David Letterman revealed that fans don’t always recognize him 10 years after his departure from CBS’ The Late Show. The legendary talk show host, who helmed his iconic late-night show from 1993 to 2015, recently appeared on Jimmy Kimmel Liveand admitted that the ten years off the air “went by like a rocket.”
“And yes, it's crazy,” Letterman said in the December 2025 interview. “And here's what happens to me now. People used to know who I am. And now, you know, I have to wear a name tag to get anything going.”
The late-night legend detailed one particularly awkward fan interaction in which he was confused for a beloved actor who’s 22 years his senior. “I was walking across town just the other day, going somewhere, maybe the farmer’s market…and a guy comes up to me, and he says, 'Excuse me, are you who I think you are?' And now, I'm all loaded up and I respond, 'Well, that depends on who you think I are,'" Letterman shared, adding, "That always gets a big laugh. I said, 'Who do you think I am?' He said, 'Dick Van Dyke,' and I said, 'No! What?!'"
Van Dyke turns 100 years old on Dec. 13. Like Letterman, he sports white hair and a bushy white beard.
View this post on InstagramLetterman didn’t grow his beard until he left The Late Show.
“Everybody hates it,” he told Whitefish Review in 2015. “My wife hates it. My son hates it. But it’s interesting. I’ve kind of developed a real creepy look with it that I’m sort of enjoying. And I can tell that people are off-put by it. And the more people implore me to shave, the stronger my resolve is to not shave. And I know, it’s not a good-looking beard,” I just don’t care.”
Letterman admitted he got “so sick” of shaving every day when he was on network TV. “And I just thought, the first thing I will do when I am not on TV is stop shaving,” he said.
In the new interview with Kimmel, Letterman, who has hosted Netflix’s My Next Guest Needs No Introduction since 2018, also joked about the weight he has put on over the past decade.
“You have put on a lot of weight,” Kimmel, 58, cracked. “I thought you were going to bring me a sack of toys when you came out here!”
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