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Relationships
The Hollow Man - Dave surprised wife was upset!
Letterman paraphrased: "I'm incapable of caring about another human being"
Posted October 6, 2009
In his first televised apology, David Letterman joked about his sexual liaisons with young female staff (some interns) and said there would be no more public talking about these things unless he or the unnamed women decided to speak up.
He left only one person out - Regina Lasko - the mother of his six-year-old son whom he had been dating for 20+ years before marrying this year. Do you get the feeling he treats the woman rather casually?
Let's calculate, Letterman said they had been together since the 1980s. Yet one intern - an NYU college student (like my daughter!) has reported dating Letterman in the 1990s: "I was madly in love with him. I would have married him. He was hilarious."
Some commenters on my earlier post argued that Ms. Lasko had no problem with the proceedings - that this was an open marriage. They imagined she was perfectly okay with his screwing interns willy-nilly and conducting long-term affairs with several women.
Letterman's second mea culpa indicates otherwise. He apologized on the air to Lasko for his revelation of his free love concept of marriage, saying she had been "horribly hurt" and that "I've got my work cut out for me" to mend the relationship.
Even those philandering politicians realize they're supposed to get their wives on board before going on camera to confess to their "indiscretions" (meaning systematic affairs with other men and women). Dave knows - he often comments on others' affairs.
Media pros keep saying how well Dave had gotten out ahead of the situation. But, gosh, he seems to have missed one important cog in imagining that he was simply going to proceed in his life without a hitch - his wife!
In the world according to Dave, "If you hurt a person and it's your responsibility, you try to fix it." Good thought - albeit a little late in occurring to a smart man like Dave. Lasko seems to have been far down the list of people he was worried about.
Is Dave a little insensitive to the main woman in his life? You know, the one he boasted about stringing along for decades before marrying five years after she had his kid: "I had avoided getting married pretty good for, like, 23 years. . . . I was the last of the real gunslingers."
Dave's former main squeeze (and head writer) Merrill Markoe commented, "As you can imagine this is a very emotional moment for me because Dave promised me many times that I was the only woman he would ever cheat on."
Dave obviously had to boot Markoe - can you imagine him staying with a woman that mouthy and assertive? Yes, Dave has his work cut out for him: he is impossibly narcissistic and incapable of an intimate and sharing relationship. Try fixing that.
P.S. Dual Diagnosis: Dysfunctional at Home and Work
David Letterman took mistress on family vacations with wife
The David Letterman sex scandal has taken a bizarre new twist – following revelations that The Late Show icon took his mistress Stephanie Birkitt on a Caribbean vacation with his wife Regina Lasko and their young son.
The New York Post is reporting that Lasko had no idea that her husband was involved with the $200,000 a year employee who is at the center of a $2 million blackmail plot involving television producer Robert Halderman.
A hostile, sexually charged work atmosphere
Two years after they received my submission packet, I got the call: Dave wanted to meet me. By then, I was living in L.A. and had already written an episode for The Simpsons and served as story editor on Newhart during its final season. Still, Late Night was my dream job, so when I got the offer, I left the sitcom I’d just started on and moved back East. Walking into 30 Rockefeller Center on my first day as a Letterman writer was one of the happiest moments of my life. . . .
Did Dave hit on me? No. Did he pay me enough extra attention that it was noted by another writer? Yes. Was I aware of rumors that Dave was having sexual relationships with female staffers? Yes. Was I aware that other high-level male employees were having sexual relationships with female staffers? Yes. Did these female staffers have access to information and wield power disproportionate to their job titles? Yes. Did that create a hostile work environment? Yes. Did I believe these female staffers were benefiting professionally from their personal relationships? Yes. Did that make me feel demeaned? Completely. Did I say anything at the time? Sadly, no.
Here’s what I did: I walked away from my dream job. . . . On my last day at Late Night, Dave summoned me to his office and pressed me on why I was quitting the show. I considered telling him the truth, but with Dave’s rumored mistress within earshot, I balked. Instead, I told him I missed L.A. Dave said, “You’re welcome back anytime.”
-In other words, the sexual harassment was so endemic at Letterman's show that he couldn't even (a) recognize it, (b) have the space to hear about it.
