My Next Guest Needs No Introduction With David Letterman

If there’s a bold idea with My Next Guest, it’s to be as un-bold as possible. I mean that as a compliment. ... My Next Guest is in no hurry, and the Clooney episode gives me a powerful foreboding. But there’s a corrective feeling to this show. The fine art of conversation has faded a bit from late night.

It’s unassuming, and uncompromisingly anti-showbiz, with the feel of Letterman holding court at his leisure (and on Netflix’s dime). It could just as easily be titled My Next Guest And I Need No Audience. As an interviewee, Obama is as smoothly engaging as ever.

These are really just live, in-depth, on-stage interviews that were taped for your enjoyment. That's it. Nothing revolutionary here. But reinventing the wheel isn't necessary if watching Letterman be allowed to be serious, to talk at length to people he's interested in, leads in turn to a little more insight into Letterman himself. That's worth both an investment of your time and Netflix's money.

My Next Guest Needs No Introduction, a new talk show for Netflix that puts the emphasis back on “talk.” ... The conversation with Obama, while mostly dense, was not without moments of levity.

Retirement jokes framed an hour-long conversation that was entertaining and moving, fun and serious, veering into areas both of them had avoided in their former roles.

The celebrity guests ensure that the interviews retain a bit of the fluffy sweetness of broadcast TV. It seems highly likely that there are thorny topics his high-profile guests rule out, and the fact that the episodes were taped last fall mean that the questions can feel a bit stale. ... But overall, Letterman’s new effort isn’t bad, and it’s great to see that beard getting the screentime it richly deserves.

That the episode takes its sweet time before returning in earnest to Letterman’s conversation with Obama suggests all manner of potentially fruitful avenues for future installments. Freed not only of commercial interruption but of the need to adhere to any particular structure, the show could go wherever Letterman’s mind decides to wander.

Dave is late-period-Dave, wry, amused, and relatively relaxed. Here, Obama is very much the same. ... It’s not a great interview, but it’s a cozy one. The conversation has the easy intimacy that can occur when two famous, successful men have reached points in their lives when they can be slightly less guarded.

My Next Guest Needs No Introduction is pleasant, entertaining, occasionally moving, a little funny and almost indistinguishable from a standard late-night interview, just stretched out. It is long, but it is not particularly deep.

The new format is looser and less comedic than a traditional late-night interview. The jokes were fewer and further between, and Letterman doesn't egg Obama for a sound bite or anecdote at any particular moment. Besides the length, the biggest change is the repeat interruptions to the conversation. In addition to the Lewis interview, the episode was interrupted with production elements, including photos and videos. Sometimes they added value, other times they felt like filler. Overall, the conversation in the first episode is a bit lackluster.

It’s all pretty rote and familiar, and what’s worse is Letterman’s stage and interviewing manner, which is clearly rusty. He fawns over his guest more than he should, he makes awkward jokes about this new-fangled thing called Netflix, and he drives the conversation into a mutual children-appreciation session so that he can enthuse about his son and Obama can enthuse about his daughters.