Starting off the week with a dim, gray, and rainy Monday. I think we need a happy video to liven things up, don’t you?<\/p>\n
Today’s selection will probably not make a lot of sense to some of my Loyal Readers, but for all you folks who are about to be baffled, trust me: this is very cool and funny. This is what’s known in the TV business as a “cold open,” a brief segment of a show that precedes the opening credits. This is actually a pretty common device, especially among hour-long dramas and talk shows. CSI<\/i>, for example, always does a cold open consisting of the discovery of the dead body of the week, followed by the bad pun of the week, and then a smash cut to The Who singing the theme song.<\/p>\n
In this case, we’re looking at a cold open from a recent episode of The Late, Late Show with Craig Ferguson<\/i> — the best late-night talk show currently running, in my humble opinion; Leno, Letterman, and Conan, meh<\/i> — for which a friend of mine was lucky enough to be in the live studio audience. Which means I heard about this opening a couple weeks in advance. For some reason, though, the bit was cut when the show actually aired. (I’m guessing some network suit thought it was too obscure and viewers wouldn’t get it, but I don’t actually know.) But the 21st Century being what it is, the clip naturally leaked onto the InterWebs last week, and now here it is for everyone’s pleasure and edification:
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