Currently OS X 10.6.3 - 10.6.5 the ncursers library is broken. A hacky fix is to copy the libraries from 10.6.2. I have put my working copies in a public drop box.

$ sudo cp /usr/lib/libncurses.5.dylib /usr/lib/libncurses.5.dylib.backup
$ sudo cp /usr/lib/libncurses.5.4.dylib /usr/lib/libncurses.5.4.dylib.backup

$ cd /usr/lib/
$ sudo wget http://dl.dropbox.com/u/8462176/osx-10-6-working-ncurse/libncurses.5.dylib
$ sudo wget http://dl.dropbox.com/u/8462176/osx-10-6-working-ncurse/libncurses.5.4.dylib

Wget can be installed with homebrew:

$ brew install wget

The Ideas for the fix came from source.