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There's a thing in the extras on the Cavet Dvds where he's being interviewed by a friend. Cavet expresses his continuing astonishment that so many musicians came on his show and that they genuinely seemed to like him, inviting him out places and the like, when he knew next to nothing about popular music and was just generally rather square. His friend points out that when he had Janis Joplin on, he treated her like a lady, and that's not how most people treated her. I think he put his finger on something there. There is something old fashioned courtly about him no matter who the woman is. What fascinates me, is that this is a revelation to Cavet himself. All these little out of style polite gestures are so second nature to him, that it never occurs to him that he's doing something unusual. Things like the lighting of Bette Davis' cigarette for her are a contrast to the bits of 1970's sex and drug references in the shows, and it is part of his appeal. He's a little bit out of step with his time in a completely unselfconscious sort of way. No wonder he was able to lure in so many hard to get interviewees from the golden era of Hollywood.