Man who played Letterman's Larry "Bud" Melman dies

By Steve Gorman

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Character actor Calvert DeForest, best known for his dead-pan appearances as the pudgy, bespectacled everyman Larry "Bud" Melman on David Letterman's late-night TV show, has died at age 85.

DeForest died on Monday at Good Samaritan Hospital on New York's Long Island after a lengthy illness, Letterman's production company announced on Wednesday.

DeForest, one of several quirky regulars used to comic effect by Letterman, debuted as Larry "Bud" Melman in 1982 during the premiere episode of NBC's "Late Night with David Letterman," which the network introduced following "The Tonight Show with Johnny Carson."

"It was the greatest thing that had happened in my life," DeForest once said of his initial "Late Night" stint at the age of 60.

With his thick glasses, pasty complexion and spacey demeanor, he went on to make dozens of appearances as Larry Bud on Letterman's NBC program, assigned such oddball chores as handing out hot towels to arriving passengers at New York's main bus terminal and pamphlets urging defection to passersby outside the Soviet Consulate.

He continued to show up on the "Late Show with David Letterman" after the host jumped to rival network CBS in 1993, but DeForest dropped the Larry "Bud" Melman moniker, which NBC claimed as its own intellectual property.

Instead, he would simply appear as himself, or in thinly disguised impersonations of Ronald Reagan, Elvis Presley, Johnny Carson and Roy Orbison.

His last appearance on the "Late Show" was in 2002, celebrating his 81st birthday.

"Everyone always wondered if Calvert was an actor playing a character, but in reality he was just himself -- a genuine, modest and nice man," Letterman said in a statement. "To our staff and to our viewers, he was a beloved and valued part of our show, and we will miss him."

DeForest also starred as Larry "Bud" Melman in a video entitled "Couch Potato Workout," released in 1989, and appeared in dozens of films, TV movies and television shows.

Reuters/Nielsen