David Letterman may be one of the most famous late-night hosts of all time, but he admits he wasn’t made for the big screen.
The comedian and talk show host, 76, detailed his audition for the Airplane! the role of Ted Striker in the upcoming 1980 disaster-faking book with Leslie Nelson, in an excerpt published by Entertainment Weekly.
A book, Surely You Can’t Be Serious: The Real History of Aircraft!, by David Zucker, Jim Abrahams and Jerry Zucker (aka ZAZ), recalls Letterman’s audition for the role — which eventually went to Robert Hays — along with director Jim Abrahams’ joke that he was auditioning for Late Night with David Letterman.
David Letterman adaptation of “Airplane!”.
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“I go out there, and they’ve set up an airplane cockpit with chairs,” Letterman recalled in the book, p Entertainment Weekly. “I had a chair, and there was another chair where the co-pilot would be. We did a scene once, and then they came in and gave me some notes, and then we did it maybe two more times. And I kept saying the whole time, ‘No I can act, I can’t act, I can’t act’, and then one of them came to me after the audition and said: ‘You’re right: you can’t act!'”
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It comes out on October 3rd Surely you can’t be serious will feature interviews with the film’s stars, including Hays and Julie Hagerty. It will also include juicy stories about the casting process with Sigourney Weaver and Caitlyn Jenner, according to the outlet.
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“They were very kind to consider me for the film, because I can see where people would think, ‘Oh, we have this thing where we’re opening an Alpha Beta (supermarket); can you come out and talk to the bag guys?'” Letterman said in the book, trans EWexcerpt. “It made sense. But the movie? And the guy who produced it was Howard Koch, who had a legitimate film career and great credits. He was someone that even I was aware of, so I thought, Jesus, he’s not going to want anything to do with me!”
Letterman added, “When I saw the movie, it was wonderful, and I was thrilled to see it knowing that I didn’t have to look at myself. Because that would destroy him. If not the whole movie, it would certainly ruin it for me.”
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Source: HIS Education