CNN anchor Chris Wallace confronted comic actor Larry David over a prickly response David sent him after a couples dinner, which resulted in the sending of a thank-you note.
Wallace interviewed David for this week’s edition of his Max series Who’s Talking to Chris Wallace on a variety of topics, including politics, his signature cringe-com Curb Your Enthusiasm, and his persona.
In what sounded like an elevator pitch for an episode of Curb, Wallace asked David about a note he got back from David when Wallace thanked him for picking up the check for dinner:
WALLACE: You and I went to dinner with your lovely wife, Ashley, last fall. And you very nicely picked up the check. And the next day, I wrote you – I thought a very gracious thank you note. And you then responded, and I have saved this, and I literally quoted this – you wrote back to me and you said, ‘Keep in mind, next time when you pick up the check, you will not be getting a next day thanks.’ (Yeah) What’s so objectionable about…
DAVID: How many thank you’s do we have to give out? (I gave one!) No, I understand. But if you, if you take me out to dinner and I say ‘Hey, Chris, thank you so much.’ Why do I have to do something… where does it say I have to send something the next day, why? Everybody’s sending all these next day ‘thank you’ texts. You thank somebody when you leave. That’s enough.
WALLACE: So tell me something else, an every day social interaction that you know, kind of greases the wheels of humanity that you think is stupid.
DAVID: Like the Happy New Year? I don’t understand why anybody would say Happy New Year to me. I can’t even respond to it on a text. Happy New Year. Why? Why are you sending that to me? I don’t care. I don’t care about a new year. What’s the difference? What’s the difference? It’s Happy New Year. What does it even mean?
WALLACE: Well, there’s even a better question, which I think is actually one of your episodes. How long after January 1, (Yeah.) do you have to keep saying… in other words…?
DAVID: Yes, I was nice and said January 7th, but now I’m revising that to January 3rd.
WALLACE: So January 3rd.
DAVID: Yeah, I’m changing it to January 3rd. Don’t wish me Happy New Year. I don’t even care if you wish me happy birthday. What do you think about that?
Wallace also asked David if this final season of Curb is really the end:
WALLACE: You announced in December that this is not the season finale, but the series finale. This is the end of Curb. How come?
DAVID: Ahh I don’t know.
WALLACE: That’s it?
DAVID: Ahh I don’t know. It was it was it was time. 12 seasons, we’ve been doing it for 24 years. I mean, it’s a long time. And I don’t think we really want to see an old guy on television until his 80’s I mean, how long…?
WALLACE: It’s too late. I already have been seeing an old guy on television.
DAVID: Exactly how long can you watch it? Yeah.
WALLACE: What are you going to do with yourself?
DAVID: I’ll find some stuff.
WALLACE: In entertainment or are you going to just play golf?
DAVID: Oh, no, no, no, no, I’ll do something. Yeah.
WALLACE: But Curb? And this is final. This is it.
DAVID: This is it Chris. This is it. I’m making a Shermanesque statement.
WALLACE: If nominated, you will…
DAVID: If nominated I will not run. If elected I will not serve.
Watch above via Max’s Who’s Talking to Chris Wallace.
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