TVSquad

That headline might be confusing to some. After all, doesn't David Letterman have an episode of his show every Friday night?

He does, but he always tapes it on Monday night after he tapes the regular Monday episode. But he wants to tape a show on Friday so he can comment on the Senator Joe Biden/Governor Sarah Palin VP debate which happens on Thursday night.

While NBC is carefully plotting Jay Leno's exit from The Tonight Show, David Letterman is talking about staying on the CBS Late Show beyond 2010. And since the subject of Leno came up, Dave thinks the guys at NBC are nuts to treat Jay the way they are, especially since he's done such a great job in the 11:30 slot. Letterman even said he wants Jay on his show the day after his Tonight Show tenure ends.

Letterman, who was once the heir apparent to Johnny Carson's desk but was passed over in favor of Leno, has thrived on CBS even though he was crushed to lose The Tonight Show. The supposed feud between Letterman and Leno, and their competition for The Tonight Show, was depicted in the HBO film (and Bill Carter book) The Late Shift. (If you've never seen it, buy or rent it; it's one of the best films ever about how TV works behind the scenes.)

If you're like me, the last two weeks of Late Show reruns have driven you crazy. I actually get a little bummed out when the late night shows are in repeats, especially Letterman's show. Letterman is always the great bookend to my day. I can always count on him to entertain me before I go to bed, to make me laugh. But he has been in repeats for the past two weeks (not just one, but two!) and it's been lame. I mean, if they had older repeats from two, four, six, ten years ago, that would be cool (we've talked about this here several times before), but it's always repeats from a few weeks ago and that's just tedious.

So, to hold us over until new episodes of The Late Show start this Monday, a few videos from Letterman's past. The first one is from the Jacksons Variety Show in 1977 and features Dave with Michael Jackson!

It seriously sends a message to CBS when even Nightline as well as Leno is beating Letterman in the ratings. Nightline averaged 3.6 million viewers for the week ended May 19. The Tonight Show with Jay Leno averaged 5 million and The Late Show with David Letterman averaged 3.4 million according to latest Nielsen Media Research data.

It's tough to believe that David Letterman has fallen from grace so far and is now largely irrelevant. Given the gap, perhaps NBC should look into keeping Leno for a little bit longer rather than have him leave in 2009, particularly considering that even Craig Ferguson is beating Conan O'Brien in the ratings.

I remember when Letterman was a shot of adrenaline to the late night wars. What has Letterman done (or not done) to place him in the number three position? If CBS decided to replace Letterman, who would be the logical choice for the timeslot?

Jim Carrey has been doing the talk show circuits to promote his new movie The Number 23. I'm always waiting for him to mention Lost's Easter eggs, but it seems that he sure loves himself some David Caruso and CSI.

In his visit to The Late Show With David Letterman, Carrey's exuberant comedic personality came out to play and he paid homage to David Caruso by doing his own impressions of the CSI actor.

If you're Jim Carrey, all you need is a good pair of sunglasses and a line from your favorite cartoon!

And in other Top 5 news, if you're looking for someone to say that they have never seen Paula Abdul drink...

Hold everything! Here's my favorite ad of the day so far.

It shows Late Show host David Letterman and Oprah Winfrey sitting on a couch watching the game (Oprah's show is based in Chicago and Letterman is from Indianapolis), eating potato chips. I believe Letterman had his arm around Oprah. Awwwwwwww.

You don't see Letterman in many commercials, acting with his goofy side. And seeing Oprah in the ad with him, after the whole Oprah/Uma thing from years ago and her guest appearance on his talk show last year in 2005...just brilliant. I'd like to say right now that whoever thought of this ad should get a big raise. If Letterman or Oprah thought of it, well, no raise for them because they already make enough money.

I think I'd watch a Letterman/Oprah sitcom where they play a married couple.

Some of you might be asking, yeah, Richard Simmons is going to be on The Late Show With David Letterman tonight, so what? Well, you didn't see what happened on the show six years ago.

The diet and exercise maven was on Letterman's show around Thanksgiving, and he was dressed as a turkey, basically acting like Richard Simmons always acts, only this time dressed as poultry. Well, his antics really got to Dave this time and Letterman kinda blew up at him (I think Simmons might have grabbed Dave or hurt his back somehow), shooting him with a fire extinguisher several times and telling him to get the f**k out several times (CBS bleeped the words, of course). Dave has talked about the incident many times since then, and has even showed the clip several times. Tonight, Simmons returns to the show for the first time since the incident. I wonder what they'll talk about? (The pic on the right is from a different Simmons appearance on the show.)

On a related note, if you'd like to hear Simmons swear, check out this video.

We told you earlier about Michael Richards' racial outburst at a comedy club over the weekend, and it was unfortunate timing, since Jerry Seinfeld was going to be on Letterman tonight and the 7th season DVD set was coming out tomorrow. But now comes word that Richards will actually appear on the show during Seinfeld's segment, via satellite, to explain his side of the story.

Defamer has the details, including a report from someone who was at the taping of the show, which airs on CBS at 11:35.

I guess you could say that it's a spoiler, since you read what Richards is going to say, but I'm sure it's still worth watching.

Conan O'Brien is once again taking his show on the road... all the way to windy Chicago. For the week of May 9-12, Conan will broadcast from the Chicago Theater. It's not something he does every year. In 1999, Conan went to Los Angeles, but his all-time best trip was to Toronto, Canada in 2003 where Jim Carrey and the Barenaked Ladies made the audiences go nuts. And Triumph the Insult Comic Dog famously became a topic of discussion in the Canadian Parliament when he targeted French-Canadians in a legendary sketch.

When he visits Chicago, what does Conan need to see?