Nobody asked me, but … (#26)
Sharing a name with someone else is not a unique experience. Certainly, those with common names must get used to it. I have friends named Scott Smith and Gary Williams and Dennis White, and long ago, they must have realized that there were others in the world with the same name. Some people bring it on themselves, giving their offspring the same label that their parents gave to them. These “Jr.’s” and ‘II’s” and “III’s” no doubt had to deal with confused phone callers throughout their youth, and I often wonder why any such person would perpetuate that. Of course, no one took it to a further extreme than George Foreman. In my case, however, I just happen to share a name with someone who is, to some degree, famous.
Since 1995, the voice that introduces David Letterman each night on CBS TV’s Late Show has belonged to Alan Kalter, whose first and last names are exactly the same as mine. There are several things we have in common – born in New York City, raised on Long Island, attended college in upstate New York, and worked for a while in radio. But there are ways to differentiate between us – he is tall, thin, and red-haired, for example.
He is a few years older than I am, and I remember hearing him on local radio on Long Island when I was in high school. But we had never met, until a few years ago, when Pete and I were in New York City for a trade show at which APPX was exhibiting. I had called to see about tickets to the Letterman show, and, of course, when I gave them my name, there was a moment of recognition. It didn’t really help, though, as we still had to answer Late Show trivia to qualify for the tickets, show up at the theater in the afternoon, go through the “audience training” session a block from the studio, and wait in line to be seated.
During the show, we were probably no more than ten yards from my namesake, but it would not have been viewed upon kindly had I jumped up and run over to him. I hoped that we might be able to catch his attention after the show, but all the stars (Letterman, Paul Shaffer, and Alan) disappear so quickly when the taping is complete, it’s as if they were beamed away. I took out a business card, handed it to an usher, and asked him to deliver it to “Big Red” in his dressing room.
Half an hour later, as Pete and I were riding a taxi back to our hotel, my cell phone rang. “Is this Alan Kalter? This is Alan Kalter.” We chatted for a few minutes, and he invited me to come back the next night and meet him backstage after the show. We got to use a secret side door to the Ed Sullivan Theater, saw Walter Cronkite waiting in the Green Room, and did indeed spend a little bit of time with Alan that night. He told me that he had heard of two other Alan Kalters – one was an advertising agency owner in Michigan, and the other had worked in radio in Syracuse … hey, that was me! He had heard of me! Cool!
He was very nice, but had to cut the visit short as he had a family obligation that evening. We took a couple of photos and left. A few weeks later, a package showed up at my house, with autographed items from the show, and he’s sent holiday cards annually ever since. I also found out subsequently that, despite sharing an uncommon last name, we are not related. Apparently, his grandfather arrived in the US with the name Kalteroff, which got shortened either at Ellis Island or some time thereafter.
There are millions of people that watch Letterman nightly, and, while Alan Kalter is not a star on that show, he participates in enough skits and has enough camera time that one would think his name would be recognizable. And yet, only twice has anyone ever remarked to me about it. The first time was four years ago, as I was checking in for a flight in … Rio de Janeiro! No one in the US had ever said a word about it, but here’s a guy in Brazil who remarks that my name is the same as the CBS announcer! The only other time was a month or two ago, at a hotel in Los Angeles. The clerk asked, “Isn’t that the name of David Letterman’s announcer?” I answered affirmatively. She continued, “You must get that all the time.” I replied, “No. You are actually only the second person to notice.” She sneered, as if I was giving a sarcastic, wise-guy answer. But I wasn’t.
Well, there was one other person who made the connection. Several years ago, my father got a phone call from a cousin that he hadn’t heard from in decades. She chatted with him for a while, and finally got to the point of her call. Could his son, that famous TV star, obtain tickets to the Letterman show for her? We laugh about that to this day.
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