Today’s Guest: Bill Scheft, comedy writer, “The Late Show with David Letterman,” novelist, Everything Hurts, Shrink Thyself
Here are my Top Ten reasons for inviting Bill Scheft to be a guest on Mr. Media Radio:
10. Used to write for ESPN The Magazine and left it off the flap of his new book.
9. Wrote a new book, Everything Hurts, which reminds me of that old joke where the guy says to his doctor, “Doctor! Doctor! It hurts when I do this!” And the doctor says… oh, wait, you’ve heard this one already?
8. Got Larry David to write a blurb for his book jacket.
BILL SCHEFT podcast excerpt: “As much as Larry David tries to distance himself from the character he plays on screen, he will never succeed in convincing people that that is some different guy.”
7. Makes his living writing for “The Late Show with David Letterman,” which gives me the opportunity to write my own hackneyed Top 10 list.
6. Got to keep his staff job on the show despite extorting $50,000 from Paul Shaffer for a tell-all book he proposed calling, “We’ll Be Here For the Rest of Our Lives: A Swingin’ Show-biz Saga”—only to find Paul already< wrote the book with David Ritz.
6. Excuse me… I’m getting a call on the other line. It’s Bill’s publicist. “What? I can’t ask Bill questions about the Letterman show? But I’m in the middle of the introduction right now… I’m doing one of those Top 10 lists… What? You don’t think that’s a very original idea? But I’m already halfway through… Oh, all right. Fine, fine.”
Hmm.
As I was saying, Bill Scheft is the author of a funny new novel titled Everything Hurts. The publisher calls it a novel, anyway; reads to me more like a roman a clef. This is his third “novel”—the first two were The Ringer and Time Won’t Let Me.
Bill Scheft Website • Twitter • Tumblr • Order Everything Hurts from Amazon.com
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