David Letterman turned down a Veep cameo because he thought he’d 'ruin it'

‘Veep’ doesn’t do cameos. Over the course of its five seasons there hasn’t been one on the show. But that was all set to change in its upcoming new batch of episodes when talk-show icon David Letterman was asked to make an appearance.

Letterman, who retired as the host of ‘The Late Show’ in 2015, admitted to Vulture that because he is such a “big fan of ‘Veep’” he considered popping up on it, too. However, after a day’s worth of consideration he changed his mind because he was certain he’d ruin it.

“Here’s how nice they were,” David Letterman said of the team behind ‘Veep’. “They asked if I would consider a cameo. Holy s*** – I got so scared. I thought about it for 24 hours and then I told them, ‘Here’s what would happen: I’m going to do your show. I’m going to worry about it, I’m going to get sick to my stomach, and I’m going to ruin it. I can’t do that to you.”

Unfortunately, after being quizzed about David Letterman’s brief dalliance with ‘Veep’ by The Daily Beast, neither its star Julia Louis-Dreyfus nor its showrunner David Mandel could provide further details because it would have occurred in ninth episode of season six, with the former ‘Seinfeld’ star admitting, “We can’t really explain it now.”

Mandel added, “There has never been a cameo in the history of ‘Veep’, before me or since I took over. Newsmen have never played themselves. We sort of backed into this. I feel like an a**hole because it will make sense when you see it.”

All that David Mandel would say about almost securing Letterman on ‘Veep’ was, “It was wild just talking to him on the phone. Those were the exact words that he said to us, but we did get him to think about it for 24 hours. That alone, speaking as somebody who’s always wanted to work there, that was a victory unto itself.”