Word: letterman
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...Letterman, 46, remains an aloof, almost opaque celebrity. In conversation he is articulate, disarmingly modest and genuinely, effortlessly funny. Having shed 30 pounds since last year, he seems more relaxed and upbeat than ever before. Yet he guards his emotions tightly and talks only reluctantly about his private life...
Colleagues say one reason is that there isn't much of it. Letterman, by most accounts, is consumed by his work, has few close friends and spends little time socializing outside the office. His current girlfriend, Regina Lasko, used to work on his show (she is now production manager for Saturday Night Live), but most staffers were unaware of their relationship until the two had been dating for months. She shares his lower Manhattan loft, though he still spends much of his time (more than she would like, he admits) at his house in Connecticut. Letterman has mentioned her name...
Others attribute Letterman's reclusiveness to his Midwestern reticence and a sincere discomfort with playing the celebrity game. "It's good taste," says Steve O'Donnell, who spent eight years as the show's head writer. "He doesn't want to lay that stuff...
Despite his kids-in-the-hall casualness around the office, Letterman is a fiercely driven perfectionist who controls virtually every detail of his show. "There's more tension than any place I've ever worked," says an ex- staffer. Letterman rejects reams of material submitted by his team of a dozen writers, and he crosses off potential guests by the score. "We'd hand in a list of 50 guests, and he'd say no to 48," says a frustrated former booker. He is also notoriously moody and has last-minute pangs of self-doubt. "In the makeup room five...
Markoe and Letterman split up five years ago and no longer speak. Letterman expresses no bitterness and praises Markoe as "the smartest, funniest woman I've ever been around." Markoe, who is now writing books, says she hasn't watched Letterman's show since the breakup and "won't even talk to people about working on another late-night show. I have no interest in helping any other white man in a suit do an inventive show. Let them all find their own damn inventive shows...