Nobody makes me laugh more than Chris Elliott and I have no idea why. I love the "please, whatever you do, don't come to the island" bit. The exchange between Chris and Letterman is priceless. I miss Late Night. There's nothing like it.
I watched David Letterman religiously, from his very first show, when he started out in the mornings, through his very last, and one of my very favorite bits that Chris Elliot did was Marlon Brando - esp when he did The Banana Dance!!🤣 Thank you so much for posting this!!
"I beg you now on my hands and knees to kill me with all your might" Who could come up with a line like that other than Chris Elliott? I'm so grateful that I saw so much of this when it originally aired, never knowing what was going to happen next. Don Geller deserves all praise for these incredible collections.
You can see Paul is having a tough time keeping a straight face, but his job was to look annoyed and insulted by Chris, no matter what character Chris was doing 😂
Especially because from 1980 to 1989 Brando had become a recluse. When Brando came on Connie Chung, it became clear how stunningly accurate Chris' portrayal actually was. So much so I thought he was doing a parody of the parody for the first few minutes. I wonder what Chung thought, because she was quite friendly with Letterman. She was a “friend of the show” if not actually a friend of Dave. She asked Connie about Dave and he responded with an infamous ape-like face.
Chris Elliott is certainly one of the greatest things to happen to the Letterman show as well as television overall. Hard to explain why he is so enjoyable, exactly, but his brand of quirky humor is just AWESOME!
@@MkeKen67 Indeed. Bob Elliott & Ray Goulding were THE best comedy duo ever despite not gaining the wider public exposure they deserved. All the more reason to appreciate their subtle, low-key, hilarious humor on radio, TV and occasionally in-person.
Elliot's Dad may have been a genius. Chris Elliot is sporadic funny. And these sequences are not well thought out. And YOU don;t know that Letterman thought this guy ws a genius. He may have put him on in deference to his father, and hoping for the best.
@@davidames1746 Chris started with the show as a production assistant in 1982; Chris demonstrated his talent as a writer that got him four Emmy awards, as well as his comedic ability doing skits, while on the show throughout the 80's; nothing to do with his father.
40 years later and this is just as hilarious as when I first watched it. Chris Elliott is a comic genius and any time one of his running characters made an appearance was the highlight of the show.
What was great about these bits was that NOBODY was thinking about Brando in the 80's, Marlon had become a recluse and your average everyday dude had not clue about what he looked liked, his mannerisms, his thoughts ect at this time. At least not the general public he hand't made a movie since basically apocalypse now in the late 70's' Somehow Chris Elliot and the Letterman writers nailed it.
Rod I disagree. As a high school student some of my friends and I were huge fans of Apocalypse Now and The Godfather. I went out of my way to watch every Brando movie I could and often did imitations of him from The Wild One, Streetcar, and those two movies.
Marlon Brando was a lot more revered in the late 1980s. His reclusiveness and faded looks had his popularity at a crescendo. Films like The Freshman were hits because Brando’s popularity was more Jordan like back then, his performance in The Godfather was the ultimate come back (critically and commercially).
I watch Letterman only due to Elliot. This or Fugitive guy, the clown, guy under stairs etc. Otherwise I find Conan O'Brien funnier, Dick Cavett smarter.
Fucking brilliant. You watch this and then compare it to the superfluous, boring, sterile scripted garbage we see today. Thank you so much for posting. I rarely laugh any more, but then I found this .
Thank you Don Giller! I have most of these buried on VHS tapes somewhere. These segments were my favorite, a perfect distillation of what made Late Night so brilliant. BANANAS!
This is surely one of the most audacious impressions ever done on television. Why? Because it was created from pure fantasy since Brando had not DONE any interviews in recent times, crazy or otherwise. What is so hilarious as Chris commented as that a few years later he was in the news again and WAS actually doing some show interviews and Elliott's image wasn't far off!
Colbert was nothing but a tool for anti-Republican jabs, especially when Trump was president. Boring comedy (?) no matter which side of the political aisle it came from
I still remember how great it was hearing the Superman theme and watching Chris/Marlon making his entrance. It always looked like the Letterman staff loved it too.
To me, this was the acme of Chris’ comedy. I remember laughing so hard as a teenager watching these skits that I couldn’t breathe. Just brilliant self-consciously stupid hilarity. Humor deconstruction at its best. Playing the theme of “Superman”, Brando’s worst film performance, was a nice touch.The Garfield mugs bit is my favorite. “For I am not God.”
"worst film performance"???? are you kidding? he may have dialed it in on his terms but that performance was iconic, with just the perfect amount of gravitas.
I waited for these every week. They struck my comedy nerve 100%... it's hilarious. Chris Elliot is the comic genius of my generation imo, he's the funniest guy to me and a genius. Notice in these Marlon appearances, his physical appearance deteriorated and he became more incoherent with each appearance...a brilliant touch by Chris.
He did that with the Morton Downey character as well. It's like portrait of Dorian Gray. You wanna see how decrepit the character can become each time you tune in.
That iconic opening tune brings back memories. Excellent collection and thanks for your hard work Don! Appreciate the *time* you have taken to assemble and upload them. You must have quite a collection of VCR tapes ... and a bear to go through. Cheers!
One of my favorite comedy bits ever. Perfectly strange, awkward and hilarious. Chris was comedy gold whenever he was on the show. And Paul Shaffer never appeared to be a fan. Lol
@@throwingsparks Yes I was wondering about that too. Paul seemed like he was genuinely pissed. But it s brilliant character that Chris did. Like Andy Kaufman, he took it way into the nether regions. It's like his own Tony Clifton.
hey Don Giller thank you for this video. It is brilliantly edited. Chris Elliott is hilarious as Brando. Especially the surprise at 13!!!! Awesome stuff. "Jacunta"
Thanks very much! This turned into more of a struggle than planned. I wanted to include the airdates within each clip, but when I did that, for some bizarre reason the beginnings and endings of each episode were getting cut off, all of them progressively more as each airdate was added. After around seven attempts with both iMovie and FCP, I gave up. This ended up becoming a 20-hour adventure in frustration. And I just remembered that I may ("may" being the operative word here) have some of these in better video quality on tapes I haven't yet catalogued. I should have first checked before preparing this but then I figured it was more important to get it out there sooner than far later.
Don Giller well congratulations on fantastic job, keep up the great work. Watching Letterman (full shows/short clips) is one of my favourite RU-vid activities. fingers crossed on your other tapes. cool stuff. "and with that I must leave you."
Absolute comic genius, to use all the different aspects of Brando's 'back story' at the time for comic effect, some of it is very subtle it can go over folks' heads...
May I be so bold? The last sketch where he asks "Are you an assassin?" still has me rolling. Great reference wrought hilarious. "I brought something from the McDonald's restaurant."😂😂😂
Chris Elliott as Marlon Brando NEVER GETS OLD. When I'm on my deathbed should that ever happen, I'm gonna request this set of clips and Abbott and Costello playing the radio and wanting to dance despite the landlords objections and getting ready for their vacation on a LOOP until I pass on to the great beyond
Someone on another one of these had the comment that the smaller studio made a difference too in the feel of Letterman in the 80s. That's a good point I never thought of the room being super important to a late night show. I like how intimate this feels, kinda thrown together but not really.
Yeah, but I do remember Dave mentioning in an interview to Brokaw that he wanted to to 'really good shows' when he went to CBS. So for us fans that loved the 80's vibe, the CBS shows that had a lot of applause over the we were left rather disappointed in the change. Thank goodness for Don Giller though.
Yeah, I could never get into the atmosphere of Late Show. The room was too big, the acoustics different, and there was something “off” about Dave being up on a stage above the crowd instead of below them (as was the case at Late Night).
@@Milesco It made sense when I was typing it. The CBS shows (I went on Nov 15 2004) pushed the (clap and 'hey/yay/) sounds rather than an organic response. It always felt so fake after than. The production was better at CBS but that didn't convert to it being a funnier show. Lol, I'm gonna go back and watch Chris Elliot do his impression of Paul.
I love how hard Chris Elliott keeps using the song Alley Cat throughout hos career…not just in this recurring bit, but also in his show Get A Life, where he had a giant stack of 45s of Alley Cat and would occasionally wear one out from playing it too much. I kind of got obsessed with that bit, and i have bought every 45 of that song every time i find one. I probably have 4 or 5 of them.. I dream of having Chris sign at least one of them some day.
Check out how subtle Chris Elliot is with his Brando expressions. He studied Brando minutely on the few talk show appearances he actually made. Best part is he doesn't do Vito Corleone at all-except for the grimaces and smiles on entrances and exits. This wouldn't play in 2020 obviously, but godamn, back in the 80's I saw Jackie Gleason yell at a band leader on a talk show, "Hey Ringo!"
When Chung interviewed Brando she asked him who he found funny and he said :Laurel and Hardy, then he asked her who she found funny and she said Letterman. Brando responded by making a pig face and grunting. So I guess he was aware of Chris' bit.
@@WillyRand Letterman was a groundbreaking late night host whose early shows are still imitated by many people who host comedic shows. He was also a really funny interviewer who was not impressed or intimidated by the fame of his guests. These bits haven't aged at all. How does your work resume stack up against that?
wow - what Dave and Chris and that team brought to television... its like Monty Python - its so good you wonder how it ever got on tv in the first place and for sure you will never see its like again.
Love that "Wow" at :36 like they really thought Brando was dropping in (35:14 mocks Marlon's heavy reliance on cue cards right in front of him on his later movies).
i'm like what the hell, i'll watch a couple... 48 minutes in and i'm committed, the skit kept getting better, the ringo jokes hade me dying, paul trying to act pissed but smiling, 47:44, looks like michael richards. seeing christopher reeve healthy is always sobering.
“I always like to bring something.” “If I may be so bold.” “The green room.” “The hottest audience in America.” “Jabs.” Etc. This compilation really illustrates the effectiveness of repetition in comedy. And with that I shall leave.
Please let me come visit you on the island. If necessary, I shall get down on my hands and knees and beg like a dog with all my might to secure an invitation! And if I may be so bold, I would like to bring you a specially made salad prepared in your honor. And with that, I will leave.
