Anybody watch Letterman tonight?

He did one of those silly contests called "What's In the Soup?," where he takes a guy off the street, blindfolds him and asks him to reach into a bowl of soup and guess what the object is (a clock radio). Well, the contestant appears to be very normal and is smiling and chatting it up with Dave and Rupert (the owner of the deli where the contest is being shot) before the contest starts. When they finally start the 30-second clock, the man rolls up his sleeves, sticks his hands in the soup and immediately begins screaming "Ow, ow, dammit, it's totally hot, what the hell!" He gets up in Rupert's face, threatens to sue and just storms out of there. Rupert was completely shocked -- there is no way he's that good of an actor -- so if it was a gag, he wasn't in on it. Did anybody watch this? If so, do you think it was staged, the guy was a nut who just wanted to be on TV, or the guy really got burned?

 

Rupert cannot do improv. They keep him out of the loop on everything.

 

Exactly. They've been doing quite a few audience-plant bits lately.

 

The fact they picked a guy instead of the standard hot-looking girl should have been your first clue.

 

It was fixed, dignan.

 

How was "Great Moments in Presidential Speeches" last night?

 

It was fixed.

You can see the curly cord of an earpiece down his neck as he leaves.

Rupert might not have been in on it, though, because I too was impressed with his reaction