text: Primetime Emmy Late Show with David Letterman was nominated as Outstanding Variety, Music or Comedy Series for 16 seasons in a row, from the 1993–94 season through the 2008–09 season. Including the nominations for its NBC Late Night predecessor, the Letterman cast and crew had been nominated 26 consecutive times in this category.
  Late Show with David Letterman won the award six times:
  1993–94 winner Outstanding Variety, Music or Comedy Series
  1997–98 winner Outstanding Variety, Music or Comedy Series
  1998–99 winner Outstanding Variety, Music or Comedy Series
  1999–00 winner Outstanding Variety, Music or Comedy Series
  2000–01 winner Outstanding Variety, Music or Comedy Series
  2001–02 winner Outstanding Variety, Music or Comedy Series
  Ratings and revenue
  The show's highest rated episode was on February 23, 1994, after the 1994 Winter Olympics (78.8 million) with 15 million viewers. Its second-highest-rated show aired two days later with 11.1 million viewers. Both were preceded by the ladies' figure skating competition which had high interest due to the attack on Nancy Kerrigan at the 1994 United States Figure Skating Championships by Tonya Harding's ex-husband and due to both women competing in the event.
  In February 2013, TV by the Numbers reported that Late Show averaged about 3.1 million per show in season-to-date live-plus-seven-day ratings (i.e., from February 4). A year later, average viewership was down to 2.8 million.