Conan O’Brien Needs A Friend - Jack Black Returns
Episode Date: August 5, 2024Actor, comedian, and musician Jack Black feels magnificent about being Conan O’Brien’s friend. Jack sits down with Conan to discuss the appropriate use of beard oil, his Covid-era dance TikToks, ...the fake sketch injury that turned real, and attempting to ride a water buffalo. For Conan videos, tour dates and more visit TeamCoco.com.Got a question for Conan? Call our voicemail: (669) 587-2847.
Transcript
Discussion (0)
Hi, my name is Jack Black and I feel magnificent
about being Conan O'Brien's friend.
Last time you were on you said shitty. I said shitty?
Yeah, and now it's magnificent?
It's a fine line between shitty and magnificent. It's not a fine line!
It's a broad line. It's a massive chasm!
Fall is here, hear the yell
Back to school, ring the bell
Bend the shoes, walk and lose
Climb the fence, books and pens
I can tell that we are gonna be friends
I can tell that we are gonna be friends.
Hey there, welcome to, what is it called?
Here we go, three, two.
Leaving that in.
No, you are not leaving that in.
You'll never know.
Yeah, you won't know.
Someday I'll listen to this fucking thing.
Please don't.
Hey there, welcome to Conan O'Brien Needs a Friend
and sitting here with my squad.
Yeah, Sonam Ossessian, how are you?
I'm all right, I'm man, I'm chilling.
It's a podcast, get your hands away from your mouth.
I'm sorry, I feel like I'm loud, am I loud?
No, you mean in general?
Yeah.
Oh, okay, I mean today, but okay,
let's do more bits about me being loud.
Bits? No, I'm fine,
I'm just, I feel like I'm loud in my ears.
You've been used at sea to guide ships through the fog.
You are the loudest, not just person,
you are just the loudest entity that I've ever known.
I'm not louder than Blake.
Yes, you are.
Am I?
Yeah, yeah, you are.
Yes, you are.
No, I'm not.
I disagree.
No, no, no, when Blake comes onto his mic,
he comes in with a certain energy and excitement,
but that's not how loud he is all the time.
You are unbelievably loud all the time.
And Matt, you're here too.
How are you?
Hi.
Good to see you. Oh, fuck you.
You little church mouse, you.
Oh, I'm quiet.
I'm Matt, I'm a cat.
You know, I had an idea.
I know what volume I should be. Would you just quiet down, please? Matt, I podcast. You know, I had an idea. I know what volume I should be.
Would you just quiet down, please?
No, Sonia, you know, you must have had people
tell you a lot.
Everyone has always told me.
Yeah.
No, no, you're right.
I don't know why I'm arguing.
I was driving to your house not long ago.
We were gonna record that Chill Chums,
which is in Altadena, and I got near your home
and didn't know where you were.
And I rolled down the window and heard you
and drove the next six miles to your house.
It's absolutely incredible.
And you weren't even mad about anything.
You were just saying, oh, I found the hummus.
And then, you know.
Why is it gotta always be hummus?
Do you like hummus?
I do like hummus.
All right then.
But I like Baba Ghanoush more.
Oh, okay.
Well, that's not ethnic.
You like Quaker Oats, Baba Canoosh.
Oh, damn.
You're so kind.
I am a kind person.
No, you're not.
Oh, you're right, I forgot.
I swear to God, I was sitting today,
this morning I came in,
we have our little office here at Larchmont,
it's kind of nice and I thought,
huh, this is kind of cool,
we do a podcast out of here,
we do a lot of the pre-production
and all the editing for the Max Travel Show here.
It's like a little Keebler elf tree,
where we do all this kind of cool stuff, you know?
And then I thought we should do more. And then it hit me, Detective Agency.
Ooh.
Don't you think it'd be cool
if we ran a detective agency?
And it doesn't have to be all of us,
but maybe, Blay, you would front it,
because you usually wear like a Hawaiian shirt
or something anyway.
You're saying that because he's wearing one today.
I know, but he usually,
you know the way the old stereotype
is kind of a guy wearing a you know, a Hawaiian shirt.
He's a little messy, he's eating a big sandwich.
Washed up, a little washed up.
Yeah, washed up, you were on the forest,
but then something went happen,
you can't go back to Chinatown, that kind of stuff.
So anyway, you would front it, and then occasionally
you would use all of us to assist,
and we would make extra money that way.
I love this idea.
I could see people coming up, finding out like,
yeah, I know they make a podcast here
and yeah, I know that they do some production here,
but oh, I also saw this flyer that says
there's a private detective agency.
So like a femme fatale walks into a room
with like the shadow of blinds on the wall and says,
Mr. Blais, I hear you can help me.
Well, I kind of think, I feel like you would be
the head of the operation, Conan.
You might send me out into the field, you know?
Like, you're the brains,
because you read all these spy novels.
That's true.
You do.
And also...
What the fuck am I doing?
Well, first of all, you're how they find us,
because they hear your voice.
Yeah.
Literally, they're like 15 miles away,
and they hear,
what?
I didn't want seeds on this bagel.
And then they just start walking towards that,
and then they get here.
She's not even like publicizing the business.
No.
I'm just talking about a bagel?
Yeah.
I have the least, my job sucks on this detective agent.
You don't have to do anything.
You're the cool guy?
Yeah, but you get paid, and you just basically,
that's all you care about.
Yeah, that's right. Anyway're the cool guy? Yeah, but you get paid and you just basically, that's all you care about.
Anyway, I envision it this way because,
Blay, you can't lead with Conan.
That's just too overwhelming.
Oh, that's true.
And also, you want this woman to come in
and sort of start to fall in love with you.
If I come in, that's screwed.
Okay.
Okay, do you know what I mean?
Yeah, no, I know what you mean.
I come in with my BD energy. Ugh.
You don't stand a chance.
What are you doing then in this detective agency?
Yeah, what do you do?
I think I come in every now and then
in certain situations, like undercover work.
What?
Yeah.
You would never be able to do undercover work.
I would, I can crouch.
If your life depended on it.
When I crouch, people don't-
You're the twist villain.
I can crouch. I can crouch. What your life depended on it. When I crouch, people don't- You're the twist villain.
I can crouch.
I can crouch.
What does crouching have to do with being undercover?
Most people-
That's literally being under some covers.
Most people spot me because I'm very tall.
Right.
So if I crouched and I hid the red hair,
the red pompadour, and I could have different disguises,
but I would go out there and I'm a,
you don't have to admit I'm a pretty good character actor.
I could, I could.
You've done all those soap operas on the travel shows.
Yeah.
You play all those different characters, you know,
but anyway.
You look exactly the same.
You look exactly like you.
You can, I've been out with you when you're wearing a hat
and sunglasses and you're looking,
trying to look like blend in.
Everyone knows it's you.
I've been there.
Don't you have a story where you were literally covered
head to toe and Martin Shirt was like,
hey Conan, and you were like, I'm fully under a sheet.
Yeah, it happens.
I was with my daughter and people were saying hi and stuff
and so we went into a sunglass store and my daughter Nev
and this is a true story, we're done in Santa Monica
on the promenade and they had these glasses
that cover your whole face and I said, let's just try those.
And I bought them and I put them on
and I walked out with my daughter and she's a witness.
And the person went by and went, cool glasses, Conan.
But anyway, well, the other thing I could do
is also just be me.
If the undercover isn't gonna work, I could say,
hey, Conan O'Brien, you're probably a fan, you know?
And then that gets the conversation started
and I get some information.
But, and another way, you know the way detectives
are always shelling out, here's a 20, here's a 20,
here's a 20, what do you know what's on the street?
I could do that, but I could do it with like, you know,
here's tickets to a podcast down as a-
Here's a headshot.
Yeah, here's a headshot, what's the word on the street?
And then the guy would be like, what, I don't want this.
And by the way, this headshot looks 20 years old.
And word on the street is you're going around
passing out headshots.
Yeah, just find it.
You know, I'm at the shoes sign stand, I'm like,
hey buddy, what do you know, what do you know?
He's like, well, I don't know much.
Oh yeah, I think you do.
And I hand over a headshot that was taken in 1993.
I'm wearing like a padded shoulder jacket.
It's for the late night with Conan O'Brien show.
And I'm like, hey, maybe now you remember a little better.
And he's like, yeah, I remember that you've aged horribly.
And he already has one,
because the guy before you gave him one
that you gave that guy.
And they're all, and guess what?
I walked back to the detective agency
and they're in the trash cans all the way back.
They've been thrown away.
Never solved the case.
Yeah.
I don't know.
I just think it's something to explore.
A detective agency.
I'm fully on board.
And Clay, you'd be up for it, right?
I'm fully on board.
That sounds fun.
I think my life needs more excitement.
All of our lives need more excitement, I think.
You know what we could do?
We'll put it in the tropes,
which is we can light it so that it looks like
there's window coming through some shades.
We can get a slow moving ceiling fan,
lot of filing cabinets, messy sandwich.
And that'll just be one corner
of another pristine office.
Yeah.
It's a bourbon in a drawer.
We hire a saxophonist to just kind of play
just always lonely saxophone.
Choose the Hawaiian version,
her ancient version of a detective or that version.
You can't blend the two versions.
Do whatever you want.
Who's even listening to this thing right now?
Oh, okay.
She just shouts, I'm not.
Cares.
The rap sign's been up for like five minutes.
Yeah.
I thought you were just asking us,
do we want to order a rap?
Oh, that would be a rap question mark.
This detective agency is never gonna work.
Okay, maybe the detective agency is a bad idea.
We'll think of something else.
I want us to have another service here.
So let's think of what that is.
I'm fully in.
Ceramics?
Hey, massage.
Ugh.
Okay.
No, like people come in to give you a massage?
Wait, that would be fantastic.
What kind of business is that?
I have to start giving people massages in a Hawaiian shirt.
I don't know. I'm gonna work on this.
I'm gonna figure it out.
Okay.
All right.
Well, and if anyone out there has any suggestions,
I'd like this, I'd like there to be
one more income stream here, one other source of revenue.
So let's think of what it is here at Team Coco.
Okay.
Now we have to do an intro. Yeah, now this was what it is here at Team Coco. Okay.
Now we have to do an intro.
Yeah, now this was what this was.
Never get these right.
Jack Black.
Okay.
My guest today is a hilarious actor
and you know him from movies like School of Rock,
Tropic Thunder and Jumanji.
Welcome to the jungle.
Now you can see him in the new movie Borderlands.
I am thrilled he's here today. He is a life force.
Jack Black, welcome.
You're the first guy and or woman who brought me an apple.
You brought me an apple.
I did.
My father has an apple orchard in Washington and I had him's FedEx in ice box
Like I'm kidding. I got that from your green room
I was gonna eat it myself, but then as soon as I'm giving it to come
You know what for a step was there a second where you thought his dad was?
I was on board that whole time.
You know why?
Because there's a kernel of truth.
My father does have, well, he did have an apple orchard.
He switched over to grapes.
Boo.
Boo.
It's hard work farming.
Boo.
I like to boo arbitrary things, like yay apple, boo grapes.
33.
What happened? So now he's, I'm thinking about how old my dad is.
Born in 1941.
Okay, I can do the math on that, he's 111.
No, he's like 84.
It's pretty, he's getting up there for farm work, you know?
But he's still living on the farm doing,
keeps him healthy.
My dad, 95.
No way. Yeah.
And he's, he does, he spots people at the gym, which is, that's what he does for a living. Great way. Yeah, and he spots people at the gym,
which is, that's what he does for a living.
Great, jeans.
Yeah.
Well, it doesn't work out.
His torso always falls off the minute he grabs the weight.
Dude, spotting is no joke.
You gotta be ready to do it.
And he doesn't bleed, just a weird dust comes out.
I'm telling you, they sew him back up and he's okay.
Yay.
You gotta respect to work out.
As jokes go, that was an apple.
Listen, we're gonna get a lot of good apple crunch
going right now in this podcast.
That's nice. Yeah.
What do they call that,
the thing the kids do now with the sounds?
Synos, ASMR.
What was I going for?
I don't know.
What did you say?
Synesthesia?
Yeah, synesthesia.
What's the one where a kid can't stand?
Misophonia.
Yeah, misophonia. Misophonia. Yeah, misophonia.
Misophonia.
Yeah.
Is it misophonia?
Misohony.
Okay, I let it go.
No way!
You know what I did?
I saw it and I let it go.
You did?
I saw it and I let it go and you grabbed it.
And that's the difference.
Full metal jacket.
That's right.
I see what you're doing.
Full metal Jack Blacket, misohony.
Yeah. Nice.
Hey.
That's exactly what I was doing. Jack, as you're... in full metal Jack Blacket, me so hony. Yeah. Nice. Hey.
That's exactly what I was doing.
Jack, as you're chomping away on that apple like an animal,
I mean, a horse. It's so good.
A horse has more dignity eating an apple
than you are right now.
You're out of control.
Also, I could have gotten A in this class
if I had just let you think I got you this apple,
but instead I took it back.
And you've angered me.
And you've angered...
I'm gonna say worth it, though.
Every bite is another delicious explosion.
Oh.
Oh, my God.
Oh, my God.
You got good apples.
You know, this beard that your face has generated
is insane.
Look at that beard. That is a crazy beard.
And all I'm wondering is how much food,
cause I'm looking at you eat the apple
and I think a third of the apple is going into the beard.
So much of my food goes into my beard nowadays.
It's, it's funny.
It's certain foods, the apples,
I'm not going to get any apple in my beard.
Maybe some apple juice.
But the food that gets in there, obviously,
it's the soups, anything that's got like,
that you have to eat with a spoon
is gonna end up in my beard.
And people say, oh, it's great, I get to eat it later.
It's not great.
And whenever it happens, a lot of times,
I will go and take a shower right after a meal
because the napkin won't get it off,
you'll still have residue in the hair.
Did you just say residue?
I did.
Was it the French form of residue?
That's a liquid you.
A residue.
I did it on purpose.
I like to use the liquid you.
I like that you keep touching your beard though
and running your fingers through it.
It's like a central experience for you constantly.
It is and I know when I shave it and that's coming soon, I'm gonna miss this,
the tactile experience of pulling on the beard.
I actually was planning on getting a little trim
before I came in here, because it's a little unruly.
And it's like, you know how you can get split ends on your hair
if you let it go too long and too untrimmed?
Same deal with the beard.
Now, there's a beard wax, I'm told.
You can put on a, would you ever try anything like that?
Wax it up a little bit.
I'm not against waxing.
I'm impressed by the people that win the prizes
for best beard and mustache where they go curlicuous.
It's mustache.
Don't say, stop it.
Stop just changing things arbitrarily, mustache.
It's a crutch.
I do change words.
I do enjoy changing words, and I don't know
if you're gonna break me of it today.
No.
But I have never used the wax,
cause I like to run my fingers through it
and then my fingers would get all waxy.
But I have used the oil, the beard oil,
but I found out the hard way, you don't want to overdo it.
Because I used some beard oil before a big concert in Germany.
We played this festival called Rock and Rolling.
And it's like 100,000 people in the audience.
They're not there to see us.
They're there to see Metallica or whoever.
And I put on a bunch of beard oil before because I wanted to be extra, I don't know.
Oily.
I wanted to be, well, I just wanted the beard to be looking fierce and rocking.
And when I went back and watched the replay of the thing,
they had recorded it, I saw that my,
you could see my skin underneath my beard
was all shiny and greasy and it was because
I put too much on and I, you don't wanna touch the skin
underneath the beard.
No, no. So from now on, when I do it, I didn put too much on, and you don't wanna touch the skin underneath the beard.
No, no.
So from now on, when I do it, I didn't do it today,
I just grab the tips of the beard and-
Tease it out.
I tease it out, you gotta be subtle with it.
Just a little tip for all you beard and mustachios out there.
No, that's half our audience, is beard and mustachios.
But you know the best thing about that, oils?
What?
The way it makes you smell.
It's better than cologne,
because it's just a hint of like muskrat.
I don't know what, the different, not muskrat, what is it?
It's got a certain musk is what you're trying to see,
an animal musk.
Well there's different flavors, like sandalwood.
Yeah, or what's the one that's kind of minty
but it smells like the forest?
Pine.
Okay, take it easy.
Jesus, Jack, it's just pine. but it smells like the forest. Pine. Okay, take it easy.
Jesus, Jack, it's just pine.
Listen, first of all, you've got El Diablo eyebrows.
They are pointed straight up, and you'll say like,
what is that again?
That when you're in the forest, pine!
And suddenly a hell hound has come up
and has attacked us to steal our souls,
and you're just talking about pine scent.
I love that you called my eyebrows El Diablo.
They are El Diablo.
I've always called them my Ernie Borgnines
when they start going out of control,
when I get some stray hairs up there.
But once again, I had someone coming over to my house
to spruce me up before I came here.
And I think our wires got crossed,
and that did not happen.
So I'm here in my completely unvarnished state,
straight out of the forest.
You know, I got it, during COVID, you did a solid,
you did it not just to national service
and international service, you made these TikTok videos
that were so funny and great.
You were, I would say 90% of the time, mostly nude.
Yeah.
But you sort of gave of yourself during that time
and you did such funny videos.
And I got a peek behind the curtains
because I thought this is Jack in his home as he is,
probably mostly walking around with little clothing, you know?
And you were hilarious. You were fantastic. Oh, thank you. Those were great. home as he is, probably mostly walking around with little clothing. Yeah.
You know?
And you were hilarious.
You were fantastic.
Oh, thank you.
Those were great.
That was an opportunity to bring some cheer to a dark time.
And I saw a little window and I had my social media guru, Taylor Stevens, who I called up and I was like, yeah, let's do some little comedy nuggets on Instagram.
About, how did it start?
Did it start with, I think we did like a mask one,
about wearing the mask and about getting the vaccination,
or stuff around that time that was just sort of seemed
like public service announcements, announcements but funny.
Then I saw on Instagram the WAP dance,
the wet ass pussy.
You mean, it's the name of the song
and you shouldn't be ashamed to say it.
I know, but it's explicit, it's got the E symbol on it,
and she, what's her name again?
This incredible artist that came up.
Megan Thee Stallion?
Nope, not Megan Thee Stallion.
Oh, Cardi B.
Thank you, Cardi B.
Cardi B.
And it had kind of a momentum of its own
where people were doing, it was a challenge,
who can do the best WAP dance?
And I was like, dude, it would be funny
if I do the WAP dance and we get me in the backyard
in some Speedos just wapping it up.
And he was like, I'm on my way.
And he came over, he filmed me.
He came over like it was a medical emergency.
You know what I love?
I think there are times when a comedy writer
or producer should have a siren
that they put on the top of their car.
Yeah.
Woo, woo, woo!
And if a policeman stops him,
hey, I gotta get to Jack Black's house,
we're gonna do the wet ass pussy song.
Right this way, I'll be an escort.
Woo, woo! It's funny, but it's true, you gotta get to Jack Black's house. We're gonna do the wet ass pussy song. Right this way, I'll be an escort.
Woo, woo.
It's funny, but it's true.
You gotta get them while they're hot
when you get a little nugget,
because they're almost like nuggets
that are floating around in the ether
and someone's gonna do it.
It's a funny thing that's gonna happen.
And so Taylor, he zipped over
and my son was spraying the hose on me
and he just filmed it.
And then he put the hose on me and he just filmed it.
And then he put the music on later so it was high quality.
You don't want to just, there's some technical magic that went into that.
And it went so crazy,
like better than anything I'd ever put on Instagram before,
that he came up with a thing like,
let's keep this party flowing.
Sure.
Let's get you up because the Marvel was
going at full speed at the time.
All the Marvel superhero movies were just automatic billion each.
We were like, let's mess with that whole thing.
We went through basically their whole catalog.
Yes.
All their greatest heroes got lambasted by my-
Lambasted.
Thank you. Lambasted by my-
Yeah, you did Spiderman.
I did Spid...
You...
Iron...
Ironman.
What the hell was that?
Oh my God, so...
What, what, what?
Eduardo!
I think Eduardo was hoping I was gonna...
Eduardo, what were you doing?
I accidentally, I was bringing up the video.
Accidentally?
I was bringing up the video to see it as he was talking about it.
But why did we hear that blast of sound?
Because I have the computer connected to the...
Eduardo, you are paid hundreds of dollars a week to not make those mistakes.
I thought about putting it up on the screen for you guys to watch while he was talking about it, but I decided not to.
It's the most complimentary mistake you could make, Eduardo.
That while we were talking, you were like,
I gotta see this, let me make sure.
Oh my God, that's right, that was.
Oh.
Hey.
Oh.
Hey.
Hey.
Hey.
Hey.
Hey.
Hey.
Hey.
Hey.
Hey.
Hey.
Hey.
Hey.
Hey. Hey. You were talking about just as you came into the studio, you had a story that I want you
to repeat, which is there is something about you got to get things at that moment.
I don't know what it is.
Comedy is not architecture.
You can't just make the measurements and then build it 100 years later.
There's this thing, I don't know what it is.
It defies explanation.
But you were talking about,
Miles Davis used to say, what did he used to say?
Miles Davis, I think this is a true story.
He said, you have to start recording
when I pull the Jaguar into the parking lot.
When he goes to a recording studio,
they start recording before he even steps to the floor.
Because usually in a recording studio,
the engineer, producer will push record
when you enter the room with your musical instrument
and you start to play.
Not Miles.
Miles is like, no magic could happen any moment.
When I come in the room, there could be magic.
This could be magic right now.
Why the fuck were you not recording?
How come they couldn't give him a lozenge?
Couldn't they give him a lozenge?
Oh, I'm sorry, how do you say it?
I say lozenge.
You say lozenge.
I don't mess with lozenge.
I guess you can't fuck with it.
It's not every, I don't change the pronunciation
of every word.
Ah!
No, but it's true, there's a magic in the moment.
I've had, I will pay you a compliment,
which I don't like to do, but I'm going to do it.
You're always, all those years of, you know,
different late night shows,
you're always one of my favorite people
because you have this combination of, you know,
just amazing comedy brain, great physicality,
and then energy, explosive energy,
and you've got all three and you would come on
and anytime you were gonna be on the show,
I was, well, I got the night off.
Jack's coming.
Like, you know, and it's why I,
you came in and you did the last show for me
because I was thinking, yeah, who else?
This is the guy.
This is the guy that needs to,
he needs to help put a bolt in the brain
of this late night show I've been doing for 28 years.
And Zach Galifianakis wasn't available.
Let's be honest.
No, no, no, he was hanging around.
He was outside the stage door
because we shot it at a theater.
He was outside and he kept saying,
you know, so we did a couple of those hangover movies.
I was like, Zach!
Sometimes people call me Jack Galifablakis.
Because they say I stole his beard, which is true.
But here's what I want to say to you.
It was such an honor that you chose me to be on your final episode.
I almost cried right now just thinking about it.
I think back and I think,
God dang it, I should have done said these other things that I didn't say on the final episode.
Like and I'm glad I'm here to get a chance to do it.
But the meaningfulness of when I first came on your show,
you were the first talk show I came on to in the national spotlight.
And I was so fucking nervous.
And and I asked you, is it OK if I like do a little skit?
Because that's kind of my thing.
I don't go on and just talk about myself and my,
and you were like, yes, you were so game.
And you let me come on there and with Kyle,
we did a little musical number about replacing Andy Richter,
which was just a joke cause I love Andy Richter.
You auditioned, Andy's a sidekick
and you auditioned to replace him.
And it was so fantastic.
It was so funny.
And you did so many great bits.
We did one bit that captured people's imagination.
There was once you and I decided
who's the greater guitar god.
And so we start playing guitar opposite each other
and then we're standing in front of the, you know,
performance area and the curtain and you know, you're playing and then I'm playing
and then you're playing and I'm playing
and then my plan starts to get off the hook amazing.
And you're, and then you get suspicious
and you pull the curtain away and slash is there.
Yeah.
And he's making the guitar sounds for me
and it killed so hard.
It was such an amazing surprise.
I believe that was your idea you came in with.
And I was just like, that's a fantastic idea.
And all we have to do is get Slash.
And then we did.
Turns out he was in the commissary.
I think so.
And Warner Brothers eating.
Maybe Smiley had something to do with that idea.
I don't know who gets credit.
That's not important who gets the credit.
Right, it was Tavis Smiley.
It was such a good idea that here we are,
ten years later, there's still people doing that same joke.
They got that from us!
Yeah!
I just saw it like a week ago, it was like,
oh, you got Slash hiding behind the curtain.
I wonder where you got that idea, but you know, anyways.
The important thing is we create vibrations,
we pick up on vibrations and we pass them on
and we receive them.
And then we sue the shit out of people.
That's right.
Left and right.
And that was the funniest thing when I was on
the farewell show and I actually injured my ankle.
Yes.
You came backstage after we were done.
Let me just set it up.
We were gonna do this thing where you panic
and you run away.
And it was gonna be that the running away part
I'm running outside was gonna be a pre-tape,
rehearsing it, rehearsing it, rehearsing it.
Let's get another take, let's get another take.
No, wait, let me interrupt your retelling of the story.
Cause what it actually with the comedy bit was,
I was coming out to perform the farewell song.
Yep.
And then in the middle of me singing this farewell song,
I get so energetic and dancing,
I injure myself.
Yes.
Fake injure yourself.
Fake injure myself.
Then the medics come in,
the paramedics carry me out and then I say,
no, he needs me.
This is too important.
You kick open the back of
the ambulance and come running back into the theater. That's it. And you kick open the back of the ambulance
and come running back into the theater.
That's it.
And as we were doing the pre-tape of me
kicking open the doors and running back in the theater,
I injured my ankle for real.
For real, yes.
And of course I come running out, you're on the ground.
It's my final late night show.
And sometimes I look to a camera that's not there
and do a take. Like it's just, you know, you know that classic,
something goes crazily wrong
and the person just shoots the camera and looks into it.
Where's my camera right now?
Right there, it just goes, really?
And I looked at a camera that wasn't there.
And as you're writhing in pain,
I should have been looking after you.
But I just thought, it's my last show.
Jack Blacks, we got this great idea and now you're injured.
But, and I thought, well, this isn't gonna happen now.
But, and it was, it was a real injury.
Yes, snap, crackle, pop.
I heard it all.
Yeah.
And then they, you, like a hero,
you got taped up, you got booted up.
I went to the actual like special ankle specialist
who taped me up and put me in a cast and said, I went to the actual like special ankle specialist
who taped me up and put me in a cast and said,
yeah, you're gonna be out of commission for a long time.
You're not gonna be getting out of this cast for,
we don't know how long.
It takes a long time for this kind of sprain.
It wasn't a regular sprain.
It was like where the, not the tendons, but the other things.
I can't remember what the things are that were torn.
I said, yeah, but can I sing?
And he said, yeah, of course you can sing.
I was like, okay, I'm going to go on Conan tomorrow then and do my bit,
and it'll be very dramatic.
I'll be a real hero when I come out there with my cast on my foot.
Was he like, Conan?
Fuck, I love that guy.
Fuck. I'm that guy. Fuck!
I'm taking his cast off. Conan's the goat.
Did he do that at all?
Something like that.
I think it was like, oh yeah, Conan O'Brien.
I know that.
I know him.
That'll be great.
Hey, pretty much the same thing.
Yeah.
Pretty much the same thing.
But he did say no dancing and jumping around though.
Let's just keep it, you know.
But you came on, you did it, you killed it.
It was, it meant the world to me.
And what I just realized today, someone reminded me,
and I was like, oh my God, I did a big 10th anniversary show.
So we started in 93, this would have been 2003,
we did a 10th anniversary show, it was a huge deal.
And like, all my heroes came out for it, it was great.
We did it, I think, at the Beacon Theater.
You did a song about the story of Conan telling my story
from the beginning in 93.
And it was operatic, the highs, the lows.
And I'm sure it's out there and you can watch it somewhere.
It's worth looking at because it's one of the greatest
things I've ever seen because you know you'd
You would you'd go through the initial beginning and and the whole and then the hard times and then everything's really going great
And then but then Andy Richter left
And it was just I mean I was watching I was like why isn't this guy getting a Tony for this?
Okay, we're not a Broadway show,
but so many times you came and I'm not gonna say
hit a home run, it's like the natural.
You hit a home run, it hit the lights, the lights exploded,
then it set off the Oppenheimer explosion.
There's nothing I can do to, I can never thank you
for all the nice things you've done for me.
Do you know what?
That's a no brainer though. How am I can never thank you for all the nice things you've done for me. Do you know what? That's a no-brainer though.
How am I not going to come out for the 10th anniversary?
But in my mind, before that 10th anniversary, I'm thinking, this is going to be a bomb.
This is not going to go well.
I will be bad.
And I just surrender myself to that.
And I go in with a fight or flight kind of adrenaline.
That's how it is every time.
I go in going, oh, fuck, this is terrifying.
And then I get out there and it goes, not always, sometimes it goes great and I feel
like, ah, I've got it. I'll never forget this feeling. And then, you know, a week later,
I have to go do another thing. I'm terrified again.
No, I do this about everything. There's just a lot of misery involved. But then if you
can catch the wave right, you have this great revelation,
this nice moment, and then you're right back.
I mean, it lasts, I can't believe it lasts for like, you know, it's like those Viagra
ads.
If it lasts longer than six hours, you're in trouble.
This just doesn't last, it goes.
And I am fooled because I think, okay, I know that happens to me, but I would guess it would,
I know I'm wrong, but I would have said,
wouldn't happen to Jack Black.
Absolutely happens to me.
Because I don't see you ever failing.
I just don't see it.
In fact, I feel my most confident, weirdly,
after a bad performance or something
that I didn't have fun at, and I think in my mind,
the next time I get up in front of a camera or on stage,
I'm going to make up for that shitty one I just did.
I don't know why that's always where I feel most comfortable in
like the defensive crouch right after a bad one.
One is like, okay, this is the redemption.
I have that up and down of performance and that goes across the board.
But I wanted to say what I forgot that I should have said
on the farewell episode that you had me come and guest on
is that the very first time you had me on,
20 years before, I had this amazing experience
on national television with you
and your embrace of my adventurous spirit and your adventurous spirit
was such a great way to kick off my journey.
Then I looked over at other comedians and
other performers and actors that had had the same experience.
That's the first time I saw Amy Poehler when she came on
your show as the little sister, and you Richard's little sister with those
braces on I was like who the fuck is that this is some kind of a crazy
performance from someone that's just getting shot out of a cannon I've never
seen her before and I know that you've done that for for tons of performance
and comedians over the decades.
And I just thought, what an amazing person you are
to be at the threshold of the industry in a way
for all these new, you know, young alternative.
That's, I mean, very sweet.
I always think that we were very lucky in the timing.
We were in the right place
and there was all this young talent coming up
and I get giddy
around talented people.
We just had so much fun, and it's nice all these years later,
just judging by your beard, that you're, I think you're 88.
That didn't have a very old-looking beard.
There's more salt than pepper, as they say.
And I, you know, served our country valiantly in the Korean War
and have the shrapnel to show for it.
But all this time later, I'm still having fun.
Like it's, you come in and we're just right back
to the same idiocy, which is so magical.
It is the secret sauce.
But the secret behind the secret sauce is
how do you have fun under the circumstances of pressure?
Like now we're on them, there's a microphone here,
it's recording everything we see,
there's a certain amount of pressure there.
You know, people are gonna be listening to it
and watching it later.
And finding that relaxation pocket,
because you can't really have fun
if you're not relaxed on some level, right?
Well, I learned a long time ago with the TV show
and with this, you gotta, that just has to go away.
I think one of the things that helps so much
with the podcast is after all this time
and everything I've been through,
the podcast just felt like and still feels like
a safe space where I'm just having fun with my friends.
The, it doesn't feel like, hey man, this is, come on.
Okay, let's go, come on.
Here comes, Jack's coming in, we got, I mean, we-
Because we don't even put these out.
I don't, trust me.
I don't.
I trust you.
Nor should you.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
And they hire actors occasionally on the street.
I just got back from Europe and so many people were like,
I love the podcast.
And I was thinking, you're just hiring actors.
Yeah. And they get my name, you're just hiring actors.
And they get my name, Cronin, no. No.
And tell Mitt and Sanja that they do a great job.
Get the names right at least if you're, but.
Do you agree with my relaxation theory?
Yes, I agree with your theory that.
You just, so you're saying the secret behind the secret is just let that shit go.
You have to. The nervousness?
No, no, no, the nervousness is beforehand.
Right.
I think all of that, I believe in that.
I believe in, sadly, I believe in the terror,
I believe in the process of questioning yourself,
of some self-loathing.
I'm sorry, but I just believe in it.
It's worked for me.
And also it doesn't matter if it's worked for me or not,
it's just what happens.
But then if I get out there and I connect with the crowd
or we get in here and we start talking some shit
about anything, all of that goes away.
You know what I think about sometimes
when I have a bad show that I'm not having,
and it doesn't necessarily mean it's bad,
it just means that I'm not having fun.
You didn't feel good.
So I think if I didn't have fun, then it wasn't good,
which isn't necessarily the truth.
But after a show where I'm not having fun
and I feel like it went bad,
I'll go, okay, this is my adjustment.
That very next show, when I go out there,
I'm not gonna care so much if it's good or bad
because that's the thing that fucked me up, is I was so worried about it being bad
that I didn't just let it be.
So that's oftentimes my mental adjustment,
is like kind of throw it away a little bit.
Yeah.
Kind of phone it in a little bit weirdly.
I like how you looked side to side.
Because it's such a horrible thing to say.
Phone it in.
But it was such a cartoonish side to side.
It was a little shabby. You look like. But it was such a cartoonish side to side.
It was a little shimmy.
You look like you're checking in on your own trouble.
He also looked right at me, and I phone it in all the time.
You phone it up.
She builds a career.
I am smart.
Phone it in.
And you know what?
I've been to her house, and it is paid for by phoning it in.
Yeah.
And the house is all phones.
There's still phones on every wall.
I feel like you were talking directly to me
because that is my approach.
No, no, no.
And you know, it's so funny we had,
I'll never forget,
but one of the magical things about Sona
is that she doesn't change
no matter how the circumstances change.
So Sona met her, hired her to be my assistant.
There was never any intention for any of this.
Years go by, we have this dynamic, this interplay,
me really hard working.
Okay, what the fuck?
Very capable, trying hard to-
Delusional.
Delusional.
So do not give me a shit.
And it always just worked.
This is weird.
So then once Kumail Nanjiani,
who was gonna be on the show, who I love,
it wasn't his fault, he wasn't able to get to the show
because they changed his shooting schedule
and he couldn't come and we heard it the last second,
someone said, what are we gonna do?
What are we gonna do?
I said, we're just gonna bring Sona out.
We brought Sona out, Sona was great,
but what made her great is she didn't care.
And you take any other person and say,
big star didn't come, but you're gonna do it.
And they get in their head and they become someone else.
There's that famous concept in science
that the minute you observe anything, it changes it.
The minute you try and observe a particle,
the minute you try and observe anything in nature.
Quantum weirdness.
Yes, you would. I love that.
You change it by the very fact that you're observing it.
Schrodinger's cat.
Schrodinger's cat.
Just make that up.
Quantum weirdness.
It's true, but you know what?
But you know what?
No, it's true, it's a real thing,
but there's one exception that proves every rule.
It doesn't happen to Sona.
And we go out and we do these shows now
that the podcast has become a thing in front of like,
you know, there's still be 3000 people
in the crowd or 2500 people in the crowd.
It's sold out.
It's a big venue.
And someone's like, hey, what's going on?
And then what's the greatest thing is so she'll do it.
And then it's over and the rest of us are like,
I think that was a really good show.
And she's like, I'm hungry.
I'm going to Taco Bell.
Oh, look, a cookie.
Taco Bell?
Can we go to Taco Bell?
But, but anyway, I heard something. I don't know Taco Bell. Oh, look, a cookie. Taco Bell? Can we go to Taco Bell? But anyway, I heard something,
I don't know if it's true,
but you and I may have something,
we have a bunch of things in common,
but we have one thing in common, I believe,
which is we both were stupid enough
to get on a water buffalo.
Is that true?
Oh my God, yeah.
On Tropic Thunder, when Tim Stiller's film, yeah.
On Tropic Thunder, and I once, for an animal segment,
and I've told people this, but I jumped onto a water
buffalo and it was without thinking,
but they had animals there and then they brought in
a massive, I mean, literally the size of this table
that we're at right now, this podcast table,
this massive beast and someone who wasn't in a position
of authority said, hey, Coney, this is at rehearsal.
Get on it, that could be funny.
And I'm just a chimp, I'm a yes and chimp.
So I went, okay, and someone brought out an Apple box
and I jumped on the Apple box and no one had,
and all I remember is just before I did it,
Andy said, don't do that.
I remembered Andy really clearly going, don't do that.
And he said it and I was like, you know, gotta do that. I remember Andy really clearly going, don't do that and he said it and I was like,
got to do it because an intern said, try it.
So I get on the water buffalo,
the water buffalo immediately throws me off.
I go up in the air and I land on a port.
Cameras have to roll in a TV studio.
So it's a poured thick concrete that's smooth,
it's very dense.
I bounce off my hip.
Pfft.
And that wasn't even the scary part.
It hurt like a motherfucker,
but the water buffalo took off.
I felt bad for the water buffalo
right up until I killed it.
No, I'm kidding.
Well, I had to shoot it.
No, it took off and took a turn and looked at me
and I ran like a cartoon character runs.
Like literally I just disappeared
and there was smoke and some hair pins.
And then I got a hematoma on my hip that was so big
I couldn't take my pants off.
And they called the Warner Brothers doctor who came in
and went, that's the biggest hematoma I've ever seen.
And I had this look like my leg was dipped in paint
for a while and I thought, well,
I think I'm probably the only person in comedy
dumb enough to get on a water buffalo.
And then I find out, Tropic Thunder?
Yeah.
Did you end up doing it?
Very similar circumstance, but I have to ask,
I wasn't listening to the premise.
Why was there a water buffalo on the set?
And animal segment, we did them all the time.
It's a talk show staple.
So they bring in like, here's a cobra,
here's a this, here's a that.
And no one had ever brought in a water buffalo.
And this is just rehearsal.
This is rehearsal.
Cameras are not rolling.
No, and so they brought this thing in
and they, I just was intrigued.
Like, well, I've been doing this for 28 years.
Never seen a water buffalo.
Get on it!
I feel like, I feel like there is footage of this.
Someone was taping.
No, no one, are you sure?
I think we might have had-
There's a camera there,
there's a camera rehearsing.
Yeah, there's a camera, but you know what the problem is?
I think we've looked at the footage
and you can't really tell what's happening because-
You can just see the very beginning
as you're getting on it.
You can see as I'm getting on it.
And then because they weren't ready to shoot it yet.
Right.
So they weren't on me.
You can kind of see, it's like if Abraham Zapruder
had been shooting in Dealey Plaza,
had been like looking at a bird or something
when Kennedy went by.
And then you can kind of see a little piece of limousine.
But the fact that there's footage of you
just about to get on makes me feel like the cameraman
may be sensed, this could go bad.
I better not film this just in case this goes sideways.
Which the instinct should have been the opposite.
This could go bad.
I'm gonna keep rolling on that.
You know what I mean?
Right, I don't know what happened there.
It's a humanity thing where the cameraman is like,
I have to look away from this, I'm turning it off,
no one's gonna see it, you know what I mean?
Yeah, I mean, I wouldn't mind if it existed
because I think I really bounced.
This was in the era of America's Funniest Home Videos.
Yeah, they could have put a boing, boing, boing on it.
But before TikTok, so you know,
there's no money in keeping the camera.
It's like, wait a second, Conan's about to get on a water buffalo and you turn it off.
So what was your experience?
So I had a similar experience. We're on...
This is like a campfire story.
We're in Hawaii. We're recreating Southeast Asia.
We're supposed to be in Vietnam out in the middle of nowhere.
And in the middle of Hawaii, you wouldn't know, it's got a jungle-y vibe.
Yeah, it does, yeah. And so I'm on the middle of Hawaii, you wouldn't know, it's got a jungly vibe. Yeah, it does.
And so I'm on the back of this water buffalo.
They assure me that it's safe and they've got
the animal trainers on these movies.
You had an animal trainer there, you have to.
It's part of the union rules.
Sure we did.
And I'm afraid of dogs.
I'm afraid of animals because it's my natural fear
of the unpredictability of the animal kingdom.
You don't know what they're going to do,
but I had been assured everything's cool.
So I got on the back of it and I'm supposed to come
around the bend on this mountain path.
And I'm just in my underpants.
And I think I'm strapped to the buffalo because I'm like
going through a drug withdrawals at the same time.
So I'm a sweaty mess and the buffalo,
I can tell is just a little bit uncomfortable.
They say, action and we start moving.
I'm like, what's happening here?
Maybe it sensed my fear,
but it was uncomfortable and it just started bucking bronco.
I was like, ah.
I flew off of that thing
and I went ass over teakettle,
I think because there's no footage of it, just like you.
Yeah.
But I just, we hadn't entered frame yet.
Like we were right behind the mountain,
we were coming around and I flew and did a little flip-de-do
and landed miraculously between two boulders
and did not get injured at all.
I did not have a hematoma.
I just sort of had this miraculous safe landing.
And Ben was, I could hear him off in the distance say,
what's going on?
Are we cutting?
Let's take it, Jack, take it from the top.
We didn't get any of that.
I was like, no, you take it from the top.
You get on this fucking buffalo! Because I had so much adrenaline inside me.
I thought I was good. I saw my life flash before my eyes. Yeah, of course.
And then I stormed off to my trailer just because I was like shaking and like
not in any mood to be in the movie anymore. And uh...
Or any movie ever again.
Yeah.
So, uh, my stuntman, Jimmy Waitman,
hero that he is, suited up and got on the back of the...
And they went ahead with the rest of those shots
from that scene with my stuntman.
And also, uh, Robert Downey Jr.
was, like, petting the, soothing the beast
and calming the beast.
And later on, months later, not months later,
like weeks later, I don't remember how long ago,
how long after that event took place.
Someone said, Jack, you know what we found out.
That water buffalo was pregnant.
And no one knew it had a baby inside,
and that's why it was freaking out.
Because it was uncomfortable.
And I was like, fuck me, man, there's gotta be a way
they should know that before they put me
on the back of a gigantic power beast.
And then, and then at the premiere,
someone was there that said,
you know what they named the baby?
Name them Jack.
I was like, that's the sweetest thing.
God made it worth it.
And I never...
No, we didn't.
We were almost killed.
I would like to meet Jack.
I wonder if Jack is...
Well, I've got a surprise for you.
Let's bring him in.
Open up that whole wall.
What do you mean it doesn't open?
I brought old Jack the Water Buffalo 8,000 miles.
We gotta fix it so this wall opens
and we can bring people what they're talking about.
God damn it, I hate this place.
Hey, I wanna make sure, cause I knew when I talked to you,
we would have such a great time.
I was like, I'm gonna go to the bathroom.
I'm gonna go to the bathroom.
I'm gonna go to the bathroom. I'm gonna go to the bathroom. I'm gonna go to the bathroom. Hey, I wanna make sure, cause I knew when I talked to you, we would have such a great
time.
Chomp.
I wanna make sure that I mention this film that you've made, which looks like an absolute
blast Borderlands.
And you are, this is based on a video game.
This is why I'm here, actually.
Yeah.
I'm here to talk about Borderlands.
Yeah, yeah.
We're just trying to cut this part out.
So it's based on a video game
that I actually played several years ago.
I think it was close to 20 years ago
that I played the first time I played Borderlands
It's been around forever and the thing that's cool
One of the thing that's cool about it is that it looks like the characters and the world was pulled straight out of a comic
Book like you can see the line
Yeah
And you don't see that in another or you didn't back when they first made this video game kind of a mind-blowing
Technique that they were using and It's kind of like Road Warrior,
where it looks like a post-apocalyptic desert landscape,
and they got the really intense muscle-bound freaks.
They call them the, what do they call them?
The berserkers.
You've got this incredible bounty hunter or they call them,
oh man, I am bad at explaining movies.
That's why I tried not to get to it.
I should have looked at a cheat sheet or something
before I came in here.
Let me help you out here.
Tomb hunters.
But you know what, so I'm watching it,
that we didn't get the, they didn't send us the whole film.
There was some length that didn't work.
That's their story anyway.
But I was watching a bunch of footage
from which they did supply.
Kate Blanchett.
Yeah, the best.
Is in this.
Jimmy Lee Curtis.
The best.
Kevin Hart.
The best.
They can't all be the best.
They can all be the best in their lanes.
Nice, got it, got it.
And then I say, Conor O'Brien.
Silence.
The best. The best.
The best.
You know who does that?
Sandler about everything.
Oh really?
Adam Sandler, my Adam Sandler impression
is I'll be talking to him and I'll be like, yeah.
And then we're staying in the same hotel
and I went, yeah, I tried the hot dog, the best.
And then, you know, whatever, I'll be like, yeah.
And I don't know, World War I was really terrible,
but World War II felt like it had like
at least an ethical reason for happening.
The best!
The best!
World War II, this is the best?
I just love that.
I always do that when I'm around him.
The best!
Anyway, you have this insane cast.
Yeah.
And, but I love your, the voice of this robot,
Clap Trap.
Yeah. And it's a really, it seems like a new take But I love your, the voice of this robot, Claptrap.
And it's a really, it seems like a new take.
How would you describe Claptrap?
Cause it's actually very funny.
Well, he's a helper robot that's kind of like
the R2-D2 comic relief of the movie,
but he's also got a bitter under taste.
Yes, there's an R rated tinge to this claptrap.
He hates this mission, he hates this world,
and he secretly hopes that everyone on this team dies.
Other than that, just like R2-D2.
But he's programmed to help,
so he's helping, but yeah, under protest.
It was a blast to do,
but I do have to admit, I never went to the set.
I did my whole role in a recording studio
before they started filming.
And I had a great time doing that.
You know I love the voice work.
It is the best.
The best!
The best!
The best!
And I got, so I did that and then a couple months later,
I knew they were all in Bulgaria, just in the deep mire
of these landscapes that are like hellish,
not that Bulgaria is hellish,
but they found the hellish parts.
Sure.
And- Good save.
I got a DM on my Instagram message service
from Jamie Lee Curtis, because we follow each other. And she said, where the fuck are you? I got a DM on my Instagram message service
from Jamie Lee Curtis, because we follow each other,
and she said, where the fuck are you?
We're all here knee deep in the hell is shit.
And I find out you are in, see me wherever you are
and doing your recordings on the recording studio.
And I said, I love you.
And I am there in spirit.
And I will see you on the red carpet.
But yeah, that's all love.
Well, it looks super funny.
I'm looking forward to it.
And also interesting,
you've done a bunch of video game related movies,
Super Mario Brothers, movie Jumanji.
I mean, this is a Minecraft, right?
Yeah. And I know that you're no stranger
to the world of video games.
Video games.
And you know, my son actually told me
about your experiences with Hideo Kojima.
Oh yeah, that was crazy.
I was in Japan and Hideo Kojima,
why don't you jump in on this?
Yeah, Kojima invited us to his studio. Hideo Kojima? Yeah, I think it's Kojima, why don't you jump in on this? Yeah, Kojima invited us to his studio.
Hideo Kojima?
Yeah, I think it's Kojima.
Oh, finally.
You listened to someone's pronunciation.
And so we went to his studio
and it was still super death straining,
it was super top secret,
and they asked you to be in the game,
and so you went in and got scanned.
I was scanned.
It was wild.
But also there was a lot of,
we'll let you, they would check the angle
of what we were shooting,
because they didn't want us to see even the people
that were at their screens
working on the game in the background.
It was so much, it was like I was in,
I was at the Manhattan Project
while they were making the bomb
and they were like, yeah, okay, we're gonna let you-
Yeah, the NDA was like a phone book.
It was crazy.
It was insane.
But it was really such a cool experience.
I love being an Easter egg and things
because you never know who's gonna see it,
who's gonna get to that level
and suddenly Conan O'Brien's ruining their adventure.
And I think in the game, what's great about in the game,
if they talk to you and they follow your quest,
they can get a special hat made out of raccoon skin
that helps you swim faster. I mean, it's awesome. It's a cool role.
That was my request.
Okay.
And Hideo Kojima, also you hear him about him having a collabs with some very big luminaries.
Jordan Peele, you might have heard of, is in there. And you also hear them mixing it up with who's the incredible filmmaker who did a splash of water, the feeling of water.
Oh, Guillermo del Toro. Thank you. That's not the name of that movie either, by the way.
Incredible filmmakers. And you see that crossover happening, right, with Hideo
Kojima and the film industry. And I'm always fascinated by where those two worlds meet.
Well, you're in it.
I mean, you are, there's a world of video games.
And one of the things that makes sense to me is that
there's such great storytelling.
My son is a fan of very good video games.
And so I will, through him, experience
what amazing storytelling there is.
And so it makes sense that there would be movies.
Well, you see some of these games
and they do come across super cinematic.
Like, you know, I love me some rockstar games,
specifically Red Dead Redemption Part II.
And it's very much like a film, long form film.
And then you see some TV shows and movies that,
well, only one really that comes to mind
is that Black Mirror, the movie, what's that called?
The Bandersnatch.
Bandersnatch.
Where it is a children's...
Let's know the difference between the way Blay said it.
Blay went, Bandersnatch.
And then you went, yes, Bandersnatch.
There's a reason this guy's a star.
Bandersnatch.
My stank filter.
And you, it's a choose your own adventure
and it's very much a video game
and it's about video games.
And you could see between Red Dead Redemption 2
and Bandersnatch, they're both kind of bridging the gap
between those two forms, and I feel
like that's the direction we're moving in. It feels like video games are kind of taking
over that space, and you can feel the movie industry kind of trembling under the hooves
of the apocalypse.
Well, the concept. The hooves of the apocalypse.
I know. I went off the rails there.
It's the seven horsemen of the apocalypse. I guess you'recary? I know, I went off the rails there.
It's the seven horsemen of you, I guess.
You're right, yeah.
Yeah, well, I'm not gonna let it go.
But yeah, you don't know.
Maybe the future of movies is you deciding
which way you wanna go in the movie.
But in the meantime, these movies about video games
that are based on video games. Would you chew and swallow,
please, before you make this very prescient point
about where theater's going and movies.
I mean, not all of them, but a lot of them,
a lot of the movies based on video game stories
are huge hits, and I think that's because of the audience,
the young audience.
Maybe you've noticed
that the new generation of gamers worship you
because of your...
God, you're saying the nicest thing about me,
but I have to wait while you masticate an old apple.
My sons worship you.
They love them some Conan.
And I wonder if you feel that in the world out there
where it's like this new generation.
Oh, that's definitely, I'm shocked,
and I often lecture them,
you shouldn't know who I am.
It's not just because of Kojima,
but it's also because of this energy that you have.
And I think it's the same thing that made the days
when I first met you electric is that this sense
of adventure and this like throwing people out there
out of a cannon, they can sense that vibe. No, it throwing people out there out of a cannon.
They can sense that vibe.
No, it's Jesus, I don't know.
I don't know what's going on, but it is very interesting
that when I walk around or when people walk around with me,
it's still in 1993, 15 and 16-year-olds and 17-year-olds like me.
2024, it's just saying,
and people my age are like, aren't you dead?
No.
But you can feel, well, this is what I'm saying,
you can feel the liquidity of the industry
where it's like TV and movies,
people aren't even really watching them so much anymore.
Now it's Netflix is kind of, and video games,
it's a, you can feel the shift.
To me, it's about, less about the delivery system.
It's always been, the delivery system,
you have to almost assume is unimportant.
It's what, you just put your thing out there
and there will be, like now we're doing this.
And probably, in fact, Adam could say,
but more people probably experience a pure hit of me
this way than they ever would have
if I was still doing a late night show.
I don't, that was not the plan, but just keep doing your thing
and you'll find the delivery system.
Does that make sense?
I do.
Yeah.
And I also wonder even sometimes when I'm not 100% confident
about the material that I have,
and part of me is like, it almost doesn't matter.
What matters more is the energy behind the material that I have. Part of me is like, it almost doesn't matter. What matters more is the energy behind the material.
Like if you're coming in in that kind of loose,
relaxed way and you deliver it with an energy,
I don't know where I'm going now.
No, but that can all make a difference,
but Brian Cranston was here
and he said something really smart once.
He said, I was talking about,
he's such an incredible actor. And he said, really smart once he said, I was talking about, you know, he's such an incredible actor
and he said, you know what?
A really great actor can get B material to a B plus,
A minus material to an A, but they can't,
the script is so important.
Yeah.
You know, that he said, if you give me a B minus script,
I'm not giving you, the movie will not be an A plus,
or the performance will be, it just can't be.
So you gotta...
Okay, then how come the funniest movie I ever saw
was Fs across the board?
Did you ever check out The Room, for instance?
That's the classic.
But that's an example of, that's just every now and then,
a meteor hits a tree, the tree flies up,
and the tree explodes into pieces,
and all the pieces reassemble into a Stradivarius violin.
It doesn't happen often, but it does happen.
Said the guy who's pretty sure it's never happened.
But that's an example of sometimes there's a happening,
but you can't make that the formula.
That can't be the formula.
That's true.
Ah.
Ah.
Ah.
All right, I gotta wrap this up
because all the air just left your body
and I worry about you.
We did good.
And I ate almost this whole apple.
Yeah, you really did.
And you know what?
And guess what?
Guess what?
It was free.
It's a free apple.
You saw some free, a free apple and you got excited.
I adore you. I love you.
I love you too.
You are, you've been a really funny,
positive part of my life.
And I was just, to get to hang out with you
and have this today, it was just a joy.
So thank you so much.
I bow to you and let's never ever
get on water buffaloes again, ever.
All right.
Absolutely.
Peace out.
Looking forward to the next time we cross paths.
Let's not wait this many years next time.
Let's get together.
We'll do a social thing.
How about I come in for no reason
where I got no movie to promote.
Yeah, next week.
That's not how I roll.
I never do that.
All right, peace out.
Peace.
Tupac.
Conan O'Brien needs a friend.
With Conan O'Brien, Sonam Avsesian, and Matt Gorley.
Produced by me, Matt Gorley.
Executive produced by Adam Sachs, Nick Leow,
and Jeff Ross at Team Coco, and Colin Anderson,
and Cody Fisher at Earwolf.
Theme song by The White Stripes.
Incidental music by Jimmy Vivino. Take it away, Jimmy. Coco and Colin Anderson and Cody Fisher at Earwulf. Theme song by The White Stripes.
Incidental music by Jimmy Vivino. Take it away, Jimmy.
Our supervising producer is Aaron Blair, and our associate talent producer is Jennifer
Samples. Engineering and mixing by Eduardo Perez and Brendan Burns. Additional production
support by Mars Melnick. Talent booking by Paula Davis, Gina Battista, and Brit Kahn.
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