David Letterman - Woman Joins Letterman's Writing Staff

Four months after Nell Scovell, a former writer on David Letterman's show, revealed in a Vanity Fair article that she left the show because of the sexual environment apparent in Letterman's production company -- leaving no female writers on his or any other late-night show's writing staff -- Late Show has added a female writer. The New York Times disclosed today (Thursday) that the new writer is Jill Goodwin, a longtime staff member who most recently worked as a writers' assistant on the Letterman show. Her addition, the Times commented, ends "what had been a somewhat embarrassing drought [of female writers] at the big late-night comedy shows." In her Vanity Fair article Scovell wrote "In 27 years, Late Night and Late Show have hired only seven female writers. These seven women have spent a total of 17 years on staff combined . By extrapolation, male writers have racked up a collective 378 years writing jokes for Dave."

04/02/2010