Conan O’Brien Needs A Friend - Mike Sweeney and Jessie Gaskell

Episode Date: October 28, 2021

Mike Sweeney and Jessie Gaskell join Conan to discuss the upcoming third season of Inside Conan: An Important Hollywood Podcast while they share favorite bits from the early days of Late Night and test Conan’s memories of sketches long gone by.  Wanna get a chance to talk to Conan? Submit here: TeamCoco.com/CallConan

Hey, Conan O'Brien here, and welcome to another episode of Conan O'Brien Needs a Fan. Usually on this podcast, I talk to people out in the world who have questions for me. I interact with them. Just normal folk. Much better than those creepy celebrities. But today, today is very special. We have two incredible guests, and these people are very important to me, Jesse Gaskell and Mike Sweeney, both terrific Conan writers and the hosts of Inside Conan, an important

Hollywood podcast. Now, this season of Inside Conan is going to look back at all 28 years of our late night run, starting from the very beginning in 1993, the first episode, and it's going to feature me, a conversation with yours truly, talking to these two very brilliant writers who know me all too well. They know what makes me tick. They know what enrages me. They've got all the dirt.

So this should be interesting. Take notes, because they're going to rip me a new one. Isn't that right? Is that fair to say? Sure. I think we let the evidence speak for itself. Right. Well, first of all, I want to say on a personal note.

Represent it, you judge. I want to say on a personal note, you know, between the, of course, we went through the crazy pandemic and then our show wrapped up in late June, and I haven't seen a lot of you guys, and so I've really missed you. So it's nice to see you guys again. Yeah. I mean that. Jesse, it's nice to see you.

It's nice to see you. Mike Sweeney, you and I have been together since almost the beginning of the late night show. We've traveled the globe together, and you and I have, as well, Jesse, and all the travel shows. So you know where all the skeletons are buried. Right. Well, I don't remember a lot of them.

That's why we're digging up people who do remember. Right. I'm like, oh my God, that did happen. Yeah. Oh my. That's another crime. We need to bury that again. Yes.

You guys are terrible. Yeah. You guys are terrible war crimes prosecutors. You're constantly bumping and getting to me and going, oh, we've been looking for you, but now we can't remember why. Tell us again. Yeah. Oh my God.

Another shallow grave. Oh my God. Totally forgotten. It's right next to the parking lot. Yeah. So, but you know what I like is you do this inside Conan podcast, and you do get people to talk about so much of the behind the scenes stuff that's happened on our show over the years.

And that is the stuff that so many people do like to hear about, and they like to hear how these shows really work and probably how people really behave. Right. Yeah. No one would believe it on our show, but. I know. Yeah. There is.

Everyone thinks your banter is scripted with, with interns and with Sona, but. Do they really? No, they don't. No, they don't. I mean, some people do, I think. He's wearing a wire, and he's getting, someone's feeding him lies in the commissar. Can you imagine if I did have a wire in my ear all those years, and it was telling me how to react to all my guests, and someone was coming up with that bullshit.

But no, we, I've always was blessed with the very, very best writers, I mean, really creative, left brain thinking writers that would come up with the strangest, silly concepts. And so thank you guys for doing the podcast, because we did put so much work into all those shows, and it's nice that you're honoring that and, and keeping, keeping that craziness alive. And yeah, I mean, today, I thought this would be a great way to launch the new season of Inside Conan, which is for me to be here with Sona. And Sona.

Oh, okay. Yay. Sona. I get it. All right. Oh, you don't get enough? Wait, are you? I know.

That's a rhetorical question. Yeah. Of course, he doesn't get enough. You've heard of him. He wouldn't be here if there was an amount that was enough. Yeah. I'm, I'm doing a podcast after 28 years of being on television every night. Have you heard of a bottomless cup of coffee?

Oh man. The name of this podcast today is Conan O'Brien has employees. And there, there we are. You're the best. You're still the best. Welcome to another episode of Conan O'Brien climbs up his own ass and thinks about himself in the third person. And in an echo chamber.

Now, Jesse, I'll let you begin because my ingrained competitive contempt for Mike Sweeney leads me in your direction. I'm glad it's finally out in the open. What makes the third season of inside Conan different from the past two seasons? What, what's going to happen this season? Well, first of all, I think we finally figured out how to make a podcast. It takes a while. Finally stopped talking over each other every day.

Except for right now. And we figured out an arc. I think the first season we were literally like, uh, we need to record one day. We were pulling in like the janitor as he walked by. Someone who put cookies down in the green room. Do you have two hours to spare? You know, we would just go and talk. But this year we're like, oh, let's start in the beginning.

Yeah. I mean, I think when you announced that you were ending the TBS show, there was this huge outpouring and all these articles written and people were sharing a lot of old clips from late night and just from your whole 28 years on TV. And so we thought it would be cool to start from the beginning and really do it as a retrospective season. Um, and talk to people from everywhere along the way. Uh, there's a lot of folks we still haven't talked to yet on podcasts who have great

stories and can really kind of set the scene of what it was like in those early years. And I, I, you know, what stuns me, I think the most is that people will bring things up to me that they saw in 93, 94, 95. And I don't know what they're talking about. And when they describe it, it sounds completely undoable. And then I'll realize we did it. And that, uh, and. Well, have you ever watched the show?

I think you'd like it. I like the host. The host seems needy. That's crazy to me because you remember the weirdest stuff that happened years ago, but you don't remember a lot of the comedy you did. Well, there's, there was so much of it. I've, I think all told well over 4,000 hours. So that would be like maybe two or three sketches a night.

That's yeah. Same amount. Yeah. And it really is the equivalent of if you had, um, eight, three different kinds of sandwiches or different kinds of food a day, uh, every, you know, five days a week, uh, for 28 years. A lot of blood. And then someone saying, you know, remember that time you had that sandwich?

Yeah. Right. It was. Extra mustard and three pieces of rye and you go, no, I don't. And then, you know, only it's not three pieces of rye. It's, you know, remember what the time you and Leonardo DiCaprio were dunked in, uh, in hot cheddar cheese. You'd think I'd remember that, but I don't.

I would think you would. Yeah. He was terribly burned. I remember that's why he never came back. His face was, was awfully burnt. That's why. Yeah. That's why he's worked very little.

You can see in the revenant, the reason the bear attacks him is that he smelled cheddar cheese on Leo DiCaprio skin and attacked him. Yeah. And you can see him peeling it off. Bear. Yeah. Uh, but, uh, I, I remember that stuns me. The other thing is I, I think, um, young people or younger people, and they shouldn't know

this, but they, it's ancient history to them. So they'll see things online, but most people don't know how angry the show had made, show made people when it first showed up because, you know, uh, and it's funny because younger people seem to like the show, but so many people who tuned into, this is back when literally there's like three, maybe four networks and I'm one of three talk show hosts or four talk show hosts, maybe late night talk show hosts and people, people were so mad at this weirdo, his weird show. And so, but it's also getting used to somebody new.

Yeah. Like, yeah. I remember early SNL where they, you know, like Bill Murray, like, who's this guy? You know what I mean? It's like you're, you have to get used to these new faces. It takes a while, uh, but there was also add to that. There was a lot of anger about the way that, um, people felt Letterman had been mistreated and he went in and I was feeling that slot and who do you think you are?

And, um, I mean, literally I used to go into restaurants and people would say, you know, who do you think you are? Do you ever think, wow, thank God there wasn't social media back then? Oh, I mean, I wouldn't be able to look at it, but there was something called newspapers. And I remembered very clearly going to, uh, talk to a therapist and I said to the therapist, people hate me, they think I'm not good at what I do, they think I'm a phony and that I, I don't belong in my job and my therapist did what therapists do and said, listen, these are negative thoughts, they have no basis in reality, you're creating these negative

thoughts because you have, um, these bad feelings, but, but they're just thoughts. They're not real. No one's real. They're not facts. They're just thoughts. And I said, no, I'm quoting from the, from the cover of USA Today and I like showed the therapist. Did you have it?

It was so funny. They made a pie chart about me. Yeah. It's all black. It was just so funny to be talking, it was so funny to be talking to a therapist and have him go, please, these are just thoughts. And it went, no, no, no, this is the Wall Street Journal. See right here, Conan, no good at his job.

He should go away. Wouldn't it be great if he died? Most hated men in America. Yeah. They're good periodicals. Yeah. And, um, and I could laugh about it now at the time. It was, uh, brutal.

It was absolutely brutal, but, uh, but it's, it's nice to, I, I wouldn't change a thing. I really wouldn't. It was just such a, all 28 years was such a kooky, uh, ride and I'm so, just when people come up to me and say, I remember the show where everybody was skeletons and I'm like, that's right. I can't believe we got away with this. I can't believe we did these things and it was a Halloween special. Yeah.

And we got a very young, brand new Bill Hader to do the opening of the show. It was a Halloween show and he did a great Vincent Price. And so I didn't even, I hadn't met, I don't think I had met Bill Hader yet. One of the funniest people ever. And I remembered asking, oh my God, the opening of his show has the most amazing Vincent Price voice. Uh-huh. And he said, oh yeah, it's this new guy on SNL and he, he volunteered and he, uh, you

know, he was a fan of the show and he did this great favor for us. And then of course. Well, he got paid. He got his, he got his $180. Um, but yeah, that's the other thing is there's all, there're all these, uh, you know, famous actors and comedy performers who got their start, uh, on your show in some form. We had, you know, what's one of the funniest things is that we had a, a sketch. I don't know.

I don't think it was the first season, but we used to do fake guests and we wouldn't tell the audience. So it was so meta and we would trick people into thinking, I remembered one week. And you'd introduce them with the music and the band. Oh yeah, everything. So. Very straight intro. So one of the things we did was Monday, we'd do the show and, and I, and at the top of

the show, I say, this person's going to be on, this person's going to be on. And of course, author of the book, you know, our civil liberties, uh, just, you know, you know, justice thwarted or whatever, um, you know, uh, you know, Josh, uh, Memic will be on the program. And then we'd get, we'd do the show and I go like, you know, we didn't have time for Josh Memic, but we'll get him on tomorrow. And then we did the Tuesday show and I'd again plugged him up front very seriously, very serious title of a book.

We got to the end and I said, you know, we didn't have time again for Josh Memic. My apology to him, but we'll have him on tomorrow. We did that again Wednesday and we did it again Thursday and then Friday at the end of the show, I say, I'm so glad we have time for him tonight, Josh Memic. And this guy comes out who looks just like an author and he's got a book that's got a serious title and he sits down and he's livid. He's so angry and he's an actor that we hire and the whole thing was scripted. And I'm like, so Josh tells you, he's like, Oh, oh, so now, oh no, now, now you have time

to talk to me. Huh? I'm angry, I sat in that green room and he rips into me and loses it. And the whole thing's a joke. So many people watching at home just thought, first of all, they hadn't seen Monday through Thursday. We were doing this inside joke for the one person in the world who had seen all that was the level of minutiae, but for that one person, seriously, yeah, but I would be like,

Oh, no, no. We always, I was always a believer and still am that God's in the details that you put these little things in there. And I learned that from SCTV, I think still one of the greatest pound for pound sketch shows of all time, you know, Catherine O'Hara and Marty Short, and I don't want to go into naming everybody because it'll take forever, but just this incredible cast of Ben John Candy came from SCTV and Joe Flaherty and Dave Thomas and, you know, Rick Moranis. But this amazing show, and they would put these little things in there that were just

if you were paying attention, like Easter eggs. And this is before I even, you know, people's called them Easter eggs, it was just they cared enough to do that. And I learned as a young teenager, young, you know, adolescent, that's what you do. Care enough about the people watching that you put those things in there. And things would show up again several episodes later. So we did a thing where we announced that one of our guests, and again, very serious was this young girl who had won us the National Spelling Bee Competition.

And we talked to her and then we brought her out. And it was an actress we hired this young actress who was fantastic. She was great. She really committed to it and fooled the audience. And the whole joke was that she's a terrible speller. We were having her spell words and she didn't get any of them right. But she was so good. And it was, I don't remember her age, but I think it was like a 12 year old Scarlett

Johansson. Oh, wow. And so this is just those are the kind of people. We also had the upright citizens brigade was was brand new. And so we had, you know, Amy Poehler any time, you know, would come in and play Andy's sister. Who had a crush on me and had this, this giant headgear on. And had a crush on me. And then Andy would always, and she had, it was kind of inappropriate and creepy.

And Andy would always sort of say, come, that's not really good. And I'd say, yeah, I've really, you know, it's not going to happen. And then she would become enraged and give these amazing speeches. But I'm thinking about the firepower we had. And she was in a million. Yeah. She was on the show maybe four out of the five days a week. Oh.

And I just, I just think how, yeah. How blessed we were, Jack McBrayer and as you say, Matt Walsh and all these people that went on to become, you know, showed up on everyone's television and they're famous in their own right and they're huge stars. And you just think this is hilarious that we had these people. And that they would come in and do this amazing work for us. We were so lucky. Yeah.

It was a great time in New York and a great time for comedy and a great time to be in Rockefeller Center and just be able to pick up the phone. And some of the coolest people would come in and do cameo, little cameo things that were incredible. Because they lived in Manhattan. Yeah. Yeah. Like Joey Ramone or just.

Oh my God. The time we had Joey Ramone of the Ramones doing a, he did a sketch for a cameo walk on and then he hung out backstage. And then we always had a postmortem, which is we would meet after the show. We did this throughout the whole run all 28 years. We'd have a quick meeting after the show in my dressing room and we'd go through this worked. How come that didn't work?

What happened there? Yeah. Sorry. The camera forgot to, you know, we'd go through what went right, what went wrong. Joey Ramone came in and sat down and sat there during the meeting. He was just sitting there because he thought he had, he had, no, he just was wanting to know what was up. Joey Ramone sitting there and he's dressed like Joey Ramone, jeans, leather jacket,

the sunglasses and he's sitting there and we suddenly were just like, we're not going to have a meeting. Let's talk to Joey Ramone about what it's like to be Joey Ramone. And he had that thick accent from Queens and he was sitting there and we were just like, well, Joey, forget the show. Tell us like, I remembered saying, we're, we're the fans, the craziest. And he, and he was just, I can't do his accent, but you know, we're just, you know, we're like, well, yeah, you can barely understand it.

And he was like, oh, South America, they just go crazy in South America. And here's some about South America and how there were certain countries in South America where they were bigger than the Beatles. And they would go down there and do a stadium and then they would try, they would get in their van and people would be shaking the van. So you know, he's telling us all about what it's like to be Joey Ramone. And that trumped anything. And speaking of Trump, that was a guy who used to do, that was a guy, the segue.

But he was someone who would just do bits. He would do anything. He would do anything on our show. And we were literally have things like, can we get Dr. Joyce Brothers to do this ridiculous bit? Right. You know, where she steps in some fake plastic poop. Now she said that's beneath her.

All right, try Donald Trump. I'll show you. You recommended Trump. I'll do it. Yeah. I'll do it. Yeah. And he used to do all these bits for us.

And this is, I mean, anyone now would say, but Conan, how could you want to say, he was a guy that did bits on our show. He was a great extract. All part of his climb. Yeah. And what did we know? We didn't know. And he used to do, I remembered he did the new Trump edition of late night with Conan

O'Brien. Right. And he did the voice over and it's like, it's Conan O'Brien like you've never seen him before. Trump style. Gold play to desk. You know. When we were in the fountain, we put a big color fountain in front of your desk.

Yeah. And he did the voice over. The idea was he bought the show. Then he bought the show and gold played at it and put all this stuff on it. And so it all seemed like funny, foolish nonsense. And then, and of course now it's got to, you know, when I say, when I tell people that guy who now has literally half the country, his beck and call, and is maybe the end of our democratic experiment, was an extra on our show, was an extra on our goddamn show.

I don't understand what happened. It could have been him or Joey Ramon couldn't be president. It could have gone on their way. Oh, why couldn't Joey Ramon become president? That would have been great. It's now a minute where you wear a leather jacket. I didn't know where to run for president here in Venezuela. Exactly.

I don't know. It was, I mean, that's why I've always thought I'm disconnected from right guy, whoever that guy was. I have a picture. You've seen. I love calling him that guy, by the way. Well, no, but I mean, I'm not, I'm not being. It's probably the best way to go through life.

Yeah. I'm not being facetious. I'm saying I don't. You know, it was so many years ago and I was so that when I talk about that version, I remember that 30 year old kid, I was 29 when I auditioned and got the show right after my 30th birthday. And I remember at the time thinking, well, I'm 30. That's old enough to have a TV show.

And now I meet 30 year olds and I'm like, you're way too young. You're a child. You're a child. That is really young. And I look at, there's a picture that Annie Leverwitz took of me that we put a sandwich board on me where I'm looking for help with my new late night show and it was taken in April of 93 and it's in Times Square. And you can look it up online, I bet.

And I have that picture in my kitchen. I don't have any other pictures of me like around the house, but I have this picture that I hang up because it's such an amazing picture. And I look at that guy and I look at him and he looks, I was to just turn 30, but I look about 17 and I look at him and I think he's got this kind of sweet smile. And I think you have no fucking idea because this is before the show started. Yeah. You have no idea.

What's going on? You have no idea. No one warned you. Yeah. How could you be warned? There was only one way to find out. And I look at that guy and I go, I have a lot of affection for that guy, but good lord. He's about to, he's going to...

A saw. Yeah. But it was... And then help groom a future president. What an arc. What an arc. Well, you know, speaking of Jack McBrayer, we just spoke to him. And he's a bit of a record keeper.

He sent us a document of every appearance on the show, I believe that too. And he was on 78 times. Oh my God. You're all here. And then at the end, he made a list and we're probably going to post this with that episode. A list that I've died slash been abused. All the different ways he was killed or named in sketches on the show. In sketches, not in real life.

Yeah. Yeah. There might have been some carryover. I know. Jack was always money in the bank and this is before 30 Rock. We used him in... 2002 he started. No one knew who he was, but he was just this hilarious, and he is a hilarious performer.

And we would, you know, use him in all these different ways. And I always would do this improv where whenever Jack was around, I'd be the kind of cruel, callous city slicker. Right. Who was like, where, where, where? Jack McBrayer, I knew I smelled, you know, horse manure, you know, did you muck out the barn? No, I did not, sir.

Yes. And he is so... Jack is so good at going with it, he'd be like, sir, that is wrong. I am not, you know, sir, that is, and he would, and he would really commit to it. So I would commit to my guy, and he would commit to his guy. And what I didn't know is that the crew was watching all this, and they thought it was real. Yeah.

So, you know, I mean, I love Jack, but literally Jack would be at the double doors waiting to rehearse, and I would see him out of the corner of my eye and start sniffing me, I would be like, where, where, where, sounds to me like somebody just came fresh from the, you know, the hog farm. And he'd be like, sir, I most certainly did not. And what if I did? I came from, yeah, I came from my condominium in midtown, I'd be like, oh, you got it. Did you get scared about the elevator, Jack?

That moving box? I did not, sir. I know perfectly well what an elevator is, and we would do this. So at one point, we would just do this, and we would really commit to it, and neither one of us would break. And I remember one time I'm walking out, and there's a couple of members of the crew, a cameraman, they're standing around, and a sound guy, and they're like, can we talk to you for a second?

And I said, yeah. And they went, you know, Jack's a really good guy, and you're pretty rough on him. Wow. And I said, guys, I love Jack. And they're like, well, if you love Jack, maybe you really, and I was like, are you, no, no, no, no, Jack, Jack, come here. Yeah. Like, tell them.

And he's, his deadpan's just too good. His deadpan was so, so good. And it'd be great if he was like, thanks, guys. Yes. He's been great. Thanks, guys. I have been. I've been waiting for someone to intervene all the time.

So he, what happened was, and this is something like you guys, I think, can attest to, which is that I don't have boundaries. To me, yeah. I don't have boundaries. I don't have, well, I don't have boundaries, but I also don't segment things, meaning comedy is not something that I do when people are around, and it's time to do professional comedy. My thing, whatever you want to call it, good or bad, is happening all the time. So, and I just did, because we had to wait to even just do this podcast when we were

out. And I had no, I just have socks on here at the Air Will Studios, and there's a smooth cement floor, and I'm dancing around and doing different characters. And charging all of us like a bull. And charging all of you like a bull, and acting like a total ass, not acting my age or anyone's age at all. I mean, a four-year-old would be disgusted, but this is what I do all the time. So I have, I will, Jack will text me something, and I'll text back, like just as, it's Jack

prayer, and we're friends, and he'll text me something like, you know, hey, you planned to have your Christmas party this year, and I'll go, well, well, well, and I'll be texting him back and saying things like, you know, you know, the problem is, if you bring the mule, you know, everybody's going to want to bring a mule. And we can't have a mule at the Christmas party, and he'll text back and say, it just be one thing. No. And I'll be like, come on, Jack, and he'll type back like, this is wrong.

This is wrong. Yeah. And he'll commit to his thing, and it'll be, sometimes it's one o'clock in the morning, and I'm chuckling and doing this city slicker guy from like 1911, and he's doing his thing, and it's for nobody. It's for nobody. It's madness. Just for the court record.

Well, it's for the people at Apple reading your text. Yeah, exactly. He's with Jack again. Well, we have a really fun, I shouldn't put this. Oh, no. Never mind. Whenever someone says something, it's like when the dentist says, this won't hurt. No.

We have a really fun thing. Let's wrap it up. Yeah, let's stop having our really fun conversation and get to this, no, no, no, I'm serious. We can do whatever you want. Sure. Oh, boy. Let's try it. Let's here we go.

I heard that shifting, subtle shift in your voice. We can do whatever you want. Uh-huh. Uh-huh. Let's see. Absolutely. It's your podcast. Whatever you guys want.

Well, we know you love quizzes on your other podcasts, so we have a, I won't know anything. That's what's going to happen, so I know that someone probably thought, let's ask Conan if he remembers these things. Oh, I want to see. I want to see. But let's try it. We have been talking. You already admitted that you don't remember most of it.

Yeah, let's hear it. So, we just wondered based on the titles of these sketches, if you would be able to describe them. Okay, go. Or maybe just guess. Go. So, these are really we're on. These are the titles from the...

I completely understand everything that you said, and we really need more explanation. These were really on. We're just trying to... These were actual sketches. We're trying to fill the time here. Okay. So, we'll say the name of the sketch, and then you... Okay.

I'll tell you if I remember. So, from 1997, Naked Goat. Nope. No idea. What's Naked Goat? Because of rating success of Pamela Anderson Lee doing SNL monologue Naked, we thought we'd try something. Pamela Lee's dad, Burton Anderson, comes out, disrobes, groin pixelated.

This makes our ratings go up, so now we present a Naked Goat eating with groin pixelated. Jesus. You guys are... Oh, my God. This is just going to lead me to believe that our show's soft. You're going to ask for a gun with a gun. Oh, my God. I was thinking so fondly of our show.

All right. Keep going. I love it. One of these will be funny. Oh, boy. The Wilcox brothers? Oh. I remember.

Vaguely, I remember the Wilcox brothers. Just give me a little more. Just give me a little more. Conan gets interrupted by Andy's whining. Well, that doesn't help. That's called Thursday. Andy's tired. He didn't take his nap.

It's okay because Andy Richter, well, this is going to give it away, is played by the Wilcox brothers. I have no idea what you're talking about. No, it's this... So apparently... You're allowed to look up good sketches. You don't have to do... I'm going to move on.

You don't have to just pick these ones that... Are these... Were these funny? No, we didn't even watch them. Oh, great. We liked the titles. This is like an autopsy where they find out that the person died 700 different ways. He was shot, Andy had cancer, and someone shoved a cannonball up his rectum.

Go ahead. Voldemort versus Mary Poppins. Nope. 2012. That doesn't matter. Does that help? Well, let's kind of remember that one. Do you?

Yeah. It was part of the UK Olympics. Sona, what do you think it was? Never mind. I don't remember it. It's a matchup of Voldemort versus Mary Poppins, two uniquely British characters. The two figures are fighting live with Voldemort beating the crap out of Mary Poppins when suddenly Tiny Tim appears, apparently to help Mary, but then he just helps finish off

Mary Poppins. Oh, my God. I'm just getting depressed. Oh, man. You know... These are funny. I'm laughing. No, no.

I'm sure... Look, I'm convinced. I'm sure some of this was good. I mean, we did some really amazing stuff. We did. You're probably saying why are we... No, no, no. I mean, I remember...

The things that stand out to me is I remembered we once did a week where we were pretending to travel through time. Yes. And we were part of the Sweeney. We built a giant Trojan horse during the Greek period, the night where we were doing... It was all Greek. Yes. And I was wearing a toga and we pushed this giant and built, had built a giant...

We actually talked to Bill Tell about it. Yeah, and Bill Tell. So he built a giant, real Trojan horse and they were pushing it through Manhattan and we timed it so that a giant truck would go smashing through it right outside Letterman Studio and smash and it looked amazing. And our first guest that night who was watching all of this backstage was Martin Scorsese. Yes. And Martin Scorsese came out and, you know, I talked to him and then during the commercial

break he was like, I gotta tell you that the thing with the shot, the Trojan horse, and the truck, that was really well shot. Wow. And I was sitting there in a fucking toga, getting a compliment from Martin Scorsese. And yeah, so there was just so much, but I'm sure you put a lot of work into it once. We did talk to Bill Tell about the Trojan horse because he had it made in New Jersey. Bill Tell, our prop master. Yeah, they circumvented Union rules and made it in New Jersey so that it would be ready

in time. Well, it's good to reveal these things now. There's gotta be a Union statute of limitations. Oh, he admitted, I'm surprised the building wasn't shut down with the crimes that were committed in the prop room. Oh, we used to have, I mean, remember we had, we used to attempt pyrotechnics on our show all the time. And I swear to God, there was no names or anything, it's just that things were done

very quickly, maybe not with an eye towards codes, the word codes, various codes, safety codes. I'm just surprised, I'm shocked. We were blessed. We were blessed that we managed to do, especially at 30 Rock. When we came out to Los Angeles in 2009, you know, people have been making stuff here in Los Angeles for, right, for 80 years. So you'd want a special effect and, you know, but sometimes we would want something or need

something in 30 Rock and it didn't exist. Yeah. And we'd find someone in a deli and say, can you make this thing right? Yes. We'd go to a shoe store. Anyway, it was pretty crazy. Yeah, it was pretty crazy. He also told one of my all time favorite stories about, I don't want to give it away, but the

time we took down Live at Five's nightly broadcast single-handedly. Oh, yeah, we guess. Because they were building shelves. Yeah, I said, do you mind talking about that? He goes, I don't give a shit. Yeah, that's, I remember that very well. They broadcast the local news that all of New York watched across the hall from us Live at Five and it's how Manhattan found out what the hell was going on in Manhattan.

So it's a big deal and Bill Toll decided to put in some shelves and I think he took a big, he didn't consult anybody and took a giant electric saw and cut through the wall and cut through a cable and no one in Manhattan. These cables must not be anything anywhere. Anyone watching Live at Five, the whole feed went out all across Manhattan and it's because our prop master wanted some shelves. Yeah, we did it at 4.30 and it was the wires that connected them to every reporter in the field.

No, I mean, you know, it's funny because I've had people say to me, are you ever going to write a book? And I think I have to, I know that I have to write a book about all the things that happened, but I'm going to need a lot of people to help me remember of what happened and also- Well, you should just listen to Inside Conan. Yeah, I'll do that. You know about the Wilcox brothers. Yeah.

I don't think that's going to be in them. Chapters two, three, and four. I don't think they're going to make it into the book. They'll make it into the supplement. They're not even making it into this podcast. Let it load your book. Do you remember this sketch? Who brought out the Wilcox brothers?

I want a name. Anyway, go ahead. Yeah, no, no, no, I just, there was way too much that happened that was, and I think some of the beauty of that, especially that first year of the show in two years is that we didn't know any better and there's a beauty to not knowing any better. When you mature or get older, not that I matured, but we started to learn some of the boundaries, but in 93, especially 93, 94, we were trying to do a Saturday Night Live every night. And we would have these ideas and Robert Smigel, who's so brilliant would, if one thinks of

it, then it can be done. And we tried so much stuff that you just wouldn't try. I mean, I wouldn't try it now because I'd be too scared. We did a thing on the show, I think that first season where we did a whole thing where, and I'll never forget this, we created like a hospital drama that had, and this is all done in front of a live studio audience, and we went live to tape, but still you have to get it right the first time. We had a whole audience and what we would do is it's a hospital drama and we got Martin

Sheen to be the doctor, Martin fucking Sheen. And then I'm in it and Andy's in it and we're also doctors and there's like, and what would happen is we would have actors who were wearing green screen things over their faces. And what we would do is we would have, we would suddenly cut to someone in the audience and their head would be on that actor's body and they had to read the line. It was called sit in the seat theater? Sit in your seat theater and it basically meant that, and suddenly we just hold up a card.

And what you were seeing was this person just came to see a late night talk show like, oh yeah, well, Letterman's not here. That's too bad. They got this new guy. I hear he sucks. Well, I don't know. It's raining out and no one else is coming in to see it. Let's go check it out.

And they're watching pretty much this play and this scene, this like five, six, seven minute scene and Martin Sheen is there having this intense conversation and we would just put someone in the audience's face into the scene on that actor's body and hold up lines for them to say. And suddenly they're doing a scene with Martin Sheen and it somehow worked and I just remembered it rehearsal thinking, we're all going to die and they're just hundreds of thousands of crazy things like that that happened that are, they scare me now thinking about them. It's like when you're older and you remember the time that you, I remember the time I got

on a motorcycle and I just had never been on a motorcycle before. So I tried to jump over a bunch of milk cartons and you're, you're more, you're more afraid later on. Yes. I'm terrified now. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

I know. I mean, it's really fun. It's been so fun to talk to people about those early days of, you know, when it really felt like this energy of people who had nothing to lose and just going for it. Yeah. Yeah. I, I'm very obviously indebted to, we, we gathered a really good crew, a Mary band that no one, I was the most, I was the television professional because I had worked on Cernot

live in the Simpsons. Right. No one else I hired had worked in television and Robert and I were the only, we were supposed to be the adults and we weren't and good God. So well, I'm really glad you're doing this and maybe I'll drop back in again because I, I, I love talking about this stuff. You remember a lot too. Yeah.

I think once we get, no, I do remember that. It's just that I can remember a lot. It's when you bring up specific things, right? And I will tell you this very quickly, which is when the great actor Jerry Orbach passed away from law and order. I remember thinking, I said out loud to somebody at the show, my God, I love Jerry Orbach. He's such a cool actor and I wish I'd gotten to do like a scene with him and people said, you did.

No. And I said, no, I didn't. I would know if I, what are you talking about? I said, I love Jerry Orbach. I idolized that guy. I wish I had done a scene and people were like, you did. I meant, and I'm like, no, I didn't. I got into a big fight.

It was my bit. It was your bit. And so Mike, Storm's out of the room. Mike comes back with one of those giant bricks because it's a different era. It's a VHS tape that's like 19 pounds and he shoved it into the machine and he presses the button and I'm on the law and order set. And Jerry Orbach is right in my face grilling me and I'm refusing to talk. It's good cop, bad cop.

And I had no memory and it chilled me to the bone. But so I will listen to this because I'll learn a lot. Listen to Mike and Jesse on this new season of Inside Cone and an important Hollywood podcast on Team Coco wherever you get your podcast. Listen because it's probably a really good instructional audio tape on how not to do things. Including a podcast. There's a link in the episode description that will take you to our interview and thank

you both very much for doing this. Thank you so much. Thank you very much. Really nice to hear. This was fun. Conan O'Brien needs a fan with Conan O'Brien, Sonam of Sessian and Matt Gorely. Produced by me, Matt Gorely. Executive produced by Adam Sacks, Joanna Soloteroff and Jeff Ross at Team Coco and Colin Anderson

at Earwolf. Music by Jimmy Vivino. Supervising producer, Aaron Blair, associate talent producer, Jennifer Samples, associate producers, Sean Doherty and Lisa Berm, engineered by Will Beckton. Please rate, review and subscribe to Conan O'Brien Needs a Friend on Apple Podcasts, Stitcher or wherever fine podcasts are downloaded.