Inside Conan: An Important Hollywood Podcast - Joel Godard Revisits Announcing Late Night

Episode Date: December 31, 2021

Joel Godard joins writers Mike Sweeney and Jessie Gaskell to discuss playing a depressed monster on Late Night (also named Joel Godard!), his filmography of one movie, the underrated art of marking your copy, and the genius of Clutch Cargo.Got a question for Inside Conan? Call our voicemail: [phone] and e-mail us at [e-mail]

From their respective homes over Zoom, it's Inside Conan, an important Hollywood podcast. Well, maybe in Hollywood, Florida. Now, here are your hosts, Jesse Gaskell and Mike Sweeney. Welcome to Inside Conan, an important Hollywood podcast. I'm Mike Sweeney. I'm Jesse Gaskell. And that was Joel Goddard, who you heard doing our intro. Yes, very excited that he did our intro. And coincidentally, he's also this week's guest. He is. Yeah, we found him. I mean, a lot of people have asked for an interview with Joel Goddard. He was, for those who don't know, the announcer for Late Night for many, many years.

For the entire run of Late Night, yeah, from 1993. Yes. To 2000, early 2009. And he, especially once Andy left the show in 2000, Joel, I mean, Joel would be on the show periodically in sketches. But once Andy left, he was on a lot more, and he was in hundreds of sketches. And he became a real fan favorite. People love him.

The character of Joel, who was... The character of Joel, right. He was very malleable. He would do... Yes. We'd be like, sometimes, early on, I'd be like, do you think Joel will do this? I don't know.

And he'd be like, I'll do anything you write. And after a while, I was like, oh, I don't think we even have to run this by him. That's correct. I'll do anything you write, and I will say it. And act it out. Yeah, he didn't say no to much. Which was great. It was great.

Yes. Great for comedy writers. Sometimes Max would be like, I don't want to do that, Max Weinberg. And we'd be like, okay, we'll give it to LaBamba. And he'd be like, let me check the script again. That was our little, we're like, well, give it to someone else in the band. Not a big deal, Max. Totally understand.

And how did you find, because you did some legwork to find Joel. I know that he wasn't exactly, like he's not on. Oh, to find him for this podcast. Social media. Yeah. Yeah. He has been and hasn't been, but we tried different numbers and emails and we were all coming up dry. And then you and I were at Conan's live podcast that he did at the Wiltern. And I saw Jordan there. Jordan's been late nights since almost the beginning where he started out as an intern.

Yeah. And somehow Joel came up and we're like, well, yeah, we really want to get Joel to be on the show. And we can't track him down. And Jordan was just like, oh my God, well, you've got to, you've got to. And he goes, I have contacts. I will send you all my contacts. Oh, wow.

And so we went through Jordan and he had one number that no one else had. Jordan did something? Jordan actually did something. We shouldn't include this in the podcast because it totally undermines. It ruins the mythology of Jordan. He actually provided, although, you know. Provided a service.

Providing someone's phone number. Not technically something that he gets paid to do, though. No. So I think we're still okay on that front. Yeah. Just sending someone a phone number is not really heavy lifting, I'm going to say. So I think he's still, his record remains. Oh, for 5,000, yeah.

Exactly. But he was very excited, and we do have to thank Jordan Schlansky. Without him. Words that have never been spoke. And we checked with his wife on that, too. Never been spoken. Well, that's great. I mean, and so it took a little bit of hunting, but we did find Joel.

And I'm excited Joel's doing our New Year's Eve special because we used to do New Year's Eve countdowns and Joel was always a big part of that. That's right. It is New Year's Eve. Yeah. Do you have any plans for New Year's Eve? I'm going out to the desert. I'm going to Palm Springs.

Oh, I know that trick. How's the trick? I don't know. You can avoid people. Oh, right. Oh, absolutely. Yes. It's a much older crew down there. It makes me feel very young. Yes, that's right. Yes. I feel really good about myself. I know. They're like, oh, look at you still having white hair. Although most of them seem to be in much better shape than me. They're just tanner. Tan does create the illusion of health. It does. Well, it did in the 60s, not anymore.

Back when doctors would prescribe it. Right, right. Are you taking your kids? No. Okay. No, no. We love them too much. I would feel sad for them if they were spending New Year's Eve

with their parents. We like traveling with them, but... Yeah. We wouldn't... Oh, no. You guys are extremely healthy as a family. You know what? We are.

I'm going to take that. Yeah. I mean, so far. Yeah, there's always time for alienation later. Both of our sons could drop us like tomorrow and wouldn't see it coming. When they find out about the will. That you're donating all your money to the Humane Society. Yes, exactly.

To one particular dog. One animal. Yes. That's the way to do it. What are you doing for New Year's Eve? Oh, you know i well i was thinking of doing the british new year's thing where you celebrate at like four o'clock and then go to bed after that oh i never stay up till midnight i had no idea that was british i've

been doing that for years and years the The Irish goodbye to New Year's Eve. I just, if we're at a party, we leave before midnight. Just leave, yeah. I think we might go to another couple's house and have a sleepover. Wait, is that true? Yes. Because nobody wants to drive on New Year's Eve. And I don't, I also hate taking lifts.

Sure. So, yeah, we just, we're going to maybe, we're going to take over some tamales. Okay. Got a big tamale order that we picked up and that's the party. That a sleepover with another couple. I know. We'll see. We'll have to see how that goes.

There's musical beds. Yeah. Do I know this couple? No, and you never will. Okay, fine. It's Tom Hanks and Rita Wilson. Oh, I knew it. Oh, yeah, that's a trip.

They're all the way over on the west side. Yes, yeah. You definitely have to stay over. I don't want to drive home after that. Yeah, that's like a 20-minute drive. Luckily, they have one spare bedroom for us. Right. They have four spare houses.

Well, that sounds great. Yeah. You win again. Oh, it's not a competition. No, it's not.

No, I'm excited. I'm excited to go to the desert. I love the desert. Yeah, I know. I think we should introduce our guest. Oh,

we did. Oh, we did, right? I mean, who knows? He's a legend of late night with Conan O' guest. Oh, we did. Oh, we did, right? Who knows? He's a legend of late night with Conan O'Brien. He is the one and only announcer.

The voice behind the magic. Mr. Joel Goddard. Hey, Mike, how are you? Hi, Jesse. How are you doing? Good. Oh, that classic golden voice. Oh, man.

Silky smooth. I could just let that voice wash over me all day. And it's great to see you. You're in Southern California. Costa Mesa, California. Good talent. I think you should do ads for Costa Mesa Board of Tourism. As Don LaFontaine, the voice of God, used to say, for a fee.

Oh, yeah. Well, of course. Especially Costa Mesa has deep pockets. They should definitely pay you. Yeah. Can we just start at the beginning, Joel, of your tenure with Late Night? Because you were also a member of the Day One Club, which we've talked about.

That was people who started on the very first day of the show. 13 September 1993. Wow. Mind like a trap. But how did you come to be the announcer of Late Night? Did you have to audition? Did you know people there? It was a combination of everything.

I was the first announcer for NBC Dateline. Now they just call it Dateline. Oh, so you got to say, and it turns out, the husband did it. Yeah, I probably did another voiceover or two for Saturday Night Live. I know I had when I was on staff. And did a couple you know after i was on our show the conan show then about august of 93 dateline had a little bit of a problem with an exploding pickup truck if you remember that uh scandal oh no i i don't they kind of rigged something about oh like a reenactment that went yeah went wrong yeah oh no i don't remember that i think they swept it under the rug well they didn't somebody else came in and took over news and they you know like when a mob guy gets hit all his guys go down too

and they were firing everybody they fired me in august of. Right about that time is when I heard I was going to get a chance to audition for you. For late night for this new show. This new show with this young fellow that nobody had heard of. So in the spring of that year, I had already, because I was in the building, I'd gotten wind of the fact that a new show was going to be in the offing. And I heard the guy's name was Jeff Ross. And I managed to find out how to contact him. And I contacted him, and he was very nice to me on the phone.

He said, well, send me your stuff, let me know. So a guy upstairs on the ninth floor, forget his name, named Chris, and also Gary Rota helped me put together an audio tape or audio cassette to get to Jeff Ross. And I did. He was the producer of the show, Jeff Ross. He was the producer. He was going to be producer. And he was nice to me.

And so I would check back occasionally from the spring until this came about in August. Here's a secret. You need to call enough times that they know you're still interested, you're still available, and you still think you're up to it. Right. But not enough that every time the phone rings, he says, I'm not here, I'm not here, you know? Right. Yeah, how many times do you think that is? I don't know.

What's the right number? Probably at least two more times that summer, just to let him know I still was interested. So within August, my then-manager got word that they were looking for Joel Goddard or a Joel Goddard type. Oh, boy. That's the way it was said. And she said, well, I've got Joel Goddard, you know

So one thing led to another How about Joel Goddard? Yes The king of freelance I think at that time in New York Was Joel Crager And he got me a chance to talk to Chaz Cowing At J. Michael Blumen Associates.

Chaz. As my agent of record to talk to the show. So things were off and running. And by August, I was invited to audition. And there were 10 test shows. Wow. I was up for five of them. So I knew I was onto something, okay?

Yeah. Sure enough, as they say down home, I got it. I got the gig. Wow. So it was between you. I'm guessing someone else did the other five test shows. Another Joel Goddard. Yeah, some other guys.

I don't know. I've never known who they were. It's best that way. I think one of them introduced himself to me, but I can't remember who it was. And you said, get away from me. It was traditional. You know, like Bill Wendell did all the promos for Letterman. Bill Wendell was the announcer for Letterman.

That's the way it had always been done. This time, the show, or maybe it was the suits of the network, they didn't want to necessarily use me for the promos. And they were offering me, like, scale, you know, for the show also. I mean, you know, not great pay, but, you know, scale for doing the network show. And Chaz said, well, you know, they're not offering you enough money, and they want to take the promos away from you. He said, I'd walk.

Well, he didn't know it, but jesus christ the last thing in the world i could do was walk right you know i just had to eat it as as you understand this you know you you guys are in the business i couldn't afford to walk right well promos shmomos i say yeah so how did so they came to you after your five test shows and said, you're our guy to be the announcer for the show. Now we'll talk business. Yeah. Very exciting. Yeah.

You said you had done a few things for Saturday Night Live. Had you met Robert Smigel when you did those? Or maybe he became aware of you when you were doing stuff on SNL? I may have met him once. I think I did work work with him once and i worked with a couple of guys doing not promos but doing actually a little silly voice over things like there was one thought one thing called you remember the some kind of a group it was a discussion program that aired oh right mclaughlin yeah the mclaughlin group they

did sketches parodies of that on snl right right with dana carvey yeah dana carvey and so forth so they had me do a fake intro called the sinatra group from washington dc the sinatra group i tried to sound like their announcer you know right and and. And they used it. They used it. Yeah. That's an example of some of the things I did for them. That's great. And so it sounds like Robert Smigel, who, you know, of course, started the Conan show with Conan and possibly Conan, you had struck a chord with them. And maybe that's where the we need a Joel Goddard type came from. So I think I owe it to Robert Smigel.

I'm pretty sure that he's the reason I got to show. Conan may have been aware of me. I don't know. I never worked for him when he was on the SNL. Right, right, right. But I think Smigel had a lot to do with it. Sure. That's good.

That's great. Thank you, Robert. There you go. Yeah. What was that like going to work at, well, you'd worked at 30 Rock for a while, but what was it like starting on this new show oh it was a it was a thrill it was a thrill i just well i've always loved doing all of this and uh i i'm never never nervous before going on which may usually is a bad sign but

i'm never nervous well this might be obvious but you did your part live, I'm assuming. So you were there with the energy of the crowd. Right. Yeah. I used to tell Teddy, you know, my wife, Teddy Dreiser, she was nervous. I said, no, I'm never nervous, but I worry something. Well, she said, well, that's a form of nervousness. Well, maybe so, but I mean, I'm never like this.

You see my hand shaking, you know? Yeah. I was never like that. Right, maybe so, but I mean, I'm never like this. You see my hand shaking, you know? Yeah. I was never like that. Right. Never like that going on. We started using you in comedy bits on the show, and you were up for anything. Yeah. Yeah.

I don't know if you said no to anything. No. Do you ever remember saying no to any bit that was proposed to you where you were like, okay, now you're fucking with me? I have a line, yes. Right. I'm uncomfortable with this. No, no, I never said that.

One day I was walking up the hall, years into our time, walking up the hall in a gold suit with gold paint on my face and everything. It was Oscar night. And Jeff Ross said, when are you going to say no? And of course I never did. Do you remember the first sketch that you appeared in or how that came about? Oh, yes. Okay.

You understand I'm a big-time actor. I have a filmography of one. That's right. Okay. And that was Guyana Tragedy, the story of Jim Jones with Powers Booth. And I play Brenda Vaccaro's

husband, who is supposed to be, what's his name? Mrs. Vaccaro. She called me Joel when we did the scene. And did scenes

in Atlanta where I was living and had been living at the time. It was done in 1980. And also went down to Dorado Del Mar and some out in the jungles.

And it was a fun thing. And I got to do a death scene. Oh, yeah. That's every actor's dream. Yeah. In fact, there were a lot of death scenes probably in the Jim Jones story, I'm guessing. Oh, there were quite a few.

Yes, yes. And some by gunfire but uh uh supposed to be running away getting getting shot a coward yes and uh she had already been shot they they were going to shoot my part from a distance and from behind you know i have the squib taped to my back. I could either pickle it myself, carry the switch, or I could let them do it. I said, no, I want it to be a surprise. I'm not going to pickle it myself. I'm afraid it would read, read even from behind. So it's about 30 yards. And so they had this wire running all around and looped back so I could do this.

So I'm out running all around and look back so i could i could do this so i i'm running and and when when when it's supposed to be a 30 30 aimed at you i know you're you're it's pretend but you can kind of get into it you know when you're thinking about getting shot so i'm running out and running for it and that squib went off and on purpose i i didn't do the you break your fall with your knee and all that stuff i didn't do the stuntman thing or or maybe they don't do it either but i didn't do the the typical acting thing of breaking my fall my feet came off the ground that was on purpose and i hit bam wow face, as I had planned. Now, even though this was intentional, it stunned me just for a split second. Now, the squib, you know, the contents, and appropriately, it's a condom filled with fake blood, you know, and the squib explodes it well some of that had flipped around uh that that liquid and got toward my eye you know i could see it dripping down in front of my eye and i was stunned there for a second and for that second just for a split second i thought oh fuck you know because you know when you're stunned like

that you don't wasn't sure it wasn't for real, you know? Oh. So that only lasted a second, but I remember that reaction. Wow. So you were a one-take wonder. Yeah. Sounds like they got it. Yeah.

Anyway, the director, he said, that's pretty, that was great. That may have been the best scene you've done. Well, thank you. And then I thought to myself, well, I had no reading lines and I was shot from 30 yards back. You died. Yeah. We really loved when you died. Yeah.

I can't believe you were never killed on Conan. I probably was. Oh, you know, you were killed many times. Many times. Yes. Yeah. So Conan's at home watching the Superstation or whatever in those days, watching movies. And this movie came up.

And he came into the writer's room the next day. And he told the writers, he said, I'm sitting there watching this movie about Jim Jones and all that. I hear this voice. And he said, that's Joel. He said, but he's got black hair and i said because i was beginning at a little bit of gray by the time he came up with you guys you know on the temples at least he said uh yeah he said i guess he can act you know write something for him so the first thing they wrote i believe was a piece about a guy i wish

you could remember his his name He did a great job. He played a professor, a sex education professor, who was too embarrassed to talk about it or to use any of the words or to describe anything. And to say, you know, he'd say, so they do, you know, and kept saying, you know, things like that. Right. He did a great job, and somehow I was involved.

Maybe I uh supposedly the narrator who introduces him or something so we did that and then one or two other little things and then janine detulio who is right around the show right on the show very funny she came up with joel is sad right and that's what really got me rolling. And so the show had been on a few years. Yeah. Because I think that was like in 95 or 96, the show. Yeah, at least. Prior to that, you were pretty much playing the straight announcer for the show at the top.

Right, voiceover announcer. I remember that. She came up with this bit where Andy thought you sounded a little depressed when you did the announcement. Yes. And so they check in with you back in your booth, which was in another part of the studio. And that was back in the days. It wasn't this wonderful booth that we wound up with after the control room meltdown, you know, years later.

It was kind of more like a typical announce booth, which is kind of a broom closet, you know? Right, claustrophobic. Yeah. And they would come to me and i would be saying all these nihilistic things and can't wait for the for the cool embrace of the grave and all of this stuff and then another time i was talking about my alcoholic father my father just would not have understood if he had seen that you know he was gone by that you

didn't okay yeah because he didn't drink at all but i was listening to the crunch of the pickup truck on the gravel outside and i hearing that i knew it was going to be a whiskey christmas i bet you remember that line you you probably wrote that mike i have a good memory and uh went through several iterations it did and uh the idea to begin with I would be spending my weekends not going home, but staying in the booth all weekend drinking and doing drugs. There were a lot of drinking and drug jokes back then. Because I had this adulterous wife, supposedly. Right.

You were a cuckold. Yes. And whose boyfriend I showed up, I'm supposed to have shown up at home early, and her boyfriend comes to the door and beats me up, relating that story. And in real life, some of the doormen in our building asked Teddy, what do you think about all that, Mrs. Goddard? And she hijacked Liberace's line. She said, I'm offended, all the way to the bank.

Well, I'm glad she was cool. Well, yeah, she didn't mind. She was getting a lot of action. Oh, yeah. Right. Did people ever say things to you about it about this kind of your comedy persona on the show like this hapless announcer sometimes skipping several years ahead i'd let my hair grow out into a gray ponytail right as a straight guy for, you know, several years. And then finally, they decided to make me unapologetically gay. You remember that?

A guy, when we were in Toronto, the only time I was ever hit on by a man in Toronto, a very nicely attired man at one of our after-show parties, you know, in Toronto, came up, you know, and very nice and polite and total decorum. He said, you know, do you have anyone, you know, do you have a lover and so forth? And I said, well, yeah, here she is. Actually, she's right here. This is my wife. He was quite dignified and so forth. But that's the only time I ever got hit on.

How many years, Mike, do you think I did the gay thing? Two years? Maybe three. Because we had Toshi and all of that. Right, right. Do you remember the first time you were recognized for being on Conan? I've been recognized in two or three countries. Oh, I like that.

When we were in France, I was recognized. Well, Toronto counts. Yeah, Toronto counts. Yeah, I was really recognized then. We really needed that security to get us through the crush of the crowd. Yeah, so that made an impression on me, that I made an impression somewhere. Yeah, we did a week of shows in Toronto. Right.

In February, which is the best time to be in toronto and uh oh god uh yeah no it was a fun week yeah it takes your breath away yes the cold it was so cold it would take you literally take your breath away when you stepped out the door yeah it was great uh you were recognized in france recognized by a fan uh in france at least once, maybe a couple of different trips. But in Venice, 25 different fans, they were all traveling together. And they saw us, and they followed us. You know, we were on the Vaporetto, and they wanted to talk to me.

So when we got off, we went near that famous bar, Harry's Bar or whatever it is. Harry's Bar. Harry's Bar. St. Mark's. Yes. And they wanted to talk to me and to get my picture. And Teddy was going to, usually people would just shove the camera at Teddy, you know, and want to get a selfie. And my question is always, do you want the real me or do you want the stupid grin? usually people would just shove the camera at Teddy and want to get a selfie.

And my question is always, do you want the real me or do you want the stupid grin? Because the stupid grin, which is what I would do a lot after those even nihilistic statements, you know. Yeah. And invariably, they wanted the stupid grin, always. Right. But in her case, she said, no, we'll take turns taking this shot. We want you in there, too. So her picture was in there, too. Oh, that's nice.

Down in the, let's see, Virgin Gorda. I was recognized down there. Okay. Well, you're very well-trained. I like the places you've been recognized. And never in the United States. No, I started getting that in the States. It must have been like the mid to late 90s I started getting recognized.

Yeah. And then, of course, into the arts, I was really recognized frequently. And for several years after coming out here to California, we moved out here in 2011. For at least a couple of years, I was being recognized and people wanted pictures. That's begun to die out because they're so old, some of them are dying out. Who knows? Well, it seems like people would want you to record messages for them or make a phone call.

You could prank call people for them. One guy in Montauk. One guy wanted that. We owned a little love nest in Montauk for a while at the Born Free Motel, where you could have your dogs. And we bought a unit there. But there was a young fellow was visiting, and he recognized me. So I remember saying, let's say his name is Mike Sweeney. Sure.

I remember recording, you have reached the telephone of Mike Sweeney. Mike can't be with you right now, but he'll be returning your call as soon as he gets out of rehab. The kid thought that was just great. Accurate. Yeah. No, that's fantastic. Well, you know, that's interesting when you're known for your voice.

Like I remember when I started working at 30 Rock, Don Pardo, the announcer for SNL, sometimes he'd be in our elevator and he would always start talking kind of just to no one in particular. But he'd be like, well, he'd be like, oh, you know, I've been working here since 47. And that guy asked for my ID. Okay, here's my ID. The same one I've had. 30 Rockefeller Plaza. Right, exactly. Going up to the ninth floor.

But we're like, we get it. You're Don Pardo. It seemed to be for that reason only that he was. Well, bless him. He got tired of doing the Macy's Parade. And I wound up doing the Macy's Parade for like 9, 10, or 11 years. I forget now. Yes. And thoroughly enjoyed it.

And at that time, on those, they paid me properly, not nickels and dimes. Okay. But anyway. I'd hope so. One Pardo story. He was telling me one time, because we were on staff together, see. His agent's name was Marge Fields, M-A-R-G-E, Marge Fields. He said, you know, I don't do auditions.

They can call me. And he said, but Marge called one day, and they said there was a call out for a Don Pardo sound alike. So I went ahead and went to the audition, and I didn't get it. And the other one was, years ago, during the on-staff days, it wasn't 24 hours a day. WNBC TV, Channel 2 in New York, was not full time. And you signed off like around midnight, 1 a.m. And there were sign-off news headlines.

They brought us copy. And it was voiceover with the slides, with one slide, which sounds pretty lame for a major network station you know even local but that's what it was his voiceover so howard reed had been on the air uh he was on the air and he was doing a sign of headlights well you've heard about though that announcers getting broken up somebody breaking them up and once you get broken up what's like doing doing movies and stuff that happens you know you get broken up and you can't stop laughing. Once it's going, you're screwed. You just can't.

Right, you can't get back. This happened to Howard when he was reading that newscast. He did something and he got tickled and he started giggling. He couldn't stop. Even going through all the terrible things in Israel and houses burning down in Long Island or whatever. Hilarious. He couldn't stop even going through all the terrible things in israel's and in houses burning down in long island whatever hilarious he couldn't stop he just couldn't control himself he just and he was just booting the hell out of it you know they just as over tea kettle down the stairs you know it just really made a travesty of that newscast and and at the end after he did it, he said, this is Don Pardo speaking.

Pardo wanted to sue him. He may have made it. I think he may have made a complaint to the union. He complained to John D'Angelo, our boss at the network. He was infuriated by this. And he had an audio cassette of the air check from that night. And I have to admit, maybe I should be sad about it, but I'm not. He played it for me, you know.

He played it and I laughed. I don't think that went over well, but I thought it was funny. He did not think it was funny. Did Pardo ever see you on late night and say, hey, why aren't I on camera more? No, no, that would have been a character, but no, he didn't. I mean, your job is, when you were an announcer, if you weren't doing a sketch, would you just come in in the afternoon and, you know, only have to be there for a few hours, or what was your day like? Yeah, oh, it was wonderful. If I had a sketch, I had to show up at noon for rehearsal and then, of course, later on get made up.

If I didn't have anything, I didn't want to be the bad guy being late, showing up, and I got it that my show time would be 4 p.m. So I would show up at 4 p.m. Perfect. And do my very best on the job. Usually I would be out before 7 p.m. That's a good gig. Now, a lot of guys like me who are freelancers,

they would come in if that was the situation, do the show opening, and leave. Yeah. But I never did that. I stayed for the entire show. I stayed for the entire show. You stayed for the whole show. Just in case. Wow.

Plus, I would learn a lot, and I would enjoy it a lot. I had a monitor in the booth. And I certainly learned a lot from that. Learned the most from your rehearsals. You and Mike can understand that. Yes. You learn a lot at rehearsals, especially with Conan. He's a real genius.

Two of the biggest, best geniuses I know of. The two things, the clutch cargo thing, pulling down the monitor and talking to Bill Clinton on there or whatever. Right, a TV screen would come down. It would be a picture of Bill Clinton or someone else in the news, but there'd be a- With real human lips. A live lips and a live mouth. And it was kind of the Conan way to deal with topical bits, but in a more over-the-top cartoonish way. And extremely well. I thought that and the desk drive, and I give Robert credit for that maybe conan came up with him any but it sounds like robert that in the desk drive yeah i'm not sure who came up with the desk driver

or it might have been i think i thought i heard dino stamatopoulos might have come up oh dino oh yeah yeah yeah but i'm not i'm not positive on that but yes that was a very uh ambitious bit so those are genius, absolute genius. Who would have thought of that? Dino Stamatopoulos. That's as good as the top 10 blah, blah, you know, on Letterman, the top 10 reasons. Although much harder to pull off. Much harder.

I know, that's just 10 things in a list. Sounds nice. We only did it like four times a year because everyone would get so cranky shooting it and rehearsing it. Oh, yeah. And then doing it live. It was a true kind of a nightmare to pull off each time. So it was like, let's give that a rest for a while.

Do I remember correctly? I remember Neil Young, the musician, was on for a week of shows. Yeah. He kind of did a little residency at the Conan show on late night. And I think he played you one night. Yes. Do you remember that?

I don't remember if he lip synced me or if he did me with his voice. I forget. I'll have to dig it up. I think Neil Young was in your booth.

Yes. And lip syncing to your voice. Right. Yeah, he was very funny. Yeah. Yeah. He still is a great performer yeah he did a

good job with that it was funny do you have any favorite memories of um your time at late night like just just either being in a sketch or an announcement or something that went wrong or something that went right but but just one of your favorite memories of being on the show oh i have many favorite memories my favorite sketch of all everything in 16 years was frank smiley doing mother theresa frank smiley who is a segment producer but yes he appeared in a lot of bits and he played mother theresa that's one of my favorite bits too it is hilarious mother theresa trashing her hotel room. And listen, fans, you can still find it on, just Google it that way, whatever you call it. Right.

It's still on YouTube. You can see it. That's right. Yep. It's Mother Teresa. He's like calling down to the front desk asking why I didn't get a wake-up call. Yeah. And then flips out from there.

It's great. It's only around 20 seconds long, but it's hilarious. My favorite one of the ones I did. Yes. Was Bathroom Tutorial. Bathroom Tutorial? I don't think I've seen that one. Yeah, Jose Arroyo wrote that.

Oh. It was in the last year. I think it was the last year of the show. We shot it in the men's room on the sixth floor. You know. Okay. And Kevin Dorff. Another funny writer.

Wonderful performer. And performer. Played the intended victim in the stall. You need to look that way up. Well, I don't remember this. Bathroom Tutorial. You know, there's this congressman that got busted in Minnesota or someplace. Oh, right.

I mean, there are many of those stories, but I know there was one. You'll have to be more specific. Yeah, joel and max go to uh go to the park go to central park right and have fun met you and max weinberg yeah you know that once andy left like prior to when andy was there the the comedy bits would kind of go, Conan would do, oftentimes, Conan would do a beat, a joke in a bit, and then we'd cut to Andy,

and he'd kind of elevate it, and then we'd end on Max. Yeah. And Max would kind of be the most outlandish, just because he was the third over-the-top joke. So everyone kind of developed a crazy character for him and then when andy left in 2000 it became we need a new second or third beat exactly right then it became conan max and then joel and i yeah i think that's when yes to my joy yes there's so many funny funny bits that

really got also the very first shows we did the things that didn't involve me they had guys playing gangsters and dunking andy's face in the water i want my money i want my money and he said i spent it i spent it yeah those are great those are last night on conan those are great things do you have any memories personally of any disasters or anything that went wrong when you were taping a show? Well, one thing is when the whole system and the whole building at 30 Rock went down. And we lost all our power. Uh-huh. And we came back and we were running on emergency power.

And it was just Conan and me sitting on camera there. We had a little discussion. That was fun. They had one little scoop light hooked up on us. You know, it really looked almost like a horror show. That was interesting. Oh, wow. So they had to throw out what was planned for the show because of the power outage?

Oh, yeah. You couldn't have audiences. Oh, wow. The whole building was down. Yeah. couldn't have audiences. Oh, wow. The whole building was down. Yeah. Couldn't have audience, band, nothing. And when it showed up in some publication, they said, Joel got a producer.

And I always felt bad about that because we know who the producer is. Right. Lies. Yeah, so. Well, that must have been, I mean, I would have been enticed to possibly cause more power outages after that. Yeah. I never asked Jeff Ross about that, but I'm sure he was already assured that I wasn't after his job.

I'm sure he was cool with it. Yeah, that was a big Northeast blackout that hit the whole Northeast. And yeah, we did an impromptu 15-minute version of the show, or 20-minute version of the show. Yeah, I remember that. Wow. Yes. It reminds me about laughing.

There's something called Gilbert's Bible, W.S. Gilbert of Gilbert and Sullivan, wrote something. In fact, I kept it on my wall in the booth. It said, each actor must play his part with the greatest gravity. And it said, the moment he becomes aware of the absurdity of his own words, the piece begins to drag. Right. In other words, don't laugh.

Some people can laugh during their performance and it doesn't hurt a damn thing. Right. Norm MacDonald, you know, didn't hurt him. Jimmy Fallon. Jimmy. When Robert does stuff on camera, Robert Spiegel, doesn't hurt a thing. Oh, yeah. But generally, when you're a comedy performer, I think a lot of people, they don't want you to laugh at your own lines.

Right. And I never had any problem when you brought the copy to me, because you've probably seen that. You'd hand me the copy, and I would just laugh out loud. You know, belly laughs reading the copy for what you wanted me to do. But then when I performed it, I never had a problem doing that. I never laughed. But if I was on with you, if the other fellow's funny, then never had a problem doing that. I never left. But if I was on with you,

if the other fellow's funny, then I have a problem. I'm as easy to break up as I was in high school when I started this. No, you were always a real pro. Joel is sad you mentioned about Christmas. You had like a, literally, it's like a three-minute run all by yourself, and you just nailed it it was amazing well thank you thank you i certainly enjoyed it oh yeah yeah another story gordo michael gordon i still remember nicknamed gordo he was a writer on the show yes some actors who take themselves too seriously you know especially you know from out here i think in the talking to a

producer or directors up and they would say and you make the suggestions you dare give me a line reading you know that's not my style that's not my style and we were doing a spot a hoo-ha a sketch uh i was on with conan and somehow conan and i there must have been our characters must have had a little bit of an inappropriateness to see and and conan is dumping me or getting rid of me and And my line was, I've got pictures. I did the line and Michael said, do it this way. I've got pictures. And of course, at the time he told me that I laughed my ass off, but that's how I did the line. I've got pictures. So that's an example. Well, you mentioned having that quote up in the recording booth. Yes.

And it was such a small space you occupied for so many years. Did you get to personalize it at all? What else did you have in there? I had a picture. There was a computer in there, by the way, which didn't go untouched. Oh, so that's what you were doing during the show, was just playing on the computer. Right. And watching the show and having fun.

Free Wi-Fi. And there was a picture of Teddy. Your wife, which I always thought was sweet. Yeah, that is sweet. You could see her whenever you were on camera. Beautiful. She was right behind you. And on the wall was that saying by Gilbert,

signed by a wonderful performer named Rue Knapp, one of the best Gilbert and Sullivan performers ever. Rue Knapp. And he had been a professor at San Francisco State, by the way. He gave me that and he had signed it. It said, in other words, don't laugh. And I kept that on the wall. There was a bag, a junk bag under the desk there with staplers and magic markers and God knows what. Debris. Let's see. I'd been in the business 20 years before I started marking copy. A lot of announcers, especially at my level at the network there, would consider that kind of a beginner's or an amateur's thing.

Really? I was always impressed by that. Can you describe briefly what marking copy, like what you would do? Yes. Must have been around 1970 or so. I started marking a full breath because unlike in the 1930s and 40s, when you thought you had to hide the fact that you were breathing, the public has figured out now that announcers breathe.

So at normal places, you take a breath and nobody cares. But I had also marked little cheat breaths. So, hello, how are you? Did you hear me take that cheat breath? Hello, how are you? You didn't get it. You didn't hear it, right? No, I didn't hear it.

No. And that was the point. So I had to mark little cheat breath points and the full breath points. So I started doing that to take care of the lung thing that I didn't know I had. And I know it now. And then I started marking the difference between what's that up the road ahead and what's that up the road ahead and what's that up the road ahead? I would mark for that.

So you mark the little squiggly marks. What word to hit. Right. So I started doing that. And from then on, I marked my copy. As I say, I'd been in the business 15, 20 years before I started doing that. Oh, wow. It always helped me. Yeah, I just thought in the business 15, 20 years before I started doing that. Oh, wow. It always helped me.

Yeah. Yeah, I just thought everyone did that just from watching you. It seemed very professional. Yeah, it's like a conductor marking. Yeah, yeah. And a lot of the New York auditions I've gone to, and you'd see the copy as you guys are left behind, you'd see one word underlined, you know,

or two word circles or something in the whole copy. Yeah. Whereas if I had access to my own piece of copy, I would mark the whole thing. Because there is a difference between, I didn't tell you to kill her. I didn't tell you to kill her. I didn't tell you to kill her. I didn't tell you to kill her. Right. All of those have different meanings, don't they? I didn't tell you to kill her. I didn't tell you to kill her. I didn't tell you to kill her.

Right. All of those have different meanings, don't they? I didn't tell you to kill her. Exactly. Wow, you did work on Dateline. Yes, yes. You know what? We've got to wind up.

This has been a real treat. You have a great memory, Joel. Joel, yeah, amazing. I wish it were better, and I'll be so sorry when the red light goes off about things I hadn't, that I didn't tell you. Oh, that's always

the case. But I've loved every second of it. Well, you can always call back in. That's right. Well, thank you. Too bad you gave me your number, because I may do that. Joel won't stop calling. Right. Oh, it's been wonderful looking at you and talking to you.

Oh, this has been a blast. It's been a pleasure. This has been so nice. All right, Joel. Thank you, Joel. Wonderful to chat with you and catch up. It was just great to hear him. Yes. And you know what? I forgot was just great to hear him. Yes.

And you know what? I forgot he can really hold forth on many topics. Yes. Yes. I know. He almost didn't need us. We should have excused ourselves early on. Yeah.

It might have been better without us. Anyway, thank you, Joel. Thanks, Joel. Oh, and hey, just a little New Year's request. If you like the show, you can support us by rating Inside Conan, an important Hollywood podcast on iTunes, and leaving us a review. Hopefully a good one. And we have a listener question. Oh, we do.

Here it is. Hey, guys, I'm an Argentinian fan. Writing from France, where I'm currently living. Wow, okay. That's very... Checking a lot of boxes. Yes. And I'm a big Conan fan. Well, that goes without saying. So I love listening to you and know all the inside trickery.

The inside trickery that made the show possible. It's just a bunch of pranks. It's one big magic trick. Listening to the last episode with Courtney Thorne-Smith, we had her on. We talked to her about her famous appearance with Norm MacDonald. She mentioned a price for the guests to go to a talk show. Are you allowed to tell how that works?

Yes. Maybe who is the most expensive? Thanks and keep it up. Happy holidays. From Adrian. Thank you, Adrian. Happy holidays. From Adrian. Thank you, Adrian. Well, thanks, Adrian. Oh, there's an accent mark

over the A. Adrian? Adrian. Oh, this is a good question. They were wondering what guests get paid to appear on the show. Right.

I think people are surprised sometimes to hear that that they get paid. Right. Especially if they're big stars. It's like, well, wait, what? Yeah, right. Oh, they need more money?

Yeah. But it's just, you know, it's part of the deal because you're in SAG-AFTRA. Mm-hmm. And every television appearance requires a fee. Exactly. So you kind of, you have to get paid. You can't turn it down. I think it's the going fee for when you're appearing on a show and you're doing over six lines. Yeah.

I think. So it's like $1,200 maybe. It keeps going up. Yeah, it's the minimum fee that any SAG, which is a Screen Actors Guild member, gets for appearing. Yes. She asked, do some people get more money? I don't believe it. Maybe some shows, maybe some people demand more money. But that's a good question. From what I know, everyone understands that they get this minimum fee.

They just get the base rate. Yeah. And that way it's also like, I don't know, it seems a little unethical almost. Well, yeah. To give certain people more or, you know. It would be crass. And I would be worried if I was famous that that would leak out. That you had demanded more.

Yeah. So and so. Yeah. Demanding more money. I remember one example aretha franklin was on the show oh yeah yeah back in late night and she had a few requests one is that she got paid in cash right which i think is a a famous thing with her about yes get the money up front get the money up front and sure enough money up front. And sure enough, she got that, back then it was probably $900.

Maybe musical guests get a little more, but I don't know if that's the case. And she had another request, which was no air conditioning while she was there, because it was bad for her throat. For her voice. Oh, wow. And it was a summer. So it must have been very damp in there. Oh, you know what? It was brutally hot in there. And people, you know, because usually television

studios are kept very chilly so that everyone stays alert and awake. Also, it was for the equipment needed to be chilled. But I don't know if that's true. I heard the real reason was so people stay alert. Don't fall asleep. Yeah. They're in survival mode. They're literally like, oh God. Our studio used to be so cold. I had like a special Patagonia jacket just for going down to the studio.

I think shivering makes it easier to laugh. Yeah. Anything comes out a little bit like a laugh. Exactly. But not when Aretha Franklin was on. It was brutal. Did she bring her purse on stage? Did we talk about that already?

I don't know that. I just love that. Supposedly, she always brought her purse out on stage. Oh. I didn't really trust anybody in the back. Oh, wow. Not to steal from it. So, like...

The cash. Because she got... She asked for the cash, and she put it in the purse, and then she'd have to steal from it. So, like... The cash, because she got, she asked for the cash and she put it in the purse and then she'd have to take it on stage with her to perform. Okay, all right.

Like, if you watch the Kennedy Center Honors of Carole King, she brings her purse out. Oh, that's great. I love that. Yeah. I heard a wild story

about Chuck Berry. Oh. This must have been the early 70s or something. I don't know. He was doing an outdoor festival in France. It was getting X amount of dollars. And he showed up and he saw it was a festival

with like hundreds of thousands of people. And he was like, wait a minute, you're only giving me, you know, basically peanuts. Look at all these people. And he demanded more money, like a lot more money and they're like well you know no that's not what we agreed to and he's like okay well i'm not performing so they're like okay they're like well it's a saturday all the banks are closed we can't get you the money and he goes supposedly pointed to like all you know they had all these you know food outlets and and t-shirt outlets all all these businesses there he goes he goes

well those people have cash he goes so figure it out and supposedly they came up with the money for him i mean the cash and he performed that is negotiating master at work. Man. I've had that experience of working on a production before where you, you know, you agree to a certain rate before you show up. Right. And then once you're there, you kind of see where the money's being spent. Oh, well, yeah. And there's like all this excess and it's like, oh, you know, the director's assistant's assistant assistant has like a tesla just for running errands and you're like oh my gosh and i was getting nickel and dimed right on my salary yeah so it does sometimes you have to wait till you show up and then you and like chuck berry you see hey there's

a lot of did you say something no i've never said anything of course no i no i just silently stew. You know, I learned at an early age, life is unfair. And I'm always just like, yeah, sure, okay. And I don't like confrontation. And you know what? I got to say, that's why we've gotten this far in the business. Okay, did we answer the question? I think so. It was a very simple question.

It was just how much money do people get paid. It was how much money they get paid. And the answer is the minimum. I think so. It was a very simple question. It was just how much money do people get paid. It was how much money they get paid. And the answer is the minimum. Right. Well, this has been fun, Sweeney. Thank you for another great year on the pod. It's been a blast. Thank you. I always love seeing you and chatting with you. Me too.

Thank you, listeners, for sticking with us. And we'll talk about more places to visit in California. Yes, we'll talk about more places to visit in California. Yes, we'll talk about more desert vacation spots. You know what? In the new year, I'm going to talk about places to go in New Jersey, where I grew up. Oh, I think that's great. That's a great resolution.

Oh, yeah. There's some places right outside Newark that I think people would love to visit. Well, hey, I do have one resolution. Oh, no one sees this coming. Yeah, what's that? I resolve to keep liking you. Happy New Year. Happy New Year.

Submit your listener questions. Dial area code 323-209-5303 or email us at insideconanpod at gmail.com. Inside Conan, an important Hollywood podcast, is hosted by Mike Sweeney and me, Jessie Gaskell. Produced by Sean Doherty. Our production coordinator is Lisa Byrne. Executive produced by Joanna Solotaroff, Adam Sachs, and Jeff Ross at Team Coco. Thank you. Of course, please subscribe and tell a friend to listen to Inside Conan on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, Google Podcasts, or whatever platform you like best. It's the Conan Show. Put on your hat. It's the Conan Show.

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