Inside Conan: An Important Hollywood Podcast - Robin Schiff

Episode Date: September 25, 2020

Writer/producer Robin Schiff (Romy and Michele’s High School Reunion, The Groundlings) stops by to talk with writers Mike Sweeney and Jessie Gaskell about telling Conan he should seek therapy on the last day of teaching him at The Groundlings, the importance of being surrounded by creative kindred spirits, and how the characters from her play “Ladies Room” became the inspiration for Romy and Michele’s High School Reunion which both featured Lisa Kudrow. Plus, Mike and Jessie talk about moments they’ve feared for Conan’s life while filming the show. Got a question for Inside Conan? Call our voicemail: [phone] and e-mail us at [e-mail] For Conan videos, tour dates and more visit TeamCoco.com

And now, it's time for Inside Conan, an important Hollywood podcast. Oh, hey, guys. Hi. Hello. Welcome to Inside Conan, an important Hollywood podcast. Yeah, that's right. We're your hosts. I'm Jessie Gaskell. I'm Mike Sweeney. I'm actually William Michael Sweeney.

That's right. Never used my full name. Now I have to do it to travel. You can't use your middle name. You need to give your legal first name to travel. Oh yeah, did you get a real ID? Is this a travel podcast? I don't know. Honestly, I don't know where we are. I don't know who we are. This is a podcast. It talks about behind the scenes at the Conan show. But are there behind the scenes at the Conan show in the last seven months? I don't know. I mean, everything's behind

the scenes now. That's true. There's no front of the scenes. DIY Conan just came out. It did. That was a lot of work that you were kind of secretly hustling. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I didn't want anyone to know I was working on it. DIY Conan. We put a show together and we put it online and we cut it up into little pieces and invited all our fans to pick a piece and recreate it. Then we stitched them all together and it became a show called DIY Conan. And everybody did something different. They're like sock puppets and live action and... A lot of cool animation.

It is kind of taking advantage of the pandemic and knowing, like, really, what else are you going to do? You're going to not recreate it part of the Conan show. What else are you going to do? It really turned out great, though. We have a lot of really talented fans. Yes. And you know what?

I have to shout out to our editors. Each of them took an act of the show and took all the submissions and put them all together in a really creative, imaginative way. Yeah. Talk about Rob Ash, Chris Heller, and Matt Shaw. Because, you know, they do so much work on the show that I think gets unheralded. I think sometimes people are like, wow, that's really well edited. Well, editing is something you don't that i think it's unheralded i think sometimes people are like wow that's really well edited well editing is something you don't really notice unless it's

bad that's the thing is good editing is kind of seamless and so you just you don't really see it exactly until the oscars and then those guys with the long white ponytails come up to accept awards exactly no it's it's such an important behind the scenes job. And yeah, they did an amazing job on the show. Yeah, they really did. So we have a fun guest this week. Yeah. I knew her before, but Conan knew her before I knew her. Because she was his improv teacher at the Groundlings when he first started doing improv.

Right. When he first landed in LA. Yeah. The Groundlings is a theater that we haven't really talked about a lot on the podcast, but is like a really preeminent comedy breeding ground for like most of the SNL cast. A lot of SNLers come out of there.

Yeah, so it's really this Goliath of comedy that people try to get on the stage there. And I was too intimidated to ever take classes at the groundlings i i mean i find improv very i mean i used to do it a few times like as a you could sit in with different improv groups back in new york and i mean it's very liberating because everyone's so supportive and and i i found nice and helpful but it's also it's just terrifying you're to disappoint them and the audience. So many people to disappoint.

There's a lot that can go wrong. Yeah. I mean, I think that's where I realized I wanted to be a writer because I was like, okay, I would like more time to think of what to say. Oh, my God. You're the fastest. And you're a great performer. I'll tell you this straight up.

I don't care if I'm embarrassing you on this podcast. Okay. So we're talking to Robin Schiff today, who is Conan's improv teacher at the Groundlings. Yes. And he told a really great story about her on Conan O'Brien Needs a Friend. And then we were able to confront her about that story to find out if it was true or not. Yes. So first, we're going to hear Conan telling the story.

We had a teacher in common, Robin. Oh, yeah. Robin Schiff. Robin Schiff. Yeah, she was great. Robin Schiff is a great teacher. And I remembered her, I remember a really funny time. I think you know about this, but she was this young, attractive teacher. And I,

I thought I was, I am doing really well in this class and I'm making her laugh a lot. And then she said, she said to me, we were doing our last final show. And after that show, she said, you know, we're all going to meet at a Mexican restaurant, which was the tradition. We'd meet at the Mexican restaurant. And she said, can I talk to you before we go to the Mexican restaurant? And I was like, yes, you can. And I just, I remember it in my head being so. Oh my God, she fell in love with my talent. Yeah. She saw me really laugh and she's going to say, look, I know I'm a little older than you, but you're not in my class. I had all these fantasies. You're not in my class anymore.

And technically, and so, you know, I don't these fantasies. You're not in my class anymore, technically. And so, you know, I don't know what I was thinking. So she invites me in her car. So I get in her car and we go to get gasoline. She needed to get gas before she went to the restaurant. So we get gasoline in her car and I like, I pump it for her. I'm like, I'll take care of that. And then I get in, like I fixed the engine.

Well, it's a little trickier than we thought, but I got that unleaded in. And she was like, uh-huh, that's great. So we start, and I think, when is she going to say, you know. I have feelings I can't hide anymore. I have feelings I can't hide. I have feelings I can't hide. And I must have that six-foot, four-inch, 155-pound body now. So, and then she said to me, yeah, I wanted to talk to you.

And I went, well, you know, fire away. And she said, have you thought about therapy? Do you remember this? Yes, yes, yes, yes. And she said, and then she said, because your, your mind's really quick. And, but sometimes it's too quick and you're always thinking up there. Don't think. And you,

but I, I think sometimes you've got to quiet your, you should really get therapy. Well, here we are at the restaurant door slam. I loved her for doing that. Oh, but she did the same thing for me.

A few years later, by the way, I think people should know Robin Schiff is a great writer. She wrote Romy and Michelle's High School Reunion. Yeah, she's a very talented woman. Really, really, really talented. And I think she blew it with me, frankly, too. Well, I'm sure she does, too.

Yeah. But she also told me after there'd been like a tough time, and she said, you know what, I can tell because you've just reported you've been crying every day for two days, you should get therapy. Oh, wow. Okay. So maybe she's just telling everyone go get therapy. Well, it was years later, you know, but, and she was right. And that was the first time I got therapy and it was the most incredibly helpful thing to me. I mean, I did really, I killed therapy. I did really well. I mean,

she said she was done with me after like six months. Wouldn't it be funny if that were my actual attitude about therapy? Right. I excelled at it. I did really well. I did so well. I got an A in therapy. So anyway, our guest today is Robin Schiff, who was Conan's improv teacher at the Groundlings,

also Lisa Kudrow's Groundlings teacher. And as a result, she ended up writing Romy and Michelle's High School Reunion, the movie that kind of put Lisa Kudrow on the map. Oh, and we should mention, we did this interview pre-pandemic. Yes, so if it sounds like we're all within six feet of each other, it's because we are. We're here with Robin Schiff. Hi, Robin. Hi, Robin. Hi, guys.

Hello. Hello. Thanks for coming in. My pleasure. Thank you. Thank you. Part of the reason we asked you here today is because you were name-dropped on an episode of Conan O'Brien Needs a Friend. Which was super surreal because I'm not famous.

So to sit and listen to me be talked about for five minutes by Conan and Lisa was completely surreal. Yeah, did you know that that was happening? This was a Lisa Kudrow episode. Yeah, Lisa Kudrow. I did not know it was happening. Somebody heard it and sent it to me. So it was so cool.

Yeah, and then you told me that it was happening. And so I listened to it. I mean, I always listen to Conan's podcast. Yeah. Yeah. Every week I listen to it. Just that one week you were a little late. That one week I was a few minutes late. I'm going to wait till he's 10 seasons in. I want to make sure he's got legs and then I'm going to dive in and listen. But yeah, I was nervous for you as soon as they started mentioning your name. And I thought, where's this going to go? You know, the weird thing is, I actually don't remember that story. And I think Conan was super traumatized by it. Because Lisa Kudrow has told me he's brought it up to her privately like 10 times. So it got it got brought up again, and that it's been brought up a lot, but I hadn't really heard the whole story.

My memory is I was Conan's teacher at the Groundlings, and it was the intermediate class, and he was hilarious, but all his characters were the same. So I thought I was really going to help him and tell him he needed acting lessons, but he doesn't remember that. Well, he still needs that. Well, you know, but it's worked out for him. Yeah. The very few characters he plays are very popular. Right. Yes.

Talk show host. Yes. So, yeah, that's what I remember. That's your memory of it. That's my memory. I know I also told him to get acting lessons because I was really— You really piled on. But the main thing—his main takeaway was that you, after this whole setup where he thought maybe you were going to put the moves on him, which I think is hilarious, that you told him to get therapy.

Yes. Yes, I told him. But I also told Lisa Kudrow to get therapy. Oh, wow. That makes sense. Have you ever notudrow to get therapy. Oh, wow. That makes sense. Have you ever not told someone to get therapy and comedy? That's what I'd be curious about. I actually have not told a lot of people.

Is that true? It's absolutely true. I just thought that was your go-to. No, it's not my go-to. Yeah. It's always good advice. Yeah. I had my reasons.

Right. I had my reasons at the time. It sounds like it helped both of them. Yeah. I think it did, but I don't know if Conan Reshton got a therapist right away. I don't know. Yeah, that's a good question. That is a good question.

At the end of this interview, you'll have to guess whether we've had therapy. I'm looking at you. I'm looking into your eyes. I'd say yes, but it hasn't worked. Exactly. Exactly. Don't know about you, Jessie. Yeah, of course.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Of course. Come on. I've been suing for a refund. So you told Conan to get therapy. Was that the end of your – because you were his teacher at that time. I was his teacher, and according to the story, it was the last night of class. We always used to go to this shitty Mexican restaurant for drinks.

Yeah. And that was the night I felt like I needed to tell him that. And I do remember wondering if I should tell him to get acting lessons or if that was like crossing a line, but I thought I was helping him. Right. But you must have seen some potential in him then. He was unbelievably funny. Yeah. He was helping him. But you must have seen some potential in him then. He was unbelievably funny. Yeah. He was just funny.

You know, I don't remember a lot of the students that I had, but I always remembered Conan. And that's one of the interesting things. Like, I remember Lisa Kudrow's first audition for anyone was for me from my Play Ladies room. And I still remember her audition. Early on, Sandra Bullock auditioned for me. I remember her audition. I remember Jenna Elfman's audition. You know, people who really have it. You guys have seen that, right? You know, people either pop or they don't pop. Yeah. So, yes, we do audition people for little sketches. But even in that small world.

And a lot of them have gone, I mean, people just started at late night just as bit players went on to have really great careers. And we take all the credit. We get no credit. And you guys, neither one of you ever performed or did you? Oh, yeah.

I tried to perform. Yeah, I tried to. Stand-up? Yeah, stand-up and improv. But I went up through UCB because they had just opened when I was starting in LA. But I remember that I mean, one thing we did want to talk to you about when I was starting

out, the Groundlings was like they were the gatekeepers for comedy performers. Right, right. Like nobody got hired on SNL that hadn't been through the groundlings it felt like. Nobody? Well, no.

But for a big period of time, there were a lot of people from the groundlings. Oh, yeah. Lisa Kudrow and Will Ferrell and Phil Hartman-Lovitz, Kristen Wiig, Melissa McCarthy, Wendy McClendon-Covey. That whole,

I love that that whole group of women who did Bridesmaids all met each other at the Groundlings. Oh, that's great. They do, they're doing what these guys have always done is kind of get together with these other women. I wish they would. I wish they'd make another movie. I do too. Were you ever there when like the SNL people would come?

I was not. I was, no, actually I was, but I wasn't in that show. What they would do was they would do, like, a special show for people who were auditioning for Saturday Night Live. Like, I was in The Growlings with John Lovitz and Phil Hartman. Right. And Lovitz was the first one to get on Saturday Night Live, and then he told Lorne Michaels about Phil. So, I was there during that time, and I was there at the night that both Julia Sweeney and Lisa Kudrow audition. I was in the audience and it was just Julia's night. It was not Lisa's

night. And lucky for her because she got friends. That's true. Yeah, that was the I love those stories of like, it's, you know, the best thing that ever happened to me was not getting that job. That happened. Ray Romano, I know, was on news radio. He got cast on that. And there was a read-through and stuff. And then they're like, oh, we're going to, you know, we're going to go a different way with the character. And I think they hired someone else for it. I think it was Joe Rogan.

So they did go a different way. Oh, really? Oh. Very good. And then I think, like, within six months, maybe that's the magic period of time, he got his first spot on Letterman and destroyed. And they were like, ah, let's develop a show with you. Yeah. It was everyone.

Wow. It was the show with his name in it. I think that's actually really good advice for people coming up is you don't know. Right. Because I had developed, I wrote a play called Ladies' Room when I was at the Groundlings that took place in a woman's bathroom at a pickup bar. And it was Lisa's first job, but it had been developed at HBO. And they had given me a list of actors. And if you can get one of these actresses, you can make the little play. It was a little play. And I couldn't get the actors and they passed. And I went to bed for like three days just crying and being depressed. If I had gotten that, it would have been over in a night.

By doing a 99-seat equity waiver play, I'm at least a Kudrow. And it changed my entire life. So if I had gotten what I wanted, it would have derailed my entire career. Wow. That's amazing. It's just a good thing to know. Yeah. The other good thing is, if you want to be in comedy, go to UCB or go to the Groundlings and take classes. Don't worry about getting in the company. It's nearly impossible.

But especially for writers, because you probably don't care about getting into the company. Maybe you do. I never planned to get in the company. I went there as a writer to kind of get out of the house and be around other people. And I used to go see The Groundlings when Paul Rubens was in it and, you know, when he was starting Pee Wee Herman, but he did a bunch of hilarious characters. And I just went there to get out of the house and wound up in the company. Oh, wow. But it's really where I learned that I was funny and how to write for characters. Right. And write under a deadline. Right.

And you're surrounded by other creative people. That's the big thing. And you're kind of like your crew. That's exactly right. Your kindred spirits. Kindred spirits. Exactly. Who will recommend you for things or just support you or you can collaborate on

stuff it's kind of becomes very organic uses yes i'm still friends with a lot of those people well we should explain a little bit of how the groundlings works because it's you go up through levels right and at each level you kind of have to get past right when i was in the groundlings when i first started in the groundlings it was so long ago that while I was in The Groundlings, it got super popular. So it went from us having agreement that if there were fewer people in the audience than in the company, we could cancel a show. And by the way, we never canceled a show, but the late shows were sometimes ill attended. And then it got super popular. But there is a committee of performers that vote on the people coming up.

And now there's like a million levels you have to go through and pass. And it's unbelievably expensive to do it because you've got to keep taking these levels. And then it's hard to get in the company. Only billionaires are in the company. Well, and the Groundlings is different from UC. I mean, Groundlings does have a lot of improv,

but the Sunday Company and the main company, it's writing sketches and then performing them. So it's a little bit like the SNL format. Right. Where you're writing all week, and then there's one night show, and then the next week it's like a completely new show. It was just so much fun.

I mean, the trauma aside, like I said, I met like a lot of nice people, but just costume shopping and going to wig stores. It was so much fun. I had so many wigs. Did you have a whole like wig trunk in your closet? I had a wig trunk. I had a wig trunk. Because, you know, I was the person who was always going to play the date and the news anchor, the news reporter. Flight attendant. The flight attendant. So I needed a lot of different, you know, wigs for that. A lot of short conservative wigs.

Yes. well and one thing i've heard it seems like people start to kind of form groups of okay i you know i know i like to write for you or these types of characters and so i'm going to kind of latch on to someone which i've heard is also what happens at snl for like yeah a successful writer will kind of latch on to a star performer and yeah they for them. Yeah, they have a simpatico. Yeah. And vice versa. Yeah. Sometimes the stars are like, oh, this writer's got a hot hand.

Yes. Well, but we should talk, Robin, about, because there are also, I mean, you went there and you were there more as a writer than a performer. Well, no, I was a performer. You were a performer. But I mean, I guess for what you were looking for from the experience. I was just looking for have fun and get out of my house. I had a shrink who said, you've got to play a sport or join a charity or get out of your house. Somehow it was before I was doing TV.

And the other two were non-starters. No, they were non-starters. But you ended up, because I mean, I think your career is so cool, but you, like you said, you met Lisa Kudrow. You had this play, Ladies' Room, that then became the movie, Romy and Michelle's High School Reunion. Right. So maybe you can tell us a little bit about how that went from being a play to a movie. Well, the plot of Ladies' Room was these three people who work at an advertising agency on the 14th floor are going to a happy hour on the ground floor at a Mexican restaurant. And I decided I want, the

tagline was, go where no man's gone before. And the whole thing takes place in this woman's bathroom, and it's about these three women who are all interested in the same guy. And this was in the 80s. It was about how do I get respect from the same men I want to take me seriously? I mean, I want a date. Exactly. Like, how do you do those two things? That was the question of the play. And I decided I wanted it to be real time. So I needed filler. So I came up with these characters of Romy and Michelle. And in the play, they were completely disgusting. I just wanted them to be the most uncensored, disgusting people possible. The first entrance that they had, they got entrance applause. Oh, wow.

Oh, wow is right. Just from their costumes? From their costumes. Oh, wow. Because they were like Valley Girl. They were never really Valley Girls. There used to be this bar on the Sunset Strip called Nikki Blair's. I don't know if you remember Nikki Blair's. I used to drive by it on the way to the theater, and there would be girls, like friends in different versions of the same outfit, and they were all wearing black. So they were both wearing black, which is completely unlike what they turned into in the movie. But they were kind of club girls. And they were just very, just a ton of stuff that I put in the movie that got cut out that was in the play.

But anyway, what happened was, first, an executive from NBC saw the play, and they... Did it win up at Groundlings? No. That was a whole different... I wrote a sketch with the two advertising women at the Groundlings. So I did a sketch at the Groundlings and I decided I would turn it into a play that took place in this woman's bathroom. And not many things in my life have I known were a good idea, but at the time I just knew it was clean. Like it was just, I just got it. And it was really about what I was wrestling with it,

you know, in my life. And I was just angry at the time. And anger is so good for comedy. It really is. Because you're just, you're not pulling your punches. You're just sort of going for it and saying, you know. The jugular. The jugular. So, from that, we did a pilot for NBC called Only Temporary with Lisa Kudrow and the girl from the play. Nothing happened with that. We shot the pilot. It didn't get on the air. And years later, I got the rights back from Aaron Spelling, who was the producer. Okay. And Barry Kemp, who created Coach and Newhart, put up money for a production in San Francisco, and two female Disney executives came to see the production and thought,

again, these two minor characters could have their own movie. Wayne's World had come out because they said it could be a female Wayne's World. But two things happened that I think really influenced the making of Romy and Michelle, in addition to Lisa getting famous on Friends. One was Titanic and the other was Clueless. I knew it. You knew I was going to say Titanic and Clueless? I have no idea. I'm only here. Because they had such high percentage of young girls making those movies huge hits.

Right. of young girls making those movies huge hits. Oh, okay. So it was for about 10 minutes. They thought it might be good to go after a female audience. Yeah, yeah. So I think that that helped it. A brief window in the 90s. A brief window, yes. A huge song in Romy and Michelle's High School Reunion is Time After Time. Right.

We play it twice. So the first people, we can't. Well, you paid for it. Didn't it cost a fortune? It cost $240,000. And you can get songs for as little as $5,000. Yes. You can imagine we must have put 50 songs up against those two scenes and couldn't beat it.

Match it. Because it played for the emotion and the humor. Yeah. Yeah. Did someone have to go to the mat or were there huge fights to insist on keeping that song and getting there? Or did everyone just go, okay, we'll spend the money? No, we went through, yeah.

No, we had to go through the process of trying to replace it. And when we couldn't replace it, they were like, great. And the movie was one of the lowest testing movies in the history of Touchstone. They were like- How do you know that? Oh, they told you? Oh, yeah. We were there at screenings. They were panicked. My ex-husband worked on the Pauly Shore movie, you know, Encino Man. And it, was that Pauly Shore? Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. Most definitely, yeah. Pauly Shore, Encino Man, and Encino Man tested radically higher than Romy and Michelle's High School Reunion.

Wow. Well, that's just sexism. Well, no, it got recut. Oh, wow. It got recut. So the first edit did badly for audiences. It did really badly. And everyone panicked and went back in the edit room. What happened was the director's cut was not, he was cutting for jokes.

Who was the director? David Merkin. Okay. What else does he do? He's been a Simpsons writer forever. Oh, yeah. And he directed Romy and Michelle, and then he directed a movie called Heartbreakers. Okay.

But the studio wasn't happy with his cut, and Barry Kemp and I went in and recut the first reel. And they were really happy with it. So we ended up doing all the posts. David left the movie. Oh, good. Great. That's good. Well, I like that ending.

That's great. And was the plot for that movie inspired at all by your own high school reunion experiences? It was in that the first idea that I got for the movie is that, because I had to figure out, I had to dimensionalize the characters. Right, because they were just like a one-off. They were a one-off, and they were just the comic relief in a comedy. They were just funny, but they were Rosencrantz and Guildenstern. They had smaller parts. The first thing that I thought of was that these two girls who didn't

know that their lives hadn't turned out well don't know until they fill out the questionnaire for their reunion. So that was, it made me laugh out loud when I thought of that idea for the two characters. I laughed out loud and I thought, okay, great. But at my reunion, I went to Pacific Palisades High and I had just a giant dud class. They were just, I didn't give a shit about anybody. And I still wanted to impress people. Right. Yeah. And I knew I was going to impress people because I was working in Hollywood, you know, and

I was willing to admit that I wanted to impress people. Yeah. So I just drew on my, you know, and just the cliche thing, the guy who was like the really hot surfer boy, volleyball player guy. Right. Who married the girl that I was jealous of. Yeah. He turned out to be an alcoholic. He had a beer belly.

But it was really that kind of thing. It really was that kind of thing. So I took that stuff. Oh, good. That's great. Yeah. So let me ask you this. Do you feel that Conan has reaped any benefits from therapy?

Yes. Yeah, definitely. I think it's an ongoing process. Sure. No, I think he would say that he has for sure. Yes. Any time you have a third party who will listen to your – like my wife won't listen to me anymore about it. She'll just be like, talk to a therapist about it. And I'm like, why? It's the same thing over and over again.

Why wouldn't you enjoy hearing that? But they're going to hate you. Well, if you paid her to do it, maybe she would. Yeah, exactly. I mean, I think even the act of going is sort of like indicates a willingness to reflect. Yeah, and I'm not willing to reflect anymore. Right, right, right. I'm done with reflection. I feel like I've grown enough.

Over-reflected. Yeah. That's a possibility, too. I've had enough life lessons. Well, Robin, we usually do a little bit where we ask people if they have advice for anyone who wants to do what you've done. And we touched on that a little. I mean, we talked about having a crew of performers. Yeah.

A posse of performers. Well, whether it's a performer or other writers, you want your kindred spirits. You want people who you trust and who are kind to be able to give your material to for feedback. I highly recommend The Groundlings for comedy. And then just write a lot. I know people feel like they finish one thing and that's sufficient, and it really isn't. As a showrunner, when I'm reading material, if I like something, the next thing I say is, what else can I see? And it's got to be really good.

And you've got to be an addict almost. You've just got to have to do it. And you have to know, to what you're saying, right, more and more and more, is understand there's a big learning curve. Yeah. And you might think you're great right away, but no, you've got so much work to do to get actually really good where people notice. And, you know, they talk about the, you know, the 10,000 hours thing. Yeah. You know, the ground, I was, did 10,000 hours at the ground.

Sure. Yeah. So that really. Yeah. Set me up. But before that, I'd been writing for years. I just wasn't produced. So it's, you know, you just got to do it.

Yeah. I know that seems obvious, but... No, it bears repeating. Yeah, it does bear repeating. Anyone who's been a writer knows that that's not that obvious because you really have to force it. I swear when you're younger, you like, you see showbiz movies where it's like, he auditioned once and he's a star. And you almost start to think like, well, you just.

You either got it or you don't. The right person sees you and you're all set. And it's not like that. Yeah. And look at your. I mean, I remember. And this will be whatever. But I remember when this kid who was in my class named Conan O'Brien got to audition for like the Tonight Show.

Yeah, late night. And we're all – late night and we're all going, really? What has Conan done really? Right. But, you know – Oh, so when you heard that Conan got the Letterman job, what was your reaction? It was just shocking because he hadn't kind of come up through the ranks. Right. But one of the interesting things about when you're coming up is you don't know who's going to get famous.

And all of a sudden people you know just in your regular life have gotten famous. Right. So it was pretty. That's wild. I know. Well, Robin, thank you so much. My pleasure. Thank you, guys.

Thank you, Robin. And that was our interview with Robin Schiff. It was fun to meet her and chat with her. Hey, we have a fan question this week. We sure do. I love fan questions. Me too. Because it means at least one person is listening.

So this is from someone named Manuel. Manuel writes, Hi, guys. Loving the podcast. I discovered Conan on YouTube because I'm not from the USA. I was watching old episodes. There are plenty of people in the United States discovering. I was watching old episodes with that young animal expert, Jared Miller. Oh, right. I remember Jared. And things always got crazy and a bit dangerous when he was on, apparently. My question is, sometime did something happen in the show

that was too dangerous and you feared for Conan's life? That's a good question, actually. That is a good question. Because I think we have answers for it. Something comes to mind immediately for me. It was here on the Conan show at TBS and there was a water buffalo in the studio from, I think, from Africa.

A real water buffalo. A real, incredibly large. I'd say they're similar in size to a U.S. buffalo. And you know how you're not supposed to go near the buffalo anywhere in the United States? You're supposed to stay far away. Unless you import one to your tv studio exactly the same rules were not being applied to this water buffalo and we had just finished rehearsing the comedy for the show so i was just off to the side and you know going over the scripts or whatever and i was vaguely aware of a massive three-ton animal off to the

you know in the performance area They were just kind of walking through, I guess, bringing it in and telling Conan what it was. I think they wanted him to possibly get, they wanted him to get on the water buffalo, which seems crazy. So they had, they had steps for him and, you know, Conan's like, okay. And he went up the steps and the water buffalo lost its balance and fell. Oh, my God. On the floor of the studio. And then immediately came up. Well, yeah, because they're not supposed to be on laminate or whatever.

No, they were not supposed. I mean, obviously, there was all these mats and everything down. But it fell down and slid out, and then it gambled back up. But it was such a giant animal scrambling to its feet, and it looked angry, and I think we all thought it was going to charge. Well, and Conan ended up getting a huge bruise from that, right? He had a hematoma. I like to call them hematomas. Okay.

When something's that big you need to use a medical term it was half the size of the buffalo it was no i it was down most of his thigh starting at the top of his oh my god well yeah because it's such a heavy animal i mean i saw it because we shower together so yeah i guess he fell from a height of like seven or eight feet wow he's very stoic about it he was very quiet for a while chewing that one over i have a memory of him getting hurt for a comedy sketch also involving an animal huh it turns out animals are unpredictable and maybe dangerous you were there we were filming a cold open for when we went to do our show in Mexico City. Ah.

It was a Conan without borders in Mexico. We went out to the desert. And the premise of it was that Conan was trying to sneak by the immigration to get into Mexico. This was kind of at the height of Trump creating a lot of animosity with Mexico. That was the whole premise. And he wanted to build the wall. Yeah. Exactly.

Which we've completely forgotten about, I guess. Yeah. The joke was basically that they were not going to let us go into Mexico. We were trying to get across the border the other direction and they weren't going to let us in. And so. The old switcheroo. The switcheroo. Yes.

So he has to, you know, open his luggage for the immigration guards. Right. And at one point he just decides to make a break for it and runs just starts running into mexico i remember oh no so we had hired uh an animal handler to bring in it is it they're the belgian malinois i think it's the dog that cops have and we were like yeah so conan's just gonna run and then the dog's gonna chase them and then you know the dog's super well trained but the dog is trained to chase down criminals that's what the dog is trained to chase down criminals. That's what the dog is trained to do. Right. And maul them. Yes. M-A-U-L.

To literally rip them to shreds. Yeah, these are police. It's like the canine unit police dog, basically. But they were emphatic that this particular dog... No, this dog knows the difference between acting and not acting. Right. I think they said if Conan stopped, the dog would stop. I think that

was it. Anyway, I think we all know where this is going. So cut to us, you know, action. We call action and Conan takes off running and the dog, as it's told to do, takes off running right after Conan. But instead of stopping, the dog actually bit him on the leg and he wasn't wearing any sort of protective gear. We hadn't thought that anything was... I don't know why we didn't think anything was going to happen. Because the animal trainers said nothing would happen. That was

good enough for me. Even though they are the most notorious promisers of things that never happen. It went through his pants and broke the skin on his leg. Wasn't it the last take like didn't we oh i can't remember i was wondering if we had to make him do more takes after that that's what i was we did a couple of takes because we're covering it with shooting it with drone yes a drone

and also on the ground but the drone shot was really a big part of it and i thought we kind of had a great take and i was like ah ah, let's do it one more time. And, you know, Cone's like, do you want another take? If you want another take, I'll do it. And we're like, yeah, let's do another. I'm pretty sure it was that extra take. You insisted, yeah. I mean, he handled it well, I thought, but he was upset with us.

And now I see how over the years this just keeps happening, where someone's like, no, no, no, you'll be fine. Just get on the water buffalo. It's going to be fine. Right. Exactly. Yes. Yes. You're a puppet. What could go wrong? Hey, I wonder if that's the take that's in that cold open. I don't know. We should go back and watch. I wonder if you blow that shot up, if you can see the dog latch onto his leg. Sinking its teeth into his leg. Well, thank you, Manuel. That was a fun area.

Yeah, Manuel. And if any other fans have questions for us, please. We're always open. You can email us at InsideConanPod at gmail.com Or please leave a voicemail. We'd love to hear your voice at 323-209-5303. And that's our show.

Thank you for listening. We like you. Inside Conan, an important Hollywood podcast, is hosted by Mike Sweeney and me, Jesse Gaskell. Produced by Jen Samples. Engineered and mixed by Will Becton. Supervising producers are Kevin Bartelt and Aaron Blair. Executive produced by Adam Sachs and Jeff Ross at Team Coco production. Google Podcasts, or whatever platform you like best.

This has been a Team Coco production in association with Earwolf.