Inside Conan: An Important Hollywood Podcast - Revisiting Comic-Con w/ Andres du Bouchet, Levi MacDougall, and Dan Cronin

Episode Date: June 3, 2022

This week Mike Sweeney and Jessie Gaskell look back at CONAN’s Comic-Con specials with writers Andres du Bouchet, Levi MacDougall, and Dan Cronin. They discuss working with legends like Mark Hamill and Jamie Lee Curtis, Conan’s cold-open tribute to Mad Max, the convention’s nightlife, the joys of electric scooters, and much more.Got a question for Inside Conan? Call our voicemail: [phone] and e-mail us at [e-mail]

And now it's time for Inside Conan, an important Hollywood podcast. Hello and welcome to Inside Conan, an important Hollywood podcast. We're your hosts. I'm Jesse Gaskell and that's Mike Sweeney. Thank you. He hasn't said anything yet. Oh, there we go. I was tempted to say, hey, maybe let's see how long I can go. Well, it turns out. Maybe I could just do the whole thing. Exactly. I bet you thought that. I would love it. Believe me, no one would complain. See, people wouldn't even notice. No, no one would notice. So how are you? I'm fine. I'm great. I had a nice long weekend.

Yeah. Memorial Day weekend. You had a nice long weekend. I did have a nice weekend. Good. I went to the Central Coast. Oh, of California, we should specify. Of California, yes.

Not Rhode Island. Right. Although, you know, I think all Central Coasts probably have a similar vibe. Probably. Because it's neither the north nor the south they're like the middle child of the state exactly that's what i like about it they're kind of resentful of the north and south shores yeah always having to mediate between the two right and the the everyone else likes the north and south shores better yeah what's going on with you uh wow um oh well around an hour and a half ago i went

outside i was gonna go for a walk i was going up the street and um par for the course there was a turtle crossing the street what yeah large turtle so um do you think it escaped from it had to have escaped from somewhere yeah because they don't just exist in the wild. Not in Los Feliz, California. And it was a pond turtle. Wow. Yeah. I mean, sometimes if it's really hot, the asphalt looks like a pond.

Well, that turtle sounds like it was in trouble. I know. So I got out of the street. I rang my neighbor's door because he used to raise tortoises, rare tortoises, and sell them. Well, I think we've cracked the case. Right. So I was just like, I can't just put this turtle on the side of the road. So I rang his door and he came right out and I said, this turtle.

And he knew exactly what he goes. Oh, that's a red-eared slider turtle. So the guy knows his turtles yeah oh yeah but it wasn't his it wasn't his though no but then he said the neighbor crossed the street he goes he has two koi ponds he has turtles ah yeah but they're not home so i have this turtle well that must be how it escaped i brought it home with me oh so you have it i have it well i where is it right now i kind of i it's right here in a i put it in a giant bucket wait move the computer i want to see you want to see it here oh my god he's so cute he's big he's he's a fully grown my neighbor

looked at me he goes i uh i could tell by the markings it's an adult male, full size. Wow. But that's not all he could tell by. He was talking about me. Oh, oh, oh. Because actually you're shrinking. That's a good looking, it's a really good looking turtle. He's got nice markings. He's got very nice markings.

But it's crazy there are two turtle aficionados living across the street from each other. Yeah, I wonder if they are rivals. This is the same turtle you buy in pet stores. The little... Yeah. I just learned that. I didn't know that. And they just get really big and old.

They get that big. And then they try to cross the street and end it. Oh, yeah. I know. I wonder where he thought he was going. I have no idea. He probably has a pretty good life there in the koi pond. I think he's really enjoying the big bucket I put him in.

He was ready to downsize. Yeah. I mean, are you going to give him back or do you think you might keep this guy? There was an awkward thing with the neighbor who was the real turtle expert. Like, I was holding the turtle and part of me was like, so maybe you could take the turtle since you've raised turtles and you yeah you bring it to the neighbor but he's like uh finders keepers yeah now i said i guess i'll take the turtle he goes yeah why don't you take the turtle yeah so he's sick of looking after all the neighborhood turtles you know what he told me till their owners right right what i know he's the go-to guy. He said, he goes, Oh, the neighbors,

his turtles have been attacked by raccoons. Oh no. Raccoons. Raccoons, which I know you've had problems. They are my nemeses as well. I think they're a blight on society. Raccoons are awful.

I see no redeeming qualities. They're little, they've got little hands. I mean, they're kind of cute. No, the better to kill you with. Well. They're too dangerous. They shouldn't have, we shouldn't be allowed to breed raccoons or. We should get them off the continent. Yeah.

Well, I think you're, I agree with you because he told, this is horrific, but he said, I said said raccoons attack turtles he goes he goes yeah actually goes a lot of them just eat the legs off the turtle and leave them alive yes oh my god oh they're so awful so maybe you're right about raccoons being assholes they are they have no moral compass no that's like you'd at least leave two legs yeah so that it could still move around they eat all the legs off that's what he was saying i didn't i should google it instead of repeating no you shouldn't google it it could be a raccoon or urban legend i don't know uh well we should get right into it i guess yeah let's get into it yeah i used the word right which was incorrect let's get Yeah, let's get into it. Yeah, I used the word right, which was incorrect. Let's get into it.

Let's get into it, because we have a great show today, unlike other days. No, we have a great show, and we're going to talk to not one or two, but three writers from Conan. Yes. And we're gonna specifically zero in on, you know, we've been doing an overview of Conan's career on Late Night, and lately we've been talking about Conan's years on TBS, and a

big part of that were the years Conan spent at Comic-Con every July. Yeah. I mean, starting in 20... 2015. 15. Yeah. We went every year up until the pandemic. Until the pandemic. Shut things down. Shut it down. So we decided to ask the resident nerds, Levi McDougal, Dan Cronin, and Andre Dubuchet. We will talk about the term nerd and whether or not that applies. Yes.

Yes. We're reclaiming the word nerd. Yeah. I'm going to say. I don't think of those guys as, I feel like they have a nerd gland that they can access when they want to. That's right.

That they can express. Right, exactly. This gland when they need to. Exactly. And, you know, it's really valuable. Let's just say it's very valuable when we're gearing up for Comic-Con. Oh God, yes.

Because I would be just lost in like a sea of, so why is it important that Captain America is a part of it? You know, it's like, I don't know. I don't get why this matters. No, every year when we had to write stuff for Comic-Con, people just kind of went away. Our writers coordinator would send around research. Yeah. Kind of just on what the writer's coordinator would send around research. Yeah.

Kind of just on what the big movies would be, et cetera. But some people already, they could have written all the research, some of the writers. And then other ones are like, yeah, I'll take that research. Yeah. Quick, please. Where I was like, I've seen Star Wars. Right. Not recently.

Right. I think I remember that. Well, you were a big part of Comic-Con. Don't be modest. Yeah. No, I found my niche. Yeah, yeah. Found my way in. You know what? Everyone, I'd say all the writers, everyone contributed. Yeah. They had to. Yes, you had to. We always wrote more than we could use down there. Right. Because it was such a big operation. You kind of wanted to go down there with options as the week proceeded. And we're going to get into all of that with Levi, Dan, and Andre.

Can we first just have you each say hello so that everyone can understand what your voice sounds like? Yes. Hello, this is Dan Cronin. How are you guys? Good. Dan, use your real voice. Oh, hi there. It's great to be on the mic and back at it in the saddle. Hey, everybody, Dan Cronin. It's good to be here. Hi, Jess. Hi, Mike.

Hey, Dan. Great to see you. Yeah, you too. Who's next? I'll go next. My name's Andre Dubuche. And this is not my real voice. I'm projecting. Hi. That's your morning voice. Everyone has to do a little intro bit. Yeah. And this is Levi McDougal.

I've been up for three hours. I have no excuse for not having a bit, but I don't. Your bit is that you're Canadian. Yeah, yeah. That's my thing. You were born with a bit. Man, talk about privilege.

Well, we wanted to have you guys on. We are getting into the Comic-Con years of the TBS show, and you three were very integral to all of those shows, and I think also to the social vibe that we had down in San Diego. We like to party. Absolutely. party absolutely i tried to um make scootering a a national national mandatory pastime for wga writers were you the first one to come back and go oh my god there's scooters everywhere we got to do it i instantly became addicted the year scooters were out there and people thought they

were dangerous and i was like i was too scared to one. The fun outweighs the danger by far. And I started taking scooters to every dinner, every rehearsal late at night. At one point, me and Rachel Yoder, a lovely post-producer on the show, I was just off with her wife, like scootering through downtown. Oh yeah, you were on a date with her wife? Yes, I was. her wife like scootering through downtown with her wife wasn't there a someone who was stabbing people on a scooter that was dan that was oh geez you know do you have that memory i feel like oh that was that was a scooter gang wars the birds versus the limes yeah it's a netflix miniseries right now when's the last time you rode a scooter dan comic-con

so it really stuck this hobby of yours yeah we could start at the beginning chronologically of what happens in the comic-con shows which is with the cold opens which were always really fun to work on and also a lot of lead time, a lot of work. Oh yeah. And much higher budget than most of the sort of pre-tapes that we would do. Yeah. I think it pretty elaborate.

That back in Burbank for the regular show. Yeah. It starts back at our regular studio months ahead of time where all of us collectively are going, Oh crap. Comic-Con's coming up. What are we what are we gonna do what's the movie and we're constantly like looking at what the big big movies are that are in the zeitgeist which ones do we have to do because you're kind of having to predict like stocks where yeah like what's gonna be yeah will people still will this be

on the radar in three months and And I would often be the guy who would defer to people like Levi and Andre who are much more versed in the Marvel type movies and sci-fi movies. And Todd. Todd too, yeah. We're nerds. Yeah, you know, dorks. Schmucks.

Goobers. Dinkuses. Dungeons and Dragons types. Yeah. And I i'd be like what about this little weird idea that will never get produced that's absurd like what about that downton abbey movie yeah dan there's not really a this is a scene i'd be like no you know can i can i I produce a piece on the history of spandex? You know, something like that. But it always kind of worked because there always was a giant, when you think about it, a Memorial Day, like summer blockbuster movie.

Right. And then we were kind of turning up there a month and a half later. So there's always something Star Wars, always something superhero-y. Game of Thrones was pretty huge that whole time, right, for those years? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So for writers interested in how we'd produce the show, it was clearly, as we would say, a volume business. Because we would be producing our own shows every day, but we'd have to have one eye on Comic-Con months ahead of time. So we'd start to generate these approved idea beat sheets that grew into like

a tome and we would all be going, there's no way we can do all this. They'll never use all this. Yeah. Right. Yeah. One of those shows would have like the cast of Game of Thrones taking up two acts of Maybe they'll cut Sophie Turner for my spandex bit. Yeah. Right. Well, one bit that you really had to think about way in advance were auditions,

which I think three of you got, or maybe all four of you worked on. It was me and Levi. If you want to talk about that. Yeah. And I think Jesse worked on one. And I joined in. And Jesse joined in too.

Yeah. That was a bit, I mean, I pitched that we should do a audition bit for a movie because the show had done things like that before. I remember the Seinfeld auditions years ago. And I was like, well, what movie is it going to be? And Levi's like, oh, it's got to be Wolverine. And then it was like, oh, yes.

And you just immediately started picturing all these stars who could be auditioning to be the new Wolverine. Levi, what was it? Was it his last movie, did he say? Did Hugh Jackman say? He had finished, it was before Logan, I think he had finished the movie called Wolverine, but at some point in the press junket, he had announced he was going to retire, which was great for us. Cause then this setup was, you know, Hugh Jackman has just announced he's going to stop playing his iconic role. So the studio is looking for a replacement.

We got ahold of the auditions. Like it was, it was the best best setup so the way it would work is we'd go to the segment producers and say hey we'd love it if we could have a moment with bill hater we'd love it yeah we'd love it or our favorite from that first one of course was betty white right and it was great she you know i guess the idea was something like she does the line and it's fine. And we asked her if she wants to do it again. And she does Wolverine. And then she puts her hand up and we were in post. We're going to have the blades come out of Betty White's hands. And right when we asked that, her like Marine assistant, it looked like he just got back from combat. He just came over and he goes, I think we got it. But luckily, but she jumped in. She jumped in at the end and said, no, no, no, we can do more.

Cause then she had done. Oh, did she really? She did the extra beat. Yeah. Cause she ended up ending it on like kind of a confused, you know, she tried the line and I was like, sorry, I just have to ask, why is it, why are you asking me? Oh, is it because of these?

And then, but it was great. Cause she came in doing nothing about it. And when she got caught up in like 10 seconds, she was like, Oh, good. Good. Got it. She was awesome. But you'd have to, you know, wrangle these celebrities for months before the shows.

And we'd start editing them and we'd looking at them and we would just be like every time we were like, do we have anything? Do we have anything here? And magically it would come together. And then it would be way too long. Way too long. You'd have to break it up into two bits. But they always went well because we we always found something. Some of the stuff was written. A lot of it wasn't, and it was just in the room and just props. Yeah. And Jesse, Levi, and I were able to play off of these celebrities. And it was so fun because we're, we're being kind

of, you know, the people running the audition, can you please try that again? And that they'd be able to play off that and yell at us. So they're all... And sometimes they would just not cooperate very much, right? Yes. Sometimes they just wanted, like, we'd prepare four pages and they'd be like, I'm just going to go in my own direction. And it's like, great, that's good. Or it would be like they didn't want to do the thing they're known for. Yeah, I know exactly who you're talking about.

Yes, or we'd be afraid to ask them to do the thing they're known for. And so, like, we were just afraid to go to adam sandler and say can you do the goofy adam sandler thing and he and we gave him lines and he's looking at he's like yeah i'm gonna try something in his dressing room he looked at like four or five pages of stuff we'd worked on being like, we're not just going to hand you the thingy thing. And he looked at us, you know what, I'll just Sandler it up. That's what they want. Thank God he's Sandler. I know.

It'd be weird if he wasn't. But playing off some really funny people who were used to improv was a blast. Because we would ask people in advance. It's when I was here last minute. Like Jodie Foster was such a long shot. We'd asked surprising. It was a blast. Because we would ask people in advance and sometimes here last minute, like Jodie Foster was such a long shot. We'd asked and then on the day, one of the talent bookers called, they're like, hey, so Jodie was just asking

what the thing is she's doing after her spot. Oh, she's in, okay. And we ran in, we had ideas ready. And then she was great. And she was good for everything. She put on the costume. It was like, oh yeah, what else? What else should we do? I know, I was costume and was like, oh yeah, what else?

I was always surprised when really, really famous Oscar winners would be extremely easy and then people who were on The Real Housewives would be the dearest. I remember Bill Hader was one where... That's like having a ringer because you had him do the Star Wars one, right? Yes. And he just, oh God.

We just had to get him to yell at us because he's a hilarious yeller yeah so i wanted like early in the audition for him to scream we go he would do the line and then one of us would butt in and be like hey bill could you uh try it and he goes no notes no notes that's in the the young han Solo auditions. All on YouTube, folks. Check it out. YouTube. And I remember Andre, we did a lot of live cameos, too, with big stars. And Andre, every year, I think, did the citizenship test, which was a giant crowd favorite.

Yeah, those are always fun to put together because it's basically an excuse to have the whole staff come up with tons and tons and tons of very idiotic jokes. Right. Comic-Con related or just kind of nerdtastic we were never allowed to do say the word nerd down there do you remember that it was like a directive it's like yeah oh they were worried that we're celebrating yeah yeah yeah they're like you know what the people at comic-con were like we don't think they're not nerds please don't do i think that's i think i think in this day and age nerd is a term that yeah that that nerds are proud to claim you know like i think it's true if somebody calls like a nerd it's kind of it's kind of almost meaningless now it's like it's almost like a boomer right boomerism yeah well because so many people co-opted it yeah yeah yeah and then like non-nerds also

called themselves nerds and then right oh this i guess i'm just a bit of a granola nerd i love it exactly anything that you have any interest in that's so much andre notoriously like was not a go backstage and mix it up with people and go meet people. I have a lot of anxiety and I did not want to ever meet celebrities. I always felt really uncomfortable talking to having to work with celebrities and stuff like that. So you definitely didn't regret going down to meet Mark Hamill. No, that was the one you guys,

you guys actually forced me to, cause I was like, you know, that's great. That's great. I'm not, I'm even just getting a little teary eyed. Think about it.

Like I'm, I was like, Oh, star Wars is basically my whole childhood right i was so happy so i was like i'm not gonna be mark hamill that's ridiculous i i just will you know uh but you guys kind of you know like no no you like you produced a bit go down there and produce the bit and you have to talk to mark hamill so i forced levi to come with me yeah you were nice so uh and then it turned out that he was like you know the nicest uh guy ever nice super oh that's great super game for whatever and uh he knew he that was one guy who knew the power he wielded with those fans like when he when he came out the level the tidal wave of adulation that he was greeted with was

deafening and he and you could tell that he was used to it he was like yep yeah yeah what luke skywalker gets i don't remember another cameo walk on a comic-con getting a bigger reception than him it was just unbelievable yeah it was wild and he was so normal but because we were running through this stuff and he had like his pup with um so you know they were just doing little stuff in green room and then he got pictures with us he's like well do more do more and he was just yeah like so low-key and then he went out there and just yeah destroyed uh it is interesting though because jess you were talking about jodie foster like this oscar-winning actress and it is just how people compose themselves like she was the type of person wants to know everyone's name and you are are? Levi? Oh, okay. I'm Jody. Yep. We know who you are. And then there'd be other people.

Yeah. That's my favorite. I'm Jody. Yeah. And then there'd be other people who they kind of exist above the room. Like, what are we doing? Nameless, faceless bunch. What are we doing? You know, who was a cool cat? And in my mind, a big star. And i guess he is a big star don cheetle oh yes i was thinking about him sure i would see cool he was so funny yeah he was so funny yeah he did one of those things where like we would never like they're all doing us a favor right like we would never ask someone to do it you know a made-up song and he's going through it and he's like in the jokes he's like okay great yeah yeah he goes what would you think if i tried like maybe we did a like a version of

the theme song where i add lyrics to it we're like whoa of course we would never request it i'm gonna cheat a little bit up Well, had you guys been, like, Andre, had you ever been to Comic-Con before the show started going? No, I don't think so. I think there was one previous remote we shot with Conan there. Before we went? The years prior. It might have been for, like, a video game conference or something. Or maybe I'm just mixing up my conference centers.

But yeah, it was probably something like that. That was probably actually in downtown LA. Yeah, no, I don't think I ever, because I also hate crowds. Yeah, it's pretty overwhelming. It is overwhelming. But you guys would sometimes go, like I know Levi, you went down to the Comic-Con floor. We'd usually have a couple passes that we were all passing around. Yeah. Yeah, was it just a shit show? It was overwhelming. It was packed. comic-con floor we'd usually have a couple passes that we were all passing around yeah uh yeah was

it just a shit show it was overwhelming it was packed it's it's funny thinking of that in like this day and age just shoulder to shoulder i know with everyone yeah because i went down initially to kind of scope it out we were thinking of you know we could just do some quick bit with all the costumes and it just didn't the density of people you kind of really have to set something up. That's a good segue into to give people a sense of what the setup was like for fans, because you're going to this huge convention that's taking over an entire section of San Diego.

It's packed. You have to walk into those conference rooms and, or, you know, Hall H, whatever they call it. A lot of times there were long lines and our show was kind of like a side stage at coachella where you could go in and get tickets sit down in an air-conditioned theater and see a lot of stars from the current movies get a pop toy that you could immediately sell and then you toy and, you know, see some of our grade A comedy. But it was a great thing.

I think it caught on and it became a really popular destination within Comic-Con. And we were at the Spreckles Theater, this old theater. World famous. I think it was down there a few weeks before Comic-Con to see a Mets game.

And I was like, we were walking by the Spreckles. I was like, I wonder who's there. And it was like a two-week run for a hypnotist. I was like, all right. You will let me perform here for two weeks. Two more weeks. You're extending my run for two more weeks.

You will cheer for Mark Hamill. You will cheer for Mark Hamill. You will cheer for Mark Hamill. It was really cool. And what you're describing, Dan, is people were so excited to be at our shows there. And that, I mean, for us as a staff, was really encouraging. Oh, hell yeah.

I mean, the audience, the laughter you would get for when you got a laugh was so overwhelming that it really felt like you held that with you for longer than usual. Yeah. You had to. And it also took some performing chops. Like you had to wait on some of these laughs because they were like, oh, wait, that's a two-part wave. It's like, oof.

Right. Yeah. That's a really good point because all of you were in sketches down there and yeah so was it totally different you just said it was yeah doing it in our studio it's that absolute like you know the scene in the movie where you the performer goes out to the stage and in a cheesy hallmark movie it was then that i realized my dream came true. And they go to credits. Yeah. Because it's just walls of people. Shot from behind and the lights.

Shot from behind. The lights are coming down on you. And it's bigger than. Balconies. Yeah. It's just incredible. Yeah. It was great.

And I always remember trying to top ourselves each year. Like you reminded me Levi would play Mr. Fantastic. Yes. Yeah. And the first time he walked on stage and took a selfie with, you know, a 30 foot long arm with Conan, which is great.

But then they had to up the ante the following year. Right. And you were way up in the balcony. Yeah. You sat in the balcony and your legs stretched all the way down to the ground. You were manspreading. Yes. Right.

That's right. There was a manspreading one in the lower balcony. And then think the last one the third one we did i was in the very top balcony and we did a whole thing too with the arm right i think after that first year because it was so hot it did make all the other years more fun to come up with stuff because we then knew the kind of crowd we were going to be dropping it on so You're like, oh, what? And I'm sure you guys have given him a shout out on this podcast before, but there's no limit to the number of shout outs to give Scott Cronick, our head of costume and wardrobe.

Absolutely. He's literally a genius. And he's a guy who would add laughs to your bit through his job. And you're like, oh, you just made my bit funnier. He made everything 20 to 40% funnier. Yes. And just better.

And visually interesting. He chroniced it up. He chroniced it. He was the best. And this was a nightmare for him. I mean, this, the comic con week was an absolute nightmare for him.

So much. And he would never, he would really not complain. Never. He would just be like, I think he took great pride in being so bad about it and being like yeah i will make everything so awesome and you can put as much work as you want on my shoulders and i will knock it all out of the park yeah his whole staff they were all yeah they were quiet badass killers yeah i mean he assassins he would put the pressure on us on those weeks leading up to it. Sometimes we'd have like one final comic-con meeting where all the departments

came together and he would have a way of like, he kind of knew which bits were on the fence. He'd be like, are we really doing, are you really going to be doing this? Are we really doing this? Full size stay puffed. Of course,

Scott. Cause I'll go ahead. I'll make a human centipede out of Smurfs. A full-size Stay Puft. Of course, Scott. Because I'll go ahead, I'll make a human centipede out of Smurfs. I'll make it. I know. I've done it before and I'll do it again. I'll do it in three hours. Wait, did you already have that?

Yeah. Oh, yeah, that's up in the rafters. We'll go grab it. Could one of you walk us through? So, I mean, in addition to the months of prep that we would do up in L.A., once we got to San Diego, what was the schedule like for setting up for the shows? Because the shows usually started around Wednesday and we got there on Sunday before. Yeah. We had to roll into town on a Sunday afternoon and then spend several days drinking.

And then, yes, we get rolling into town on a Sunday. Prep, prep, prep. A lot of downtime. A lot of what restaurant should we go to tonight kind of stuff. Then Wednesday, the shows would be taped on Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday. Is that right? Yeah. Yeah.

And then we'd be back out of town on Sunday again. I would just say that the difference between Burbank, where we had a studio up and running, the booth, everything there is set. This felt like we were taking over and excavating an old building from the 1800s. Like, how do we put our show on here? So there'd be just days of guys on walkie talkies and representatives from the theater and representatives from our crew kind of chatting it out. Well, you can't do that. That's a five 55 and you're going to need a nine 87. And there was all this technical stuff and we'd be waiting around going, what are we doing? And just so many cables to just to get the lights up and running took forever. And then the other huge factor, when we finally started to rehearse comedy bits, picture doing a bit that you've timed out to three minutes.

And it's like, okay, that's going to take six minutes here. Just by virtue of like, it's twice as long for the actor to walk to his mark as it was in Burbank. Everything took twice as long. The actors are now farther away in their dressing room. So the stage managers had to work everything out. When should things be queued? It was a ton of logistics and really, really tough and amazing that we were able to mount those shows as quickly as we did. There was a great thing with the theater being so old because the whole production, it felt like the circus rolled into town.

We had all our trucks full of stuff. And before they went, props, costumes would check in with us and be like, okay, guys, we're about to close the doors on the trucks. Do you really have everything you need? All that stuff. And then we got to the theater and the basement is kind of where they put all the celebs, but then also all the writers who were performing and then all the actors coming in.

So there wasn't a separate place. And like big celebrities who were coming in with their team of five to ten people and so you go downstairs and just everyone is together it felt so much like old-timey showbiz like vaudeville people are getting naked in front of each other yes there's a picture yeah when i was doing a mr fantastic everyone from the first suicide squad was there and i remember i had to just stand back by the door in my unitard and it was like yeah will smith and margo rob like all those guys they're just feet away and they're like everyone's just having fun it felt like oh we're all doing showbiz together yeah yeah because they're all out taken out of their comfort zone too you know being thrown down to san diego to

i remember being dressed as the clown down there in the basement. Well, celebrities were doing it. Oh, butterscotch. Butterscotch. Oh, I love butterscotch. Those bits that Todd wrote that I loved doing, but the makeup was always the hassle. It was like so suffocating.

Yeah, onerous. There are always bigger swings. I mean, anything in Comic-Con had to play to the back of the house, be visual, and we could take some chances on things. So like the Mr. Fantastic, I remember one time I played an astronaut who was going to have an alien chestburster come out of his chest in the middle of the bit. And I was laying on an angle, so like this, and I had to stick my neck out. And then a fake body was in front of me. and Eric Allard, our SFX guy,

with his hand would push this thing through, and all the blood came out, but I had to lay on this rack on an angle for like 20 minutes before I was brought out there, and I'm suing the show. Yeah, your neck is still messed up. What was the writer's room like there in that building? Lavish, luxurious, full of all the amenities you could possibly want.

We had huge windows that you could easily slip out of. Oh, yeah. The windows were very... They were encouraging us to leap to our deaths, I think. Yeah. They almost went down to the floor so you did feel like it was like what are you waiting for yes the call of the void all i can hear are those fans there were fans everywhere white walls and tiny folding chairs

oh yeah and i'm i'm a i'm a. And I'm a big heavy dude. And those chairs, I think I broke a couple of them. They were so flimsy. I mean, it was fun. Any roadshow that we've ever done, it is fun to see the entire staff crammed in to one place like we're a political campaign or something. It looks like we're fundraising.

Yes. And we've mentioned a couple times which restaurants we're going to go to that is a huge part of comic-con was we are going to try to eat our way through san diego and bucatini so my memory restaurants my memory of like on the business side where all the producers were this would be early on maybe the day of the first first show, but you'd see Jordan Schlansky approach our executive producer, Jeff Ross, and, you know, whisper to him. And if you listened, you'd think maybe he's coming in with some big news like, hey, look, our lead guest canceled tonight. This is crucial. But what he's actually saying is, Jeff, the pasta tonight is a popper dell with a bolognese. I can

make some other calls if you need. It was so high importance. If you went into the writer's room at any minute, there would be menus on at least three of the writer's screens. Something to get to just escape from because every other minute was filled with,

you had 20 bits. Of course. And, you know, 40 people coming in. Do we know about that? And then celebrities would be getting changed at times. You know, you'd have a comedy bit that wasn't so specific. So this person's going to play it

and then they come in. They're not available. Would it work for this person? So you kind of workshop it. There was a lot of that too. Yeah. Way to bring it and then they come in they're not available would it work for this person so you kind of workshop that there was a lot of that too yeah way to bring it back to work dan was almost at a restaurant i was trying to pull it on his scooter i have the menu in front of me if you guys want to get through it well and we would start doing dress rehearsals eventually which was kind of when we learned that our bits were in the show

or cut. And so that would also help because you'd be like, all right, well, actually everything I had got cut. So now I'm going to literally spend the rest of the week eating. Give me those menus. There's a great pub that's basically connected to the theater. Time to go sit there with the crew guys

and have a couple punts. Swings, what was that? I don't think this was your bit, Levi, was couple of points. Yeah. Swings. What was that? Oh, I don't think, I don't think this was your bit. Levi. Was it, it was called hyperdrive.

Whose bit was that? I was going to ask about hyperdrive. Oh no. That was Gordo and I. Gordo, Michael Gordo. Oh, okay.

Yes. Can you tell us about it? It got hot. So yeah, so it came off the first year when we saw the set, Christopher Gumas, our set designer, he created this amazing set that made it the stage stage basically look like the interior of a large spaceship.

So when we saw that window on the back with a giant screen that they could put video clips on, we pitched that Conan's like, well, the great thing about this is we can actually drive the theater. We have warp drive on the theater. So I thought I'd put it into hyperdrive and let's see where we go so then it was just a pitch fest all the writers put in stuff and i think the first one was you know into an asteroid belt kind of some more typical stuff and then a cow bounces off the windshield and he's like oh we got to get out of here hit hyperdrive again so everything is just new bits and we had i remember one time we landed in a dark room and like, what's going on. And you see a door open and we're clearly inside a fridge and Kumail

Nanjiani looks down. He's like, whoa. And they have a little interaction with Conan. So it was, I think like seven or eight bits. It was fun. It was longer.

And it's always so much coordinating with, you know, a video bit. And then Conan's kind of trying to improvise, but he's also locked into a track because of the videos, which is always tricky. And you never have enough time to rehearse there. So it always got bumped.

It would be scheduled for the first day. It would get bumped to the second, third, fourth day, then to next year. Right. It must have tried it like three years in a row. Then to 2024. They traveled through time to the next year. Yes.

They'll have spaceships next year, right? And our digital effects team who worked their asses off on it. I know, so much special. It's such a bummer, but Steve Robinson, yeah, Eric. And yeah, we had to come back and go, we're saving it for next year?

Yeah. Stick around, stay alive for another year. That problem of trying to make an old idea seem fresh to Conan, too, and you're like, oh, you loved it when we first did it can we please just yes and he would be like he'd be like wait it's it's the same thing from last year yes it is like a fine wine yeah also it's a 2015 vintage hyperdrive i mean conan would be comparing a bit like that which there's absolutely nothing wrong with it it's conceptual it's interesting he'd be comparing a bit like that, which there's absolutely nothing wrong with it. It's conceptual.

It's interesting. He'd be comparing it with all the live energy stuff. It's just explosive. And it's like, let's just get something else. Right. If you get a celebrity to play the hyperdrive, then maybe. Yeah. Betty White.

Bring back Betty White. Kamada had pre-Marvel Kamale. That's right. I don't know i had pre-marvel camille that's right i don't know what more you could want oh that's right what was the bit andre you did with chris parnell and he's signing books yeah that's my that's my favorite thing i love that yeah that was actually yeah so that was uh that was the first year we were there i think right and then the second year we were there i was able to i ran into him in the hotel and thanked him again. He was very nice. But he was just signing copies of his new novel, which was basically, the whole bit was a long excuse to get to him saying, winter is coming. But the main character of his series of novels was named something winter.

I forget what the character was. It was like a steamy book. It was like a long way to get to a sex joke. And he had a huge laugh at the end a huge cheer but it was like yeah that was that was i i was like when we like made good use of the space there so he was like sitting in the audience at a desk yes cut you know stacks of his fake novel and we had a big long line of fans leading up to it yeah that was cool i think i must have borrowed that device of the line because there was a bit i did where we find out uh andy has put out a real a hit comic series yes and and then it you find

out it's called the red dingus and it's it's clearly conan is the main character and has his origin story and everything right it's a lot of fun i guess guess that's the other fact we haven't really talked about. Not only do we have to set up, rehearse, figure out what was going in the show, but we were then always filming things in San Diego that we either just needed the tail end of something we couldn't get in LA or it had to be in San Diego. Once we got Conan into his superhero costume,

we were then having to wrangle him to shoot pre-tapes. And he's, of course, got a million things going on. But we would shoot him walking around the streets of San Diego in a superhero costume. So it was always finding ways to fit that in and then edit while we're there. Yeah, I was wondering about that. The bits that we would shoot there and then you'd have to immediately go into the editing room and turn them around overnight. There's a trailer. That editing trailer was intense.

You had to know how to just like stay out of the way like hey we maybe hop in and are is it okay it's a little apocalypsy now and there it was just every fall of saigon was coming and everything was just like oh my god i've got 10 minutes to edit this yeah that was out on the street near where fans would kind of hang out because that's where it's near where the stage door. So sometimes you'd get recognized as, you know, from from bits. I'm sure sure Andre did. I'm sure Levi did is Mr. Fantastic.

But I would keep the costume on just so people notice anything aboutgging two 10-foot arms around. Pretty dirty. We did always have to find, you reminded me, Levi, we'd have to find, it was one year, was it your bit where Conan got fitted for the superhero costume? But then we were encouraged to find ways to bring that back. I think Conan liked wearing it. I think Sweeney and Gordo and i were there when he first tried on just the muscle suit because it was ironhead studios right who had made it and remember they

were it was first just going to be a helmet and then they we got talking and they were really collaborative and lovely and like oh we could we might have time in our schedule to do a costume the muscles take a long time but we do have a leftover torso from Ben Affleck's. So that's what kind of made it. Yeah. So Conan just had these insane muscles the first time he put it on. I matched Ben Affleck's torso. So the muscles are built into the suit?

Count me in. What have I been doing all this time? And, you know, that, you know, he'd do a monologue and then he rolled the piece where he's being outfitted for this outfit. And when the bit ended, the first time I think he was lowered from the ceiling. So during that, I don't know, six minute or seven minute tape, they timed it. They had to rehearse getting him in that suit. It's almost like, it sounds like an SNL sketch where they have to doarse getting him in that suit is almost like you remind it sounds like an snl sketch where they have to do those quick changes that again the suit hook them up and then hoist

them up right now the suit just getting the suit on alone and then all the safety harnesses to make sure that we didn't start on a debacle i know what it was like a parachute jump where you know you forget the parachute it's yeah we only hooked one hook sweeney whenever we were ever like hoisting people up on things that's when i first heard about the foy brothers who are the foy brothers based in vegas and they like own the hoisting business they it's a monopoly it's so weird hoists yes before thereists? Yes. Before there was Shell Oil, there were the Foy Brothers. It's like a Will Ferrell movie. They invented the pulley system.

Is that right? I mean, they invented this system for theatrical. I mean, they may be. It must be some specific. They had an acrobatic background, right? They patented the concept of height. Like, sometimes, like, if you're going to put that thing from there up there, you're going to owe us a lot

of money. One family owns all of San Diego's gravity, so you've got to go through that. They came up with the phrase, look up. The foys. Those guys are loaded. How did they do it? No one knows. It makes you feel like you're in showbiz, though. Yeah.

Like, learning about the foys. It became a verb. Yeah, well, we'll just foy that up. Right. I'm just picturing those guys charging by inch of how many inches off the ground you want something to go. They charge by the inch. I think it was like that. I think it was absolutely like that.

It's like, well, if you wanted more than eight inches off the ground, it's going to cost you. What were the things we had hoisted or foiled? I know there was Aquaman spawning. That was one of my favorite bits. That was Jose Arroyo's bit. Jose Arroyo. It was Aquaman, the year the movie came out, and just how he mated. Oh, that was great.

Yeah. He released a bunch of eggs I liked the bits like that one and um that one was a great use of of the of how much room we had to play with

right in that giant theater and so was the um the one that Todd I think Todd wrote it where it was like all the Planet of the Apes characters

yes with un- un-rendered CGI so it was all yeah green screen green they ran out of time

they didn't have time to do the CGI that was great because there was like in green screen they ran out of time they didn't have time to do the CGI that was great because there was like a green fake horse and you know tons of actors tons of actors

were you guys in any of you in that one? I was one of them but yeah the energy because they opened the shot and just the crowd who are already

like you know orgasming from the show they're like you're amongst them and more people just kept coming in green suits. People are like, you don't know where to look in the best way. So funny.

The Aquaman one, you should point out that Jose Arroyo is a cartoonist. You could picture him sitting there sketching it and going, is this something? Yes, it is, of course. He always did famously sketch. That was always helpful. him sitting there sketching it and going is this something and yes it is of course but he always did famously sketch helpful all he he could storyboard his own stuff storyboard them before

he even pitched he did the the the mad max which was the first big cold open we did our first year of comic-con jose had yeah yeah like a nice like 12 piece sort of thing he story he storyboarded that whole he storyboarded a whole bunch of it just for us to kind of workshop it, yeah. That was, I remember, I think Levi's idea was, oh, you know, because that was the year of the Mad Max movie. That's a good one to talk about. Yeah, let's talk about that from the origin. I'd love to hear about that. It's so huge.

I had nothing to do with that. That's why I'd love to talk about it. Yeah, right. Yes, yes. Those are the things. And that was, so i had just started writing for the show a few months before right so that was kind of 2015 2015 yeah and that came out of jose and i walking for lunch and kind of oh okay you guys came up with it together i think

the first thing i pitched to him because i had just seen it and he hadn't seen it yet was um conan traveling on the front, the way that Tom Hardy, the way that Mad Max is strapped to the front of the truck. I think that's where it started. And then it went through a bunch of iterations. And then once we had pitched it to Conan and he had seen it, he got excited. And then he ended up,

I think he pitched playing the guitar player with the Doof Warrior. The Doof Warrior? Is that what? Yeah. Doof Warrior. Yeah. And we? Is that what? Yeah, yeah. Doof Warrior, yeah. And we are a special effects guy at the time. Practical effects, Eric Allard.

I remember just going down because our prop room and special effects are together. So they're all going to be involved. And we're just at that point, it's like, hey, guys, they know the deal, too. It might go away. We're like, here's what we're thinking. It's large scale. Right. Ideally, it's this massive truck.

We don't know how big we can get. And then in the thing, he's got a flamethrowing guitar. So of course we're assuming if we can just get a guitar made, we can add the flames in post. Right. And right away he stops us. He's like, Oh no,

no, no, no. We can make that. We can make a flamethrower. Just give us some, give us some time on it. So yeah,

we have four right here. They're not tuned. They're not straight legal no he went just crazy building this truck right down i mean it's a it's a pretty much an exact replica it was close encounters he first made it out of mashed potatoes and he wouldn't stop well wasn't wasn't there like the shot with all the flames coming out of the guitar and everything? Didn't that make the most expensive single pre-tape we'd ever done

or something like that? And just building the truck, yes. And the guitar cost a fortune. And Conan himself, wasn't he foiled off the front of the truck? He was rigged in like bouncy restraining things so that's the thing yeah they not only had to make it huge and impressive and actually able to work but it had to be safe enough for us to put the star of the show on there and then even

with that we had a closed section of like a secondary highway but that flame must have shot 30 feet at its max and it was easily adjustable by Conan. So we were having to watch the power cables on both sides of the highway. They were almost as high as the truck so that he wasn't just setting everything on fire. He could have started. It was like, don't tilt the guitar up too high or you'll start a brush fire. The worst fire since that gender reveal. Yes, exactly.

One shot I was obsessed with getting was the shot where you're coming up Worst fire since that gender reveal. Yes, exactly. Yes. One shot I was obsessed with getting was the shot where you're coming up, because it's just a great shot from the movie where you're coming up behind the truck and everyone's drumming. And it was the band drumming. Yeah, yeah. And you come around the side. Yeah. And then pan up and you saw Andy driving the truck.

And then you go up and you see Conan Sadu for you. It was like that big reveal shot. It was a cheer and then cheer and then cheer. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It felt like such a movie shoot. Yeah.

The part where Conan is gradually lowered down to sort of calmly, calmly look at the map with, I think it was a map, right? Yes. Well, it was like a movie shoot. We had a whole camera truck with one of the,

the camera at the end of like a 20 foot boom, which is you know something we never ever have yes which seth our camera guy who we knew was good but he was always using a handheld camera and you know he was great with lenses he knew how to make it look cinematic yes but then when they brought in the truck i remember us saying we're like so how's this work best seth do you want to talk to whoever controls and he's like no i can control it and so how's this work best? Do you want to talk to whoever controls? And he's like, no, I can control it. And so it's him with a remote control doing long panning shots that moved up. And man, he just mastered it. It was so cool.

Talk about another guy who would elevate everything you did. Because, I mean, he really was like a, you know, what's the term on a movie? Yeah. Like a cinematographer almost. Exactly. Yeah. Loved to get the script early and he'd go through it and have all these great suggestions for shots and you're like

yes yes yes yes it's all great and he'd order the equipment he needed to get what you wanted like if he knew he needed a new lens or whatever it was it's great working with a guy like that and then would coordinate a b unit if he had to if he got someone and he's like i'm gonna cover this so you're covering this right it's something i think we all learned early especially with ideas of this scale is once you have the kernel of the idea like here's the gist of it it's this mad maxing do you then go around to every department you almost want to do that before you've nailed too much down because they're all going to make it better in a way that you wouldn't have even considered is possible right and so then you can start incorporating that into what the jokes are and the beats.

Yeah. You're good about that, Levi. It's like the script should almost be the last thing that you do in a way. Yeah. Get everyone on board. And start elevating it. Foy. See, Foy just made more money off that comment.

Foy. All right. Your podcast contained the word Foy eight times. And we're going to need to know how high up you guys were each sitting multiply eight times the inches of height off the ground that you were that's how many dollars you want to describe the frenzy over the funko dolls and how they became a currency? No. That's fine. The fun part was figuring out which characters Conan would be.

Yes. And that would be handled months in advance. Tanisha would kind of... I think it was usually me and... Was it all of us? I feel like me and Todd were kind of... I guess it was probably because we just happened to sit right by her desk. Yeah, I think it was a smaller group of people who had opinions on it yeah how many how many of those did they make over the years like four i did four a year so times five years so 20 wow and they did

do a set for the final year that we weren't able to do oh right that they released because i remember we pitched them so far in advance we didn't know that wasn't going to happen what were they so the last ones we did there was a marty mcfly uh dr malcolm so jeff goldblum from jurassic park in the pose on his side which is one of my favorite ones yeah there's a chucky an aquaman and a wonder woman were the final cool for the final set yeah and a sean spicer one chance but yeah the dancing with the Stars, Sean Spicer. Yeah, but I mean, people would get a free one at the show, but then if you went outside immediately after

the taping, there was like cash being exchanged. People would be out there and be like, I'll give you 20 bucks for your Funko Pops. Like 100. And they would just have bags full of them because they'd be paying 20 bucks each to people or bartering with other funko ones so i'll give you five of these kind of funko's for one of those yeah and then i think there'd be people waiting at the stage door till conan came out trying to get him to sign yeah the dolls and it it's such

a cynical thing where it's like i think he would just tease like okay yep it's such a cynical thing where it's like, I think he would just tease like, okay, yep. It's going straight to eBay. Once I signed it, while the ink's still wet. And then all the writers, we would, we would sell our version of Conan's autograph and we got very good. Yeah. Any other favorite memories of socializing?

I remember one of the last comic cons we went to Todd, I think had somehow hired a karaoke bus. Yes. It was a woman who was a friend of his. And yeah, it was a karaoke truck. And one of my favorite memories from that night, our writer's assistant, Kathy Yamamoto, who's, she's awesome and very sweet woman, kind of quiet, but she got up there and is belting out a tune. I just wish I could remember which song it was,

but it was the ultimate karaoke death. And I took a picture of it because she's singing, she's singing. And then on the screen, it says 54 instrumental measures. She's like waiting for a couple minutes. That's like two minutes. Whatever song it was, there was a huge interlude before coming back, but we all got up, got up there and we're belting out tunes as we drove around San Diego.

It was a blast. I think, I think the shows were done at that point too. Yeah. That must've been Saturday. Yeah. Yeah. My main social memories are are as probably the heaviest drinker on the staff i think i can probably say that

confidently uh but it would be sitting in that hotel lobby at the grant hotel with whoever happened to be like from our show or from other shows or you know yeah the bob's burgers people would be there with the bob's people writers a lot they were fun yeah and just sitting there drinking till two two in the morning every night or whatever yeah sometimes it would spill out into the lobby like i remember right seth myers was there hanging out one night definitely the bobs burgers people i'm trying to think who else i remember that hotel lobby had a sign like a commemorative sign about how they didn't allow women there until like, I don't know, the 60s or something. Because of it was like that this was where prostitutes would hang out and find their johns. And so the women just weren't allowed in the lobby.

It's just much safer that way. We can't have the temptation. Something about that lobby makes you want to sell your body. Well, there was one year where I think Andy left early and Galit, his assistant, gave us access to his

penthouse hotel room. I think that was the first year. And we were up there. I mean, oh man. There were up there i mean oh man it was a lot of there were strangers there we had no idea there was a lot of drinks i remember ordering like a case of uh beers to be brought up to the room and the bill and then the bill being something like 300 bucks because charge it to richter of course one bottle of beer is going to be 15 bucks here in a fancy hotel the next year it was like andy maybe you should head home on wednesday yeah there's this one time where i won't i won't say the guy's name he's not he's not famous but he's quite

successful we were all hanging out in the lobby it was like you know a bunch of you know a good solid dozen you know of us and then it was like oh, the bar's closed or whatever. And Rowie's like, oh, I got booze in my room. Let's go to Rowie's room. So we all piled into the elevator. And then this other guy who none of us knew just came in the elevator with us. And I'm just assuming that he's taking the elevator to his room. And he gets out of the elevator with us. And I'm like, oh, his room must be on the same floor as Rowie's.

And then he walks down the hallway with us to Rowe's room and then comes into Rowe's room with us. And I'm like, who are you? And then he introduced himself. Then there's like, oh, you're the guy who created blah, blah, blah. Oh, neat. Whatever. Fine.

I guess you can hang out with us. And then he turned out to be like a real asshole and like an abusive drunk. And we finally And like, we finally were like, get the fuck out of here. Well, he needed people to abuse. Strangler.

Yeah. I won't say his name, but like that's, that was like a weird negative thing that happened. Wow. Why don't that go the whole thing? Like, and then he comes into Rory's room.

I was like, Oh, I guess he also has a bed in Rory's room. We, we kind of ushered him out, and then it turned out his room was just down the hall. And then we were making fun of him in Rowy's room, and then he pops his head back

out of his room and shouts, I can hear what you're saying about me! And then slams his door again. And so then you got louder. It should be mentioned that Comic-Con was just south of San Diego's Little Italy. So that's why we ended up eating. Just a quick scooters ride away.

Just a quick scoot. And you are knee deep in Bucatini and seafood too. I remember the next morning, like showing up at 10 a.m. to rehearse and some people on the staff were so, you could tell they were possibly still hammered from the night before. Just people who stayed out all night is just crazy. Thank you guys.

This was so great. Thanks for all the good stories. This was great. Yeah, thank you, Jesse and Mike. This was really fun. I know and good trip down memory lane, specifically the one that leads to pasta. Well, thank you so much to our good friends,

Levi McDougal, Dan Cronin, and Andre Dubichet for joining us. It was great to see them and chit chat with them again. And have a trip to San Diego down memory lane. Yes. Several trips to San Diego. Yes. One per year. And it's time for our listener question. Oh yeah. It's a listener question. It says, subject line was a Canada question. Oh. And here it is. I have a question that I've been curious about for quite a few years. One day I was watching Conan and out on stage walks the guy from a widely broadcast series of cell phone commercials in Canada.

It was Levi McDougal. And here's, and they attached one of the ads. How did Levi end up getting on the show from Canada? I presume he started doing those commercials while in Toronto and it seemed like a surprising jump to go almost immediately to the Conan writing staff. Love the show. Okay, sure. No, love the show. And, uh, oh, and, and this person also mentioned their lawyer, but the fact that a lawyer does, it should No, love the show. And, oh, and this person also mentioned their lawyer. But the fact they're a lawyer should not negate the legitimacy of this question. I'm not answering any lawyer questions. And I think that's a great question from a gentleman named Spencer. Thank you, Spencer.

Wow. Yes. And so we thought it only made good sense to have Levi himself answer said question. To go straight to the horse's mouth. Hello, Levi. Hi, guys. Welcome back. Welcome back from 20 seconds ago.

Thank you. Thanks for having me back. I'm honored. Well, so this, it feels like this person exposed you as having some fame and success in Canada. A dark past. Yeah, they tried to keep hidden from everyone, knowing what Conan would do if he got a hold of it. Well, can you tell us the level of, I mean, do these,

did these commercials broadcast a lot? I mean, was, are we talking like, can you hear me now, Verizon? Kind of. Yeah. They were with a company called Rogers, which is like at&t in canada and they also own a lot of the sports arenas and i think have their own sports channel so this these commercials would play during hockey games all the time oh no and that's a real popular sport in canada it is yeah yeah so it's basically like being in a Super Bowl commercial. Yeah, I guess. Yeah. Every night. Every night. For six months. For 10 years. So you did those for 10

years. Off and on for 10 years. I think we did 23 of them. Wow. Oh, yeah. And it started as a one off. And then they're like, that one did all right. We're going to do one more. And the other thing they did in the first spot is I already had gray hair, like a lot of gray hair in my temples. I went gray really young. And at one point on the first spot, they're like, hey, can we just try taking those out? So for the next almost 10 years, every time I got a haircut, I would just get it dyed brown again. And that's why I had brown hair when I started at Conan. Right. Because I thought you were going gray just from the stress of the job.

Definitely part of it. A couple of months. That took care of the top of my head. Well, that's how I learned about these commercials. Because you were very modest when you started working at Conan. You didn't really say, hey, get out of the way here comes the rogers guy and then do you remember you you dropped by the office to explain that you had to go back to canada for a bit and and that you were going to be dying your hair brown oh you so you still had to do more even after you got the

job yeah wow yeah we were just wrapping them up and then to tie it back into comic-con that's why the first year right for mr fantastic they were able to just shave the sides my hair where he has silver streaks on the sides because it was like my roots would have been silver so it was would have saved the show a lot of money yeah i hope that went right into your pocket. Me too. I hope that too. Wow.

So you were secretly going back to Canada for what sounds like a much more lucrative job. Well, until you find out what Canadian commercials pay and that they pay in Canadian dollars. I have a lot of people who assume I'm a millionaire. Sure. Yeah. I have a lot of people who assume I'm a millionaire. Sure. Yeah, still going back at the start of the job. Wow. Was that a shock to start living in the United States? And I'm guessing all of a sudden you're like, wait, no one's recognizing me down here.

Yeah, I was. What the hell? I was livid. I'm sure you were. Or did you enjoy the break it was nice they were pretty non-stop and i i was just talking about this with someone i was going to a or coming out of a movie theater here in west hollywood and this middle-aged couple came up to me so this is in west hollywood and they they go hey are you in are you in those

rogers commercials and they were very nice and i said yeah are you guys canadian and they went uh uh yeah how how would you know that like they were really thrown and then they just didn't assume they were only played in canada so it was a yeah it was my canada finder so, when you get recognized in the States, it's almost exclusively by Canadians then? Yeah, pretty much only. Yeah. Yeah, some diehard YouTube fans who are into international phone commercials.

I swear that's the Rogers guy. But the writer of the question assumed that you went directly from being in phone commercials to being a writer for Conan. But that's not exactly true. Yeah, that's not quite the timeline. So like many comics in Canada, I guess in the States, too, you do acting gigs and commercial stuff to help pay the bills. And so I just lucked out getting these kind of ongoing ads. So I...

So that was something you'd been doing in conjunction with writing and stand-up and... Exactly. All the other stuff. Yeah. Yeah. I'd been, I did some TV writing and then other just kind of Canadian comedy things. How I got the job in the U.S the quick version i had come down i would come to la new york every now and then to do stand-up i did a show at ucb and then i think it was called see you next tuesday it was after oh yeah it was their big it was after death ray it was after comedy death ray which was their big kind of weekly show so they had two two stand-up shows

in a row i taped that set and then held on to it for like a year just to, you know, I was like, I don't want to burn this material. And then I figured I should have a stand-up clip online. And I put that online and Dimitri Martin came across it. I don't know how. And he was looking for new writers and he reached out to me. He got my name from the clip. He was like, are you the guy from the phone commercial? Yeah, he's like, I want to talk to the phone commercial guy.

No, he had no idea from the phone? Yeah. He's like, I want to talk to the phone commercial guy. Um, no, he had, yeah, he had no idea. So he reached out. So I got, I asked me to submit a writing packet.

I submitted that, got hired to a show in LA, ended up touring with him for a few years during standup. And while I was touring, I submitted my writing packet for Conan. Nice. And you know what? I,

your writing packet was great, but, um, it was also one of your stand-up sets maybe it was the same set is that that i saw on youtube where it kind of sealed the deal oh cool yeah i don't know if i ever mentioned that but it was really really really funny would have been nice to know sweeney compliments are nice to hear, Sweeney. Compliments are nice to hear. You know, he gets plenty of compliments. So you didn't hire me because of the phone commercials either. I wish I had known about them.

I wish, in looking back, all the writers for Conan were just commercial performers. From all over the world. Exactly. Talking bears from the Super Bowl. bowl hey aren't you the now this is milk guy from sweden i was in a bunch of kinder commercials in germany and right away when you started at conan on t that was 2015 i think you it was kind of you were like this voice on what was going on in canada and yes, it was the correspondent from Canada. Yeah.

And it was OK for us to make fun of Canadians because we had Levi. Yeah. I made it safe. Yes, exactly. We were dying to do it for years and had no we didn't know the way in. Yeah, I was able to sign the release to make it acceptable for the show. Yeah. Well, Levi, you were just in Canada doing some traveling.

Do you still get recognized there? Not so much. I think this time once in Toronto. I just had someone. Are they like, you look like the guy from the commercials, but with brown hair. Do you put a brown wig on when you go home? Yeah.

Huh? Huh? I just pointed it out. Hello. Yeah. A big prop. It's a cardboard phone. Unnecessary.

Remember? Use your normal phone. Did you have a tagline in the commercials? It was pretty much just, it wasn't like the same every time. Like, can you hear me now? It was a lot of muttering. I remember the director would, on our final shot, would just always be like, give it a Scooby-Doo. And that would always just be me going,

you know what? You are to the bank. You're a really good mutterer. I know. Now that I think about it, you, in sketches, sometimes you put a little English on it and add a little. That's my secret. Oh my God, that's a secret sauce.

Wow. Everyone's got one thing have that before the commercials or you got that i've been doing it my whole life it comes naturally to me this is easy for me you don't goodwill hunting when he's like on the truck he's like this is easy you guys have to work at it this comes now that's what i was like you were a janitor and you were just muttering behind the scenes of commercial shows. Yeah, yeah. Until finally somebody put you in front of the camera. Yeah. The rest is history.

And maybe, like the same way the Verizon guy down here came back, maybe they'll bring you back in a couple of years. Ooh. But for, yeah, for a competing phone company. Yes. Let's pitch it. Let's get it out there. We got the Rogers guy.

Yeah. He works for us turncoat you've worked up some new scooby-doo isms yeah yeah you'll you'll be ready to go yeah i've been working on my art i'm not the same i've evolved and i got some i've got some new mutters in his mutter mutter bank well thank you for asking that question. And this will probably just lead to more. We might end up just getting more Levi questions. So I hope so. Yeah.

We'll have to have you back to a regular feature. Stay on the zoom until. Right. Yeah. I won't log out. If you don't mind. It just seems easiest. Yeah.

I'm all set up. I'll be right here, guys. Thanks Levi. Thank you, Levi. Thanks guys. Thanks Levi. And if you have a question that you want to ask

Levi related or not exactly leave us a voicemail at 323-209-5303 or you can email us at insideconanpod at gmail.com yeah

and I guess that's it for the show nothing left to say really no I can't think of anything the turtle's still here oh thank god

I mean he he can't go anywhere at least not fast at least he's got all four legs that's right i'm really falling for this turtle now yeah what uh what are you gonna say to the turtle when you tuck him into bed tonight what would i say to any turtle i use use the royal we, and I say we love you. Perfect. Inside Conan, an important Hollywood podcast, is hosted by Mike Sweeney and me, Jesse Gaskell. Produced by Sean Doherty. Our production coordinator is Lisa Byrne. Executive produced by Joanna Solotaroff, Adam Sachs, and Jeff Ross at Team Coco. Engineered and mixed by Will Becton.

Our talent bookers are Gina Batista and Paula Davis. Thanks to Jimmy Vivino for our theme music and interstitials. You can rate and review the show on Apple Podcasts. And 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.

Try on some spats. You're going to have a laugh. Give birth to a calf. It's Conan. This has been a Team Coco production.