Johnny, but so jokes sounded like Dave. Always amazed to see submissions to the show containing jokes Dave wouldn’t do in a million years.
So what’s the key to making a joke a “Dave joke?”
Uhh…good question. It’s sort of like the Supreme Court Justice who famously said he couldn’t define pornography, but he knew it when he saw it. In fact, during monologue rehearsals in Dave’s office, there would be daily discussions about a given joke. Not so much whether it would be a Dave joke, but whether it would play. I always liked to write just dumb silly jokes (A philosophy professor at Columbia is retiring after 50 years of studying the greatest thinkers in history. Asked the greatest thing he learned, he replied, “Never buy a hat when you’re drunk.”). BTW, Dave would have flagged that repetition of “greatest” in a heartbeat.
So a sort of non-sequitur punchline?
Yeah. Like a magician, you try to get the listener to look over there and then the punchline is over here. (The classic joke of this kind, prolly decades old: boastful Texan tells laconic Yankee, “I got a ranch in Texas, takes me half a day to drive across.” Laconic Yankee: “Aiyuh. I had a car like that once.“
You read all the time that Dave didn’t really “sell” the monologue until the Late Show. And the monologue was more Jay Leno’s obsession. What was your take on that? How did Dave feel about the monologue? We’ve always felt he did a good job.
I think Dave spent more time prepping the monologue than any other aspect of the show. He didn’t test out his jokes every week at the Comedy & Magic club in Hernias Beach, but he worked very diligently whittling down maybe 125 jokes to 10, then making sure each one was always worded just right.
This is a little obscure, but I remember a very strange joke and I was wondering whether it was one of yours. It was about Renée Richards, the transsexual tennis player. When asked about the hardest part of becoming a woman, she said, "learning to like Tom Jones.”
Don’t remember. Really. Too many jokes. BTW, in the earlier answer, Hermosa Beach got autocorrected to Hernias Beach, and to the best of my knowledge, there is no Hernias Beach in Southern California. Or anywhere else.
Good to know! I just was reminded of the Tom Jones joke because it was so out there. Just a couple more questions: Obviously you were featured on the show from time to time. Did you have a performer bug in you too, like Chris Elliott and Conan, or were you more pressed into service, as it seemed you were when Levon Helm didn’t show up, for example?
More the latter, though I did do standup in San Francisco and L.A.
What’s life like now that you are away from show business? Going to go fly fishing with Dave?
No, I cook and tweet, and I don’t fish because of my fear of hooks.
I think we lied: we might have a couple more questions if you have the bandwidth.
This is one of those open-ended ones, but answer it any way you like: What makes you laugh the most? What do you find the funniest?
Self-confident stupidity. Like Inspector Clouseau.
Couldn’t George W. or Dan Quayle be lumped in there? I suppose that’s why those guys were such fun to skewer.
We had a question about the show’s influence. Larry David has said they didn’t realize Seinfeld was a big deal because they were so busy working on the show. And Fallon recently said something similar. Did it surprise you when the show became not just a hit but a phenomenon?
Yes. Absolutely. We were so involved day-to-day, we didn’t see what was happening. And then Dave was on the cover of Rolling Stone and everybody was talking about it.
Did you have any jaw-dropping moments, when you were in awe of a guest or bit?
Bob Dylan, always. Elvis Costello. Anything Andy Kaufman ever did.
Right — we were just talking about the famous Kaufman/Lawler bit and we seem to recall you on screen [Yup, he’s there at the end, by the exit doors when Kaufman flees the studio]. Someone on Twitter just unearthed the morning show clip and it’s gold too.
Okay, that’s great for us. Thanks so much for giving us an hour of your time.
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