Conan O’Brien Needs A Friend - The Looming Comedian

Episode Date: October 7, 2021

Conan talks to obituary writer Kitty to better understand how he’ll be remembered after he’s dead. Wanna get a chance to talk to Conan? Submit here: TeamCoco.com/CallConan

Conan O'Brien needs a fan. Want to talk to Conan? Visit teamcoco.com slash call Conan. Okay, let's get started. Hi Kitty, say hello to Conan and David. Hi Conan and David. How are you Kitty? Well I'm good.

This is quite surreal. Is this real? Are you real? Uh, there's no proof that I'm real. Actually, I may be a phantom. I may exist only in your memories. You're just sitting there like it's kind of weird. You're like the president thing at Disneyland right now.

Yes. Sometimes I like to go and sit with them sometimes. Now Kitty, so much to ask you, where are you right now? I live in Hurley, New York, upstate New York near Woodstock. Oh, that's beautiful country up there. It's gorgeous up here. It's gorgeous. Yeah, I love to get up there.

I love Columbia County, I love the Berkshires, that whole area is just absolutely gorgeous. It is. We found it by accident. We were living in Iowa. When you say you found it by accident, you were driving, your car broke down, and then you decided to move there. Yeah, we drove from Iowa to New York just on a whim. That sounds like heaven.

Yeah, so we went, I had no idea where this was. We flew to Albany, drove down through Hudson, and it was October, so our heads exploded. Leaves, changing, yeah. It was prime. It was also the Woodstock Film Festival. So we're sitting, having coffee, and Matt Dillon walks by, and we thought, where are we? What's going on here?

Well, he tends to walk by wherever you are. He's probably following you. I think he is. I think he's outside. Yeah, you see him. He's got a problem that way, but I just saw him go behind you right now. Well, I have a question for you, which is, I'm told you're a writer, but I don't know what kind of writer.

What do you write? I write obituaries. I write a lot of things, but I'm a- Oh my God, you're an obituary writer. Oh, this is incredible. I'm fascinated by obituaries. I always go right to the obituaries in the paper, and I never quite knew what fascinated me so much about obituaries, and I was asking my dad, who's a smart guy, and my dad said, it's because the story is complete.

He said, everything else you read is, okay, this happened, but we don't know how that will change tomorrow. But when you're reading an obituary, it's the story has an end, and it's very profound, and there's something kind of beautiful about them. I love that he said that. You know, it didn't occur to me until my dad died. He died before my mom did, and I was sitting, and I was looking at letters that he had written me when I was in college, and it dawned on me just like your dad said.

You see the arc. Yes. You see the beginning, and now I see the end, and it just changed everything that he wrote in those letters. Yes. How I read it. I was like, oh, he was 40-something then. He had no idea what was going to all turn out, and so your dad's correct.

Yeah, there is something about them. The circle has closed. That's it, and so I'm fascinated by obituaries, and I think they can be sometimes the most profound part of the newspaper. Everything else is chaos, and then there's something beautifully enduring and obviously very final, but feeling very true when you read an obituary. You always see the highs and the lows in their life. You always, especially with anyone in the arts or politics, there was always the early

years of struggle, then some triumph, then terrible disaster, usually midway through, but then the recovery from that disaster. Exactly. Exactly. Well, I don't know. I write somewhere there is no recovery, too, and so there's that, too. That's the story, you know? So what we do, I actually have a company with my husband, it's called the Healing Obituary,

and we came up with it because I had been writing them for friends and family, and it became clear that the most meaningful part of it was when we all sat down and I started asking them questions, and that gave them that chance to talk about the person, the first chance that they had since the person died. So things were coming out of their mouths that were unbelievable, and I was writing it all down, and it never fails after I'm finished, the person will say that was the most meaningful part of the whole ceremony. That makes a lot of sense because you're getting them, there's this notion that I had

a while ago, and this isn't a new idea because there are people that are terminally ill, and they basically have a funeral while they're still alive, where everyone can talk about them, and while they're there, and that's something, and I started to think recently, what if there was a service where you could get someone to write your obituary so you could read it before you go, you know, obviously you don't want to do that too early in the game, but it might make people feel better if they could look at their life through that lens and think, oh my god, this is what I've done, and this is what I've meant, and here is who I'm survived by, and this is everything I went through.

It could be a very profound experience for people. Well everything you're saying is true. I just have to say, David and Matt, isn't this just a hysterical interview so far? No, but guess what? But you know what, here's the thing, here's the situation, Kitty. One of the things I like about this format so much is that I don't want things to be funny that shouldn't be funny, and when there is something, a funny moment, and we'll have it, then we'll have it, but this is fascinating to me, and this is a really nice conversation,

and I think people- I agree, and I love what you're saying because it's exactly what we do. I'll write an obituary, I'll write an obituary for people who hire me and who ask me to, but our main function is to go to funeral homes and train their staff how to write a better obituary. You read them in the paper, and they're a lot of times the same. Conan loved his cats, and he loved his dogs, but most of all he loved his family, and so we're teaching-

Well that's just bullshit. I know. See? First of all, who loves cats? There's their cats. Well you have cats, right? I know, but not by choice. I have them because my daughter wanted them, and my wife wanted them, and yeah.

Well then we would say Conan really hated his cats and was forced out. But that's more interesting. Let's workshop this. I like this. Exactly. Yeah. And- I just got an amazing detail from an obituary that I wrote a couple days ago.

This woman told me that her husband was in plays. They had moved to Florida. They were kind of snowbirds, and they moved to Florida, and in their little community he was performing plays, and he sang to her from the stage, and he pointed at her when he was singing. This is like an 82-year-old guy, and I said, what was he singing? And she said, uh, something about the days dwindled down to a precious view, and I just thought, oh my God.

So I didn't put that in the obituary. I love it. She wasn't really paying attention. I know. I don't know. He wasn't that good a singer. I was watching the other actor. I don't want to see that.

She was on her iPhone the whole time. She was watching the races. I'm trying to see if my horse came in. I don't know. That guy was always singing some bullshit. Kitty, can we workshop Conan's obituary? Yeah. I mean, I am curious because I want to know, am I going to get a New York Times obituary?

Because I think it's all when you go, meaning I think if I'm in a ballooning accident tomorrow, yeah, I'm getting a New York Times obituary. That's pretty awesome. Gee, I hope I go in a balloon tomorrow. But, but, but, see, I'm not worried about that because I'm not going to go ballooning tomorrow. Okay. That's good.

If I stick around too long and I go on like 92, I'm not going to get anything because if you stick, if you stick around too long past your prime, they don't care anymore. Oh, yeah. I'll get a shout out in the Brookline Chronicle, but that's going to be about it. So what do I do? How do I make sure I don't lose my slot in a New York Times obituary? You keep going and doing what you're doing and you won't be washed up by 92. They'll still be out there, you know, well, Kitty, I know that they write like certain

celebrities obits in advance when they're an in advanced age. How early do they start doing that? Yeah. Has someone already written mine somewhere? Yeah. Oh, God, yes. Yep. Have you, Kitty?

Yeah. Not me. There's a file at the New York Times that they, you know, that's how come when someone dies, their obituary pops up so fast because it's already mostly written. Yeah. They don't do that for young, vibrant, like the moment Conan got a talk show, they started writing that obituary. Exactly.

I've got to read it. I've got to see what they've got on me so far. I know because they'll write whatever they want about it. Yeah. You can't have it. You can't see it. They'll never show it to you. No.

You should call them right now. You should call the obituary desk. Here's what I want. I want the phrase sexual athlete to be in there. I want them to say Conan was a sexual athlete and had an animal magnetism. I don't care if it's true or not. I just want it in there. That's going to be when Conan the Barbarian dies.

Here's what we need to do. We need to get the locksmith from last week's episode, get him to break us into the New York Times. Yeah. Look at these things. Right, and bring the roller skating woman from another episode to take out the guards by smashing into them. We should do.

We can use all of the people I've interviewed in these Conan O'Brien fan segments. I can talk to them and I can reunite them and we can form this super team. Yeah. This is the heist crew. There's a locksmith. O'Brien's 11. We do this. O'Brien's 11 and then the whole goal is to break into the New York Times, find my obit,

and then I use you kitty. You have to come with us through the whole thing. Everyone else is taking out guards, picking locks, creating a special kind of chloroform that knocks people out, and then you're the one, finally when we get in and we've hacked the system with one of the IT people I've talked to, then you write the obit that I want. Conan O'Brien, known for his animal magnetism and his sexual athleticism, is gone at 144. I've got it.

Hold on. Wait, she's right. Your crew's going to be dead. Your crew's going to be long-lived. And then we all have to get tattoos from that woman that was the tattoo. Right. All right. Conan's 11.

Yeah. It should be a cartoon show like Scooby-Doo. I like it. Okay. All right. Well, we've created a really good show where maybe it's just a whole other spinoff podcast cause Conan writes his obit. Every week we add more bullshit to my...

It's just one sentence a week. It's the shortest podcast. My cookie. A little bit. Don't go on for pages and pages. No, but I'm fascinated by this and I have to say, every now and then I'll read an obit that was for a life that was so fantastic and so unusual. And I'm going to cite an example.

A lot of people don't know this, but Stalin had a daughter and she grew up in the Kremlin and her father was Stalin and her mother, I think, famously committed suicide because you try living with Stalin. She went on to obviously survive her dad, then left the Soviet Union and then was sort of a tabloid person in like swinging London in the 60s. And then she's living all over the world. She's marrying. She's marrying again.

She's in all these sort of mini scandals. And she's Stalin's daughter. And then she finally ends up, I'm getting this wrong, but you'll get the gist of it. She ends up dying at a very old age in like a little shack with no power in Nebraska or even west of Nebraska, someplace in the northwest region. And people were like, yeah, she was this sort of kooky old lady who lived in a shack and didn't have any power and would see her every now and then. And you just looked at the arc of her life was insane.

She might have been married to Frank Lloyd Wright. Maybe I don't know. We're going to have to look that up. But I know exactly and I'm trying to think of her name, but you're right. I know she was a voice on the Flintstones for a while. But what I'm saying is look up that obit in the New York Times. I think I read that three times and kept sending it to people when I said, match this arc.

Like this arc is incredible. You're, wait a minute, you're growing up behind the walls of the Kremlin and your dad's the most feared, you know, autocrat in the world. And then you're dancing on tabletops at a nightclub and swinging London. And then you're like having a fistfight with Richard Burton and Monaco. And then you're in a shack. Just mind boggling, absolutely mind boggling. There's a book that you must read.

It's by an obituary writer named John Pope and he lives in New Orleans and every he writes obituaries for people from New Orleans. So Kitty, I'm just fascinated by the whole thing. The whole topic blows my mind that you're an obituary writer and that you are going to help me break into the New York Times, rewrite my obit so that it has some real zip to it. But do you have any question for me? Well, if we did the template for how we would write your obituary, the question that I would ask you, actually, I thought maybe David and Matt, we could do it and pretend that you're

dead. Okay. Can we have me have gone in a really cool way that I was mountain biking in Sullivan Canyon near my home, which is something I really do. And I came around the corner and there was a bobcat. I got off my mountain bike, died of a heart attack, fought the bobcat and we just went at it and we fought for six hours. And then finally I expired, but my dying words to a park ranger was, don't harm the bobcat.

It was him or me and the bobcat is set free. And then much to my annoyance in the afterlife, I found out the bobcat is a hero. But anyway, that's how I died. And now Matt and David will help fill in the info. Okay. All right. So Matt and David, when you think of Conan, what are the first words that come to mind? Oh, comedian, entertainer.

This is awful. This is just my profession. Oh, right. Why don't you just get my shoe size while you're at it? He's dead. Oh, okay. Obituary critic. I'm gone.

I'm not here. I'm in a bobcat's lower intestine. Wow. I just feel like even when he's gone, he's looming over my shoulder. That's because I am. I'm right here. He's even there more now that he's dead. Yeah.

So far we have him described as a looming comedian. Oh, that's good. Uh-huh. I think we can do better. Sexual athlete. Yeah, but that's you. Very full of himself. Yeah, full of himself.

Okay, I'm not here. Concerned with his own obituary. That's why I need to break into the New York Times and get this thing taken care of. Writer from Beyond the Grave. What if this first line was Conan O'Brien, a man obsessed with his own obituary? It would be. That would be, that should be what it is. Has died.

Okay, that would be awesome. And you know what? You can write your own. People do it. There's a guy who famously did it in Des Moines and it was hilarious. I want to write one that has, that's filled with misinformation. Yeah. You know, because, I mean, just, I think it would be so much fun to throw in all this

stuff in there, like, after a brief, you know, I mean, stuff that doesn't even make sense chronologically. Yeah. But just, you know, people are busy, they're reading this thing like, oh, Conan O'Brien, let's check it out. And it was like, you know, during the Korean War, he served briefly with the, like, and they're like, oh, okay. And it's like, he wasn't born when the Korean War broke out.

Exactly. But no, I can put stuff like that in there. Why not? Yeah, you should do that. Yeah. Oh, my stepson said that your obituary should include that you leave behind your wonderful scenes in Death Stranders. Oh my God.

That's right. That's a video. Death Stranding. A very obscure reference. Yeah. My stepson's cool like that. He said that. Yeah.

Well, I have to, I have one thing to tell you. If it's in the first paragraph of my obit that I make a cameo in the obscure video game Death Stranding, then I've really achieved nothing. That's why. See, there are plenty of people who would disagree. That's true. Three of them, I think, and that's worldwide. Well, Kitty, I'm afraid that's all the time we have, but I've real, I have to say, I meant

everything that I said about what you do. I think obituaries are really important and I think they're kind of hauntingly, they can be hauntingly beautiful when done correctly and probably help people heal. They really do. I appreciate you saying that. People think their lives have been boring and they're really not. Right. Especially when they're allowed to make things up and they're open, which is what I mean.

Well, Kitty, nice meeting you and I hope you're not writing about me anytime soon. I hope we're not thinking about this for a long, long time. So do I. But if I do go, let's hope it's a bobcat. I'm a big guy. Cougar, bobcat. Yeah. Same thing.

Yes. Yeah. That's right. Well, thank you so much, Kitty, and thank you for being such a great fan and I hope our paths cross in a non-obituary way someday in the future. Same. That would be great. And I got to say, your behind the scenes people are just really wonderful.

Oh, good. I've had a blast talking to all of them. Terrific. Well, thank you. Thanks, Kitty. There's supposed to be, but I'm glad they are. Well, you take care, Kitty. Thank you very much.

I don't know what just happened. She's got it. She's got it. And she's gone. That's okay. That was abrupt. Who did? She really did that.

No, she did that. She could not have gotten out of there faster. She said all she wanted to say. She was gone. Kitty out. 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. This has been a Team Coco production, in association with Stitcher.