Conan O’Brien Needs A Friend - Deep Dive with Dana Carvey 1

Episode Date: August 5, 2019

On the first episode of Deep Dive with Dana Carvey, Dana and Conan talk about the Beatles, the key to impersonating British actors, and Predator Island. Plus, Paul McCartney catches up with John Lennon in the afterlife.This episode is sponsored by HotelTonight (www.hoteltonight.com), Lights Out With David Spade, and Clif Bar (www.clifbar.com/CONAN).

Hello, this is Conan O'Brien Needs a Friend, Deep Dive, with Dana Carvey. Hey, Dana. Glad to be here, Conan. It's a six-part mini-series where I, Conan O'Brien, along with occasional help from my assistant Sonam of Sessian, and my producer, Matt Gorley, go deep into the weeds with one of my favorite comedians and friends, Dana Carvey. Enjoy. I've had the privilege of taping how many Conan O'Brien episodes?

Thirty-six at this point. Each one of them perfection, I'm told. The point is, I interviewed one gentleman who's been a really good friend of mine for years and who I've always regarded as possibly the funniest person alive, and we had such an amazing time that when the interview was over, I was enraged that it had stopped. And then we aired the episode, and the universal complaint was, what happened? Why did that only last an hour? Sounds like my wedding night.

I'm so unfunny, but here he is in person because here's the plan. His name is Dana Carvey, and we're just messing around, doing whatever comes to mind. Unbelievably fun. It's really fun. You know, one of the things that I wanted to mention was we started to do it when we talked on our initial podcast, and it was really fun, and I was just trying to set you up and stay out of the way, but you had this great idea, which is that Paul McCartney can speak to John Lennon, John Lennon's in the afterlife, Paul McCartney can speak to him.

John doesn't know what's going on in 2019, so Paul has to try and explain it to him. To help you do it, I try to do a John, I'm not an impressionist like you, but I just try and do, isn't he, it's kind of a, help me out with the John, but it's sort of like it's just a nasal. It's nasally, and it's a little more like, well, it's okay. And Paul's kind of the base going down here. Right. What are you talking about, Paul?

That kind of thing. And I have a little bit of an edge. I'm a little impatient. A little impatient, because you can't see, but we were mates, we were lads, as you can recall, John. I remember, yeah. Yeah, we had a bit of a competition. Yeah.

What's happening on Earth, Paul? Tell me. They don't tell me up here. Don't get the papers. You know, America, you know, they have the new president, he's talking about the big orange man with the white circles around him. What do you mean there's an orange man as president? What the fuck are you talking about, Paul?

He just has an orange issue to him, you know, he's like sort of a tanzerine tone, you know. Is he ill? Do you have an illness? No, he doesn't, you know, we don't know how he does it, whether he applies it or he's in a booth or something. And this man's the president of the United States? He leads the whole thing, you know, he's 300 pounds, he's orange and large. You're not making sense, Paul, I don't understand, that a large orange man is president of the

United States. He's got swirly cotton candy hair and every day around four or five little purple-y sparks. If you look close, green and purple sparks come out of his head. I'm not sure I understand, but this man's the president, what else is going on? The whole world loves him, Kanye West loves him. What's a Kanye West? He's a person, you know, he's a singy talker. We did a little singy talk with him.

Paul, is he a musician like we, uh... Sort of, he's like a chef. Does he have a group? Does he have a group? He just goes about with a rhyming about himself, he's like a chess slumper. He talks about how great he is. Remember when you said we were more popular than Jesus? He thinks he is Jesus.

And does he get in trouble the way I did? Well, he gets in a bit of, you know, he gets in a bit of a thing for being, you know, a supporter of the Trumpy man, you know, people go, what does he do? And that's the orange man you're talking about. Yeah, they think he's like, oh, googly-googly up inside, you know, but, you know, he's a good guy. He's got a terrific wife, you know, by the name of Kim Kardashian. That's his wife, is Kim Kardashian, that's the chess slumper.

No, she's related to the chess slumper. She's married to the chess slumper, right? Yeah, and she's... That's what I fucking said. I said she's married to the fucking chess slumper. You're not listening again. You didn't do this and see... You didn't listen on the white out when you don't listen now.

That's why you have fucking problems. You've always been a bit cheeky, John, you know, you said, the only time you said you liked my music was here, there and everywhere. I'll never forget it. I got a little choked up, I get a little vapor-y with it, you know, we're feeling a compliment. We always loved you, John, you know. You get a little sentimental on me, Paul. I get a little sentimental.

With Kim Kardashian, you know, she makes a living with a bottom. It's very unique. How does he only make a living with a bottom? It's not a normal bottom. It's a bottom 2.0. It's like God made a fanny and attached a person as an afterthought. And you know, she takes pictures of a bottom. Wait a minute, someone takes pictures of their own bottom?

A woman takes pictures of her own bottom? Because in the future, we all have the baby televisions in our pocket. Paul, you've lost me completely. You're saying that the wife of the chess thumper has an all-bottom, a box of extra bottoms, and she takes pictures of it with a mini telephone? Yeah, she takes pictures of it. At home, family, they're getting rich taking pictures of their bottom. Everyone's taking pictures of their bottoms.

One gentleman got so frustrated he became a woman. How do you do that? If he just dresses a woman, is that what he does? Well, I don't know. I don't know if he's gone all doobly-doobly full-course meal downstairs, but on the surface he's got a little dressy on, with some little bumpy things and lipstick. He used to be a great athlete, but now he's a she. I've been listening to you for five minutes, Paul.

You haven't made sense once. You're saying that a man turned into a woman? Yes, it's in 2019. And you're saying that someone took pictures of their giant bum-bum with a television that goes in their pocket? That's a dystopian world, I'm sure. And there's an orange man that runs the world? Yes, it's a crazy world, John.

And he's got a candy cane on the top of his head? He's got a candy cane with little sparks coming out of it, John. And you're saying that people don't write music anymore? They just tell rhymes about how good they are? They don't. They just... Yeah, they just... They just just stomp on it.

I could do this, I could do that, I'm this, I could do that. And that's how they do it, and the young people love it, you know. But everybody's on social media, talking to each other. What's social media? It's a place where you share your life with the world, you know, and you talk... You know, you take pictures of your life, you make it seem so incredible. And everyone looks at it and goes, what's all that? They're on a yacht?

Why am I not on a yacht? You know, and people are getting all dispirited, and they're poppin' peels, and feeling all bad about themselves. So they're writing letters to each other, and they're showing these pictures? Well, no, you're going on your baby television. You click on something, say, Instagram, instead of a telegram. And people take a picture of themselves and say, here I am, and if they've got a good bomber, they're a bikini, a particularly nice-looking gal, she can monetize it, make a role, man.

You mean a bird? A bird, a gal, a squiggler, a dobler, you know, one with a coogler. You know, you know when you're saying, never pull, we pick up the bongas, remember? Oh, we have the good old the bongas. Oh, the bongas. We take them in the back of the bongas. Remember behind the dumpster. She's got a pair of the gingas and the bongas.

Yeah, that was how we were, you know. She's a little dobbly on the shove job. You're a little goobly-obly. All down in the doobly-doob. It's the first time you've made sense to me, Paul. Oh, solid John, you know, you've got to come back one of these days. Well, they don't really allow it. You're all Jesus.

You're not allowed to come back. Well, we'll see you soon, I don't know. I came back one time, no one recognized me. But I remember one time, you know, we used to get really with the birds, you know, in the back of the limo, you know. Hell, those birds. You can't do that anymore. Oh, you're not allowed to get on with the birds in the back of a limo.

No, if you say something that's a little bit wobbly, you know, you can't be out in the society anymore. You go to a place called Predator Island, they're all herded on the island. What's, who's on Predator Island? Well, everybody's out there, Harvey Weinstein, the big movie producer, Charlie Rose, who's out there, who, you know, had a robe that was open, so he had to go. Wait a minute, because... Woody Allen's out there, you know, you remember him with the movies?

Oh, I remember him, the movies, with the glasses. The glasses and the thing, and the blubber, blubber, blubber, they're all out there, you know, in Predator Island. That was awesome. There's a bootleg, I think, where they're not getting along, and it's one of those outtakes. And they're kind of messing around, and then Paul is trying to get them back on track, and Paul just says, all right, everybody, back to the drudgery. And there's a pause, and then you just, you hear John lose it.

He just goes, all right, everyone, back to the drudgery, and then you just pause, and then you're just here, well, you're the one that's fucking making a drudgery, doesn't have to be drudgery, and you're like, oh, my God, these two. Oh, yeah, and there's a new movie coming out about the, they got all the found footage from Let It Be, and they're reconstituting it, so there's... But George Harrison said about John, he said, he made us fists, you know, they needed Lenin for that, and Paul, I mean, it's just still, is the story of all time. You're a fan, right?

Oh, super fan, yeah. I know, we could talk about that all day. This is a funny thing about the Beatles, I listen to the Beatles channel, Serious. All the time. Okay, I listen to that. And they always play clips of different Beatles over time, giving just their reminiscences, and they're pretty interesting, and then wrinkles will always be, especially the ones from later, most recently.

His things are just like, we played Shea Stadium, we landed in the parking lot, and then we went inside and played. You're like, that's not adding anything to the conversation. Histories really are, you know, what was it like at the Cavern Club? It was in a cavern, we went downstairs. And then... It's just perfunctory information. Yeah, and we set up and we played, and then we left.

And it was called the Cavern. You're like, all right, that's not helping me. Well, it's just lends itself to Paul dealing with being who he is, you know, that he downplays, and that's what's always been funny to me. But you know, it's funny that it's very hard for Paul McCartney to just say, yes, I was part of the greatest thing that ever happened in show business. He can't say that, but he goes too far the other way. We were just a little band that, you know, we just made a couple of Toonsie Woomsies and

then off we went. I know. And he's like, John and I, you know, we were mates, but we had a competition, you know, so he goes, it comes up with Strawberry Fields, I go to the fields, you know, it's a great little tune, you know. And I thought, well, that's where he grew up, you know, so I got Penny Lane, I'm on Penny Lane, clink, clink, clink, do-do-do, you know, and so we had, you know, we had Penny Lane, Strawberry Fields, just be like, hey, hey, wait on, hold on, he had on only

sleeping. Hold on, hold on, let me see what I'm coming with, Eleanor Rigby has a job with a face to do-do-do, do-do-do, you know, and there's a nice little tune. I love that he doesn't even know his own songs. Right. It has a face, it has a face, and it's a tune and a goodly-do. But it's like 21st century pop masterpiece, it was a cute little number, Eleanor Rigby do-do-do-do, you know, it was a nice little album, you know, with a dear prudence on

prudence, you got the prudence, you know, it was a great little song, you know, he's so brilliant, it's just the throwaway, it's like Kubrick going, you know, I made a little 2001, you know, the models, whoop-dee-boo, there we go, go to the moon, head to do, you know, it's like, and like you could say it, Conan O'Brien, you know, 30,000 hours of incredible comedy over three decades, do-do-do-do, and do-do-do-do-do, what? No one would understand me. See how I snuck in a compliment? That was nice.

It took me so many hours. You love doing British actors, you know, you love British actors, you love, I know you love Michael Cain. I really just, the key to Cain is nasal, everybody knows he walks down, but if you, if you go very nasal, you go very slow, I'd like to say coded, when I came on your show and your first year, and I'd done a picture with Ellen Balken while I played a detective, and I went on, and I'd not seen you yet on the show, and I have to say, as the British would say, you were dead from the neck up.

You weren't batting with a full wicket, and I enjoyed it, and I'm glad you went on to great things, but that was the way I chocked like this, and what I do sometimes is Michael Cain in kindergarten, I like to eat paste, I don't know why, but I'll eat things in the classroom. My mother doesn't make me a proper lunch, I watched chewed on a hula hoop for a couple of weeks, and I ate my way through a tenor ball before I hit it first grade. I chewed my desk down to the nubs, and the teacher says, where's your desk? I said, well, I ate it over a nine month period with the splinters and all the different intestinal

combinations, it was fit for my parents, so it could be toe to toe. The other thing about British actors, as I said way here, British actors who play Nazis and don't bother to change their accent, those are the best, because then they kind of seem to overemphasize that they're Nazis, now see here, I'm a Nazi through and through, nobody loves Hitler like I do, well I'm a Nazi as well, I'm Nazi to the core, what about you Siegfried? I'm a Nazi all right, my wife has a wedding ring in the shape of a swash to go, that's how Nazi I am, Munich, Stuttgart, I now own a town, yes, hey here comes Hitler, hello

hello, well James, I'm the leader of the three rock, oh yeah, yeah, James Mason played Rommel right, that was the same thing, yeah, James Mason played Rommel, yeah, James, James Mason, I'm a Nazi god damn it, did he make any attempt, he made no attempt, oh, no not at all, not at all, also British actors can play anything, British actors play Romans all the time too, you know, like if they do a movie about Rome or anything, they're always I daresay, well I also thought that you could do Richard Burton if you just take the Lenin tone, that was sort of like him for Richard Burton, you should teach me how, Elizabeth, oh, armies will crush our armies, I don't know what if I'm doing Robin Leach or John

Lenin, I don't know, I'll just do it as John Lennon, but yeah, those British actors just were, you know, they can play anything, they do anything, and they have great accents, it's amazing how they do American accents, and we can't do the same, can we, ours are a little, what's your best, I mean if you do just a basic British accent, can you make it in London? No, I could not, not in a second, the one time I effectively, someone was kind of following me around once in an airport, and I never do this, I'm real friendly with everybody, but something about this guy just was like creeping me out a little bit, and he finally

just came up to me and he went, you're Conan O'Brien, right? And I just went into like, I don't know if I was doing Irish or what, but I just was like, no, he don't have the right guy, but yeah, I've heard of the Ken and Bromble, I did, and the guy went, oh I'm so sorry, and he walked away, but then he kept creeping around and then he saw someone else come up who was nice, and I took a picture with that person and he came up and he went, oh, okay, all right, I guess he really fucking made a fool out of me, and I was like, shit. After I saw Christopher Guest in Spinal Tap, I tried to play Blackjack with his accent,

and I did make it through, I wasn't on TV then. The main thing, well now I'm doing Michael K, it was just sort of like, it's one hire, like that, I could all bet this, all right, and they go, where are you from, I'm from Berkshire, about 30 miles south, if you just have to do it subtle, because you just go way over the top and then they know. That's how they know. Someone was telling me, I was just in Australia and a woman was trying to teach me how to speak with an Australian.

That's a tough accent. That's a really hard accent, and one of the things she told me is you have to let the back of your, it has to come from the back of your jaw, and the back of your jaw and your throat have to be a little paralyzed, meaning you can't enunciate that. It comes from back, yeah, it's gotta have, and I couldn't do it. God, I had it perfect, like two years ago, I watched it on Australian show, but it's very flat. They put like, syllables in the word no, like, no, right, like that, it's insane.

It's all right, it gets back to that, yeah, back in the back of your throat. Back in the throat. I love you, Dan, here in Astalium, and then if you go too far, you're doing Jack Kennedy, I believe, at this station. You know what I used to do? And I say to you, I saw a world newspaper, it was like National Enquirer on Asset. This was like in the 80s or something, and it was Hitler, Elvis, and the two Kennedys, and they said they were still alive, so I used to do that to amuse friends that were

smoking cars for hours. Can we hear a little now? What are you going to do, Bobby, hold on, hey, what's Hitler doing over there, he's 120 for granted, I love. I'm going to teach Adolf to speak, Adolf, C-Spot, Ron, Shouts, Divide, and Fightin'. No, C, shout. Oh, come on, Bobby, you've been teaching for 45 years, ever, we snuck down in this bunker, and we took that anti-agent thing that word of arm brawn invented, and I'm going to put

a dress on and go get some Dunkin' Donuts, anyone want to come, Jack? I will not go to the top service with you at this time. I don't do it because it's easy, I do it because it's hard. Shouts, Divide, we'll die in the big day. Why are we going to leave this bunker, I'm sick of being down here, 2019. Why is JFK working so hard to teach Hitler how to speak English? Well, it was technically JFK's here and Bobby was more down here, Elvis, I can do it, let me just try again, Adolf, say Adolf, shout, Divide, Adolf, shout.

Bobby ain't never going to work, now we're going to have a visit later on from Jimmy Stewart and Richard Nixon, they live in a parallel bunker, they're coming down now. Now, what's going on here, what's Hitler doing here, what the hell, I mean I faked my death with Richard Nixon but I didn't think Hitler would still be here, what do you got to say, shout, Divide, I feel like I got to stab him, I believe, anyway, I used to do parallel bunkers and Regis was actually still alive and just knew everybody, hey everybody, can I bring you a sandwich, anyway, I love these time traveling bunkers you've got out here.

I love that he's very congenial, he's just trying to like, does Hitler want a sandwich, does JFK want a sandwich? Everybody want a sandwich, what are you going to, shout, Divide, I did something you would do. I guess, I don't know, I love taking all those people that don't belong together and shoving them in my space. I do have addendums, I have additions to, we did, in our very first one, we did a thing called Predator Island and I have a couple additions but we should probably set it up.

The theme of Predator Island is that there's one island where everyone who's been sort of kicked out of show business, ostracized during the Me Too movement, they all live on one island. One island and it's maybe an ABC TV show, Bill Cosby meets you at the dock, they let them out of prison and Arnold is the host, because why not, you know. Welcome to Predator Island, would you like a pill? Yeah, I'm Arnold Sussenegger, welcome to Predator Island. We got Harvey Weinstein and Charlie Rose on the mountains, who can hunt them in the

night but right now look, coming to the jungle is Woody Allen, Woody, what are you doing here? Yeah, great, I made my stepdaughter, now the Sinatra lookalikes got my scalp. Run, Woody, run away, wait, he's telling Woody to run away? Yes, because I'm programmed to kill but I like you, I like Hannah and the sisters movie, so run in the jungle, but I like a pill, not now Cosby, I just had a protein shake, stop with the pills, I don't want the pill for crying out loud. Let's go to Cheetah's Cove with Lordy LaFleur and Mussamo, whatever his name is, and look

at racist lagoon, we have Rose M. Barr, Megan Kelly, and the new arrival, Liam Neeson, it was the time of the troubles, I had a crazy urge to come and shut up, dive down and breathe through some baboon, because I've got an AK47, I've got skills that have a crying as above beat of time, anyway. Oh no, Arnold, Woody's back, Woody's back, run, run Woody, run, I'm a train killer, run, your scrawny little body has an advantage, scamper up the hill through the brambles and into the high crest rocks, I haunt you in the night, there'll be more, how did that pitch go over at Netflix with the Obamas, that's something that's not kind of in the

brand we want to do, we want to do good positive shows, that's a little negative, I don't know about an island with people all crazy on it, Arnold chasing them down with a machine gun, Bill Cosby trying to force a pill on everyone on the island, I don't know the dump, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum. Okay, Mr. Obama at the end, you just were making rhythmic noises. Dunum, dunumum, dunumum, dunumum, dunumum, dunumum, dunumum, dunumum, he would be in the bunker with Hitler and Elvis and you know, I'm glad to be here, the Canada brothers and Elvis and Hitler, show us if you date the blinding, show the fuck up, shut the fuck

up. I think Obama would not be taking any shit from you. Obama I think that's a little rude, he had a bad few years, he took the youth pill that we took and we taught him about American democracy and other things, that sounds like a bunch of bullshit, fuck him, never lie to Hitler, call me crazy, love aggression, love aggression, come on, well yeah, Elvis and I used to do a bit where Obama sings Elvis you know, cause he can really sing, on the I-95, in the pancake room, one night only, former president of Barack Obama sings the best of a return to sundar, come on everybody,

I mean there is a, they have that bass, they do have the bass, and Al Gore opens, you know, Al Gore opens for them. Have I done my Al Gore, yeah, I do Al Gore opening, well Al Gore is, he has a one man show that he uses to open for Barack Obama and it's called, I told you so, it's about climate change, I told you, I told you, I told you we were getting hot, you believed me not, the seas are rising, I'm not hypnotizing, the ice is melting, we are sweltering, we are getting hot, I shit you not. And then he goes backstage and tells Obama how he thinks the crowd is.

Well there is a bachelorette party right up front, and they will not shut their mouth, they have had several courses of drinks, big fruity ones, I think they even had a Bahama mama that Johnny Carson used to drink, and they just will not shut their pie holes halfway through my song, I said goodbye polar bear, that's my big ballad at the end, they just were, well that's alright, I'll take him out, I'll do what I gotta do, I'll do my heckler, I don't come to jack in the box and bother you when you're working, that's my opener, that's what I'll do, I'll take him down. So Obama's got, Obama knows how to handle hecklers, doesn't he?

Obama can make movies, he's a badass, he's like a superhero, he's a superhero in our podcast. Alright, if I laugh anymore I'm gonna have to go to the hospital for all the best reasons, so man, something inside me broke, I laughed so hard. Thanks to everybody here, I can't believe we're doing this and we're actually at work, really? Yes. I'll believe it when I see the check.

You'll be waiting a long time. Hello Amazon courier, your products come to me before I even order them, how are you ruling the world? That's it for tonight's episode or today's episode, there's no time frame when you're on a podcast, goodly doo. Conan O'Brien needs a friend with Sonam of Sessian and Conan O'Brien as himself, produced by me, Matt Gorely, executive produced by Adam Sacks and Jeff Ross at Team Coco and Chris Bannon and Colin Anderson at Earwolf.

Well thanks to Jack White for the theme song, incidental music by Jimmy Vivino. Our supervising producer is Aaron Blair and the show is engineered by Will Beckton. You can rate and review this show on Apple Podcasts and you might find your review featured on a future episode. Got a question for Conan? Call the Team Coco hotline at 323-451-2821 and leave a message, it too could be featured on a future episode. And if you haven't already, please subscribe to Conan O'Brien Needs a Friend on Apple Podcasts,

where wherever fine podcasts are downloaded. This has been a Team Coco production in association with Earwolf.