Long before he inspired the Timothée Chalamet movie Marty Supreme, the real-life table tennis legend Marty Reisman made a surprise appearance on Late Show with David Letterman.
A24 has just released the first teaser trailer for Josh Safdie’s highly anticipated new film starring Chalamet as professional ping pong player Marty Mauser—a character inspired by real-life table tennis champion Marty Reisman. While the movie explores the fictional Marty’s beginnings, David Letterman once hosted one of the real Marty’s final late-night TV appearances.
Reisman’s Late Show moment came in 2008 as part of a surprise Letterman arranged for guest Matthew Broderick. Broderick told Letterman he was a longtime ping pong enthusiast, though his skills only rose to “the level of a 13-year-old girl with a table in her den.” The actor recalled playing as a kid at Marty Reisman’s Riverside Table Tennis Courts in Manhattan—a place known to serious table tennis fans.
“Marty Reisman was this legendary ping pong player,” Broderick explained. “[He was a] world champion. Supposedly, he could do a trick where he would put a cigarette on the table and hit it with a ping pong ball, and it would crack in half.”
“That’s how good the man is, or was,” added Broderick, unsure whether Reisman was even still alive. “I’ve never met him.”
When Letterman replied, “Marty Reisman is here tonight,” the actor laughed in genuine disbelief. Out came Reisman, appearing in front of a ping pong table and dressed to the nines in what Letterman described as a “million-dollar” outfit.
The 78-year-old champion then demonstrated the trick Broderick had described, aiming to split a cigarette placed on the table by stage manager Biff Henderson. It’s unclear whether Reisman actually severed the cigarette—after sending it flying off the table, the ping pong pro appeared to shrug, but Letterman offered a congratulatory “nice job” and quickly moved on with the show.
Reisman passed away in December 2012, less than five years after that Late Show segment.
It wasn’t the champion’s first time in late-night television. Reisman also visited The Tonight Show in 1975, when guest host John Davidson featured a novelty performance by an act called The Clowns of Ping Pong.
The biopic he inspired, Marty Supreme, opens in theaters nationwide on December 25—promising to bring Marty Reisman’s larger-than-life ping pong legacy to a new generation.
