Combing Canada’s tastiest television archives

Bruno Gerussi starred in Beachcombers as well as Celebrity Cooks, which aired on the CBC and Global in the 1970s and 80s. SunMedia

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David Letterman knows how to get the yuks.

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That’s both from the audience and in the case of his 1977 appearance on Celebrity Cooks with Bruno Gerussi, from the pot of admittedly “inedible” half-inch-thick pasta he made before their very “easily amused” eyes. Yuck.

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There isn’t a whole lot of the series left on go-to portals such as YouTube, but what’s there suggests it could sport one of those fashionable “this program is presented as it was originally created” disclaimers should it someday appear on Prime, as all things seem to (Murder, She Wrote … Say it ain’t so, Angela Lansbury). Across a largely unscripted series that ran for 478 episodes in the 1970 and ’80s on the CBC and then Global, some eyebrow-raising material is bound to be found. Draw your own conclusions.

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Gerussi, who was born in Medicine Hat, Alta., of course is best known as Nick Adonidas of The Beachcombers but Canadians of a certain vintage will almost certainly also remember him on the cooking show and as the host of CBC Radio’s Gerussi!

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Other notable guests on the series, which also produced more than two-dozen prime time episodes and was syndicated in the 1990s in Canada and the United States, included Margaret Trudeau and Montreal Canadiens great Jean Beliveau.

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Landing Letterman back then wouldn’t have been quite the coup in 1977 as it would in 2026. Long before he grew a beard that could put him in the running for Santa Claus, the longtime late-night host was anything but. Introduced as one of television’s “most accomplished writers” with Jimmy Walker among his employers, Letterman quipped to Gerussi that he’d recently appeared on an episode of a celebrity game show and nobody recognized him.

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This, again, was at a time when McDonald’s breakfast was so new, it was fresh enough to merit a punchline.

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If only Letterman’s timing in the kitchen were as promising. For this episode at least, there wasn’t much celebrity or cooking to be found.

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