Letterman retired from his over 30-year role as the host of the Late Show With David Letterman (previously Late Night With David Letterman) two years ago, passing the reins to comedian Stephen Colbert.
“Here’s what I have learned: If you retire to spend more time with your family, check with your family first.”
The new series will be produced in a collaboration between Letterman’s Worldwide Pants and RadicalMedia, which has worked on well-received Netflix productions such as What Happened, Miss Simone?, Oh Hello on Broadway, and Abstract: The Art of Design.
For his part, the host seems ready to get back to work.
“I feel excited and lucky to be working on this project for Netflix,” he told The Hollywood Reporter. “Here’s what I have learned: If you retire to spend more time with your family, check with your family first.”
In terms of content, the new series will be prerecorded and will showcase long-form conversations between the host and a guest in the studio, as well as explorations of topics of interest to Letterman that will be shot in the outside world. The production companies have yet to reveal a guest list for the new show, but they should have no problem booking virtually any star on Earth, given Letterman’s pedigree.
Executives at Netflix are elated at the opportunity to work with the iconic comedian, with Letterman helping to expand the streaming service’s talk show content outside of its weekly Chelsea series. It also can’t hurt that Letterman’s final episode of The Late Show on CBS garnered 14 million viewers and has a chance to be one of the most popular shows on Netflix.
“Just meeting David Letterman was a thrill; imagine how exciting it is for me to announce that we will be working together,” Netflix’s Chief Content Officer Ted Sarandos said. “David Letterman is a true television icon, and I can’t wait to see him out in the wild, out from behind the desk and interviewing the people he finds most interesting. We’ll have to see if he keeps the beard.”
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