Former Late Night writer: David Letterman's explanation for not hiring women was a "master class in distortion"

The Cut

Letterman co-created his NBC Late Night show with a woman, his then-girlfriend Merrill Markoe, who served as the original head writer and was responsible for many of its innovations. Yet in 33 years as a late-night host, he mostly avoided bringing in female writers. Nell Scovell, who became the second female Late Night writer when she was hired in its ninth season, dissects Letterman's recent explanation to Tina Fey on My Next Guest Needs No Introduction on his lack of women writers, and finds a straw-man argument, scapegoating, obfuscation and nonsense. Scovell, the author of a recent book on her experience as a female TV writer, writes: "After creating a straw-man argument that women just weren’t interested in working on an award-winning TV show, Letterman sets out to further absolve himself of guilt." Scovell also contacted Markoe, asking why "she may have slipped Letterman’s mind." Markoe wrote back, “Because we were having sex, maybe he remembers me as an intern.”