A PIECE OF THE PIE

Why would Barry Sand, triple Emmy-winning producer of NBC’s “Late Night With David Letterman,” leave the show he helped create to take over as captain of Fox TV’s much-maligned “Late Show” with nobody in particular?

Speaking from his soon-to-be-ex-NYC office, Sand said that Fox had been courting him for some time. Finally, the “thrill of a new challenge” proved too appealing . . . plus the thrill of an enhanced salary.

And, he acknowledged, he’ll get a piece of the show’s potentially high profits. (He had no such deal with Letterman.)

Sand promises a new and improved “Late Show”: “There’s a vast graveyard of people out there who tried to do Letterman and Carson--I give you Alan Thicke, I give you David Brenner, I give you Joan Rivers.”

He wouldn’t tell us his plans for renovations . . . but he added with only half a laugh, “I’m not giving up my apartment in New York.”