Conan O’Brien Needs A Friend - John Mulaney Returns

Episode Date: May 2, 2022

Comedian John Mulaney feels irregardless about being Conan O’Brien’s friend. John sits down with Conan once again to discuss what goes into crafting an SNL monologue, putting all of himself into his new special From Scratch, and seeing the world through the eyes of his son. Got a question for Conan? Call our voicemail: [phone]. For Conan videos, tour dates and more visit TeamCoco.com.

Hi, my name is John Mulaney, and I feel irregardless about being Conan O'Brien's friend. I feel like you'd be someone who can't hear that word said. Hello and welcome to Conan O'Brien. That's me, Needs a Friend, which is literally anybody who's willing. A woman of the podcast, joined as always by my stalwart team, Matt Gorley. Hi. Sona, don't do that. Say hi. Yeah, I'm glad.

He went, hi. No, just... That's his normal voice. My God. Well, I'm sorry. My God. I called you my stalwart friend, and then you went right into that pervy voice. Anyway... Pervy voice. Matt Gorley.

Hi. No, seriously, if I worked at a pizza restaurant and someone called in an order and I went, hello, and they went, hi. That's not what I did. I'd hang up. I'd hang up. That's not what I did. Good.

Hi. Anyway, and Sona, I'm obsessed with you, and I want to make sure I get your intro out. You're a person who's here, and I need to know you. Jesus. That's the nicest thing you've ever said about me. Out of monster. Thank you so much. You're a person who's here. Thank you.

You are. You occupy space. Yes. You're a person who's here, and I'm a pervy hell-greeter. But I just said that is the nicest thing he's ever said about me, so... And it's the nicest thing he's ever said about me. Oh, by the way, Gorley? Yeah. Hi.

Hi. Hi. Hi. Hi. Hi. It's the breathing heavily. It's... Hi.

Hi. But it's also, it's just, yeah, I don't know. I just, it was like if a little insect could talk, and it would go, hi. But now I'm just a little insect? Just a little bug, a cute little bug. You're an adorable bug. Oh. Pervy's not cute. Which is it?

No, you're a cute looking little bug, and then it turns out you're a pervert. Okay. As long as I understand, I'm okay with it. Yeah. Okay. All right. Fine. Listen, we got to settle something.

Yeah. A couple episodes ago, you really lit into us for drinking, drinks with ice in them during an interview. Yes, refreshing drinks. Yes, I did. Yeah. And you said you would buy us straws. Mm-hmm.

You never did. Well, first of all, I'm a busy man, as you know. That's fine. Straws are very hard to find. Well, I've got some here. Oh. And are these, you know, because I do want to help the environment, so we don't want to have disposable straws.

What'd you get? These are just, you know, just multi-use metallic straws, and they're a little warm because they're in my pocket, but don't worry. Oh, God. Wow. You sure know how to excite a fella. Anyone want to? Oh, I'm sorry I called you pervy.

Hey, anyone want a straw that's in my pocket? Drink from the straw in my pocket. Yeah. Drink from the straw that's been warmed by my grind region. Would you like a lap temperature straw? Okay. So we're going to, can we bring David in? David has gotten us some of the very same icy drinks that we were drinking last time.

Oh, hi. David Hopping, who is the very, very good assistant who's been filling in. Okay, you don't have to stress out very, very good. He just, I mean, I call him David picks up on the first ring hopping. Okay. Oh, this is incredible. So you brought, David, you brought the same drinks, yes? Same drinks.

So we can see. So go ahead and start talking, and Sona and I will try. Okay. So just say something important. Okay. Okay. Hold on. There's an important announcement here from the, what, what, what, what is this experiment

supposed to tell me? You freak. You're not, you're, no one sips like this. And yours is all going into your lungs, clearly gorely. You're like, let me give me one of these groin straws, which I will now call them. Look, I've got one, and I think it, hold on a sec, this is just me now. You stop, Sona. You stop.

And coffee. You stop too. Okay. What? Coffee. I laughed when I drank it. You were like, let's, let's test your straws. I will pour the liquid into my lungs and we'll see how quiet it is, Cody.

I was so excited to do this bit that I started laughing before it was funny. And then, okay, let's, hold on, let's, let's, let me, let me try it. And let's really, this is just me, you guys back away from your, let me, let's see. This is me. I'm holding it right up to the mic. I'm talking. Let's say I'm interviewing Jeff Goldblum. Okay.

Hello, Jeff. Oh, oh, oh, Conan, yes, yes. Oh, my boy, my boy. Oh, yes. Oh, Jeff, do you mind if I take a little sip? Oh, my, oh, my boy. Please, please, please. Hydrate, hydrate all you will, yes.

Yes. Oh, hydration. I was in the fly. Thank you, Jeff. I appreciate it. Here we go. Wow. Silent.

Let me try that. Try it. Oh, stop doing that. Idiots. Oh, that's good. That's quiet. Oh, okay. Conan, do you mind?

Yes, Jeff. What is it? Well, they're clearly exaggerating the sounds of their drinks. Oh, my boy. Oh, listen to that. Can I say something? First of all, you, this, this was your big, I love how you put a lot of fun into this. You had David go out and get straws, everything.

I brought the straws from home in a warm body temperature bag. You know what my brother Neil does now? This is true. My brother Neil, um, are you okay? I don't know. Have you ever, hey, have you ever used a straw before? Never. Oh, my God.

You're crying. He's actually crying. Tears are coming out of his eyes. Oh, my God. Oh, my God. You sure showed me. You sure showed me. You lambasted us for saying, we make too much noise when we drink.

Well, take a look at this, buddy boy. And then your lungs exploded. I do hope you're okay. I've never seen someone in... Never better. Yeah, this is, um, there is no reason to make all that noise. I brought up my brother Neil because his thing is he loves to drink a soda, but he puts a ton of ice in it.

And anytime I call him, I mean, anytime I call him, he crunches the ice. He says he likes it because it makes the soda last longer. Oh. And he's just crunching the ice the whole time I'm talking to him. I'll be telling him something like, Jesus, come on, Gorley. Sorry. I'm trying to... That was soda.

Now you? Sorry. I know what people want to hear during a two-year COVID crisis. I always have to clear my throat. I cough a lot. I clear my throat when I laugh hard. Well, screw what I was saying. No, your brother crunches ice and I think that's why you hate it so much

because you want your people's undivided attention and you think they're distracted. And I'll be telling Neil something like, yeah, you know, I haven't confessed this to anyone before, but I've got a real fear of crunch, crunch, crunch, crunch the whole time. And I'm like, I can't talk to her like, you know, I've always felt like what I should really want to say to our father is crunch, crunch, crunch, crunch, crunch, crunch. And now I'm doing Nixon crunching ice. Crunch, crunch, crunch, crunch, crunch, crunch, crunch, crunch. Mr. President, we really think Watergate's getting out of here.

Crunch, crunch, crunch. Mr. President, I know you are done with your soda. Can I just take the... No, no, no, there's still ice in there. But go ahead, what did you have to say? Well, anyway, they've revealed that there are tapes. Crunch, crunch, crunch. Crunch, crunch, crunch, crunch, crunch, crunch, crunch, crunch, crunch.

Do you think this is going to follow me around these tapes? Well, we're really worried about crunch, crunch, crunch. Oh, for God's sake, golly. Is he saying crunch or does Nixon eating ice out like him crunching? When Nixon does anything, the sound effect is in his voice. Okay. So if Nixon's like, well, time to cross the room. Walk, walk, walk, walk, walk, walk, walk, walk.

This is like Nixon sound effects theater. It is. It is the sound effects theater. And now I'm going to enjoy this icy drink. Crunch, crunch, crunch, crunch, crunch, crunch, because of the ice. He explains. He explains the sounds. Anyway, that was terrible.

Your whole experiment was a failure. Yeah. But we had some good laughs. We had fun getting there, didn't we? Well, why don't you go have a tracheotomy. Okay. That'll open an airway. I need help.

Yeah. And very good. Okay. All right. Enough foolishness. Let's do this. My guest today is an absolutely hilarious comedian who is currently on tour with his stand up show from scratch tickets are available at johnmelaney.com.

He also voices Chip in the upcoming Disney plus movie, Chip and Dale rescue Rangers beat me out for that role. That's available to stream on May 20th. I'm absolutely thrilled. He's with us today. John Mulaney. Welcome. Listen, I am so thrilled to see you again.

You did a very nice thing recently, which is you were hosting Saturday Night Live. You wrote me into a little bit of the five timers club, which meant a lot to me just because I had been in the first one a million years ago. Conan played the doorman in the first one, sort of the butler of the yes. And whose name you had a character name, which was Sean, Sean, which is completely un, as you pointed out, completely unnecessary for the sketch. And I can't remember, I think it was in the script. It was the first five timer sketch where Tom Hanks was being inducted.

And it starts with me opening the door of the club and I work there. And Tom. It starts with, I would say, which is a really tricky move, which is a kind of a live TV fade from home base, which is where the monologue normally happens where the host stands to a set. So there was almost this like Playhouse 90 kind of like push in on a door to cover his transition. And then you hold it down.

I mean, you're holding down a few moments of live TV in this grounded ass character, Sean, who's working there, who's happy to work then. I'm happy to work there. And I remember I walked to the door and I open it and Tom says, oh, hello, Sean. I think he, no, no, he says, what's your name? Oh my God. Okay. I don't remember.

Which feels like a note Lauren would give like, people will wonder who that is. And they're like, should we say his name's Sean? He's like, yeah, you know, like that will solve this non problem. Right. And I could have, you know, now in these sensitive times, I could have said, oh, I'm Sean because I'm Irish, right? You guys owe me $600,000 because I'm offended. But these were different times.

And so, and so I open the door, all I remember, you clearly remember this much better than I do, but I'm not a seasoned hand. This is a big deal for me. And Tom walks through the door and my job is to put a smoking jacket on him, like a velvet kind of robe. I go to get it off the hook and put it on him and something gets snagged briefly for a second. In my mind, it was 40 minutes of me trying to struggle, you know, wrestle Tom Hanks

into this smoking jacket. Yeah. Later on, I saw the tape and it's barely perceptible, but I was horrified. It is putting on a garment in real time, which on television has a weight to it. That's much more, it's much heavier than you realize. And I watched that the week I'd seen it back when it aired, and I'd seen it in time since, but then I watched it the week that we were doing SNL together a few weeks back. And I thought, boy, that's awkward to put a jacket on in real time, forgetting that

I was going to do that at the end of this five-timers sketch. Paul Rudd hands me his jacket. Yes. And it's interminable. And... It's interminable. I'm glad we're getting into this because... I throw my suit jacket off.

Yep. In real time, you watch my shoulder go back in the weird light bulb of a shoulder I have and it goes in and... You see how I put on clothes, which is like... Yeah, you can port my body. You dislocate your shoulder like a magician. Oh, he's not present in his body, the audience. Oh, he's not present.

Actually, a heckler shouted that, which was... Breathe. Breathe when you speak. You've been performing for 20 years. Breathe. Now. So you kindly wrote me into this and you gave me such a great line, which is Steve Martin says, yeah, it's too bad that this is not important.

And just... You gave me this great entry line for me. One of my better lines anyone's ever given me, which is, did somebody say not important? And I had people on the street saying to me, oh my God, that line, did somebody say not important? So thank you for that. That was really fun. As much as it's a comedy staple, did somebody say the notion that someone, like you're walking

by somehow and you hear the phrase, just the very conceit that someone would hear a phrase and then enter the room where the phrase was said to say, did somebody say it's the greatest? I know. It's one of the greatest conceits that's never happened in life. I was walking by the Five Timers Club. I heard Steve Martin's voice. I heard a voice say not important and I have to enter the room and say, but the nicest part is as much fun and as nice as it was to get to do that sketch and go back to Saturday

Out Live after so many, many years. That was a joy. People were so happy you were back. From rehearsal onward, it was the greatest thing to see from the everyone on the floor, everyone in the booth, all the writers that worked there, like throughout the after party were like, can I meet Conan? Can I meet Conan? Can I meet him?

He's nobody. I mean, not nobody, you know what I mean? He was somebody. Yeah, yeah, yeah. You should have said if I had a time machine, you could go meet him back when it was a real thing. It was so fun. It was so nice.

There were people there that, so that part was really nice, but it was also fun. You mentioned you were going to try out your monologue and the comedy seller and I could come by and what I come by and check it out. It was just nice. Yeah. I had the experience to hang out, to watch you do your set, which by the way, I remembered at the time thinking like, oh my God, you're loaded for bear. I mean, you had it perfectly nailed what you wanted to do.

I was lucky in that I'd been on the road some and I knew and I had some life events to address. So like I knew what I was going to do basically and that's a big relief. Yes. Because that's eight, seven, eight minutes, right in the barrel live TV. So having that under control, I would say I was still nervous about it up until the second I did it, but having it feel under control and running it at the comedy seller and having you and Olivia and people watch it, it was good.

Right. It was very nice to, I mean, first of all, as you know, and as people listening should know, the monologue going at Saturday Night Live, going back to, I think, almost the beginning has always been one of the last things addressed. So orphaned. It's so orphaned and it is so, you know, just completely neglected and it was always the thing when I was working there, it was the thing that would get pond off on people. And so whenever, and you think about it, yeah, if John Mulaney is coming out to do a monologue,

you're going to be fine. He's going to handle that. But most of the time when you have an actor who's never done a monologue in their life, you know, that wasn't, I mean, the biggest revelation to me was that a lot of these, a lot of people would come on the show were extremely talented, but they were film actors and sometimes they were film actors in their early twenties and they'd never been in front of a live audience. Right.

And let alone, they got out of college, they started auditioning, they got great breaks in their integrate movie and they're really talented. But the notion of standing in front of a live audience and doing any kind of humorous speech. Well, it's also terrifying. It's also where they came up with the kind of hamburger helper of host comes out. Oh, wow. It's great to be here hosting Saturday Night Live, cheer, cheer, cheer. And I just want to say, excuse me.

Cookie Monster. What are you doing? Oh, I have question. And then, well, you have question, please, Cookie Monster. I'm trying to do my, and that kind of helps the host get through. I love the, I'm trying to do X. On SNL, whenever that's like, excuse me. Yes.

Yes. And I have to say, by the way, thank you, thank you, thank you very much. It's great to be here hosting Saturday Night Live. Simon Rich and I wrote a monologue every week for three years because of this very reason. Because no one else would deal with it. No one else would do it. And my first week at SNL, Simon had been there the year before and he came up to me and he goes, we're going to write a monologue every week because no one writes the monologue and

you can't cut the monologue. And it was actually a great, easy, and it was actually a great, it was such a great way to just be in the mix quickly. And of course, writing a monologue on a Tuesday night doesn't mean jack shit. You're going to read, I mean, it will be a thousand percent different by Saturday and your names will still be on it because you're still producing it. Right. But he used to call, thank you, thank you, thank you very much.

It's great to be here hosting Saturday Night Live F7, like on the keyboard and we were going to try to make it a shortcut, F stop seven, thank you, thank you, thank you very much. It's great to be here hosting Saturday Night Live Cheer, excuse me, Cookie Monster, Cookie Monster. I'm trying to do a monologue. We'll get to that in a minute. And then some kind of soft New York joke that the Muppet people are okay with, like Cookie Monster met squeegee guy and you're like, okay, yeah, that's kind of a New York joke

from 1989. Yeah. And then gave blowjob to get crack. Hey, the Henson people want to talk to you. Can the Henson people? Hey, man, we're old hippies. And it's like, you know, we're weird old hippies who look like our own puppets. You know, the way when Cookie Monster eats cookies, the cookies just fall out of his mouth.

Yeah. It's the same thing when he gives a blowjob. Oh, I'm sorry. It's the same thing. There's just cum shooting everywhere and none of it goes down. Come on, man. No, no, no, no. He's not, he's being so profane, but he is, that is right.

It's a problem. Hey, the Henson people are here. Conan, the Henson people. They look like mops. Hey. Have you ever talked to the Muppeteers? I know they're not called that. Yes.

And I, they did monologues, they're great people, but it's funny how they moved and looked and talked like Muppets themselves. So you'd go to the green room where the Muppeteers, again, sorry if that's not the term, are waiting between dress and air and you'd be like, hey, in this Miss Piggy, you know, someone's going to go, I bet pigs can fly and she'll go first class, you know. Yeah. And Jesus, you're good. Tatum, you're good.

That was an actual joke I put in a Muppet thing. And they told me they liked it. That's why I remember it. But you'd be like, hey, so now she's going to go first class and go, yeah, we can do that all fellas, right? And they go, yeah. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. And also like big bowl cuts and beards and their eyeballs just rattle around in their

heads. They do. They have loose eyeballs. In real life. I went to the museum. That's a true fact. I went to the museum of puppetry in Atlanta. Of course you did.

Right. I had the money. And do you remember on, like, do you remember on Sesame Street that there was always this kind of all purpose Muppet who was like bald with hair on the sides and a mustache? Yes. Yeah. This was a guy they just used. He could be anybody.

He could be anybody. They showed us that, like, that was a thing that they had like a thousand of those. And it was basically like they'd missed a potato headed. He was the film. It was called like a non-character. It was the glue. It was the Phil Harman of Muppets. Yeah.

He could just be, he could be a reporter, but he could also be the person he interviewed. You needed him to come out in a trench coat and put his Muppet hand out and feel for rain and then... Man, that was a good, a little good Muppet hunk there. And our apologies to the Muppet people. It's really on me. I took it, I took it in a bad direction and I apologize. Yeah. It's all right.

No, no. What I did was terrible and unforgivable. It's all love. I could easily edit it out, but I won't. No, it's all love. Have you noticed what people say that when, like, they just want to move beyond something they haven't apologized for or dealt with at all? It's all love.

Come on. Like, what's all love? You murdered my wife. But it's all love. We're moving forward. You lit fire to my house. I know. Listen, that's then, right?

It's all love. We're doing the podcast. It's probably like when they go up to... Because Ringo Starr only says peace and love, peace and love. Peace and love, peace and love, peace and love. Yeah. Mr. Starr. With a Tourette's-like energy.

Yes. Yeah. You remember that video where he said he wasn't going to sign autographs anymore? Yes, I do. Fucking fantastic. He said, don't send anything more, peace and love, peace and love. He just decided that he was going to tell people, no more, please stop writing fan mail. I'm done and requesting photographs of me, which is not something you have to say.

You can just not respond anymore. Also, I'm like, it just became overwhelming to you? Yeah. It started in 1962. Started in 1962 with the most letters anyone could ever receive in the history of letters. And now it's like, you know what? I'm Sega this. I love it.

We have a storage unit filled with them. He just wrote. It's a fun video to watch because he says, that's it. No more. And he goes, from now on, peace and love, peace and love. No more. I can't take it anymore. He says, from now on, they're all going straight in the bin, which means they're going in the

trash. You're like, okay. But from now on. But from now on, he's like, well, I can't throw these away for 50 years. Did you see Julian Lennon saying, imagine? I heard about it. I didn't see it. That'll end the war.

That'll do it. No one cares. You know what I mean? It's like, who cares? It comes up in my Google feed every other hour. If I sang imagine. He swore he'd never sing it. Did you know that?

I didn't know that. I didn't know her care. No, I know. You're yelling at me as if I'm Julian Lennon. I'm yelling at you like you're my Google feed, where I'm like, listen, it's embarrassing the news you know. It's like, you know what I can handle intellectually and it's embarrassing to be reminded of what I actually click on.

Every day I get another thing about Wheel of Fortune fans are upset that because there's always some. Yes, who misses an obvious one. But I guess there's an article almost every day by some sort of web site and now I get them every day and I'm like, is Wheel of Fortune under fire or is this just the feed I'm getting? Is everyone hearing about Wheel of Fortune? Well, the thing I keep seeing is the Wheel of Fortune where they'll say, we'll be a contestant and then you'll see the board and it will say, all you have to do is solve it and says,

why did the Hicken cross the road? And the letter C is the only thing missing and the person's wondering and wondering and wondering. Why did the Thicken? Why did the Thicken cross the road? And you would have won the Acura. We took down Wheel of Fortune and we took down the Muppets. And I squeezed in a little shot of Julian Lennon that no one needed, took him down a

peg. For too long. He's been getting a free ride. Right, he's been getting a free ride, riding high. What are you friends with him? Are you like thinking, you're doing the math in your head now, but I need to cut that because you're so close with him? We are very close.

I've interviewed him a few times. He seems like a lovely fellow. And I think he was born, I think we were born days apart from each other. In different circumstances. Yes. His father was one of the most famous people in the world and mine, a young microbiologist with a dream. But your dad did drop acid constantly.

Dreaming did. Still does. My dad is 93 years old and still dropping acid and he wears a, he tried to dose you as a kid. He tried. He dresses like Sammy Davis Jr. did in 1971, just tons of, tons of crazy jewelry. And I go home and every time my dad gets wackier and wackier. It's funny just knowing your dad.

Yeah. But he's constantly blasted out on LSD and did you ever do LSD? I'm an incredible square. Oh, okay. Wait. I was ranked in college and then I was some, I walked in on some people who were doing cocaine. I opened the door and some guys, I'll never forget they were wearing white tuxedo jackets

like the evil kids do in a John Hughes high school movie. They really were. And they looked up and they said, Hey man, do you want to do a line? And I said, thank you, but no, it interrupts the heart rhythm. Oh no. Oh yeah. Which is, you know, cause my dad was a doctor, I'm like, it interferes with the heart rhythm. And then I backed out of the room.

Alvi Singer over. Thank you. No, it interferes with the synapses that feed signals, the reptile brain, the heart. And no one ever offered me anything after that. Is this okay? Is this then apocryphal and not true? And I, okay, you can cut this up. You can do whatever.

I keep telling you you can cut things. I can do whatever I want. You're not even going to be on the podcast when it airs. I heard that you had a tank of nitrous in college, which doesn't sound like it's true now. It is not true. I did not. Was there a tank of nitrous at the lampoon building?

Yes. Oh. Was I the president of the lampoon for two years in charge of things? Yes. Did I order the tank of nitrous? No. Did you sign the invoice? No.

Or maybe I did. I don't remember. You know, there were plenty of things that people wanted to do at the lampoon and I could neither prevent it nor make it happen. Oh, okay. I thought you were about to say you didn't see it happen. Oh, no, no. I saw a tank of nitrous there.

Get delivered. And, yeah. Hello. Nitrous delivery. Look, I got a tank out here. I got to get this truck out. All right. Well, I guess someone's doing some welding somewhere in the building.

But this disrupts the heart's rhythm. I have to call my father. He's busy dosing right now. But I have to find out if nitrous interferes with the heart rhythm as much as cocaine, the white lady. Look, I got 10 tanks to drop off by noon. So you can just sign this fucking thing or get out of my fucking way. But no, the idea that I would- Do you remember how an industrial tank of nitrous arrived?

I never know how- I hear about like the Grateful Dead had a tank. I'm like, where do you buy a tank of nitrous? There was shit coming and going from the Lampoon building constantly. It was like they had an elect- made a 12-year-old president of the United States. I had acne. I wore a three-piece suit because I thought that I had achieved this- that I never had owned it before. But I went out and literally got one because I thought, I should have, if I'm going to

be a president of this very old August organization- So I actually wore like a vest- You were like the president of an organization you didn't understand. I didn't understand. This was just for a little while, but I was such a square and then there were, you know, these upperclassmen saying, yeah, we got nitrous coming in. Well, of course you do. Okay. Your fellas seem certainly out of sorts when you breathe it.

I've noticed some of you seem a little- Well, less than on-kilter, let's just say. If you've had a full dose of that wacky gas. But I never did any of that and I used to walk around with Coca-Cola in my glass. Oh. Yeah, I was a total- Sinatra used to hate that. If someone around him, he would smell your glass to find out, I worked with Frank for years. I shouldn't do this.

I'd do this occasionally. I'd bring up something I read, but I'd bring it up with the authority of someone who lived it. Sure. Frank would do that. Ask me how I know. How do you know? I read it.

A biography of Frank Sinatra. He'd smell your glass to make sure it was actually whiskey, not Coca-Cola. Okay. Well, he would have- He was a very aggressive, unhappy person. He did come by the castle in, I think it was- Zadey? Zadey? 83.

The doorbell rang and I had a big glass of, it was a coffee mug, but it had Coca-Cola in it. He'd ring a top hat and tails. Yes. And I opened the door and it was Frank Sinatra. Hey, dingbat. He went, hey, ring a ding, ding. And I-

Pipsqueak, if you don't move. Yeah. And then he said, what's in the glass? And I said, nothing but gin here, Frank. And he said, I got to smell it. And he smelled my glass and he could smell that it was Coca-Cola. And he fucking lost it. This is a true story, 1983, February of 83.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. And he lost it and he was with Jilly Rizzo. Oh, man. His big bodyguard. And he said, Jilly, show this leprechaun what we do. Mr. Sinatra, don't take kindly to fibs. Mr. Sinatra, very disappointing you. And he beat me with a trash can, which I've never seen anyone do.

While Frank strolled in. Yeah. And just did nitrous. He did nitrous. No Rourke or whoever the hell was that. This guy's conservative, but he makes me laugh. And at least he's got real gin in his glass. Yes, sir, that fucking stretch out.

This guy. St. Patrick's Day parade flag. This guy's like the news, but he cracks me up. So that's the day that I was beaten by- Horowitz, get over here. Give me an off kilter quip. This guy twists the news up so much you don't recognize it. Sinatra.

Yeah. Sinatra, if you just found out, he loved the lampoon and went by constantly. Now you fellas. You fellas take things and you write them all screwy. I've always been a fan. Be great if his true passion was not the blues and it was not the great American songwriting tradition. No.

It was Ivy League humor. Ivy League humor. I used to say- And these fellas put out a calendar that was fake with made up things in it. And little sayings, and they'd say Ben Franklin said this and the guy never said it. So I get my Harvard Crimson, which is the newspaper that they put out. That's the straight sheet. That's the straight sheet.

But guess what? One day I get it and it's all different. It's saying crazy things and I'm like, chili, get in here. Look at this. There's crazy news today. And then it turns out that those lampoon pranksters, they did their own version of it. And it was screwy. See?

It wasn't the straight dope. He submits. He's... Read it if you... He's embarrassed though. I wrote a little something. It's a pretend letter to the editor. It's phony and it's fake.

It's not a real letter. Read it if you want. Yeah. Sinatra's real nervous. It's staged and phony. Sinatra's real nervous about submitting to the lampoon. My SNL packet never got read. It's sitting there cooling like ice and this thing must have been cooler than iceberg lettuce

because I never got a call from Jim Downey. Wow. Mr. Sinatra. I love that that was his big weakness was that he loved Ivy League humor and that he submitted to SNL and couldn't get his packet read. This guy who... Well, that's what they told him. They probably haven't read it, Frank.

They probably haven't read it. Oh, that's different then. I've been worried they read it and didn't like it. But if they didn't read it, well, that's on the square. I mean, I don't know. I don't know where we are. I don't know. We've washed ashore.

Well, were we supposed to... I don't remember where we were either. We were... I asked you if you did nitrous. Your dad took LSD. Frank Sinatra used to come by the lampoon all the time, beat the shit out of me because I wasn't drinking straight gin. And you lied to him.

I did lie to him. And you know what? But I like that he's ready to rock as soon as you open the door. It's in your glass. What are you drinking? And I like that I was beaten with trash cans because there's part of me... I feel like that's probably would be a henchman thing. I bet they don't leave a bruise, kind of like a phone book, you know?

Yeah, it's like... Smashing someone's head between two trash cans. It's a certain kind of trash can that if they hit you with it, there's no bruise and you get out clean. Again, you did this. You made these riffs happen. You know what I once saw? What'd you see?

A Palm Sunday Mass when I was a kid. Lucky you. I just... I know. 12th row. Jealous. That's where John Leavitts would lean in. I just went to Palm Sunday Mass.

Jealous. I saw a mom so mad at her kid. She grabbed all the palms from her family and threaded them together like a whip and started... No, you did. Yeah, she started hitting her kid with it. That's fantastic. I know.

I was like, that's next Friday. The mom took the time to thread them together. I remember her going like this. You can't see what I'm doing, but I'm sort of fashioning them out together into a whip. Thank you. I'm very fascinated. I do want to talk to you about your process, which I don't understand because... How does it work for you?

How do you... Do you sit down? Do you write this out? How does it work? No. I know it's a very boring question, but I often watch you and think, I don't know how John does that. I have no...

Man, there might be times I've said I had a writing process. I have no writing process. I just was talking to some other comics about this. I was like, do you have a process? Everyone was like, no. It's scary to admit, but okay, so this hour I'm doing right now, I started getting on stage in May of 21 and just doing an hour with... I had a bunch of areas and stories that I wanted to try, so I think I had the time.

I think I looked and thought I can cover in 60 minutes of talking, but it was really from scratch. That's the name of the tour. The shows in New York, those May shows were called from scratch because I wanted to convey to the audience that I'm actually like, this is all going to be new, so it could be rough. It could just not be polished or that tight at all. The first shows weren't tight at all. Thank God someone reviewed the first one and said it was a helpful review.

No, they said it was open and vulnerable and dark, and I thought, well, I literally was just institutionalized, so I'm like... But also, no, it's totally fair to write that review. What was the amount of time... If it's too personal, don't tell me, but what's the amount of time between when you get out of rehab or that process and when you set foot on stage? Got out in February and went up for the first time in May. Did that...

Now, part of it is, it was 2021, there's just last winter, so not everything was open yet, and there weren't... There were no opportunities to go out. I think maybe I had some Zoom college shows that I smartly didn't do, and then, yeah, by the time those dates at the City Winery, this really nice venue on the West Side Highway there in New York, once those rolled around, it was the first time it made sense, other than to go to the comedy cellar where they had plastic up, literally, it was the first time it made sense to get on stage.

But I also, at the same time, probably were everything open, I still would have waited a couple months. Right. Well, I can see, I can imagine a couple of things, like I've said, all I've done is a ton of nitrous, but I can imagine it feeling like this is a very vulnerable time, but also this could be very cathartic, this could help, and I don't know which way it would come out. It's...

I mean, I sort of now am at this place where my mom, who I love so much, she was like, you will look at my tour schedule and be like, I'm concerned, you're out so much right now, you're okay, is it stressful? And I'm like, this is one of the greatest times of my life, and this is the best thing for me. It's so fun, it's so... I don't know if right now it's cathartic so much as it's just a joy to be out. So fun that people come out, it's so nice, like after everyone, not just myself, everyone

had a very challenging couple of years, like everyone's out together. It's the best, it feels great. So I was... I knew this will make me feel better getting up on stage in May, and then I also had a very real like, oh, I bet I feel... This is gross, but I feel like my skin's been peeled off, so I don't... And I was still kind of going through some chemical withdrawal, which lasts longer than you think, and so I just wasn't comfortable anywhere, and was a little nervous talking

to friends and was seeing people that for the first time just for dinner or something was strange. So I didn't feel stage ready, I felt shaky for a little bit. Then I started to go, well, I'm getting antsy in this different way now, and I think it's because I want to go out and be a comedian. And then I've yet to meet Malcolm. Oh, well, he's a little baby. Yeah, I know.

But I mean... That is so cute to hear you say his name like he's a person. He is a person. I know, but it's so funny. I keep going to parties and bus stops and stuff, and I don't see Malcolm coming along. Yeah, yeah. I didn't like... I haven't run into him yet.

I didn't see Malcolm at Phil Rosenthal's. I don't know why he wasn't at the big pizza oven cook-off. Pizza con 22. I think Andy Richter said this once. He said, because he had his daughter, Mercy, before I had kids, and he said, man, it sure makes your life before look like it was in black and white. He likened it. I was kind of like, what's it like?

And he said, it's like the black and white movie Wizard of Oz, and then she opens the door in its color. He said, that's how much it... Wow. And he said, it sure does make your life before look pretty silly when a human being shows up. That's really funny. Yeah.

That's really sweet. It does. Yeah, that's an interesting... It does... Man, you know when you watch a movie with someone who hasn't seen the movie before? That's what it feels like with Malcolm. When I'm out with him, I'm like, oh, the world's great because I'm seeing it sorted through his eyes.

And he's looking up like trees and shit. Malcolm will lay on his back on a blanket in the backyard and just kick his arms and legs squealing because he sees trees in the sky. And I never cared about any of that shit, outside stuff. Never cared. No, I really didn't. I really didn't. Not a nature guy.

Not a nature, I was not a backyard guy. I'm an endorsement. And so... You are a rugged endorsement. You know what I love? You're a rugged endorsement. Right. Right.

You're the Nick Offerman of the Indoors. Yeah. Who can't do a single thing with his hands. Couldn't shuffle a deck of cards. Or I could, but if I wouldn't want him to watch. Not because I'm cheating, but I don't know how to shuffle. But man, he just... And I love, I mean, he's my son and I love him so much, but also like I just, I'm fascinated

by him. Yeah. And I love watching him see the world. And seeing what like sounds, what sounds, images, lights, volume levels, he make him laugh. And then times where he gives these looks like, Jesus, not like crying, just kind of like, can you not? Yeah.

Well, you have that great one. I'll get like too loud and too high in his ear. Like, hi. Yeah. And he's like, okay. All right. Take it easy. Dingbat.

Chilly, take care of this guy. Hey. And a bigger baby crawls up. Bigger baby crawls in with an appropriate to scale size trash can. Give me that. Give me that head. And I still am ambitious and I still want to do things, but it's just, that's still there.

But I'm like, if he's good, I'm good. Yes. I liked that, I don't know, almost lessening of the ego or ego deflation of just, oh, I still have a big ego. Oh, no. Trust me. Sort of why. But when my ego is deflated, it's still insane.

I'm still Stalin. I mean, sometimes I leaned down and I go, Malcolm, you know what your last name is? Fucking famous. Is it true that you're constantly handing Malcolm eight by tens of yourself? Oh, yeah. I would like to. He's sort of one time I walked in the room and just because he's learning his hand, he's just learning his hands and he's just always like, it's like he's a shifty guy lying on

the stand. I'm like, you keep gripping one hand and the other hand back and forth. Yeah. These little pudgy ass hands that look like quiche and he's like, but he banged them together when I walked in. I was like, ooh, I wonder if I could get him and just train him to do that every time I entered the room. Yeah.

Hey. I tried with my kids. You know, it was great with Mike Sweeney, warm up your kids. I did. Mike Sweeney. All right. Energy energy. When my kids were born, the minute they came out, I had Mike Sweeney sort of worked the

crowd for 10 minutes and so they knew that I was a big deal. I don't know why that just reminded me of when we first started doing the late night show in 93, we knew nothing about what we were doing. We had all these crazy ideas and all these grand schemes, but in terms of the nuts and bolts of how you run a late night show, we didn't know anything and we didn't know that you need a warm up guy. Oh no. So we...

Was anyone helping you? Here's what happened. No, actually. So we didn't know that we needed a warm up guy and then someone said, oh, we need a warm up guy. And we said, well, who does warm up on Letterman? And they said, well, the announcer does it. And for Johnny Carson, the announcer, Ed McMahon did it.

And so we thought, right, the announcer. So we had hired this announcer, very nice guy, Joel Goddard, who had a terrific voice and he'd be like, it's Conan O'Brien. And then we started putting him in sketches, but he was a straight voiceover announcer guy who literally his whole, you know, his career had been, stay tuned for more. You know, this brought to you by Chevy Trucks, reliable Chevy Trucks. That's all he had done. And so we handed him a microphone.

Someone handed him a microphone. I was, of course, busy just trying to not wet myself. And so we were busy with how can we premiere this show and not get killed and how can we survive? So we just sent him out. And I remembered walking out to befuddled crowds for a while and not kind of understanding what was going on. And then once I was putting my tie on and God love you, Joel, it was great.

But I heard him doing the warmup. And he was saying, then Conan went off to Harvard where he studied the history and literature of America, specializing in Flannery O'Connor and Faulkner's work in the Deep South, part of the Southern literary movement. He graduated magnum cum laude and you're like, why don't you, born with every advantage. You know, it was the last thing in the world you would want to tell an audience about a comedian. Yeah.

Conan is. So let's get a lot of energy up. Let's get a lot of energy for a man who's read a lot of books. You're in town for one day. You're in town for one day and you've come to a taping and it was just, he joined the acapella group. Yeah. Four white males singing group, specializing in singing and rounds.

Before I bring him out, let me tell you, I've felt Conan's hands and they are lily soft. Never a day's honest work. O'Brien claims he's never actually seen anyone do physical labor because his pot hair, the Latin term for father, told him it should be avoided. Let's bring him out now with a lot of energy. Conan O'Brien. That's a true story, but God bless you. So I mean, I'm thrilled.

I'm thrilled that you're getting to be a dad and see what this is all about, you know? It's just. It's the best. And he's a great hang too. He's just a great, like I can. He's chill. He's a chill hang. I can prop him up on the couch now because his neck is strong and like I was watching

Bosch and I like how low the bar is for babies. He's a great hang. Really? Yeah. His neck is strong enough. I know a lot of people that that can't be said about. I know. I know a lot of people that can't hold their head up and make eye contact.

No, no. So I was watching Bosch on Amazon Prime. That's one. I just want to get it in. Yeah. And. That's Bosch on Amazon Prime. That's Bosch.

That's right. The title is Bosch and I just propped him up next to me and it was like he was watching Bosch. That's pretty cool. Can you imagine the pride I had? I was like, one day he'll watch Bosch and I may or may not be here, but he'll be there watching Bosch and his neck will be even stronger than it is now. Absolutely.

We can only dream. Are your kids, are they, you have, Sona has twins who are. Yeah. Yeah. They're nine months old. Do you watch Bosch with them? I know. We watch other stuff.

We watch a lot of reality TV. Oh, you should watch Bosch. Yeah. You got to watch Bosch. It's on Amazon Prime. It's on Amazon Prime. Okay. That's cool.

Yeah. I was going to say, you were talking about how you hadn't met Malcolm yet and I was like, you're not going to want to meet him until you can get a response. He didn't want to meet my kids until they could laugh. Really? Yeah. I love, I have to get a laugh out of any creature. I won't meet, I won't meet a, I won't go to a petting zoo unless I've been assured

they're capable of laughing the animals. And so for a while I didn't, I wanted to go when I thought I had a reasonable chance. Yeah. And I did. I worked Mikey for a bit. Charlie, I don't know what his fucking problem is, but Mikey. Wow. Wow.

Yeah. I'm sorry. He seems like a snob. He was a little baby. He's a stuffed shirt. He's an angel. He was wearing a little silk top hat when I opened the door. Maybe you're just not his style.

He high-hatted Conan. He did. Anyway. Yeah. And then he, I don't know, he just stoned me. Yeah. I got Mikey. Yeah, he did.

He got one of them. But I work hard and then I will turn, this, I once went to when my, when my daughter was in preschool, maybe it was first grade or kindergarten, but they had a thing where you read to them and you're supposed to read a book and different volunteers would. You're over-explaining a thing that I know what it is. They had a thing where you would read to them. Excuse me. This is why I asked what you were doing when your child was born because I'm not done yet.

So they can't read yet, you understand. And so what they want is that. They got these little schools. They got these schools with short stack desks. Yeah. It's like a college, but it's not. They've dumbed it down because the kids are small and the fountains are real low to the ground.

You're still with me. And so they had these kids drop their whole pants to pee in there. So I started doing it and then I got at the bus station says, you can't do that here. I said, Mac, I could show you a school where this is what everyone does. Why am I Sinatra again? Jilly, get over here. So I got brought in to read to the kids and I started doing shtick and stuff and the kids were really laughing and I said to the teacher when it was done, I was killing.

And she was looked at me with such sadness and she was like, you just need to read the book. I actually said to the teacher, they still can't read. To this day, none of those kids can read, but oh, do they know how to laugh? Oh, do they know how to laugh? Because you ad-libbed every so now they think reading is just holding a book while riffing. Yes. I didn't.

Oh, that guy. I look at a guy in the Hawaiian shirt. I never opened the book. It was Good Night Moon and I was holding it and I'm like, look at this kid over here. And look at that guy with the sweater. Hey, would you get that from Bill Cosby, you know, like, and killing. Absolutely killing. People doubled over laughing.

And crowd shots like Evening at the Improv. Screams. Little tables laughing. I want to make sure I do right for you because, look, I'm a guy that gets, I cut to the quick. You got this movie coming up and we keep promoting Amazon Prime. You've got an upcoming Disney plus movie, Chip and Dale, Rescue Rangers. Is that or not? Is that?

Suddenly I'm a prosecutor. Is that true, sir? That's true. Yes. I do at this time. All plugs should be done that way. It's a very funny movie. It's a cartoon, right?

So it's, you don't see me, but you hear me. No, no, I'm serious. Oh, and I'm the one explaining shit, huh? Yeah. So you hear my voice and Andy Sandberg and I played Chip and Dale of the beloved Rescue Rangers franchise that many of us, did you watch Rescue Rangers? I did. Yeah, of course I did.

That and DuckTales were big deals to us. This is while you were writing for Wilton North report or some shit that no one's ever, that only people like me know about. I was waiting for the craft comedy hour. Brought to you by Paul Maul Cigarettes. I was doing a summer stock show with Alan Havy. So now the Chip and Dale from Rescue Rangers are the actual actors from the show Rescue Rangers and I don't know how much I can reveal.

Who cares? We're going back together to solve a mystery. It's a genuinely really funny movie. I think people who are not even familiar with Rescue Rangers would like it. Sandberg Salaris in it, Akiva Shaffer directed it. It was a great, great time. How nice is it? Dan Gregor, Doug Mann.

If I'm forgetting any of the writers, I truly apologize. We can a lot of funny people. We'll have someone else's voice at them later. It'll be very clear. It wasn't you. Todd Stones, Alan Zaslaw, Kathleen Shugru. How nice is it every day, I thank whatever force is guiding the universe for the fact that I managed to have this living where I'm routinely working with really funny people.

That's great. I mean, how you just tossed off Sandberg and Akiva. It's the fact that I had this thought, you and Simon Rich came over to my house and we hung out. We built a fire with the flue closed and the room filled with smoke and it was this perfect test of politeness because I was like, it's fine. I think it's fine. Oh, no.

The room was filled. You know, it was so great. The flue has always been open and it's just open all the time because we're here in LA and you keep the flue open. And unbeknownst to me, someone... It's like a guy trying to pretend he doesn't have a butler and he runs the house himself. Oh, let me fix a fire. What was it?

I didn't know what fire was, I just thought fire was naturally occurring. Like when they did that, they did this profile of Dan Rather once for the New Yorker I think or somewhere. So he goes... He like went to the news floor, which he hadn't done in 35 years because he was being followed by a journalist and phones would ring and he'd pick them up going, rather here. And people would go, what? And he'd go, rather.

And they'd go, what do you mean, rather? Yeah. What about Dan Rather? He'd be like, I'm Dan Rather. Like the reporter was like, he clearly had not been working the phones in the newsroom for some time. I knew... You knew I was in trouble when you rang the doorbell and the door opened and I was being

held by a butler. I was actually being carried. I'm carried around the house. I haven't used my legs in my home in over 20 years. No. You sleep in that chamber still. That has no benefits. It has no benefits.

It actually... You're on a pure late 60s health regime, cottage cheese, cottage cheese and melon. And one of those vibrating belts. I did get to go. I was taking a tour. We shot something. All of my stories involved, I was shooting a remote. Everything is there.

I was shooting a remote and we were over at a, by Will Rogers, the great humorists home. I assume he did something bad though. So you might as well say, great, but flawed, right? Sure. He was a guy in the olden time. So he's probably did bad things, right? I don't think he did. I think he's one of those guys that everyone, when he died...

You want to, you don't want to bet on my side. You know what, great, but probably flawed. We're all flawed, so it's safe, you know. Okay. Great, but probably flawed. His kids are probably old too. So they don't care. I went and shot something and he was, you know, the biggest comic and humorist of his

day, 20s, 30s. And they said, hey, Conan, you can come upstairs and look at his real bedroom. We never show it on the tour. And I'm like, of course I'm a history buff. I'm like, I've got to see that. Don't, don't, don't, don't, don't, don't, don't, don't, don't. Mr. Brian, please wait for us to catch up. Where Roger's real bedroom?

Oh boy, here we go. Here we go. Here we go. Here we go. Here we go. Here we go. I'm going to have a bureau. Oh my God, oh my God, oh my God.

Oh my God. But anyway, they showed me his bathroom and it was a very pedestrian 1930s bathroom, but it had one of those weight reduction belts that there were so many things that I only know about because I grew up watching comedy shorts from the 1930s and 40s probably like you. And I also know them from The Simpsons because I feel like that was, those were, yeah. But there's a whole generation of comedy writers that I'm part of where we grew up when there wasn't enough stuff to put on TV.

Yeah. I remember watching Laurel and Hardy on UHF stations. Yes. Just on a Saturday. And the Three Stooges. Yeah. And so, and I would watch Bugs Bunny cartoons, which always had an anvil meaning, and I've always pointed out that no one knows what an anvil is only because they've seen them

in cartoons. I've seen anvils back in theaters with ropes tied to them to hold up curtains. So maybe it was, it was that, you know what I like about Bugs Bunny was he was always trying to get to Albuquerque. Right, right. That was his goal. Yes. And, and he rarely talked about it, but it was, it was understood.

And then people would just try to murder him because he'd be sarcastic. Yes. So he'd be like, you know, on a boxcar trying to get to Albuquerque. And then like, you know, Elmer Fudd would show up and he'd be like, you suck, doc. You know what I'm saying? You know what I mean? He'd mouth off. That was not his quip.

Well, doc was. And you suck, doc. You suck. Sayonara. Sucker. Motherfucker. Come on. I'm going to look through Bugs Bunny's now.

Well, these are the old band ones, you know, the ones they don't show anymore. Yeah. So, the ones that make fun of you are you don't suck. You smell like, you smell like ass. Bug. You fucking suck, and I told you before, get out of here, chomp, chomp, chomp, chomp. And then they just beat the, and then they just try to kill him. And then he'll hide behind a cactus, he'll dress up like a woman, he'll do anything not

to die. Yeah. He's like an old acid head wandering around the American Southwest who's just like, pissed someone off. They're like, we're going to kill you with right, we're going to stick a rifle in your mouth and try to blow your head off and he has to do anything to live. You know, it was like Bill Walton, hang, you know, but you, Bill Walton, yeah, got to get to Albuquerque, dead in company.

So your take on Bugs Bunny is that he's desperate to get to Albuquerque because the dead are playing in Albuquerque. The dead are playing there, Bob Weir, Bill Kreuzman's first show in weeks. Bill Hader sent me this clip of Bill Walton. Of course he did. Yeah. But who Hader is born to play? Bill Walton talking about how he was obsessed with Kareem and it's, maybe it's, I'll send

you the clip, but he's just going, I'd be in the weight room going Jabar, Jabar, Jabar. I'd be running Jabar, Jabar. I'd bike from Oregon to Mexico, Jabar, Jabar, I was like, Oregon to Mexico. So Hader, for example, there's a good example of someone who, if a bunch of us are hanging around, I will say I've never taken it for granted when I'm around funny people or when I'm around a Marty Short or a Steve or anyone, I just, I can't, I always look to a camera that's not there and just mouth, thank you, this is so much fun. I mean, I laugh extremely hard multiple times a week, which is like the greatest thing you

could ever ask for. Yeah. It's the greatest thing you could ever ask for. And when people ask me about Saturday Night Live and hosts or, not music, but hosts or just moments with like, you know, when Sarah Palin, when Tina did Sarah Palin and sort of marquee moments, I'm like, I'm like the greatest thing was writing a sketch with Samberg and laughing so hard till three in the morning or writing with Bill every week and just dying laughing with one of the funniest people in the world, writing with Simon Rich and Marika

Sawyer and like starting on Monday night when we start writing ideas, just like absolutely laughing hysterically. Did you feel? It's the greatest feeling in the world. And, you know, we were younger than two, but it's still, it still is the same. It's still exactly the same. I wish if, you know, the one phrase I don't agree with is no regrets. Oh yeah.

You know, people say no regrets and they think, no, that's... We don't in the rehab world. It's not really a thing. Welcome to no regrets rehab. What I do, I do find myself thinking, you know, I was so intense when I was at SNL and so concerned that I, you know, do good work and I have something really good to offer that it, I don't know, it didn't have to be that way. I think I could have had more fun.

I did have a good time, but I wish, I wish I had been able to, I don't know, can you see that? I could see that. You've seen her at... I don't like... I think it's your work ethic. You're very hard on yourself. Right, right.

I think that, you know, you could... I wish I had not quite been that guy. Yeah. I wish I had been. I get that. But you... I don't know. Well, one thing that's bad to what that I have found was really bad to ingrain in myself

was that if I'm having a miserable time, the end product will be better. Yes. That was a big thing. Of course. And I remember the first time I hosted Saturday Night Live. The show was really fun, the show was great. I twisted myself in knots all week and was pretty miserable. By Friday night, I was feeling miserable.

Things turned out really fun on the show, but just emotionally, I was like, you know, no one wants me to host because I'm a writer, everyone's thinking this is going to suck and everyone's waiting, it was like the world is waiting for this to be bad. And I was just in knots. And it was so unpleasant that while, you know, a lot of other things in my life I needed more emotional maturity about, I did make a pretty good resolution that the second time I came back, I was like, I'm going to have fun. And if it's a bad show, then that's fine.

If this weird Catholic superstition of must suffer for it to be good, if that's true, I'd rather have fun for the week and have the show suffer. Let's just see as an experiment if that happens. And I had a lot of fun that week and I thought the show was strong. It took me years to undo that. I mean, I feel like I've even heard like top NBA players say like practice is where you work hard and the game is fun. Exactly.

So if you've asked me if they're going to host SNL, I always say really try and think about sketches, what you're going to do, what you like, what you feel comfortable in, and then really try and pay attention to hitting your marks and stuff at dress, air, just have fun. Yeah. It's a water slide. Yeah. Very true.

See? I'm not so stupid after all. Remember when you called me stupid? No, your announcer told me that you graduated magna cum laude. I'm just getting some things in that might just be conversation rather than for the podcast, but you should listen to Bill Walton on Al Franken's podcast. This is all going in. Okay, good.

Bill Walton on Al Franken's podcast. It's so funny. Okay. It's just like, yeah, Al. He just keeps quoting song lyrics. He's like, I'm looking for the bright side of the road, man. See what love can do. So it's so amazing.

All right. I'll check it out. Okay. Whoa. I'm on a Bill Walton kick today. Listen. Anyone who tuned in to this one knew that it was going to be about Bill Walton. Yeah.

One of the great basketball players of all time. They expect it because they know about your obsession with Bill Walton. Jabar. Jabar. I don't know how to end this one. Oh, wait. I do want to say I'm playing the Hollywood Bowl and I'd love people to come. Okay.

When is this? This is May 7th. And one of my favorite comedians, Earthquake, is a special guest on the show. Oh, great. He's absolutely hilarious. It's going to be a great time. Formal wear is encouraged for the audience. Really?

Yeah. Earthquake and the date again, May 7th. May 7th, Hollywood Bowl. You know that place off the 101 where no one can park? Oh, trust me. I've... Park at the VFW down Highland. It's one of the great venues of all time.

Yeah. It's really, really fun. I'm thrilled, I'm thrilled that you're out there. Please come. I would love to be there. I got so many cops. Well, that makes... Okay.

That's not nice. And yes, I'd be... No, I mean, I'm desperate to give these away, so you come. I love... Anyone you know. I love going to a show and then assuming that, of course, there'll be a moment when the lights come up and I'm brought up on stage and putting that out there to someone, to the star who really doesn't want that, that's my favorite thing.

Someone once told me, I think it was this comedian, Jim Florentine, he told me he was doing a show and Howard Stern walked into the theater and the entire audience gave him a standing o' page. Oh my God. Like, mid-word. Yeah. Yeah. They did that for Abraham Lincoln at Ford's Theater.

That I'm not going to touch with a 10-foot pole, bro. I know. He was one of the presidents. Sorry. I know this. I have a lot of reverence. That wound is still pretty fresh. I have a lot of reverence for everything except Will Rogers.

For some reason, Julian Lennon. No, but for real, that singing, that song is going to help a lot of stuff. I would love to come see you at the Hollywood Bowl, May 7th, Amazon Prime, Bill Walton. Check out Being the Riccardo's on Amazon Prime. How did Amazon Prime get to you? Hey, this is a gift that you coming in and chatting with me about everything in random order is a gift and I'm just delighted, delighted to know you. It's a delight to know you.

And, man, goddamn, one of the funniest human beings, and just, and so. You're the greatest. You're the greatest. No, you're the greatest. You made me so happy in my life. You've brought me so much happiness. I thought you were doing a bit. Do you remember your three-year anniversary on late night when you wore a top hat?

Yeah. I remember in a cape, I remember sitting there with my brother, like, you came out and we looked at each other and we were like, and we kind of felt like because we had been such rabid fans that it was like our victory, too. And we like looked at each other and we did it. You did. Thank you. No, no, sorry.

No, but it's nice. I just remember that. I remember, and I've told you this before, but when you had Grady from Sanford in Santa Ana, I just remember knowing it was the night Grady was going to be on and I'm somewhere out of my house in Chicago, but I just remember it was getting close to 1130 central time when your show was on and I'm just sprinting down the street to see because I knew it was the night you're going to bring Grady out. That's right.

Sprinting. That makes me... Going Jabar. Damn, you callback. Sorry to undercut it. No, that was... That makes me really happy. And many, many thousands of times since.

Yeah. Yeah. All right. Well, listen. Kissing. Listen, you stupid idiot. You're so awkward. I know.

I can't do anything. Neither of us looked at each other when the other was coming. No. It's so funny. I was commenting. This guy's pen got more looks. I can't do it. But...

This guy's staring at a cheap pen. It's the good pen, man. This is the pilot precise grip. Thank you, Sona. You got me the right pen. Okay. This is fucked up. Anyway, damn it.

You take care of yourself. You take care of yourself. And don't talk to me that way. Never speak to me again. And I'm going to come by soon. You got to meet Malcolm. I'm going to make your kid laugh so hard. Yeah.

I'm going to freak him out, but that's okay, you know? I'm just looking for a reaction, so... Absolutely. Absolutely. God bless. And your dad does not take acid. I don't want to be sued by him. Yeah.

Yeah. Well, he's so high. He wouldn't be able to sue you anyway. No. He does not take acid. He's seeing Bob Weir and company this morning. Okay. I'm shutting it down.

God bless you, sir. Thank you, Conan. I love you. Nice to see you. It's so nice to see you. Conan O'Brien needs a friend. With Conan O'Brien, Sonam of Sessian, and Matt Gorely. Produced by me, Matt Gorely.

Executive produced by Adam Sacks, Joanna Solotarov, and Jeff Ross at Team Coco, and Colin Anderson and Cody Fisher at Year Wolf. 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 by Will Beckton.

Additional production support by Mars Melnick. Talent booking by Paula Davis, Gina Batista, and Britt Kahn. You can rate and review this show on Apple Podcasts, and you might find your review read 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, Stitcher, or wherever fine podcasts are downloaded. This has been a Team Coco production in association with Year Wolf.