This is a group of payphones near the Ed Sullivan Theater
in New York City. In a lot of ways these are the phones 
which inspired the payphone project, because these are 
some of the phones David Letterman called and those calls 
(as well as other telephone skits) resulted in some of 
his most inspired moments. Or at least I am led to believe 
they were inspired. The Sid Tuckman bit and the requisite
"that's what we talked about in rehearsal" jokes from the 
early years come to mind to make me think there are no 
spontaneous moments at all on that program.




I called these phones. One night I called and a woman answered 
and I said "HI, THIS IS DAVE LETTERMAN, CAN I PUT YOUR VOICE 
ON THE AIR?" And she said "This is NOT David Letterman."

She was right. It was about midnight on a Sunday, and we can 
assume that at that hour I was not David Letterman.

I called these phones later that night and a tough-guy sounding 
fellow answered with the words "Hello, cocksucker."

There were a few other calls, but after that one I gave up on 
these particular phones, and had to wonder how Dave got so 
lucky all the time with calling these or other payphones in 
midtown and always striking up a conversation or other 
meaningful contact with a wayward tourist on their way 
to Miss Saigon or a desperate pizza delivery person living in 
their own personal hell and stuck on the notion that this brush 
with greatness was their ticket out of oblivion.




The last time I saw Dave call these phones (and the last time 
I watched his show) it was obvious that the guy who answered 
was some groupy who knew the call was coming. 

He answered on the first ring and supplied all kinds of weak 
I'm-gonna-be-bigtime comedy, and even now I can see that guy 
standing there on 53rd Street and Broadway waiting for Dave 
to call so that all his trials, Lord, soon be over.