Talk Show

By: Dick Cavett

Narrated by: Dick Cavett

Length: 8 hrs and 54 mins

Publisher's summary

For years, Dick Cavett played host to the nation’s most famous personalities on his late-night talk show. In this humorous and evocative book, we get to hear Cavett's best tales, as he recounts great moments with the legendary entertainers who crossed his path and offers his own trenchant commentary on contemporary American culture and politics.

Pull up a chair and listen to Cavett's stories about one-upping Bette Davis, testifying on behalf of John Lennon, confronting Richard Nixon, scheming with John Updike, befriending William F. Buckley, and palling around with Groucho Marx. Sprinkled in are tales of his childhood in Nebraska in the 1940s and 1950s, where he honed his sense of comic timing and his love of magic.

Cavett is also a wry cultural observer, looking at America today and pointing out the foibles that we so often fail to notice about ourselves. And don't even get him started on politicians.

A generation of Americans ended their evenings in Dick Cavett's company. Talk Show is a way to welcome him back.

©2010 Richard A. Cavett (P)2010 Macmillan Audio

Exceptional.

This book was exceptionally well written and performed-Mr. Cavette has had a fascinating career and shared so much of it in this book. I always thought he was intelligent but I have learned he is brilliant with a wonderful and wry sense of humor. I felt he gave me a gift with this book.

Honor for the intellectuals

Would you recommend this audiobook to a friend? If so, why?

I already have recommended it to several friends. It is so refreshing to know that there are still intellectuals among us and Dick Cavett is certainly one of them. It was a joy to listen to Mr. Cavett read his essays on a wide array of subjects ranging from the quirky show business folks he has met and interviewed to recent political events. I particularly liked his essays on the decline of the English language.

The Voice of Reason

Can you release another volume, please? Surely there are enough scrupulously written columns penned by this sensible, prolific man to fill an encyclopedia.

Witty, wry and wonderfully entertaining...

As a long time fan of Dick Cavett, his memoir "Talk Show" took me down memory lane of some of my literary heroes, television greats, political silly people and the golden era of live television. Mr. Cavett's intelligent insights and observations of those familiar faces and public figures enlighten his readers/listeners with his humor and his understanding.
I especially enjoyed his analysis of the Imus firing situation, perhaps because I agree with it. I wonder if Mr. Cavett's respect of the I-man remains after his "defection" to Fox Speak...more's the pity.

Dick is too smart for you!!!!!

This book is basically a compilation of all of Dick's columns for the NY Times. Cavett spends so much time complaining about George W. Bush's mispronounciation of the word NUCLEAR that one wonders how he ever had a career before Bush was president. He spends so much time bashing Bush(Probably helped get the gig at the NYT) that it makes you wonder how he has survived the last president's 2 terms without killing himself. Here is a good breakdown of the book: 10% Dick Cavett TV show memories 15% Dick telling you how stupid you are(He loves to use quotes in foreign languages and references to Shakespeare to get this point across) 15%Dick telling you about who he knows/knew and his great adventures with them 60% conservative bashing. Yes, Dick does show some kindness to John McCain, but McCain is not very popular with the conservative base. The book has some interesting moments such as when Dick describes the death of a guest on his show and his adventures as a child, but most of this is a series of trashy, condescending columns compiled into a "book." Read at your own risk, but remember you will always be a small person and too stupid to hang with Dick.

Dick Cavett Talks Trash!

Would you recommend this audiobook to a friend? If so, why?

Already have because I learned a lot of trivia and love it

What did you like best about this story?

How witty it was

What does Dick Cavett bring to the story that you wouldn’t experience if you just read the book?

His delivery as a speaker/writer

Was this a book you wanted to listen to all in one sitting?

Sure if time would permit but I didn't. Four sittings.

Any additional comments?

I thought the book was a true insight as to the esoteric private stories behind the celebrity peeps. It's so witty that I couldn't wait to pick up from where I started from after taking a break. It's a lot better than "People Magazine" and doesn't mimic "The Inquirer" but more of an intellectual entertainment learning experience without pictures. It's certainly a generational book about people my children, who are in their forties, most probably never heard of or understood. I would give it a "Five" based on content and originality!

Limp Dick

I found Dick to be flaccid and angry. He dislikes fat people, conservatives and Republicans but mostly the Dick dislikes Americans. He seems upset that we aren’t French, or, at the least, European.

I have an idear…yeah, that’s right idear and I’m proud it. I know who I am. My idear is for the Dick to move to Europe and when we Americans finally snap out of it and become the effete whine lovers he wants us to be, we’ll call him and he move back and disapprove of us from another angle. But don’t come prematurely, Dick. We’ll call you when it’s safe.

The good news is Dick writes for a newspaper so his babbling will go unnoticed. Now if we could just get him to stop writing books. Well I’m being generous. This isn’t actually a book its mean spirited hissing of an old guy stuck in 1970 something. I’m an old guy too. I was there in the 1970 somethings. The entire decade dreadful. Move along. Get new stories. But he doesn’t and with the Dick’s second cheap shot at Richard Nixon within a few pages of the first one, you think “Oh come on Dick, straighten up. Dick Nixon was a dick we all know that. Get over it, or on it, or whatever you’re pleasure is with that sort of thing, but again, move along.”

He does move into more recent times by going on about the word “nuclear” and George Bush. What about Jimmy Carter’s repeated malicious attacks on the word. Remember that? “Nu-ca-Lar”. It took the world an entire year before we figured out he wasn’t talking about a newly discovered planet. But Carter and his God awful diction doesn’t get rammed by the dick. That would be politically incorrect.

Isn’t that so very sad? Dick Cavett has joined the ranks of scared, thin lipped set. In his prime Dick Cavetti was a cool breeze. He defined politically incorrect AND he was likable and independent we rooted for him because he seemed to be amused by it all. What happened to that guy and who the hell replaced him with this mean spirited little twerp? For those of you don’t know…and you won’t learn this from any of his recent writing…Dick Cavett was a very funny guy. Very funny. And a rapid fire witty as well. Where did that go? It’s not in this compilation…that’s me being polite and calling this a compilation but not discribing what it is a compilation of…..that would be mean spirtied. That doesn’t mean that everything the guy writes has to be funny and so on, but it doesn’t have to be this tripe either.

Anyway, back to dick pile, he might have fired more shots across poor Nixon’s coffin, I don’t know. I stopped reading after the second groin punch at a guy who isn’t here to defend himself. Besides, life is too short for this short of limp wristed snippiness of a pompous angry little man. On the up side, Cavett does go on to tell us about his battle with depression which he apparently won, but I don’t see how that give him the right to dishearten the rest of us with this ingratiating writing.

Here is the problem with the dick. He’s a very smart, funny, observant self-made man of incredible accomplishments and he can do better than go on with these smarmy swipes at the human race.

Have I called this work childish and tiresome? Let me check….no…so it’s childish and tiresome too but only because it comes from such an exceptional, urbane wit who really better than this.

Dick Cavett Remembers

I’ve was never a fan of Dick Cavett. I tried and tried to watch his talk show. He got terrific guests. But all that unrestrained wit and unbearable, never ending cleverness was too distracting for words. I couldn’t figure out who he was trying to impress – the celebrities, his audience, the crew, himself? Maybe if he had an English accent it would have been easier to take. But Dick Cavett the writer is another matter. He’s got great stories to tell and he tells them with the same wit and style I found so tedious on television. A few of the anecdotes are dated and boring but that’s what the fast forward button is for. Most of his tales are truly wonderful and he reads them in a warm, relaxed conversational manner. Its almost as if he were sitting next to me in the car. He’s a lot more likable that way.

A delightful time spent!

What made the experience of listening to Talk Show the most enjoyable?

By far the best part of this adventure was hearing it told in Mr. Cavett's own voice, infused with his characteristic wit and intelligence. This reminded me of both how much of an influence he was on my life over the years, and how much I miss that now.
The book is a treasure-trove of backstage glimpses, wry observations on life, political commentary, and some very memorable jokes.
And, thank you Dick Cavett, for coming to the rescue of the English language!!

Any additional comments?

As soon as the audiotape ended, I raced over to my computer to see if his autobiography had been recorded by him here. Disappointed to not find it! What do you say, Audible?

AT TIMES A GREAT LISTEN AND AT TIMES UNBEARABLE

Would you recommend this book to a friend? Why or why not?

YES, BUT WITH A WARNING. WHEN CAVETT TALKS ABOUT THE WRITERS, COMICS, MOVIE AND STAGE STARS HE HAS MET AND INTERVIEWED, THIS IS A GREAT BOOK. BUT WHEN HE GETS INTO HIS DISLIKE OF EVERYTHING REPUBLICAN, ESPECIALLY GEORGE BUSH OR SARAH PALIN, WHO CARES. HE MAY BE RIGHT IN ALL HIS OPINIONS BUT THE ELECTION IS LONG OVER AND THIS BOOK WAS PUBLISHED TWO YEARS AFTER MCCAIN LOST TO OBAMA- SO WHY INCLUDE POLITICS. THERE WAS NO NEED TO INCLUDE HIS POLITICAL RANTS. TO ME, THOSE CHAPTERS BRING THE BOOK DOWN FROM GREAT TO BEARABLE. AT TIMES I THOUGHT I WOULD GIVE UP LISTENING.

What could Dick Cavett have done to make this a more enjoyable book for you?

SKIP THE POLITICS.

Have you listened to any of Dick Cavett’s other performances before? How does this one compare?

NO

Could you see Talk Show being made into a movie or a TV series? Who should the stars be?

NO

Any additional comments?

CAVETT IS CLEARLY A BRIGHT GUY WITH A WONDERFUL HISTORY AS A SUPERSTAR INTERVIEWER. HIS RUN IN WITH NORMAN MAILER IS LEGENDARY. BUT WHY BORE THE READER WITH HIS RANTS ABOUT EVERYTHING REPUBLICAN. HE WRITES ABOUT WHAT A POOR SPEAKER SARAH PALIN WAS BUT IGNORES ALL OF JOE BIDEN'S GAFFS. HE TALKS OVER AND OVER ABOUT HOW BAD GEORGE BUSH WAS, BUT WE KNOW THAT AND IF WE WANT TO HEAR POLITICAL OPINION WE COULD TUNE IN FOX OR MSNBC. SO MR. CAVETT, IF YOU DO A NEW BOOK, PLEASE STICK TO WHAT YOU DO BEST, REMIND US WHAT A GREAT COMEDIAN GROCHO WAS OR WHAT A GREAT ACTOR RICHARD BURTON WAS. ENTERTAIN US, DON'T BORE US !