Here’s the 22-year-old intern who wrote the #1 and #2 entries on Late Show with David Letterman’s finale Top 10

David Letterman’s 33-year career in late-night television memorably gave a lot of would-be comedy writers and producers their own starts in show business as interns, receptionists and pages — and wouldn’t you know it — even his grand finale held true to that formula.

Caroline Schaper, a 22-year-old intern for Letterman who just graduated from the University of Michigan, scored the top two jokes on Late Show with David Letterman‘s final Top 10.

“Things I Always Wanted to Say to Dave” attracted A-list celebs and funny people, with Tina Fey delivering Schaper’s joke for #2, “Thanks for finally proving men can be funny.”

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Bill Murray uttered the #1 reveal, also penned by Schaper: “Dave, I’ll never have the money I owe you.”

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Bill Scheft, Letterman’s longtime monologue writer, revealed Schaper’s participation in the finale as part of his great reflections on Letterman via Tumbler.

Schaper spoke to CNN today from France, saying her parents had given her a vacation there as a graduation gift since she majored in French. As for the jokes and her role on Letterman, she explained:

“I wanted to write for late-night TV for a long time, so in my free time at the show, I would just write down Top 10 jokes for practice. And then Chris Belair, one of the writers at the show, found out I was practicing and talked to the head writer, and made it so that I could submit. So for about a month I had been submitting jokes, and it just so happened that the two I wrote for Bill and Tina were the ones that ended up getting said by Bill and Tina.”

Kudos! Roll the clip.

Sean L. McCarthy

Editor and publisher since 2007, when he was named New York's Funniest Reporter. Former newspaper reporter at the New York Daily News, Boston Herald and smaller dailies and community papers across America. Loves comedy so much he founded this site.

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