Inside Late Night with Mark Malkoff - Laurie Kilmartin

Episode Date: April 15, 2025

Comedian Laurie Kilmartin joins Mark to discuss writing for Conan O’Brien’s TBS Show, Comedy Central’s Tough Crowd with Colin Quinn, and her standup special on Hulu.   Laurie’s Standup Special on Hulu: https://www.hulu.com/movie/laurie-kilmartin-cis-woke-grief-slut-16f62d45-5c3f-4d94-b4d6-e7537e8f03ba Official Website: https://lauriekilmartin.com/ Follow on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/anylaurie16 Follow on X: https://x.com/anylaurie16

Hi, I am Mark Malkoff and welcome to Inside Late Night, presented by late-nighter.com. Today's guest is comedian Lori Kilmartin, who wrote for Conan O'Brien for 11 years during his TBS run. We also discussed her recently writing for Conan on the Oscars, her stand-up special currently on Hulu, and much more. Now it's time to go inside late night. Lori Kilmartin, thanks for talking with us. Oh, I'm thrilled to be here. 11 years writing for Conan for his TBS show. You recently did the Oscars.

You wrote for the Oscars. And in terms of doing well, Conan, I mean, it was just like, you know, it was a grand slam. I mean, who gets asked 51 weeks beforehand if they'll do the Oscars the next year? What was that experience like? It was so fun. You know, the show ended in June. of 21. And then we stuck around for an extra quarter because he was thinking of doing a show on Max, but it turned into the travel show, but he was thinking of doing like a more of a talk show

on Max. So I guess it's been since October of 21 where I've just been out here in the wild without a writing job, you know, just making a paltry living off of stand-up. And I just, I was so used to being alone. and walking around in circles in my house. That when we all started meeting again at Conan's production office, we were all just so grateful to be hanging out together and sitting around a table and throwing out ideas and writing jokes. And it was really fun.

The lead up to it was really fun. It was fun stress. It was, I hope this is funny, stress. And then the actual night was unlike anything I've ever been a part of. it was so big, more than I could have anticipated, you know, just the, I mean, the level of security at the show and how so many people were involved in making the Oscars and the production value, I guess, was astonishing. Like, nothing I'd ever seen. I've only, with Conan, we just worked on the TBS show. So it was, you know, you had like $5 per sketch or whatever to spend.

And just to see like ABC, the Oscars, they spend a money. They bring a ton of people in. And it was really overwhelming and exciting that night to be there. How long were you working, were you writing with Conan and the team leading up to the Oscars, roughly? He contacted us in December, early December. In fact, it might have been like a week before his parents passed away. So we were kind of starting early. and then then all of a sudden these kind of things started you know he had that double tragedy

and then the fires happened there was a lot leading up to it i'll tell you that video is really fun when you're with mike swan and you're on inside conan and conan that does kind of like the bob hope walk on like johnny person yeah and it was so unexpected you i mean he knew you were in the building and he got really excited that he he crashed I loved that they captured that on video. That must have been a kind of a thrill. Oh, it was a thrill. I mean, he, he always crashes into the writer's meetings anyway, you know. Usually it's just, it's us. He doesn't really get involved in that until later on, you know, so he's spared all of our terrible ideas. They do get filtered a little bit, so he gets the better ones. So, but he'll crash, you know, he'll burst in and then take over.

So, I mean, he's so funny. We always love it when he does, although that means we're there an extra hour, but. it's a funny hour so it's okay it happens there's certain writers that are so good at what they do and were so valuable in terms of late night now somebody like an alex bays maybe or a bill chef that was with letterman forever and you would think that they were able to get it right away or pretty soon but bill i mean bill chef i think took seven years to get hired at letterman Alex bays took years until he got hired on saturday night live and now is it Seth Myers and you wanted to work on conan show you were a monologue writer and you did packets on the NBC show. You did the 1230 show, the Tonight Show. And so how many, did you only do one packet for each show and it didn't work out? Yeah, I did a packet for late night. And I don't know that I was the right hire at that point anyway, you know, but I did it. I did a packet. And then the Tonight Show, I heard that I might have been hired at the Tonight Show, but then all the stuff with the Tonight Show. night show happened. So I heard that packet might have done the trick, but there's no way to prove

that. And it doesn't matter anyway. And then the third one was the TBS show. So that was my third packet. Do you think that the TBS show, you would have got in hired and been motivated if the last comic standing, if people weren't so mean on the message boards? Because I know you've done some interviews saying that you were so depressed and it kind of was driving you to, you started writing jokes and putting them on Facebook and it just kind of led you to write all this material and then you had something like 200 jokes that you and you submitted your favors to Kona. Do you think that that's true? Actually was something that might have helped or do you think it would have happened either way? I mean, maybe. I do remember that now. I was I was like, do I suck? And then I

just started posting a bunch of jokes on Facebook. That was pretty much the thing at the time. And I'll think Twitter wasn't around or wasn't a big thing, you know. So I did. have, when I heard that Conan was hiring, I did have a nice backlog of current events jokes to pick from. So it definitely helped. How long does that take for that skill set? Because to write jokes for a monologue, Alex Bays couldn't do it at first. And it took him years of doing that. And Seth Myers calls him the greatest living joke writer. Obviously, Seth hasn't read your material. But in terms of that skill set, that muscle, it's such a specified thing, especially, you know, Conan has a very specific rhythm with his monologue. How long do you think when you started writing, I mean, you're a stand-up, so you know how to write jokes. But in terms of writing monologues, how long do you think it took you to get good?

It's a learning process for a stand-up because we write for ourselves so differently. It's so personal. And a monologue joke is so impersonal. It's almost the opposite way of coming at something. And also, you're not writing about yourself if you're writing about current events. And it's learning to write monologue jokes is a great. skill that will positively influence your stand-up, but being a good stand-up does not make it an easy ride to being a good model of joke writer. I think, you know, everyone has their own style, too. Every host has their own joke style, you know, and you kind of learn as you go what your host likes to do, the kind of jokes that they're really good at telling. That's their strength. You know, not everyone can do deadpan, not everyone does act. Like, everyone's got their own thing that makes them funny. And so, you know, you kind of want to learn to write well for that person. 11 years. You didn't, some interviews saying early on, and I get this, there's some anxiety you're

getting up at 815. You have to be funny every single day. It's like a factor. It's a machine. You're churning this out. How long did it take you until you felt you could maybe just relax a little bit or did that never go away? A really long time. Like the first day, we weren't on the air yet when I started. So it wasn't like I was jumping onto a moving train. We were getting ready for it, maybe like, I guess we, we debuted in November and I started some time in September. So I had some chance. We, you know, we were just writing tons of jokes. And I was like, you know, because I had, I had written on other shows, but they were not this demanding. It was a lot of waiting around. And it wasn't like, I need X amount of jokes by 11 a.m. and then another chunk at 12.30,

etc., etc. So that was, I was terrified that I would not be able to keep up. You know, I learned and I did have some, you know, weeks where I wasn't getting anything on. I was like, oh my God, what's happening? And so for me, what I did was I took like a bunch of Conan's monos that he had done successfully on the show. And I sort of broke each joke down into the kind of a joke it was just to get myself in that his rhythm. you know and so that was very helpful for me and so anytime you know later i didn't need it but earlier when i would be stuck i would like look at the the joke templates i had written that were off of his um you know the style of joke that he liked to tell and i would kind of if i had a subject i was working on and i and i wasn't getting it i would kind of look at the templates and see how i could fit it in there you were very unique writing for late night because this doesn't normally happen that you'd be with Conan in his dressing room with other monologue writers before the show and what was he like before the show some you know there's some anxiety for some host

others um like jimmy kimly heard is just very loose what what was that like oh gosh i mean i'm always interested how other hosts do their monologues and stuff had you know um so conan would have all the mono writers it you know at first it was like five of us and then it ended up just being two the last couple, maybe the last year, but minus COVID, of course. But, you know, when the show got smaller and smaller, it's like half hour or shorter. Oh, it's lots of fun. I mean, you know, there's lots of making fun of the jokes, how bad they are. Conan would make fun of the writers.

Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. And or, you know, just, I don't know, just thinking of fun of the jokes or making fun of the writer. I mean, it's just, it's almost just like loosening up your tongue, making fun of whatever it was in front of you. So, you know, it was a lot of fun. That's the thing I missed the most. And I didn't realize it until we were back writing for the Oscars is how much I laughed every day and was entertained. Like, I always remember thinking, it's like I'm getting a very private concert with like five or seven other people starring Conan O'Brien and Andy Richter.

I love hearing that. Every day. like four days a week, you know. I was talking to one of your old monologue colleagues, Rob Cutner today, and he was pointed out, he pointed out that for some reason, you always, they would write you as a nurse. You would be on the show. What? Was that an inside joke?

I have no idea why you'd wind up as a nurse. That wasn't, you didn't study to be a nurse. You didn't have aspirations? I think a couple times I had, I think I had maybe have a nurse face. And I also think they have one nurse uniform, and it's like a size 14, which really, that works for me. So that's probably more than anything else I fit into the uniform. And I don't think the nurses have a lot of lines. So I wasn't risking the comedy of the sketch.

You could put me in for a line or two, and it'd be okay. You're on the Warner Brothers lot. I mean, it's just this amazing history. What was one or two in those 11 years, not the most surreal things that you saw, either on the lot or backstage. I mean, it was just so many people parading around that lot. You know, we were mostly inside the studio. You'd go get lunch or something at the cafeteria or the, I guess, yeah,

but it wasn't a lot of stuff. Like, you know, that every time someone makes a movie about show business, they're walking by dwarves and people in costumes and stuff. And that didn't really, that didn't really happen to me. I'm sure it may have happened to other people. Apparently, because we were on the same lot as Ellen, and something crazy, like they'd stop the traffic light so that she could make an uninterrupt,

she could just go left out of the studio and not have to be waiting at the light while people pointed and went, Ellen, so they would like change traffic. So she could just make a quick left outside of the studio and go home. That's different. How many other comedians that you know of in 1990, had their own website.

Did Dan Cook even have a website in 1996? Was he even born in 1996? I'm not sure. We have to do some research on that researcher. But 1996, how do you go about that? I mean, it was so, I just, I don't even know where to start. I mean, you didn't interview saying that even back then people weren't even saying dot com. They were saying period.

the dot, same period, instead of dot. I remember I was going through old, you know, videotapes like VCR tapes. Yeah, videotapes, whatever. VHS tapes, my God. And just digitizing them for what? I don't know, but I'd like to have them for maybe my great-grandchildren if they exist. And if a humanity exists, they could take a look. But one of my credits was that I have my own website.

And that was enough of a credit to people be like, wow. I don't know. I just was kind of interested in it. And it, you know, it wasn't like basic HTML was pretty easy. The stuff you did the back end stuff to make a website. And it was kind of fun. And websites weren't that fancy. So pretty much anyone could, I mean, like, Drudge.

His website is still exactly the way it was when he started it, probably in 1990. Who is that? that dredge the dredge report? Oh, that's a good point. Yeah, but there's Brandon, yeah. Yeah, so most websites were like that for a long time with a couple of graphics you could borrow or steal from like a graphics place. So it wasn't that hard. And I would write like a weekly blog, although it wasn't called that, just to kind of account for what it was like to be a road comic. You know, the few people that were on the internet, it wasn't like I had a huge

audience. It was just a couple people that were on the internet as well. It was definitely not a big crew. And when I went on the road, you had to bring your own modem and hook it up to the hotel phone. And that means you couldn't get a phone call. And, you know, so it was a lot. But also, I was so lonely on the road. I spent so much money on AOL chat rooms. It was like $2.95 a minute or an hour or something like that. I never would have thought of that. So yeah, that was really early on. I always love talking to people, and I've talked to maybe, I don't know, like a dozen people that were on tough crowd with Colin Quinn, only because there is never, that I know of a television show, certainly late night, that was run like this. The stories that I hear of how it just was around the office and the culture was just so, nothing scandal. It was not scandalous. It was just peculiar, in my opinion, I don't know if you agree or not, but in terms of like, you think that they would be just focused on the work, but there'd be boxing going on. and just, I don't know. I would talk to people.

That's probably just calling loosening up. I think every host has their own weird things they do to, you know, because they are trapped in this building until they do the show. And you get your adrenaline up and you can't really go for a walk because, you know, in Conan's case, you're amongst the, you know, you have to stay focused and you have to meet with people. But you want to kind of get some time alone in your head. So, yeah, I think every, every, probably every host has some.

crazy rituals they do. They wouldn't normally do in an office just because they have to get, they're not doing what anyone normally does or hosting a show. It's a big deal. The environment, everyone I talked to absolutely loved the place. It just seemed like I had never heard, I'm not doing a good job with my examples, but what was your experience like there? What are a couple things that stand out from Tough Crowd? Well, I mean, I loved it. It was my first writing job. I was just filled with anxiety. Ken Ober was a headwriter. He's passed away. He was part of, he was on, oh, this MTV show with Colin. Remote control.

Yes, that's right. And Ken was the greatest. I loved him. And Brian Tucker, who's also one of the headwriters at SNL right now, he was like maybe second in command under Ober. I don't know. It was a lot of fun. I didn't know what a writing job was. I didn't know what it was like.

I didn't know if you just sat and wrote all day or what. And this one was real loose. And we only, you know, Colin mostly wrote his opening salvo with probably with Ken. I think Ken wrote it a lot with it. And then we were kind of more responsible for the Act 3s. And sometimes we try to work with the comics if they wanted anyone to work with them. But it was real loose and it wasn't like any other writing job I'd ever have after. You've been doing stand-up.

You've done so much television on Kimmel and Corden after midnight, which I just heard two hours ago, was canceled, unfortunately. What? Yeah. No. Yeah. Your episode I heard did. No, that's not true. did not do it out but um wait it was really canceled yeah that's what i that's what i was unfortunately

and i don't think they're going to replace it with anything so yeah i was i was pretty um just because i know people to work there and stuff i thought that that was such a shame what you were on so let's talk about that what was your wait can i just double check you that is insane i would love that i would absolutely love for you to do that why it's this has never happened on my podcast before on anything out of that work Wow. Here's the thing. It's so cheap to produce

Taylor wanted to go back to. I could see her wanting to go back to doing. I mean, this girl is filling theaters. She's on the, I could see that, but why not have somebody else do it? It's so cheap to, it's as cheap.

I'm telling you, this is shocking to me is when tough crowd was canceled because, or as Comedy Central said, not picked up. but like it's so cheap the comedians cost nothing trust me i've done it twice they they have a small writing staff wow that is really wild i definitely think they could have kept it going with the different host i was surprised those those things take a while i was very surprised that it didn't get more time i mean she's her career she's going to be fine um it was just yeah i was and like

her stand-up is like she's a great stand-up is like she's a great stand up. She's filling, you know, to have to do a show four nights a week and then host, you know, tour on the weekends. It's exhausting. And I think she's doing it for a year. And I think she kind of, from what I heard, she sort of got talked into doing after mid, like, like she really, she's a comic, you know, and I think maybe this wasn't, you know, her dream job. But, you know, There's so many comics who this would be their dream job. I'm really surprised they're not trying it with somebody else. I'm surprised as well.

That's what it seems like the news is coming out, that they're not going to replace it. You've mentioned something on Twitter that I had never really thought about, and I thought this was so interesting. You have stand-ups, stand-up comedians normally are going out in front of just when they're starting out open mics. You might have just a few people. If you're lucky, maybe you get some clubs might let you on really late at night and

stuff, but traditionally you're not playing when you're starting out for big audiences, but you wrote on Twitter that now with social media, there are comedians that are starting their careers with sold out shows. That is unbelievable to me to really think about because, you know, it used to be people would ask advice and stuff and normally would take, you know, a bunch of years, years to find your voice and to build up to that point. The only person I can think of that was unique was, I believe Bob Newhart, because wasn't, didn't he record, um, a record without, I don't know if it was a small audience, but he'd never really performed live like that before. I think he might have been, or nightclubs. I think that's right. I forget. I know that new heart might have been

the one person, but besides Newhart, I mean, besides a genius. Yeah. Yes. Um, it's such an interesting point. And I, you know, good for them if they can do it. But I mean, you're not going to find your voice within a year, but I guess, I mean, if you're selling out places and stuff and you can just kind of- That doesn't mean you found your voice. It just means you're selling out. You're just selling tickets. It does mean that eventually I was going to say, if you keep doing it, you're going to find your voice. If you can keep having those people show up, but it's just such a strange to be selling out places like that when you have not done it for that long. Here's the thing. I'm not sure, I don't know, but to me, part of finding your voice

is bombing. And if you, because you start to, you know, you tell three jokes, nothing happens. And then you tell another joke and you did something different. Maybe you did it emotion or, you know, it was how you delivered it. But you're like, okay, that kind of thing works. I can do that. Right. So you're really, you really need to be convincing strangers that you're funny. And if you're already selling something out, they're not strangers. You're a celebrity. So you're not getting the right read on what's funny about you. That's a really good point. know that you are going to find your voice that way. I mean, you'll, you might do well, but I don't know, you know, it's, I could be wrong, but I really, I really feel like the, you know, there are people

that have started stand up after they got famous. And to me, it doesn't feel, something feels off. Oh, it feels like, without naming names. I'm not naming names, but it feels like 100%. They need to pay their rent, I mean, and just make a living. And that's, you know, fine. They're established. I mean, we all know who a lot of these people are and they're playing zanies and they're probably doing very well based on previous stuff that they've done but yeah right i wouldn't say that they're stand-ups by any means they maybe they do um but yeah it's it's completely completely different you're a new york times best-selling author you barely you are though you you've put out books um you're writing you have a big following on x um used to be called twitter and when your father and

And was it 2014 was when he passed away? You were, I mean, this was like nine days, ten days where you were, you were tweeting. And people got really emotionally invested. You're a very, very gifted writer. At what point did Norm MacDonald reach out to you? And I know that he was giving you some Bible verses, either for comfort or was it when your father passed away? How did that work?

He was, he didn't reach out to me directly. He tweeted to me. Like I had tweeted something, I forgot, but something about. It was the night that my dad had died earlier in that day, and I was just in my dad's, the garage, which was his office, he converted it to this labyrinth of, you know, plywood bookcases. It was the ugliest you've ever seen, but it was so my dad. And just alone with all of his stuff was, that was a really shocking night, you know. And I think so I tweeted something about that. And then Nora, replied with something really comforting, which I can't remember. I mean, if I was a good person, I could remember it off the top of my head. But that was it. He just replied to it. That was very helpful at that night. I know that you were on an Apple TV show. Hillary Clinton, did she produce a show called Gutsi? And you were on that? What was that experience like? It was a, she featured comics on,

I think maybe the episode was about comedy or being funny. But then she went to a clown school. I was like, all right. Really? Yes. Oh, goodness. Okay. I have to look that up. Like, you looked up at midnight. I have to look up. It's a little right. I would not look up clown school. So it was, so she sat down with three comics. It was myself, Yamanika Saunders and Nassoon. And it was Hillary and Chelsea. And they just talked to us about standup on comedy and being funny. And I gave her my theory was she, they didn't make it in the show. But my theory was that one theory I have is that people are Americans are still not used to hearing women's voices. in leadership roles. And I'm like, part of that is stand-up comedy. There's not enough women headlining. There's not enough women headlining shows at a lot of clubs, including the one we were sitting at. And that's part of the problem is the more they hear women taking over something, you know, or talking or speaking, and the more they sort of submit to listening to somebody, the easier it will be for them to vote or feel comfortable having a female president.

You got a lot of press. People, outlets would point out that you were the only female writer on Conan on the TBS show. Just for a little while. A lot. Yeah. Late night has definitely changed a lot. If you talk to people like Meryl Marco back when she was headwriter at Letterman, when you talked to Madeline Smithburg when they were starting out the Daily Show,

very few packets, they said, would come from women. And it was one of those things. I'm glad things have changed now. And it seems like they're getting more packets and they're actively pro. It seems like they're being proactive with seeking out voices. But yeah, in terms of like just going with packets, that's a shame that that's how. Well, I mean, I would have done a Packer for The Daily Show had I know. No one told me.

I don't know how, you know, you at the time, you only fad out through a writing agent. And so now we're dependent on writing agents signing women, which they aren't. So, you know, you do have to, if you realize there's a bottleneck someplace and then you need to go around it. Seth Myers, it seemed like really did that early on on his show, which I thought was great. And yeah,

hopefully that'll keep going. I always love going back to somebody that's had such a long career and done so much. Back in 1987, I don't know if at this point you had dropped out of UCLA, but it's this pivotal thing. Because you start doing stand-up, your first time, I think it was at food bars.

But at the same time, you did a Shakespeare play that year in March, which was Comedy of Airs at Diablo Valley College. How do you know this? I do my research. You could go either way. It's like, am I going to do? And you got a good review.

You played the maid. What was the maid's name? I forget. I don't remember. I had like two lines. I was like over 200 pounds because I had some kind of mental breakdown. And I was just climbing my way out of it. And yeah, I don't remember much.

But it was fun. It was good. Was your aspiration at that point that you might do plays? Yeah, I'd always wanted to be. an actress. Standup hadn't occurred to me until I went to see some stand-up. And then I was like, oh, I want to try that. And then once I did, I was totally hooked. What was your favorite time on television in terms of doing a late night show? I mean, you had Camel, Corden, Conan. Was there a particular set that you're really proud of? Gosh. All of them. No. You know, I don't like engaging

in these emotions of, like, what was I proud of? I would say my, I'd rather talk about my worst. set. Let's talk about that. That's great. People love that. There was a show in England, I think it was called The World Stands Up. And the club was a dance floor. And the audience was like seated on the dance. It was just like, what is this? And then they sucked. The audience sucked. And it was a bunch of American comics. And, you know, I think to perform well in England, you have to be there for a while and figure out what they hate about Americans and accommodate them and acclimate that way and learn learn how they see you, you know? It's like being a female comic. You know, it takes a while to go, oh, okay, so they see me this way. So I need to come out this way. I'm not like a guy comic to them.

So, of course, I hadn't done any of that. I just walked out, started doing my act, and I was bombing hard. And I was like, oh, my God. And then this other comic went out and he's like, Just pretend like you're killing. They're going to add laugh tracks. And he did. And he bombed just as badly as I did. But if you look at his face, you think he's murdering. And then they added laughs in later and it looked like he crushed.

And I was like, that's just not what I want out of comedy. Like if I'm bombing or something's not working, I enjoy commenting on it. You know, it's like, look at me. I just tried to be funny and it didn't work, you know. Who was he there, Merv or Mike Douglas? Merv Griffin, the same thing. I think it was Johnny Dark was telling me that sometimes you'd get an audience and they would put the laughs in no matter what. It's so strange. Yeah, once you get it in the editor's hands and the producer or whatever, they're just making good television. They don't

give a fuck about any of the jokes or anything. They're like, we're going to add laughs and then people watching it home while they're ironing or whatever will think it was funny. I'm big on comedians being supportive of one another. And Greg Regal, who did a really killer set on Leno, I remember back in the day and stuff, you were in Dayton and Ohio with him. And I thought that this was really nice that you attributed this in an interview. And I just, I really like when I hear this about comedians is that he just, he knew you were moving to New York and he just picked up the phone right then and there and called three clubs and be like, you should have her. He did. Which is really nice. He was awesome. And then when I moved there, I was like too embarrassed to, called those collapse. Really? Yes. Oh, wow. I, yeah, I, yeah, maybe I did one. I, I can't remember it. I was, like, so overwhelmed. And I was like, I'm not ready. I'm not ready. It was another thing, just like with the UK, if you're moving to New York from wherever you're moving, if you've been a performer in one state and you move to New York City, there's going to be a learning curve. The audiences are so different. The whole vibe is different. And it takes a while, you know, and And so I guess I had my ass handed to me pretty quickly because I was given spots at the comic strip, like Friday and Saturday nights. And I was not ready for Friday or Saturday night crowds. I still was, I still had a very suburban act because I was mostly on the road in the suburbs, you know. And I did not have any city polish. You know, I was all suburban. And so I needed to get knocked around a little bit. And I did. And then I then I sort of mastered. the New York City set, I guess. But it took a while. Were you on set when I know you knew Greg Gerardo?

Were you on set with the tennis Leary incident on Tough Crack? I've talked to a couple people that were there and afterwards and stuff, how tense it was. What do you remember and can you set up what happened? Basically, Leary was taking some shots at Geraldo. Yeah. And Geraldo was defending himself and being very witty and funny and just basically he clobbered Leary, who was this huge star. And Dorello wasn't really established at the time.

But what do you remember? I remember it just, I don't remember being that tense. I just thought it was like an interesting moment. There was a lot of, I mean, they weren't that high profile with Leary, but these guys were always attacking each other. It wasn't professional wrestling. It was real. They were actually, they were upset with one another.

That would actually happen. I think Leary later said he wasn't upset. But yeah, he didn't play back, right? Had Geraldo called somebody else out like Keith Robinson or something, Keith would have hit him back and it would have been fun and funny. But Leary sort of took himself very seriously and didn't, wasn't playful, you know. I remember being sort of tense, but not like it looked way more tense on television than to me it felt in the studio because there was always, people were always like, you know, budding heads and stuff. It definitely looked worse on TV. In your 11 years at Conum, did you ever, was there anybody that was a guest that you really wanted to meet that you went backstage to say hi to or get a photo? Two, Carol Burnett. I have a photo with her. And there's mascara running down my face because I'd started crying. And Chrissy Hind, she signed a cover, her album. She signed it over to me. She had a vinyl copy. So she, I met her. Those are the only two I asked to meet. Our dressing room was sort of like this communal area. Like we had a, there were individual dressing room. rooms and they all met into like this big sort of living room area. So frequently we writers would be hanging out there. You know, after after the mono was done, there's, you know, we just hang out if we, if we didn't have a writing assignment to get to immediately. And then the stars would start

congregating some of them. Some of them would just stay hidden in their room, depending how big they were, I guess, hidden in their room. And then they were led out to Conan. And some of them would just stand around and talk, you know, maybe not necessarily with, you know, people working on the show, but maybe they're publicist or whatever, but they hang out sort of communally and be somewhat available. I mean, people kind of knew not to always be bugging these people because they were, they were guests and we wanted them to come back and feel comfortable and not weird around us, so. I get that, but that's great. I'm sure Carol Burnett, that meant a lot to her. I know she, I got to interview her for a podcast I did, and she said she got really with

Carrie Grant. She had just had such a tough. I was like the one person. She had a time. Oh, my God. But I'm sure that meant a lot to. Let's talk about your comedy special. This was, this came out in December, late December, with comedy dynamics. And it's available on Amazon, Apple TV and YouTube. You know, it came out January of 24. I shot it the previous year. Yeah, it's out. I'm completely wrong on this. That's okay. So it's been out for a year. And what's it called? It's called a cis woke. grief slut. And I have some comedy about my mom dying of COVID. I have some comedy about being doxed and harassed for telling an abortion joke on MSNBC. At that point, right then was the height of dumb shit male comics talking about trans women. So I just wanted to come at it from a different point of view, which I did. And then, uh, cis woke. And then woke, I just named it woke because I figured that's what everyone was calling me behind my back. So I'll call myself that. And you guys can all get mad. It's on Hulu now. Oh, good. So Comedy Dynamics produced it. And then they're like, they're this, they just feed it out to different places. And Hulu, you know, Hulu wasn't the

original one, but they, Hulu's got like this new commitment to stand up. You know, they, they did Roy Wood juniors, Bill Burr, Arna's got one coming out soon. So they're doing a lot of high profile stuff. And they just bought mine, which is kind of cool because it will sit in the same area as the Hulu's special ones and no one, except comedy people, would know that it wasn't like one of Hulus. Congratulations. Yeah, that's

cool. The L. Portal Theater. Yeah. And I know that you have dates coming out. You're doing club dates in April, May, and June. So check out Lori Kilmartin.com and your books and everything on your website, best sell and author. Thank you so much for doing this. I'm grateful.

Thanks so much. It was a lot of fun. I appreciate it, Mark. Thanks for listening. Please subscribe so you never miss an episode. On Apple Podcasts, please rate it and leave a review. Be sure to go to late-nighter.com for all your late-night TV news, and you can find my podcast at late-nighter.com forward slash podcasts. Have a wonderful week, and I'll see you next Tuesday. I'm going to be.

I'm going to be. I'm going to be. You know, I'm going to be able to be. I'm going to be. We're going to be able to be. We're going to be.