Arsenio Hall

Comedian, actor, and talk show host Arsenio Hall feels relieved about being Conan O’Brien’s friend. Arsenio sits down with Conan to discuss his new book Arsenio: A Memoir, constructing the energetic environment of The Arsenio Hall Show, circumventing notes from the network, and how losing his magic equipment in a house fire forced him into a comedy career. For Conan videos, tour dates and more visit TeamCoco.com. Got a question for Conan? Call our voicemail: (669) 587-2847.

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:02Conan O'Brien?

  Who do you shop for first on the holidays, Sona? Was it, do you shop for the kids or do you shop for Tac?

• 0:06Speaker 01

  My kids.

• 0:07Conan O'Brien?

  Okay.

• 0:07Speaker 01

  Or Oki.

• 0:08Conan O'Brien?

  You gotta get them your stuff.

• 0:08Speaker 01

  Or my dog.

• 0:09Conan O'Brien?

  And then your husband is last. Well, guess what? It's that time of year. You feel that, you smell that, uh, that cinnamon cider in the air? Do you smell that?

• 0:18Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 0:19Conan O'Brien?

  And you see pumpkins around, people buying turkeys. A little early to buy a turkey.

• 0:23Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 0:24Conan O'Brien?

  Doesn't matter. Holidays? I would say it's just around the corner, but that's a cliche. It's, uh, very nearby in the cupboard. Well, guess what? Amazon delivers joy with low prices on the gifts you want, even this early in the season. So get ahead of the season. Shop early gifts, top picks, holiday decor, and advent calendars at low prices. Get ahead, start on holiday gifting with Amazon's low prices. Shop now at amazon.com/holiday.

• 0:56Conan O'Brien?

  You looking for something sweet and satisfying?

• 0:57Speaker 01

  Always.

• 0:58Conan O'Brien?

  Meet Wonderful Pistachios Chocolate Sea Salt and Chocolate Toffee, your go-to treats.

• 1:04Speaker 01

  Mmm.

• 1:04Conan O'Brien?

  Each pistachio is thinly, not thickly, thinly dipped in dark chocolate antioxidant goodness.

• 1:12Speaker 01

  The way you said that, thinly and thickly was uncomfortable.

• 1:15Conan O'Brien?

  It doesn't overwhelm the pistachio. They know what they're doing. I'm so glad they made the right choice. Or discover Wonderful Pistachios Dubai Chocolate. The sweet indulgence you didn't know you needed with rich dark chocolate, smooth white chocolate, crispy katafi, and a delicious crunchy pistachio. I'm telling you, snack time never tasted so good.

• 1:35Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:35Conan O'Brien?

  Look it up in history. It never has. Never has.

• 1:39Speaker 01

  Can you?

• 1:39Conan O'Brien?

  Check out wonderfulpistachios.com to learn more about Wonderful Pistachios chocolate products.

• 1:47Conan O'Brien?

  Hi, my name is Arsenio Hall.

• 1:52Speaker 02

  And I feel relieved about being Conan O'Brien's friend.

• 2:20Conan O'Brien?

  Hey, welcome to Conan O'Brien Needs a Friend. Sona, did you finish your string cheese?

• 2:25Speaker 01

  Did not, I still have it.

• 2:26Conan O'Brien?

  Sona, I look over, I'm about to start, and Sona has string cheese hanging out her mouth, and she's shaking her head like, "Don't go yet, don't go yet." You hid it so fast, no? You hid, you jammed it under the table.

• 2:40Speaker 01

  Yeah, I did. I'm holding it.

• 2:41Conan O'Brien?

  Okay, well, be proud of your string cheese, you know? There you go.

• 2:45Speaker 01

  There we go.

• 2:46Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah, how is it? Is it good string cheese?

• 2:47Speaker 01

  It is good. Thank you for having it in the fridge.

• 2:50Conan O'Brien?

  I didn't know we had string cheese.

• 2:52Speaker 01

  You don't do the grocery shopping?

• 2:53Conan O'Brien?

  I used to, and then about a week ago, I thought, maybe I shouldn't do it anymore. I would always be rushing out just before guests were here. "Al Pacino's almost here, I've gotta go to the market." "He likes his provolone." The market? Um, the market. That's right, I said the market. That's like where people in a fairy tale go shopping. Papa Bear's down at the market with Goldilocks. Sona, good to see you.

• 3:21Speaker 01

  Good to see you too, boss.

• 3:22Conan O'Brien?

  And we're also joined, of course, Matt Gourley is out, he's on paternity leave. And we're very happy for him, but David Hopping's sitting in with us.

• 3:31Speaker 03

  Hello.

• 3:31Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah.

• 3:32Speaker 03

  I'm here.

• 3:32Conan O'Brien?

  Wow, you light up a room. All right. Listen, you had that coming, you know you did.

• 3:36Speaker 03

  I know.

• 3:38Conan O'Brien?

  No, you're a fantastic fellow.

• 3:40Speaker 03

  Hey, thanks.

• 3:40Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah, and you're about to move into a new apartment.

• 3:42Speaker 03

  I am, yeah, thank you.

• 3:43Conan O'Brien?

  I'm very happy for you, but you made the mistake of showing me a video of your apartment, and all I've done is give you a hard time since.

• 3:50Speaker 03

  I was excited, we were together whenever I got the email that we got approved, and I was like, "Oh, here's the new apartment," and ever since then, I've regretted everything in my life.

• 3:58Conan O'Brien?

  Because I used anything I saw in the apartment, it's very nice.

• 4:01Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 4:01Conan O'Brien?

  It's two floors, it's got two balconies, and I started to go after him like, "Oh, two floors, huh? What am I paying you? You've got two balconies? I don't have two balconies." And so anytime you open up to me as a friend, I quickly use it against you.

• 4:17Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 4:18Conan O'Brien?

  You know what? I don't want to speak anymore about our trivial matters because I am over the moon about today's guest. Very excited. This is a guy who I have a lot of respect for. I have a lot of respect for him. And we have worked in a similar profession. And we have a lot of things, I think, in common. And I just, I've always heard he's a lovely guy. And I'm so excited that we get to chat. So let's get right into it. My guest today is an actor. He's a comedian. He's a talk show host who now has a new book. And I've read this book and it's great. It's titled "Arsenio: A Memoir."

• 5:00Conan O'Brien?

  I am just, well, this isn't a job. This is just a really fun thing I get to do.

• 5:10Conan O'Brien?

  Arseneau Hall, welcome.

• 5:16Speaker 02

  Relieved.

• 5:17Conan O'Brien?

  Relieved? Why relieved?

• 5:19Speaker 02

  See, I should have prepared.

• 5:22Speaker 02

  Okay. Being totally honest, if you have to take it out, take it out. Last night, me and Howie Mandel arrived in Beverly Hills to do a benefit for abused animals with Jay Leno.

• 5:36Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah, yeah.

• 5:37Speaker 02

  So because this is last night, about eight o'clock, and I am thinking, get to bed, get up tomorrow, do Conan, and I'm looking at Jay in this green room. And I don't keep up with all white folks' business. You know?

• 5:51Conan O'Brien?

  Well, guess what? I do.

• 5:55Conan O'Brien?

  I only keep up on white folks.

• 6:00Speaker 02

  But I do remember that you all had friction.

• 6:03Conan O'Brien?

  Water under the bridge.

• 6:05Speaker 02

  Yeah, yeah. Yeah, and you know, Jay is... Your friends are laughing.

• 6:11Conan O'Brien?

  Water under the bridge.

• 6:14Speaker 02

  But I, I, I thought about it and I'm like, wow, I hope Conan doesn't hate me, you know, because.

• 6:19Conan O'Brien?

  What?

• 6:19Speaker 02

  No, no, because I, you know, Jay is like a big brother to me.

• 6:23Conan O'Brien?

  Sure.

• 6:23Speaker 02

  And we fought too, me and Jay, we're like Cain and Abel. We're brothers, but.

• 6:29Conan O'Brien?

  Which one gets killed?

• 6:31Speaker 02

  Uh, he does, he does. I'm, I'm the better fighter.

• 6:37Speaker 01

  Jesus Christ.

• 6:38Conan O'Brien?

  No, no, no, I honestly, uh, I'm, I'm just, I, this is gonna sound so corny, but, um, I am so happy with my life, uh, and I get to do the things I wanna do and I honestly don't think about any of that stuff. I really don't.

• 6:56Speaker 02

  And I think of it as white folks business, I honestly don't know what happened, but I do remember there was something, I was breastfeeding back in that era, you know?

• 7:05Conan O'Brien?

  You are a medical miracle.

• 7:09Speaker 02

  How did you?

• 7:11Conan O'Brien?

  You're actually lactating right now. You know, um, listen, I am, I, I, I so want you just to be a happy person in the world because I was telling Adam today that, I don't know when I've had a guest, I mean, I filled my book with things I wanna talk to you about. Um, I read your book, uh, your memoir, it's fantastic. It's great, I mean, really great. And you have such a unique story and you're so honest in this book about everything, about how you were feeling. And one of the first things you address in the book is you say, I wanna write this book because I wanna clear up some misconceptions. And one of the misconceptions about you is there are people out there that think you're a recluse.

• 7:55Conan O'Brien?

  And you are not a recluse, you know? You might be hanging out with the wrong people, but you're not a recluse.

• 8:04Conan O'Brien?

  And I'm talking about Howie Mandel.

• 8:08Conan O'Brien?

  No, but, no, but, but, but Arsenio, you wrote this book to sort of tell your story and it's, and it's a crazy story. It's a fantastic story.

• 8:20Speaker 02

  Yeah, there are a lot of things that I'm sure people will read and say, that couldn't have happened. I mean, he was a magician, Johnny was a magician, so he thought, I'll do the, the, the, the. He was outside a park after playing basketball with Mark Jackson and he saw Muhammad Ali doing a magic trick with a Kleenex, you know?

• 8:38Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 8:39Speaker 02

  Sometimes it sounds amazing and hard to believe, but I think I've just been blessed with an incredible life, which is why I was so cool going home after quitting the show and chilling.

• 8:51Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah, yeah. Well, you know, first of all, you and I both know what these shows take. And then you were dealing with a lot of stuff that I never had to deal with. So I take my experience, which I thought was really difficult, and I love the job as you did, but it's difficult, it's draining, it takes everything you've got. And then I think, okay, but Arsenio is dealing with a whole other layer that I didn't have to deal with.

• 9:22Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 9:23Conan O'Brien?

  I mean, you've got, when you're doing your show, and we'll get there, because I want to do a little of your origin story, but I want to get to, you know, it's 1989 and people forget that your show starts in 1989, and even though that sounds like it's the modern era, there's still stuff happening in 1989 where you're getting network notes, like, don't say brother so much on the show, you know? Don't go into the audience too much because there are a lot of black folks in the audience. You're getting notes like that.

• 9:56Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 9:56Conan O'Brien?

  I think about that calculation, you dealing with that kind of stuff on top of everything that I know about, and I think that's an achievement to be present for all that and keep your spirits up and do a great job.

• 10:10Speaker 02

  Yeah, and, and you know, my desire was to do the- Show and put people in the mix that weren't in the mix. You know, when I was a kid, I'd watch The Tonight Show or, or, I don't know, Dinah Shore.

• 10:23Conan O'Brien?

  You also watched a lot of daytime. You watched Merv Griffin.

• 10:26Speaker 02

  Oh, yeah.

• 10:27Conan O'Brien?

  Um, and it's it really is. And Mike Douglas, and you know what? There's a lot of young people who don't know those people. Those were guys that had, um, talk shows in the day time. And they had a certain kind of energy that I think you brought consciously or unconsciously into late night. Which is you didn't have a desk because those guys didn't have a desk. You.

• 10:52Speaker 02

  And by the way, when I took over, Joan Rivers had a desk and my producer, you know, my dream Weaver. She made me get rid of it because she came to see me do stand up one night and she says, I don't want anything in front of you. In case you want to stand up, in case you want to move forward and it will create who we are.

• 11:11Conan O'Brien?

  Yes.

• 11:12Speaker 02

  You know.

• 11:12Conan O'Brien?

  You, I mean, this is, uh, Marla Kel Brown, is that right?

• 11:16Speaker 02

  Mm hmm.

• 11:17Conan O'Brien?

  At who you're a really good friend and your producer. The two of you had this mission in mind, which is, and I just want to take people back for a second. Cause we're talking about it. We might as well talk about it now and then we get to the other stuff. I remember when your show came on, people can forget how revolutionary that was. You came out and you were doing a show that was completely different from anything that was going on.

• 11:41Speaker 02

  And in all fairness, you talked about daytime energy.

• 11:43Conan O'Brien?

  Mm hmm.

• 11:44Speaker 02

  There was a lot of things that I picked up, things on my hard drive from my childhood.

• 11:49Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah.

• 11:49Speaker 02

  Uh, there were times when I remember a specific day looking and seeing this new rapper that I knew about, but the public didn't quite know about yet. And his name was Fat Joe. And he was with a friend who was on the show that day. And I remember thinking Ed Sullivan used to have Diana Ross stand up. So the mass public didn't know who he was, but my audience needs to know.

• 12:13Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah.

• 12:13Speaker 02

  And that is what I thought my job was. And I was like, you know, I didn't say it like over there in section B.

• 12:19Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah, yeah.

• 12:19Speaker 02

  You know, I didn't do it that way, but I said, yo, Fat Joe, stand up, take a bow. And that was from my childhood, seeing Ed Sullivan say, Diana Ross. Take a bow.

• 12:29Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 12:30Speaker 02

  It's a horrible Sullivan, but, uh, you know.

• 12:33Conan O'Brien?

  I didn't know that was Sullivan.

• 12:34Speaker 02

  Yeah, I know.

• 12:35Conan O'Brien?

  I thought it was a guy.

• 12:36Speaker 02

  He's doing Merv again.

• 12:37Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah. Or someone struggling with a neuromuscular disease. That's what I was getting and I thought.

• 12:43Speaker 02

  That's something I've had a problem with this week.

• 12:45Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah, but, uh, I think the thing that I always really admired about you and to this day is that at a time when everyone thought these late night talk shows are this certain kind of thing, you came along and you said, um, I'm gonna do what's right for me, what feels comfortable for me. Now, that sounds like an easy thing to do. I remember the, one of the first times I met Johnny Carson and he gave me advice. He said, just be yourself. Until he saw who I was. And he said, have you got anyone else you can be? But, but, uh, but it sounds like an easy thing to do. It's one of the hardest things

• 13:26Conan O'Brien?

  to do in the world and you came along and you and your producer Marla and you're just like, this is what the set's gonna look like. There's gonna be no desk. We're not doing that. This is going to be, um, a party. This is going to be everything that I've wanted my whole life because in your book, you detail that even as a kid, you're pretending to be Johnny Carson. You're pretending to be a talk show host. You, Oprah would say you manifested this and you really did. I mean, it's pretty incredible.

• 13:55Speaker 02

  Doing a talk show in my basement, the ghetto of Cleveland. I'm also a magician. That is a recipe for getting your ass whipped every day. Every day you walk to school, you're gonna get your ass beat, you know? Give me a quarter, but do a trick with it first, motherfucker.

• 14:14Speaker 02

  You know, that was my life.

• 14:16Conan O'Brien?

  They, they hit you and three pigeons fall out of your sleeve.

• 14:21Speaker 02

  Absolutely.

• 14:22Conan O'Brien?

  That's so fantastic. No, you were, I mean, we're gonna just jump around because that's the kind of interview this is gonna be. We're gonna jump all over the place, but-

• 14:30Speaker 02

  This is gonna be a jazz interview.

• 14:31Conan O'Brien?

  Jazz interview, and everyone loves jazz.

• 14:36Conan O'Brien?

  You, you go in, you go in with the things that you wanted to do, and you, you did them right away. You were completely yourself, and it was a phenomenon. I mean, the show was, it's all anybody was talking about. It was a big hit. And one of the things that people forget, because TV is so different now. It's not even called TV anymore. It's just, there's entertainment everywhere on all these different platforms. Back then, it was next to impossible to crack into one of these shows. You do, and you say, "I'm gonna do this completely my way." And I remember the guests. I mean, these were not people you ever saw on television.

• 15:17Speaker 02

  And these are the people you saw that they weren't making me turn down. Like, I was having Ice Cube stop by the studio and say, "Yo, dog, look at this and tell me what you think," you know? And it would be him performing with NWA. And I'm like, I can't even say the title, you know?

• 15:36Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah, yeah.

• 15:36Speaker 02

  Niggas with attitude. And I went to Paramount. I tried to get them on. So there were people you didn't see, because early on-

• 15:46Conan O'Brien?

  Because you couldn't get them on.

• 15:47Speaker 02

  Well, yeah, Paramount wouldn't let me put NWA on. Eventually, I brought Ice Cube on and Dre on and, and Eazy on separately after they broke up. But in the beginning, Paramount would just say no. After the show took off, I would push harder and say, like, I went through the same type of meeting when Ice T came up with Cop Killer. And I'm like, "I wanna do Ice T. And I wanna let him explain this whole thing he's going through right now with this album." And- They said no, and I said, no, we're doing this one. I stopped letting them say no.

• 16:25Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah.

• 16:25Speaker 02

  Uh, because I had a little bit of power. And I'm like, I gotta do this. Otherwise, I merv.

• 16:32Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah, you gotta get the power first, you know, and you got the power. You start to exercise it, and I'm just gonna, because this blows my mind. I was, again, I love the book, but your guests, Muhammad Ali, Jesse Jackson, Miles Davis, Michael Jackson, biggest star, one of the biggest stars in the history of the world. Uh, you got Mike Tyson, Whitney Houston, Maya Angelou, and she was so nervous. Is this true that you guys?

• 17:00Speaker 02

  Oh, yeah.

• 17:01Conan O'Brien?

  She wanted backstage, she needed a little something to calm her down.

• 17:03Speaker 02

  Yeah, and um, I think we were at this point where our green room wasn't supposed to have liquor in it because something had gone wrong. And uh, she knocked on my door and she says, hi, baby, can we talk for a minute?

• 17:19Speaker 02

  And she comes inside and um, I offer her a drink of what I have. Because somebody, a talent coordinator had told me, you know, Maya wants just a little toddy to relax her. And it became a tradition whenever she came on the show. You know, me and Maya went in and had a little sip together. It relaxed us.

• 17:37Conan O'Brien?

  What were you having, I'm just curious.

• 17:38Speaker 02

  It was a brown liquor. I don't remember exactly what it was, but it was probably that stuff in the purple bag. You know, it's that brown stuff. Because I think that's what I had.

• 17:47Speaker 01

  Crown Royal.

• 17:48Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 17:49Conan O'Brien?

  Crown Royal. Yeah. I did that, but it was cough syrup.

• 17:54Speaker 01

  What?

• 17:54Conan O'Brien?

  And it wasn't Maya Angelou. It was Al Roker.

• 17:58Speaker 02

  Oh, wow. That's a party.

• 18:01Conan O'Brien?

  I was working a different thing, you know?

• 18:05Conan O'Brien?

  But you had these people on, you had this music on, and there was, I mean, I remember nights where it was an event, I remembered, uh, I could be making this up, but I seem to remember a night where like Eddie Murphy's there and, you know, Eddie's the biggest thing on the planet. You know, I think Michael Jackson comes by and you're looking at.

• 18:26Speaker 02

  Oh, you know, back in the day, um, I used to host the. MTV Awards.

• 18:30Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah.

• 18:31Speaker 02

  And like, I think I did it for three years, but one of those years, Michael couldn't come to the MTV Awards. So we made a deal that the award he was getting would be given to him on my show the next week.

• 18:45Conan O'Brien?

  Wow, okay.

• 18:45Speaker 02

  And there was also an award in the film world for Eddie. So I'm like, let's see if Eddie will come and Michael and Eddie can kiss each other's ass. You know, no.

• 18:57Speaker 02

  Uh, Michael and Eddie, okay.

• 19:00Conan O'Brien?

  I'd tune in for that.

• 19:03Speaker 02

  Michael and Eddie can each give the other an award, and that's how we did it. Uh, Michael said, Eddie is the best comedian in the history of, you know, and Michael gave him, and Eddie is like, yeah, oh, Mike, so this one is for you.

• 19:19Speaker 02

  And Eddie gave him, and it was the best segment ever.

• 19:23Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah, so.

• 19:24Speaker 02

  Especially when me and, me and Eddie are out there and, and Michael walks out.

• 19:28Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah.

• 19:29Speaker 02

  We knew he was walking out.

• 19:30Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah.

• 19:31Speaker 02

  And it fucked us up, you know?

• 19:32Conan O'Brien?

  It's like, no, but that was an event. People talk about, everyone's trying to make events happen on TV, and I think they're fewer and farther between. They don't happen that often. But you come along at this moment. This is just unprecedented. This is unprecedented, and you brought all of these entertainers that meant so much to you. And you, you bring them, you're, you're so true to what you want to do, that you start getting it from both sides. You get white people saying, or white, you know, it's a network note, I think, sometimes. They wouldn't, it's not a network note, I shouldn't say that.

• 20:09Speaker 02

  It's too black.

• 20:10Conan O'Brien?

  The show is too black. The show is too black.

• 20:11Speaker 02

  And you're too black.

• 20:12Conan O'Brien?

  Okay. Was that a thing that was actually said to you?

• 20:15Speaker 02

  Oh, yeah, we, we talk in meetings, nobody could text back then, because it hadn't been invented.

• 20:21Conan O'Brien?

  Yep.

• 20:21Speaker 02

  And they would not only tell me you're too black, but they would give me examples of what I shouldn't do. And you know, you you mentioned one earlier. Stop calling everybody brother, but that was an interesting meeting. Because I went over to an executive's office. And they said, I was listening to the show because executives would have monitors on.

• 20:40Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah.

• 20:40Speaker 02

  Watching everything. And the executive said to me, stop calling your guests brother. And I said, what do you mean? It's tonight, I'm listening to the show and all I hear is brother this and brother that. And that sounds like it's not inclusive to your larger audience. And what they didn't do was pay attention to who I was talking to. Because I was calling Mark Wahlberg brother. Um, he was with Marky Mark and the Funky Bunch.

• 21:08Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah.

• 21:08Speaker 02

  And so what they learned with me is, yeah, there are a lot of things I'm doing that maybe need to be ironed out or changed. But pay attention because I called everybody brother and some of this stuff.

• 21:19Conan O'Brien?

  If Mr. Rogers was on, you'd say, hey.

• 21:21Speaker 02

  Yeah, that's, yeah.

• 21:22Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah.

• 21:23Speaker 02

  Me and Mr. Rogers had identical jackets that we picked out for the show one night. And I'm like, this is Brother Rogers.

• 21:32Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 21:33Conan O'Brien?

  But you know, that's, you get that, okay? Which people would probably.

• 21:37Speaker 02

  And one more thing.

• 21:38Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah.

• 21:38Speaker 02

  And you know the hardest part? The hardest part is when black people come at you, they come at you with bars and spit. Like when Ice Cube was mad, he found something that rhymed with arsenio. You know, and released the track, you know, people asked me, uh, yeah, you know, when you.

• 21:58Conan O'Brien?

  Now I'm thinking.

• 22:00Speaker 02

  See, when you make Streisand mad, it's not as much a problem.

• 22:03Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 22:05Speaker 02

  But, but Ice Cube, that motherfucker was sitting at home.

• 22:09Conan O'Brien?

  Talk about.

• 22:09Speaker 02

  You know, people asked me if I liked the bicentennial.

• 22:18Speaker 02

  I hate it and I hate arsenio. It was some shit like that.

• 22:22Conan O'Brien?

  It wasn't his best rhyme. But you know, that's, that's the point I'm making is that you. Yes, you're getting, you're getting these notes from white people saying it's too black, but you're also at the same time getting flack from the black community saying it's not black enough.

• 22:40Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 22:40Conan O'Brien?

  And you get some flack from, you know, Spike Lee, and you get some flack from some other people who say, this hasn't gone far enough, and...

• 22:50Speaker 02

  Why is Ed Asner on before me? Excuse me? Why, this is the black show, right?

• 22:55Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah.

• 22:55Speaker 02

  I thought things would be different. Why the fuck is Ed Asner coming out before me on the black show too?

• 23:00Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah.

• 23:01Speaker 02

  You know, and it was rough. It was, because I have a flaw in my personality. I love to please. I love to make people happy.

• 23:08Conan O'Brien?

  I know what you're talking about, yeah.

• 23:09Speaker 02

  I want them to go home, you know, I want Mike Epps to go home happy.

• 23:12Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah.

• 23:13Speaker 02

  You know, and sometimes you just can't make everyone happy. But I tried for six years.

• 23:18Conan O'Brien?

  Well, this is the thing, is that you're in this bind because you can't make everybody happy. You just can't all the time.

• 23:27Speaker 02

  Spike Lee was angry because I simply couldn't give him the day he wanted. You know, sometimes when you're rolling out a movie, if the movie opens tonight, back in the day, movie opens tonight in the theaters, Spike wants to be that Friday night guest, also knowing, you know, and this is just an example, also knowing, say for instance, that more people might watch on a Friday, because they don't have to work on a Saturday, and sometimes numbers on a Friday are better than Monday. But he had a specific day he wanted, and we were already booked with our first guest out. And, and he got angry at me.

• 23:57Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah.

• 23:57Speaker 02

  And, you know, and that stuff happens every day. Back then, you build up a thick callus on your heart, because you get attacked every day by somebody for something.

• 24:08Conan O'Brien?

  Okay, that I don't believe. Because you strike me, I think we, there are some similarities between us. I think that I try to pretend things don't hurt me, but they do. And I know you, and everyone knows you, to be a really decent, good person. I think that it did really bother you probably to get, it hurts, because you're so trying to make everyone happy with this show. And then suddenly you're thinking, okay, I accept that there's a white executive who doesn't understand, but I would think slightly.

• 24:45Speaker 02

  White executive, you say, I want to do two numbers with Bobby Brown, and they'll say, the model? And you realize your struggle is. It's going to be hard, you know?

• 25:07Conan O'Brien?

  You know, winning an award, that's a big achievement, right?

• 25:09Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 25:09Conan O'Brien?

  Every now and then in life, maybe something nice like that comes your way. Winning them consistently is almost impossible. It just doesn't happen, you know? Well, guess what? Winning five times in six years? You know what that sounds like to me? Sustained excellence.

• 25:24Speaker 01

  Nice.

• 25:24Conan O'Brien?

  Hyundai has done just that, earning the title of America's best SUV brand for 2026 from US News and World Report. You are a very happy Hyundai driver.

• 25:33Speaker 01

  I drive a Hyundai Palisade and I love my car. I love it. I love driving around.

• 25:37Conan O'Brien?

  I've been tooling around in an Ioniq 5N, which I love. Beautiful car. Well, listen, whether you need an SUV for everyday life, your next big adventure, or extra room for family and friends, Hyundai has an option for you. The Tucson Hybrid is loaded with technology and built for everyday life. The Santa Fe Hybrid's fully capable and ready for adventure. The Palisade, that's yours, right?

• 25:57Speaker 01

  Hello.

• 25:57Conan O'Brien?

  They're going to rename that the Sona. The Palisade Hybrid, yeah, delivers premium capability and class-leading interior space. With available, I have this memorized, H-Track all-wheel drive, up to an EPA estimated 619 miles of range on vehicles like the Palisade Hybrid and Hyundai's industry-leading warranty. It's easy to see why Hyundai continues to deliver the quality, innovation, technology, and value drivers expect from an award-winning brand. View US News Best Cars at cars.usnews.com and call 562-314-4603 for complete details.

• 26:32Conan O'Brien?

  Did you know that one in four Americans targeted by scams end up falling for them?

• 26:36Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 26:36Conan O'Brien?

  You fell for one.

• 26:37Speaker 01

  I fell for a scam.

• 26:38Conan O'Brien?

  Now, you didn't lose too much money, but you did lose.

• 26:41Speaker 01

  I did lose, and it was very inconvenient, and now they put protections on my account like I'm, uh, dumb.

• 26:46Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah, I don't know where they got that impression. Criminals are now using AI to make scams look more realistic than ever. In 2025, AI fraud spiked 1,210% and cost Americans $893 million. That's incredible. Well, with AI, it can get so smart now.

• 27:07Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 27:07Conan O'Brien?

  Do you know what I mean?

• 27:08Speaker 01

  Maybe I should start scamming.

• 27:09Conan O'Brien?

  No, that's not the point.

• 27:10Speaker 01

  Oh, no, that's not the point of this.

• 27:11Conan O'Brien?

  That's not the point.

• 27:12Speaker 01

  It's so much money.

• 27:13Conan O'Brien?

  One accidental click, Sona, can expose your information, putting you at risk of identity theft. Luckily, this is the point. Not that you should start scamming, but that everyone should get LifeLock.

• 27:22Speaker 01

  Right, right, right, right.

• 27:23Conan O'Brien?

  LifeLock has live, US-based restoration specialists who will be with you every step of the way to fix your identity theft, from first alert to full restoration. This is fantastic. How do you not have this?

• 27:35Speaker 01

  Mm-hmm.

• 27:35Conan O'Brien?

  If you have expenses or money stolen due to identity theft, you're backed by the million-dollar protection package with up to $3 million coverage in some plans. Join now and save up to 30% off your first year. Go to lifelock.com/conan. That's lifelock.com/conan to save 30%. Terms apply.

• 27:54Conan O'Brien?

  Sona, what are some of the things in life that really get you down?

• 27:56Speaker 01

  Uh, driving?

• 27:57Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah.

• 27:58Speaker 01

  That's the first thing that popped in my head.

• 28:00Conan O'Brien?

  No, but I've seen you drive, and it's true. I'm always picking mailboxes out of your grill.

• 28:05Conan O'Brien?

  You're a creative driver. Uh, look, let's face it, just living on Earth can be a lot, right?

• 28:10Speaker 01

  It can.

• 28:11Conan O'Brien?

  I mean, oy vey, it's a lot.

• 28:13Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 28:13Conan O'Brien?

  There's gravity, there's mosquitoes, there's the... You know that they say the sun is going to, at some point, go supernova and incinerate the Earth, probably in 5 billion years?

• 28:21Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 28:22Conan O'Brien?

  But watch your diet, we might be sticking around for that.

• 28:25Speaker 01

  Oh, man.

• 28:25Conan O'Brien?

  So, cosmically speaking, you've earned a break.

• 28:27Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 28:28Conan O'Brien?

  And you know where this is going? I think you do.

• 28:29Speaker 01

  No.

• 28:30Conan O'Brien?

  Pluto TV.

• 28:31Speaker 01

  Oh, right, of course.

• 28:32Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah, to escape all of these hassles in life, you gotta get Pluto TV. Turn off all your earthly problems and turn on the movies and shows you already love. You've seen them, but you want to see them again. They're old friends.

• 28:42Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 28:43Conan O'Brien?

  Anchorman, The Legend of Ron Burgundy, Dirty Dancing, Alias, X-Files, Pluto TV is completely free.

• 28:49Speaker 01

  Ooh.

• 28:49Conan O'Brien?

  These streamers, all these things cost so much money these days, and I won't mention that when I do an ad for them, but...

• 28:56Conan O'Brien?

  No subscription, no fees, zero dollars. And as any mathematician will tell you, zero is one of the most profound numbers ever conceived. I was thinking about that this morning.

• 29:04Speaker 01

  Wow, that's profound.

• 29:05Conan O'Brien?

  I really wasn't. The best thing on TV are free. Escape to Pluto TV. Stream now, pay never.

• 29:17Conan O'Brien?

  Going back to your origin story, your dad was a preacher and very charismatic, performing preacher. And you're looking up, admiring this guy. And you talk in your book about how it meant the world to you to try and please him and that you're still trying to do that to this day. You go through, and I know what you're talking about because my parents are very loving. I wanted attention from them. I wanted to make them laugh. And that is kind of the chemistry behind everything you do. And here I am, all these years later, and they're gone. But I do think there's still part of me that's trying to win them over. And so there's so many things in your book where I go like, oh, my God, I understand.

• 30:01Conan O'Brien?

  My dad's a microbiologist. He's not a preacher. But it's the same thing.

• 30:05Speaker 02

  Did he want you in the family business?

• 30:07Conan O'Brien?

  He, I kind of think he wanted all of us to get into, one of us to be a doctor. And then he quickly saw, these idiots. I don't want them operating on me. So he was happy that I got into comedy.

• 30:19Speaker 02

  My dad wanted me to be a preacher so bad, Conan, that he would bring me, holding my hand, into the pulpit on a Sunday morning and sit me down next to his guest pastor or assistant pastor. And so my life was watching the congregation and watching my dad from the back. As a matter of fact, in Coming to America, when I told John Landis about my background, John Landis, the director of Coming to America, he created these shots. When the preacher's onstage at the Black Awareness Pageant, he created these shots that were really me describing to him my experience watching people. Yes, Lord, that's what I saw. I saw that lady. I saw my dad from the back.

• 31:01Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah. Well, you know, I was, again, we're jumping around, but I love this because I have it in my notes, like Coming to America was like-

• 31:08Speaker 02

  This is how my stand-up is.

• 31:09Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah, I know.

• 31:10Speaker 02

  It's just like Miles Davis on some kind of Fentanyl or something.

• 31:13Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah.

• 31:14Speaker 02

  You know, it's like-

• 31:15Conan O'Brien?

  But this I like.

• 31:21Speaker 02

  Sound of it! Yeah.

• 31:25Conan O'Brien?

  He leaves the stage and then he leans back in.

• 31:30Speaker 02

  I'm sorry.

• 31:30Conan O'Brien?

  But no, but this is, this is, this is how it's gonna be, because this is the best way. But I have Coming to America like 75 exclamation points because, yeah, Eddie's great in that film. You are so good in that movie. That is such a great performance. And I remember when you were the preacher, and I didn't know that your dad was a preacher. And then I read in the, in your book, that of course you could play that part, but I think you channeled your dad.

• 31:56Speaker 02

  And my, my mother was a male barber, so I was able to, uh, channel her in the barber shop.

• 32:02Conan O'Brien?

  I mean, and, and I also didn't know that you made Coming to America while you're waiting to kind of hear about whether or not you're gonna get your own show.

• 32:10Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 32:10Conan O'Brien?

  And there's this downtime, and that's when you and Eddie, who were friends at the time, and he brought you in. And then suddenly you're making this movie together. That's some project before you start your big show.

• 32:22Speaker 02

  Yeah. And they turned Coming to America down. We, we went and pitched it at Paramount, and they said, no, thank you. And we were like, give us some notes. What, what should we do? And they were like, we're not sure, but you know, it's a fish out of water. We've seen this a billion times. And Coming to America at that time didn't have the barber shop. It didn't have the preacher. It didn't have Eddie as the old Jewish man.

• 32:44Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah.

• 32:44Speaker 02

  It was a guy named Ned Tannen, I believe, who was running Paramount, who eventually gave us notes. And he said, everybody wants to see Eddie do characters again. Everybody misses SNL.

• 32:56Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah.

• 32:56Speaker 02

  How about if the people you meet in America are played by Eddie? And I was sitting there saying, uh, could I get y'all a drink?

• 33:08Speaker 02

  And, uh, and it's Eddie that said, hey, I saw Arsenio do stand-up on this HBO thing. And, uh, he does this thing about Jesse Jackson. I know he can do a great preaching. And we can come up with some barbers. And Eddie came up with, with, uh, the specific characters. And I just, uh, sat there shaking, because I'm like, I gotta do characters with Eddie Murphy. That's like saying, you know, uh, check Jordan.

• 33:35Speaker 02

  You know.

• 33:35Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah.

• 33:36Speaker 02

  Lock that motherfucker down.

• 33:40Speaker 02

  Whoa. So, so I was a nervous wreck.

• 33:44Conan O'Brien?

  Sure.

• 33:45Speaker 02

  Going into coming to America.

• 33:46Conan O'Brien?

  But you know what? It's, you're great. You're great in it.

• 33:48Speaker 02

  Thank you, thank you.

• 33:49Conan O'Brien?

  It really holds up. And, um, this I need to explain to people because I don't know if people understand the trajectory because it's really fascinating. There's a whole part of your book I think people should read because it's really lovely about you as a kid. You take up magic. Um, we also have something else in common. I was a different kid, as you can imagine. And you're a, you were a different kid. We both had names no one had ever heard before.

• 34:15Speaker 02

  Yes, yes.

• 34:16Conan O'Brien?

  So you're Arsenio, I'm Conan. I don't know if you have the same thing, but my dad didn't even know about Conan the Barbarian. That wasn't a big thing when I was growing up. It wasn't like a known thing yet.

• 34:25Speaker 02

  Mm-hmm.

• 34:26Conan O'Brien?

  So people used to get really hung up on my name and I'm a strange kid with like a giant pompadour. And they're like, what is, what is this Conan guy? And I swear to God, sometimes if they give you a name like that, it makes you become something interesting. It's a, it's a weird theory, but you're a, you're a one-named celebrity even when you're a kid. You're Arsenio.

• 34:48Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 34:48Conan O'Brien?

  And people must have thought, what the hell is an Arsenio?

• 34:50Speaker 02

  And yes, yes, because Arsenio, no, there are no Arsenios.

• 34:55Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah.

• 34:55Speaker 02

  Anywhere, you know?

• 34:57Conan O'Brien?

  There never has been an Arsenio. We've done a national manhunt for an Arsenio.

• 35:01Speaker 02

  I did something like that, like a few years ago, and there are like 18 of them now worldwide. And a lot of them were born around when the talk show was on. But back in the day, you in Cleveland and you at the basketball court in the ghetto of Cleveland and people are picking up and it's like, uh, I got Leroy, uh, let me have no neck.

• 35:23Speaker 02

  Tyrone, you with us?

• 35:26Speaker 02

  Arsenio?

• 35:28Conan O'Brien?

  And you're, and you're there in a magician's hat.

• 35:30Speaker 02

  Yeah, yeah.

• 35:32Conan O'Brien?

  Arsenio's got in a magician's hat, yes. And you're like, "Well, look what I can do."

• 35:37Speaker 02

  I'm like this motherfucker with a cape dunking over his head.

• 35:42Conan O'Brien?

  And you, and, and people need to know, you were, you were really serious about, you were really serious about the magic, and you took the magic pretty far. You were good, and you were getting up on stage, and you were-

• 35:54Speaker 02

  Getting on TV shows.

• 35:55Conan O'Brien?

  Getting on TV shows as a magician. I mean, people don't know that. You were a, uh, the real deal magician.

• 36:02Speaker 02

  They flew me to, they flew me to New York the first time I ever left Cleveland. They flew me to New York to do a PBS show, and, uh, and I did my vanishing candelabra, which was, uh, something I'd never done on television.

• 36:15Conan O'Brien?

  It just, so you're, you're, you're that guy, and then at one point, someone sees you do your act, and you, of course, funny is in your bones, you were being funny in between-

• 36:25Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 36:26Conan O'Brien?

  The, the, the act, the, the tricks you were doing, or the illusions you were doing, and someone said, "More of that, the comedy."

• 36:33Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 36:34Conan O'Brien?

  "You should be doing the comedy."

• 36:35Speaker 02

  It kinda hurt my feelings, though. Cause, cause back then, my soul is, you know, I'd had dinner with Harry Blackstone Jr.

• 36:41Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah.

• 36:42Speaker 02

  You know, and my soul was that of a magician, and when this guy, Hank Morehouse, in Ypsilanti, Michigan, uh, says to me, "You should get rid of the magic," and, "Do you know what a stand-up comic is? You should be a stand-up comic," cause I would take tricks. Like, I had a trick where you tie two handkerchiefs together. We call them silks.

• 37:02Conan O'Brien?

  Mm-hmm.

• 37:02Speaker 02

  And, uh, and I put the handkerchiefs in your shirt, and then I'd take another silk, which, by the way, this became what Ali was doing in front of the playground.

• 37:13Conan O'Brien?

  When you saw him, you saw him, yeah.

• 37:15Speaker 02

  So, so I do this, this silk disappears, and it appears between the two that are put down here in your shirt. But what I would do is I would do the trick twice. The first time I'd get a, a lady from the audience, I'd put the two silks in her shirt, and when I first pull them out, her bra comes out in between.

• 37:36Speaker 02

  Two silks and I'm 10.

• 37:42Conan O'Brien?

  Tell me, you were cancelled at 10.

• 37:46Conan O'Brien?

  That's hard to do.

• 37:47Speaker 02

  And now you can't even, you can't even touch a lady's.

• 37:50Conan O'Brien?

  Oh, no.

• 37:52Speaker 02

  So, so this guy was saying, you're making adults laugh. And I, I remember, and then I do the trick again, and I, I make it happen correctly. The silk appears in the middle. And I remember Toni Lipford, a little girl who lived in my building. When I went to, uh, New York to do this and went to Colon, Michigan to do the convention. She would let me use this training bra. And it was important because my mother's bra and all my aunt's bras, they were like parachutes. They were huge.

• 38:22Speaker 02

  I, I had.

• 38:25Speaker 02

  My, my, my Aunt Mabel, she never had a bank account. My Aunt Mabel.

• 38:32Speaker 02

  She used to have $400 and a Kleenex.

• 38:37Conan O'Brien?

  You pulled a bra, $30,000 in quarters. Go flying.

• 38:42Speaker 02

  And two people died from suffocation.

• 38:46Speaker 02

  But Toni Lipford loaned me a little training bra because we were the same age. And it was one of those bras that almost has no cup.

• 38:52Conan O'Brien?

  Yep.

• 38:53Speaker 02

  You know, and that, that was easy to use and make that trick work.

• 38:57Conan O'Brien?

  So someone sees you, you start doing stand up. And, um, this is when your life takes a major change because you're doing stand up. You're getting really good.

• 39:06Speaker 02

  By the way, in Cleveland, uh, while I'm watching TV one night, uh, my grandmother's in Cleveland at the house I'm living in. I'm in Kent, at Kent State. I'm watching TV and I see a street, you know, how they interrupt the news? I see a street and it's on fire and these houses are burning. And one of them looks like a house at the corner of my grandmother's street. And I realize the whole neighborhood's going up. That's my grandmother's house. I jump in the car and I drive from Kent State to Cleveland. My house burns down that night and that's where all the magic equipment was. So, so I was forced to get funny and get more bras.

• 39:44Conan O'Brien?

  It's like, but it's like divine intervention again. It's like, okay, I'm gonna be a stand-up. And you start to get to the point where you could get potentially a booking on the show, Tonight Show with Johnny Carson, but there are bookers like, yeah, you're not a Johnny guy. You're not a Johnny guy, which, you know, is now sounds ridiculous and insane.

• 40:10Speaker 02

  But I get it. The show had a distinct personality. You know, you have a stationality. I wasn't surprised when I saw Deon Cole on your show. You have a stationality that's very specific to your brand of humor and your demographic and everything. And for me, I got that Bobby Kelton and August Hamilton, those were Johnny guys.

• 40:30Conan O'Brien?

  Those were the gatekeepers of Tonight Show.

• 40:32Speaker 02

  Yeah, and Johnny liked them. Tom Dreeson had done, you know, 4,000 Tonight Show appearances.

• 40:38Conan O'Brien?

  Right.

• 40:38Speaker 02

  And I waited for Joan to go on one Monday, and I knew I was probably more a Joan guy. And I got on the first time with Joan and then got to sit with Johnny when I Coming to America.

• 40:50Conan O'Brien?

  Coming to America. So to instruct everyone who doesn't know, this interesting thing happens. Joan Rivers is a frequent guest on Johnny Carson's Tonight Show. She gets offered her own show. She does it, causes a major feud with Carson because he does not like that. She's on Fox. She does a show, it implodes, it doesn't work, it comes apart. But you had gone on that show.

• 41:12Speaker 02

  Yeah, as a stand-up.

• 41:13Conan O'Brien?

  As a stand-up, you had been successful on that show. And then when Joan leaves, they need someone to kind of, this thing's still on.

• 41:20Speaker 02

  Yeah, they got 11 weeks with just a set. And Joan leaves, she's not coming back. I think Edgar, her husband, killed himself.

• 41:27Conan O'Brien?

  He did.

• 41:28Speaker 02

  Yeah. So that ship had sailed, and they went through a lot of guys letting them have the show for one night, from Wally Cox to Malcolm Jamal Warner to Suzanne Somers. Because I remember Suzanne Somers did very good. And in the end, they were choosing between me and Suzanne Somers.

• 41:47Conan O'Brien?

  Wow, that's so. So you come on, and then they more or less say, hey, Arsenio, Really good at this. Why don't you just, this show is ending, but why don't you take over till it ends? Now, here's the thing you don't know. That show ends, and there's kind of a feeling like, wow, that Arsenio guy did really well. He's gonna come back, okay? And here's the thing you don't know. There's a replacement show after Joan's show.

• 42:12Speaker 02

  Wilton North.

• 42:12Conan O'Brien?

  The Wilton North.

• 42:13Speaker 02

  I do know this now.

• 42:14Conan O'Brien?

  Okay, so the Wilton North report gets announced. This guy is gonna put on a show. There's no host for it yet. But they get some writers before they even have the host, which is kind of unheard of. And I get this call, and my writing partner and I go in and we get offered jobs to write. We need work. We haven't worked in a bit. So we say, sure, we'll do it. We don't know what this is. Who are the hosts? They say, we don't know yet. We're gonna find him. And so one of the first meetings we had, you were still, I think, finishing up your show. And we were just having an early introductory meeting. I leave and I heard there's, and I go, is there anything to eat around here? And they go, yeah, there's a snack room in there. I go into the snack room and I see you.

• 42:53Conan O'Brien?

  And you were at the refrigerator getting something. And I said, oh, I knew who you were. I'm like, that's, that's the guy who's been, you know, you weren't.

• 43:01Speaker 02

  Holding down the fort.

• 43:02Conan O'Brien?

  You were holding down the fort. And, and I was like, oh, hey. And you were so nice to me. You were like, oh, hey, how you, you were very gracious. And you were like, I am so, I am so glad this story goes like that.

• 43:12Speaker 02

  No, no. Excuse me, white meat.

• 43:16Conan O'Brien?

  Well, you did call me white meat, but you were very nice about it. You were like, you are really white meat. I'm like, well. Yeah. And then, um, no, but I remembered you being really nice and I went back to the room and I went, hi, hi. Cause I was, you know, super young and there's a guy who's been on TV for a couple of weeks. And I knew, I recognized you and that's like a big deal. So I was like, oh, I just saw the, you know, the guy, is it Arsenio? You were just new. So we, we work on that show. We're way behind the scenes. It implodes. It doesn't work out.

• 43:50Speaker 02

  Two DJs from Northwest, right?

• 43:53Conan O'Brien?

  San Diego.

• 43:54Speaker 02

  San Diego.

• 43:54Conan O'Brien?

  There were two DJs from San Diego and they, they hired them and it wasn't their fault. It was just a weird. You gotta start with the person. You gotta start with the person. You can't.

• 44:04Speaker 02

  For a talk show, uh, you all know, cause you work for Conan, but, but that guy is the engine. You can take a body of a car. We've seen this done. I saw. Jay Leno.

• 44:17Conan O'Brien?

  Don't apologize. You know, I saw it. That's your problem. That's not my problem.

• 44:23Speaker 02

  I know this guy who's a mechanic. And he put he put a helicopter engine in a truck.

• 44:31Conan O'Brien?

  Sure.

• 44:31Speaker 02

  And it ran different than a Chevy.

• 44:33Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 44:34Speaker 02

  The motor.

• 44:35Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah.

• 44:36Speaker 02

  Where the motor?

• 44:37Conan O'Brien?

  So this mechanic, he was like, he was like, "Yeah, yeah, I gotta take a helicopter engine. Put it in a Chevy, Chevy Chevette." "Why you doing that?" "You know, it just seems like it's gonna cost a lot of money and waste a lot of time, so I thought maybe I'd do it."

• 44:54Conan O'Brien?

  But anyway, whatever this guy's name is, he's having fun, that's the important thing.

• 44:59Speaker 02

  This is what I was afraid of. This is what I've been, oh my.

• 45:03Conan O'Brien?

  But, um, so, this is, this could be my favorite episode ever. Seriously, and I have this man to thank.

• 45:13Conan O'Brien?

  But, but, but you know, so I met you, then they decide, okay, uh, this, this Arsenio kid has something, and Paramount, you get the syndication deal, and your show starts, and here's the thing people have to remember, I remember this very well, your show started, I think, at the very beginning of 1989, like, early January.

• 45:36Speaker 02

  Yeah, I wanted to get away from the September

• 45:39Conan O'Brien?

  That's when they make every That's when they make everyone, that's when I had to go, September 13th, it's when a lot of shows start. You, you show up, it's like, second week of 1989, and it is a smash immediately. And here's the thing that's really interesting. You talk in your book about, um, your ratings were huge, I think you were second to Johnny that first week, but what, what you had is you had 35 and younger. Your demo was through the roof. And what's interesting is, that was good news for you then, but what you couldn't possibly know is today, to have a demo like that, that means you're on the air for the rest of your life. The demo is more important than how many people are watching you.

• 46:24Conan O'Brien?

  And I think you existed at a time.

• 46:26Speaker 02

  For advertising.

• 46:27Conan O'Brien?

  For advertising because, you know, now, I mean, for a chunk of my career, it's the demo that saved me. It wasn't that everyone in America wanted to see me, it's that young people who buy things wanted to see me. And that's what made a difference and saved me. I think that you were in a much more difficult time where you had a great demo. And then you're also expected to get everyone in the country watching you, which is complicated. Do you know what I mean? I mean, first of all, you were, I, I, I just think that that was a challenge you had that.

• 47:01Speaker 02

  It's impossible.

• 47:02Conan O'Brien?

  No show can pull off today. No show can do that.

• 47:05Speaker 02

  Yeah, you know, even, even when you deal with the world of comedy, I had an audience that was loving when I bring on a new guy like Chris Tucker.

• 47:13Conan O'Brien?

  Yep.

• 47:14Speaker 02

  But if you like Chris Tucker, you probably don't like Argus Hamilton, you know? It's a different thing.

• 47:22Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah.

• 47:23Speaker 02

  And for me to be a different show every night is very complicated.

• 47:27Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah.

• 47:27Speaker 02

  Um, it, it, it was tough to, to balance and, and they were telling me, especially around the time when Johnny was about to leave. They were telling me, if you do the right show, you can inherit the king's kingdom.

• 47:41Conan O'Brien?

  Right.

• 47:41Speaker 02

  They'll come here when Johnny leaves. Cause we don't even know what they're gonna do and who they're gonna replace him with. That was all a mystery. So they were really pressing me at that time, cause, cause like, like I would get a call from Michael Bivins of New Edition.

• 47:55Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah.

• 47:55Speaker 02

  And Michael Bivins would say, I just signed four guys out of Philly called Boys to Men. And I'm not finished with the album yet, but I, I would love to tell them that when we finish, they're coming on your show and it'll inspire them and everything. I said, even better than that, Mike, bring them next week. And I've always wanted to put The Temptations on, cause I used to tour with them.

• 48:14Conan O'Brien?

  That's right.

• 48:15Speaker 02

  They were my heroes.

• 48:16Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah.

• 48:16Speaker 02

  I wanna put Boys to Men and The Temptations all together. Like, I wanna have forty niggas doing choreography, you know? And, and, and so, so let's have The Temptations and Boys to Men. And it's a beautiful line of men performing the old, the new.

• 48:33Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah.

• 48:33Speaker 02

  Boys to Men's Idol, my idols and, and stuff like that. Paramount was like, you're not gonna get Johnny's audience doing this.

• 48:41Conan O'Brien?

  Right.

• 48:41Speaker 02

  You know, and, and so they wanted me to change my persona. I remember one time them saying, could you get rid of the earrings? You know, um, but that happened, and, and by the way, that's not a black thing. I've seen, uh, producers tell Howie Mandel to take off his earrings, you know, or, or make them smaller or whatever. That, that's just what they think the culture in America wants to see.

• 49:04Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah.

• 49:04Speaker 02

  And I would have like a nice jacket, but my jeans would be ripped, you know?

• 49:08Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah.

• 49:09Speaker 02

  And, uh, they were like, there's no reason to have your jeans ripped. You know, one time I, I carved Adidas stripes in the side of my head. Cause that was happening then, not for y'all, but, uh.

• 49:24Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah, David, what did you have carved into the side of your head?

• 49:28Conan O'Brien?

  The lyrics from Frozen?

• 49:30Speaker 03

  Just like, let it go, let it go.

• 49:32Conan O'Brien?

  Let it go around his head.

• 49:35Conan O'Brien?

  He was in a different culture.

• 49:37Speaker 03

  Than the Midwest.

• 49:39Speaker 02

  But you can imagine when you do something like that, they're like, yo.

• 49:44Conan O'Brien?

  But here's the thing, they're, they forget that this idea that you have to get everybody into the tent is incorrect. If you're, you wanna be ruthlessly yourself, which you understood, and it's been, always been my credo, you gotta do your thing, and if it doesn't work for you, or if it doesn't feel authentic, it's your job not to do it. But you, you were doing television at a time when you're at the forefront of a lot of this, you know? I mean, there are a lot of people who the first time they saw, I mean, a black person with their own show, and it's a late night show, which is, it's just unheard of. So you're the first person doing that, and the first is hard. You know what I mean?

• 50:28Conan O'Brien?

  It's, it's, and you must have so many people that have come up to you over the years and have said like, no, I grew up watching you, and I saw whatever, my values, what I liked reflected back at me, and that's massive.

• 50:40Speaker 02

  Yeah, I get enough love in the streets that I never have to work again, man. And, and you forget, you, you, you forget. Somebody reminded me in Vegas, I go to see Bruno Mars, and the dude backstage says, I remember when you put him on. And I forget things like that. Bruno Mars was like an embryo, you know? I mean.

• 51:02Conan O'Brien?

  He was born on your show. You delivered him.

• 51:06Speaker 02

  Oh, he was performing and slipped in some placenta.

• 51:14Conan O'Brien?

  But you know what? He made it look cool. He slid all the way across the stage.

• 51:18Speaker 02

  Yes, that's Bruno.

• 51:21Speaker 02

  But, but you know, his dad and the people around him were kind of secretive about his actual age. But I think he was like five, you know? And I still have people come up and say, dude. And, and the cool thing also is they're not always black. Sometimes it's a white dude who's a lawyer who says, "We used to stay in and watch you, then we'd go out on a Saturday night back east."

• 51:43Conan O'Brien?

  Well, here's the thing you knew. What I could tell is something authentic and new is happening here. And that has nothing to do with race. That has nothing to do with... This is just someone who knows what he wants to do and has a vision and is expressing himself and bringing all these different people in. And it wasn't just, I mean, you have people like Prince. You have all these incredible performers come on who weren't doing other, other shows. But Madonna is coming on. People that don't do these shows are showing up on your program. Robert De Niro, that was his first talk show.

• 52:21Speaker 02

  Yeah, I, I knew I could get him though, because I had a lot of black women on the staff.

• 52:29Speaker 02

  And I said, "If he's gonna do a show, it's gonna be this show." I got a lot of sisters named Tukey on the staff.

• 52:40Speaker 02

  And at the same time,

• 52:43Speaker 02

  at the same time while...

• 52:44Conan O'Brien?

  I love Tukey.

• 52:47Conan O'Brien?

  Hey, we got a, where's my Tukey? Where's Tukey?

• 52:51Speaker 02

  At the same time while this is going on and I'm experiencing this, this, this life, I'm leaving the lot, you know? And there are other people on the lot like Ted Danson doing Cheers or Mary Hart doing Entertainment Tonight. I leave the lot one night and the guards ask if they can search my car because some instruments from my... Show, stage 29, The Posse, The Band. Some instruments have been stolen. And we're supposed to search all the cars leaving the lot tonight. And of course, that's when I become black. You know, that's when I get too black. Because.

• 53:26Conan O'Brien?

  You're the host.

• 53:28Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 53:28Conan O'Brien?

  Of the most successful show.

• 53:31Speaker 02

  Right.

• 53:31Conan O'Brien?

  And.

• 53:32Speaker 02

  And, and, and don't get me wrong. I'm sure Mike Douglas steals, you know. Uh, from time to time when he was here on earth. But, uh, but it was just, it was, sometimes you're going through stuff. And that's the straw that broke the camel's back in, in a moment. And I did things that I should not have done. But I was like, you're not searching my motherfucking car. Did you search Ted Danson's car? You're not searching my fucking car. Um, I'm a part owner in my show. And the instruments that were stolen, that's money out of my pocket, motherfucker. I don't steal my own shit. And they give me that shit free. If you want a E3 or a clavinet. Uh, you know how many bass guitars I have at home?

• 54:15Speaker 02

  Fender's just, we're sending you another jazz and a precision in the main, you know? So i- it was just absurd. And, uh, me and this guy that I was rolling with, we break the gate. You know, the gate that goes up and down. We broke that motherfucker off. That, those, those are not very strong, those gates. They need.

• 54:34Conan O'Brien?

  I think everyone's on your side on this gate breaking thing.

• 54:37Speaker 02

  But, but yeah, so, so I, I got in a lot of trouble for, uh, the, the problems at the gate that night. But, but I was just.

• 54:45Conan O'Brien?

  You got it. That's insane.

• 54:47Speaker 02

  Yeah, you know, but Lucy Solhany called me the next day and she's like, come over and let's talk about what happened at the gate last night. But, uh, I, I was, I was pissed and I didn't handle it right. And if a young comic asked me for advice, I'd say, you know, don't get into it with the guards and don't break the gate off. If they say you can't leave, you know, but I was like, you gonna hold me? You're not, it's not gonna happen. You're not searching my car and you're not keeping me here.

• 55:12Conan O'Brien?

  I thought it was amazing doing your show and the LA riots start. And I lived in LA then and it was, uh, that was, I think I was working on The Simpsons when the LA riot, I was, we're working on The Simpsons and we're on the second floor working on The Simpsons. And we can tell things are, it's, you know, the air.

• 55:33Speaker 02

  Where was the office?

• 55:34Conan O'Brien?

  Uh, we were on the Fox lot.

• 55:36Speaker 02

  Cause you could look, you could go on the roof of some of those buildings and see smoke from south central.

• 55:41Conan O'Brien?

  That's what happened is we started to hear, we heard about the verdict. We hear that, that there's violence breaking out. And of course, whoever's running the show at the time was like, well, we gotta get this, you know, what does Marge say next? We don't know what Marge says next. And some of us are thinking, um, can we just go check the TV? Hold on, let's just, does Homer speak here? I think it should be Marge's line. And then someone went out to get like a cup of water or something and was standing on the balcony and saw just all this smoke.

• 56:10Speaker 02

  Yeah. Now, no, at some point, we're all watching TV and we see Reginald Denny dragged out of a concrete truck.

• 56:17Conan O'Brien?

  He's, he's dragged out of a truck and hit over the head.

• 56:20Speaker 02

  Cinder blocks.

• 56:20Conan O'Brien?

  Cinder blocks, yeah. And it was, you know, it, it, uh, so I jumped in my car at Simpsons and I drive back to my apartment because the, the guy said, let's, let's figure out that Marge line later. Everybody go home. And so it was a very strange, upsetting, obviously, uh, time. And you were advised, well, you can't do your show. And you said, I'm doing my show. And you had very strong reasons for why you thought it's important for me to do my show right now, which were?

• 56:53Speaker 02

  But, but yet, by the way, as, as an EP, I understood where they were coming from. They were talking about insurance. They were talking about somebody getting hurt.

• 57:00Conan O'Brien?

  Yep.

• 57:01Speaker 02

  Um, you know, I got what they were saying, but I also got that this ain't the time to shut up and dribble.

• 57:08Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah.

• 57:09Speaker 02

  You know, this is a time for an entertainer to use his vehicle in some way. I understood that at that point, I thought maybe this is the night I book somebody like Farrakhan. I I gotta book somebody that can reach the brothers out in the street. Because I think we're about to tear up our own neighborhoods.

• 57:29Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah.

• 57:29Speaker 02

  And obviously, everybody thought that would distract from what I'm trying to do and what's going on. And it would be bigger than the riots. And I said, oh, yeah, yeah, no, I get that. And so we got Tom Bradley, Sean Penn popped by, Sinbad, everybody. And then I invited like 200 members of First AM, me, my church. So I put my church, they signed waivers, and everybody sat in the audience and we did the show that night.

• 57:56Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah.

• 57:56Speaker 02

  Which a billion things are going through my mind, because I also remember Tom Bradley. Sean Penn brought a guy with him and Paramount sent a lawyer out to say, the guy with Sean Penn, we can't talk to him, so don't go over there. And to this day, I I said, OK, OK, I had so much on my mind. To this day, I wonder who that guy was. And it's also interesting because from Ice Cube to Minister Farrakhan, I look now at what you guys are going through and being told what to do, what not to do, who to book with Colbert and who not to book.

• 58:30Conan O'Brien?

  Right, right.

• 58:30Speaker 02

  And Trump wasn't in my mix. But it's funny, because I never thought to publicly talk about me being censored.

• 58:38Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah.

• 58:38Speaker 02

  Or publicly talk about them not letting me have someone that I want to have because politically that person is wrong or whatever. I I also remember when I booked Bill Clinton, I grew up thinking that you always bring the other side. And I thought that was a law, but I guess it's changed or it's vacillated a little bit these days. But I remember putting an offer out to Mr. Bush.

• 59:02Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah.

• 59:03Speaker 02

  You know, because I wanted both of them.

• 59:04Conan O'Brien?

  But he can't play saxophone.

• 59:05Speaker 02

  He can't play saxophone.

• 59:06Conan O'Brien?

  I mean, talk about another thing, that's in history books. Bill Clinton with the with the Ray Bans playing saxophone.

• 59:12Speaker 02

  My Ray Bans and my tie.

• 59:14Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah. On your show, that hadn't happened, you know, I mean, all these things were happening that were resonating, you know, throughout the country. I mean, that's a moment that's gonna endure. And the thing I'm thinking about is your instinct about have the other side. I think you had this idea of let's open up the house, invite everybody in, and see what happens. And if you lead with goodwill, and that's the, because you were always about goodwill. If we lead with goodwill and we get everyone together in a room, I don't have to agree with everybody, but this is gonna be interesting. And to me, that's, that's a nice sentiment. And sometimes now, people get so locked into being angry about everything, that we're not inviting the other people in.

• 59:58Speaker 02

  Yeah, I remember having the first openly gay stand-up comic on, a young lady named Lea Delarua, who went on to do Orange is the New Black.

• 1:00:06Conan O'Brien?

  She's great. She's terrific.

• 1:00:07Speaker 02

  She walked out, she's, "I'm a big dyke!" You know, and I'm like, "Whoa, I had no paramount would be over later after the show to talk to me."

• 1:00:16Conan O'Brien?

  They're no longer worried about the gay.

• 1:00:17Speaker 02

  Yeah, yeah.

• 1:00:18Conan O'Brien?

  Forget the gay. What the hell was that?

• 1:00:22Speaker 02

  Yeah, it was, so it was, it was tough. It was a tough time because they didn't want any of that. They wanted me to just cool out, dude, and wait for Johnny to leave.

• 1:00:32Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah.

• 1:00:40Conan O'Brien?

  You know, winning an award, that's a big achievement, right?

• 1:00:42Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:00:43Conan O'Brien?

  Every now and then, in life, maybe something nice like that comes your way. Winning them consistently is almost impossible. It just doesn't happen, you know? Well, guess what? Winning five times in six years? You know what that sounds like to me? Sustained excellence.

• 1:00:57Speaker 01

  Nice.

• 1:00:58Conan O'Brien?

  Hyundai has done just that, earning the title of America's best SUV brand for 2026 from US News and World Report. You are a very happy Hyundai driver.

• 1:01:06Speaker 01

  I drive a Hyundai Palisade, and I love my car. I love it. I love driving it around.

• 1:01:11Conan O'Brien?

  I've been tooling around in an Ioniq 5N, which I love. Beautiful car. Well, listen, whether you need an SUV for everyday life, your next big adventure, or extra room for family and friends, Hyundai has an option for you. The Tucson Hybrid is loaded with technology and built for everyday life. The Santa Fe Hybrid's fully capable and ready for adventure. The Palisade, that's yours, right?

• 1:01:30Speaker 01

  Hello!

• 1:01:31Conan O'Brien?

  They're gonna rename that the Sona. The Palisade Hybrid, yeah, delivers premium capability and class-leading interior space with available, I have this memorized, H-Track all-wheel drive, up to an EPA estimated 619 miles of range on vehicles like the Palisade Hybrid and Hyundai's industry-leading warranty. It's easy to see why Hyundai continues to deliver the quality, innovation, technology, and value drivers expect from an award-winning brand. View U.S. News Best Cars at cars.usnews.com and call 562-314-4603 for complete details. Who do you shop for first on the holidays, Sona? Was it, do you shop for the kids or do you shop for Tac?

• 1:02:08Speaker 01

  My kids.

• 1:02:09Conan O'Brien?

  Okay.

• 1:02:09Speaker 01

  Or Oki.

• 1:02:10Conan O'Brien?

  You gotta get them their stuff.

• 1:02:10Speaker 01

  Or my dog.

• 1:02:11Conan O'Brien?

  And then your husband is last. Well, guess what? It's that time of year. You feel that, you smell that, that cinnamon cider in the air? Do you smell that?

• 1:02:21Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:02:21Conan O'Brien?

  And you see pumpkins around, people buying turkeys. Little early to buy a turkey.

• 1:02:26Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:02:26Conan O'Brien?

  Doesn't matter. Holidays, I would say it's just around the corner, but that's a cliche. It's very nearby in the cupboard. Well, guess what? Amazon delivers joy with low prices on the gifts you want, even this early in the season. So get ahead of the season. Shop early gifts, top picks, holiday decor, and advent calendars at low prices. Get a head start on holiday gifting with Amazon's low prices. Shop now at amazon.com/holidays. Sona, you have to admit, the holidays, it's really about hanging with the people you love.

• 1:03:04Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:03:04Conan O'Brien?

  And getting to be yourself. Not going to some stuffy holiday party where you need to conform to what the man wants you to think about the holidays.

• 1:03:13Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:03:13Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah, it's about being yourself. Turn your holiday time into Miller time by enjoying a Miller Lite in a place where you're free to enjoy yourself on a walk with a cousin. With a cousin? Why are they getting all specific about?

• 1:03:24Speaker 01

  Because it's family.

• 1:03:25Conan O'Brien?

  But what about a niece or a nephew?

• 1:03:27Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:03:28Conan O'Brien?

  Um, like a walk with an ex-wife? Uh, I don't know. I mean, they're just throwing, that's a weird, they just made a very specific choice.

• 1:03:36Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:03:36Conan O'Brien?

  Now's the time for those unexpected holiday side guests and enjoy a great tasting light beer. 'Tis Miller time, as Dickens wrote. Miller Lite is brewed for taste, the taste you can depend on. The original light beer since 1975 and still iconic more than 50 years later. I like to be with my bros, my chums, my posse. Crack open a Miller Lite, take a swig, a sip, look around and see my friends. We've known each other forever and we're just hanging out.

• 1:04:03Speaker 01

  Yeah, you guys are just doing chest bumps and high fiving.

• 1:04:06Conan O'Brien?

  Miller Lite is great taste done right. Go to millerlite.com/conan to find delivery options near you, or you can pick up some Miller Lite pretty much anywhere they sell beer. Tis Miller time. Celebrate responsibly, Miller Brewing Company, Milwaukee, Wisconsin. 96 calories and 3.2 carbs per 12 ounces.

• 1:04:28Conan O'Brien?

  Now, one of the things that I didn't know is that you decide, you do this for six years, which is a real stretch. These are hard shows and you're doing it, as I said, you're, you're carrying a heavier backpack than, um, certainly than myself and, and other hosts. Or a, a different backpack. Cause I, I don't, I, I also don't like to put myself in a position where, oh, it's tougher for me. Everybody has some burden to bear. That's fair. I'll give you that. That's fair. But I, reading your story and, and seeing what it is that you were dealing with, um, I have crazy respect. I'll put it that way.

• 1:05:09Conan O'Brien?

  Crazy respect for what you did and that you always kept it, like I say, the emphasis on goodwill and let's try it. You know, that spirit of let's get boys to men and the temptations and see what happens. That's a beautiful thing. What I didn't know is that you start to burn out. You're like, I think I've got to stop doing this. I've got to stop doing this. I, I need to put this down. And you go to Paramount and you write them a letter and you say, I'm going to leave. And they, they say, okay, well, don't say anything about it yet. And they sit on the letter and they don't, they tell you, you can't tell anybody. Right. So you keep doing your job, but you have every intention of leaving. And then they announce that they're ending it, which is.

• 1:05:54Conan O'Brien?

  I don't have another word. It's just a shitty thing to do.

• 1:05:58Speaker 02

  Yeah, I, I, I don't think they realize how important truth is in the long run. You know, in that moment, it's like, ha, we beat you. But they don't realize I'm a human being. I'm a person with a legacy. And I want to inspire people to know, not just black kids, but to know, dream and you can win. And I want my story to reflect the truth of what that journey was like and what that ending was like. I've seen two books. My, my son is involved with a bookstore in Lamert Park. And, uh, you know, I raised him right. He could have done it in Beverly Hills, but he's doing it in Lamert Park. Doing a lot of business over there. And one day he shows me two books that are about me. And it's one of the times when I said, I gotta write a book. I just didn't know how to go about it.

• 1:06:43Speaker 02

  Because I realized, I don't even know these books exist or who these authors are. Uh, we tried to search one of the authors and it's not even a real name. It was written under an alias. And I'm like, she didn't even want me to know she was telling this stuff about me, you know? Uh, so I, I really wanted to leave a book on this earth that I wrote about me.

• 1:07:03Conan O'Brien?

  And it's also, it's really important for people to know that you were like, this now needs to end. And I want to end it and go out on, on my note and then.

• 1:07:13Speaker 02

  And I put the letter in the book.

• 1:07:14Conan O'Brien?

  Oh, it's there.

• 1:07:15Speaker 02

  Yeah, it's, it's, and it's, remember when you used to fax things? And it was on that kind of paper that like a, like a cocaine dollar bill rolls back up after.

• 1:07:23Conan O'Brien?

  Remember that paper? Do I know? Do I know?

• 1:07:28Speaker 02

  It was that kind of, that old horrible paper and it doesn't last well.

• 1:07:34Conan O'Brien?

  And that, that creates a misconception that, oh, um, because, you know, uh, um, you, you know, very publicly disagreed with a lot of the things that Farrakhan was saying and rightfully so. But you wanted to confront him about those things and talk about it. And of course that got everybody freaked out. And so there was this perception that Paramount was saying, because you talked to Farrakhan.

• 1:08:02Speaker 02

  Right.

• 1:08:02Conan O'Brien?

  Your show has to go. You had sent them a letter long before saying, I'm ending this show.

• 1:08:08Speaker 02

  Yeah, and they told me, they said, let's get together with a publicist. Let's decide the way to position this and how to send out. Back then, we would send out a press release, you know.

• 1:08:17Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah.

• 1:08:18Speaker 02

  Now you.

• 1:08:19Conan O'Brien?

  Tweet.

• 1:08:19Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:08:20Conan O'Brien?

  Send a tweet.

• 1:08:20Speaker 02

  You do Snapchat, so they don't have it next month, you know.

• 1:08:25Speaker 02

  I didn't quit. What the fuck y'all talking about?

• 1:08:28Conan O'Brien?

  Show me.

• 1:08:28Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:08:28Conan O'Brien?

  Show me where I quit.

• 1:08:30Speaker 02

  I want receipts.

• 1:08:34Speaker 02

  But they kind of fucked me up. It was like a relationship that.

• 1:08:39Conan O'Brien?

  That's how these things tend to end, I have to tell you, these.

• 1:08:42Speaker 02

  Really?

• 1:08:42Conan O'Brien?

  These talk shows.

• 1:08:43Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:08:44Conan O'Brien?

  They tend to end that way.

• 1:08:45Speaker 02

  You've kind of been through yours with the network.

• 1:08:47Conan O'Brien?

  You go through this stuff, but and then.

• 1:08:49Speaker 02

  And they have more power and more ink than us, so they're always.

• 1:08:51Conan O'Brien?

  But then you realize that, you know, I think like you, I've always tried to take the attitude. I was, I was really lucky, just very lucky person that easily could not have come my way. And I think I'm a hard worker and I think I have some ability, but.

• 1:09:08Speaker 02

  Mostly it's a lot of luck and. And people need to hear that.

• 1:09:12Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah, and I.

• 1:09:12Speaker 02

  It's not just talent.

• 1:09:14Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah.

• 1:09:14Speaker 02

  I saw Prince get booed when he first hit. I think he was opening for the Rolling Stones. Nobody had more talent than Prince, but it's luck and timing that goes with that talent. I know a lot of talented people, funny people, great musicians that are struggling.

• 1:09:31Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah, and, and trust me, I have made it a life's mission to say, you can maximize your chance of getting luck by working really hard and by being a pleasant person to work with. But this book also makes it clear that you were, you were working so hard and you had all these different arcs before we got to know you. And I mean, I didn't know anything about the magician stuff. It maybe wanted to cancel this book.

• 1:10:01Conan O'Brien?

  You know what I love too that's in the book? The time that you're outside a comedy club and it's, you don't know Eddie Murphy that long. You guys are just, and you're like hanging out by a parking meter outside the comedy club.

• 1:10:10Speaker 02

  Hadn't met him at all.

• 1:10:11Conan O'Brien?

  Hadn't met him at all.

• 1:10:12Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:10:12Conan O'Brien?

  And...

• 1:10:14Speaker 02

  And Keenan Wayans, Keenan Wayans is gonna introduce us.

• 1:10:18Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah. And you're chatting with him and you confess to him that you were, spent a lot of your career as a magician. And then he confesses to you...

• 1:10:27Speaker 02

  That he was a ventriloquist.

• 1:10:32Speaker 02

  And here's another crazy part. I talk about this in the book. There's a night, and you'll relate to this, this is just for me and you right here. You ever ask the guest that question and they've decided that what their pre-interview had in it, or whatever their publicist told you, they don't want to talk about that?

• 1:10:50Conan O'Brien?

  Yep, yep.

• 1:10:51Speaker 02

  So, I say to my friend, uh, cause I know this is a great area.

• 1:10:56Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 1:10:57Speaker 02

  And I know that he, you know, at home, I know we've smoked a joint at some point, and he's done, "Send your wincers."

• 1:11:04Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah, yeah.

• 1:11:04Speaker 02

  You know, I know I've seen this shit.

• 1:11:07Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah, sure he has.

• 1:11:07Speaker 02

  Right? Yeah, and that shit is funny.

• 1:11:10Conan O'Brien?

  And this guy could afford a dummy.

• 1:11:13Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:11:13Conan O'Brien?

  But instead...

• 1:11:14Speaker 02

  Instead, lipstick right here. You know, and, uh, and, and so, so I say to him, and I know I can, I can lay back, cause this is gonna be two minutes. And I say, "So, you were a ventriloquist?" And that motherfucker says, "No."

• 1:11:35Conan O'Brien?

  Yes.

• 1:11:36Speaker 02

  And moves on, "But you were a magician?" "Uh, yeah, yeah." And we go from there. And I couldn't believe he bagged me like that, but he didn't want to do that shit.

• 1:11:46Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah, yeah.

• 1:11:47Speaker 02

  You know, he didn't want to talk about me. But recently, I've kind of been exonerated from the House of Lies, because, uh, because he did a documentary recently.

• 1:11:58Conan O'Brien?

  Yes, that's right.

• 1:11:59Speaker 02

  Yeah, and in the documentary, motherfucker decides to tell the truth. You know?

• 1:12:04Conan O'Brien?

  But Bear Law on TV, in that moment, he left you hanging.

• 1:12:08Speaker 02

  Oh, man. And I, you, you have no idea, I, I didn't feel exonerated until recently, when he's on his little, uh, uh, documentary.

• 1:12:17Conan O'Brien?

  Yep.

• 1:12:17Speaker 02

  And he's got a Richard Pryor and a Bill Cosby ventriloquist dummy. And he's like, "This is the one, you can't fucking..."

• 1:12:26Speaker 02

  I don't know why this motherfucker put people to sleep like that. And he's doing this, and I'm like, yes, yes, I told you, motherfucker. He was a ventriloquist, lying bastard, you know?

• 1:12:38Conan O'Brien?

  That's when you're yelling at your TV at 3:00 in the morning.

• 1:12:42Speaker 02

  Yes, yes.

• 1:12:42Conan O'Brien?

  They have to take you away.

• 1:12:44Speaker 02

  Oh, yes, yeah. My wallow puts me in another room. Let me go, let me go.

• 1:12:52Conan O'Brien?

  What's a better episode than this episode?

• 1:12:54Speaker 01

  I know, this is fun.

• 1:12:55Speaker 02

  No, you've had some, you've had some fun stuff.

• 1:12:57Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah, yeah, guess what? I don't know, I don't know. This was, um, this is just insane. We gotta, I mean, we gotta do a part two sometime. We really do.

• 1:13:07Speaker 02

  Yes, how long have we been in here?

• 1:13:09Conan O'Brien?

  Hour and five minutes. Hour and five minutes. This is much more than we do.

• 1:13:14Speaker 02

  I wish my stand-up would go like that.

• 1:13:15Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah, but you know what? Uh, we gotta, we just gotta do a part two sometime. I just want to make sure, you gotta get this book, uh, Arsenio, A Memoir, because it's beautiful, it's really funny. It's an incredible story.

• 1:13:28Speaker 02

  And even if they don't read, get the book.

• 1:13:30Conan O'Brien?

  Get the book, cause you can, you can, if you've got a table that's uneven in your home.

• 1:13:35Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 1:13:36Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah, or the microwave, you want it to sit on something sturdy.

• 1:13:40Speaker 02

  Or I, I, I hate to quote other comics, because sometimes that can be perceived as stealing. But, um, I love Chris Rock's take on books. You know, it's like, hide your money, cause that's the last place a nigga gonna look, you know?

• 1:13:56Speaker 02

  So get the book and put something in it to hide.

• 1:14:02Conan O'Brien?

  It is, uh, I was so excited today for you to, uh, come in, and I'll tell you this too. I have so many friends, so many writers of mine, people I know who are stand-ups. They've worked with you, they've bumped into you. Universally, everybody says you are an unfailingly nice person. You're a really good person, and that means the world to me, too.

• 1:14:25Speaker 02

  Except that guard at Paramount.

• 1:14:26Conan O'Brien?

  Oh, come on. I think I'm on your side on that one.

• 1:14:30Speaker 02

  I, I try to, I try to treat people the way God would want me to treat people, and I know that sounds corny. But also.

• 1:14:36Conan O'Brien?

  It doesn't.

• 1:14:37Speaker 02

  Okay, you know, I, but that's where I'm from. That's who I am. And I try. I've fallen short in my life many times. But when I came up, nobody says good things about Cosby anymore. But I remember a time when you could pop by Cosby's dressing room in Atlantic City or in Vegas, and I've had Jerry Seinfeld agree with this. He would sit and talk to you for four hours, give you advice. We'd have conversations. Uh, Richard Pryor, I remember one time I opened for Chaka Khan at the Universal Amphitheater. And I was so proud to tell Richard, I got a gig, you know, and we're at the Comedy Store, Richard's working on his special. And he says, I'd like to come to that. And I say, really? I can leave your tickets? And I leave him and his guy, Rashawn, his body man,

• 1:15:21Speaker 02

  uh, two tickets. And Richard comes early and watches me. And then when Chaka comes on stage, once you get started, uh, uh, uh, Richard gets up and comes in back. And I know he loved Chaka Khan on a couple levels. You know, not just music, but, uh.

• 1:15:38Conan O'Brien?

  He's a Renaissance man.

• 1:15:39Speaker 02

  He's a Renaissance man. He, and a Coxman. And, uh,

• 1:15:44Speaker 02

  and he loved him some Chaka, but he came backstage to, to tell me, you did a great job. That was wonderful. And that's the greatest moment of my life.

• 1:15:53Conan O'Brien?

  Sure.

• 1:15:53Speaker 02

  That Richard took the time to come to the amphitheater and then got up and came backstage after the opening act, left the stage. Uh, so I try to treat young comics and young entertainers that I meet the way the legends taught me. The way the legends treated me. I remember having Quincy Jones come to watch me at the Roxy. The next day he calls me, has me come to the studio, and I sit with him while he masters something called Off the Wall.

• 1:16:19Conan O'Brien?

  Oh, wow.

• 1:16:20Speaker 02

  That we didn't even know. And, and he's going, he's like, listen to this. This is Sheila E. hidden, uh, different, uh, soda bottles with different levels of water in it, and it makes different noise. And it's

• 1:16:33Speaker 02

  and he just plays that part. And I think it was the beginning to, don't stop till you get in. But, but sitting there and he said, yeah, man, Michael coming back, man. He coming back hard. You know, and then he played a song. He says, you're from Ohio, right? This is the first time I've ever met him. You're from Ohio, right? And I'm like, yeah, John Levy told me you're from Ohio. Let me, let me play you something else. He plays a song called Fi- Find One Hundred Ways. And he says, this is just a scratch track by a guy who's letting me hear how it can sound. And I said, what's his name? He said, his name is James Ingram. He's from Ohio. He's from where you from. And I'm saying, let him sing it, you know? And he says, yeah, yeah, this is my first day with the demo. And, and he puts on his album, Find 100 Ways

• 1:17:14Speaker 02

  and Just Once, and allows the guy on the scratch track, the demo, James Ingram to sing it. And James becomes a huge star. Those kind of moments are incredible blessings. And all I can do, in fairness, is try to return them every time I get the opportunity with a young man or young woman.

• 1:17:31Conan O'Brien?

  I always hear you do that, you do that relentlessly and with great kindness. And Arsenio, we're gonna have to do a part two at some point because you have, there's so much more to talk about. There really is. You've got so many great stories.

• 1:17:46Speaker 02

  Like they say in our business, we get off script.

• 1:17:49Conan O'Brien?

  This was not a script. This was me loving the book and then talking to you about it. And being really excited that you're here and fanboying a lot. So that's me being me.

• 1:17:59Speaker 02

  I'm a fan. You remember I came up to you.

• 1:18:01Conan O'Brien?

  Were you outside the Four Seasons Hotel?

• 1:18:03Speaker 02

  Yes, I was waiting.

• 1:18:04Conan O'Brien?

  And you came up to me and I was like, Arsenio walked up to me. Was so nice to me. I'm always that way.

• 1:18:10Speaker 02

  You're above the crowd, wherever you are, you know? There's a lot of little guys with uniforms running around. I'm like, look at Conan above all the uniforms. How are you? I didn't realize you were that tall.

• 1:18:22Conan O'Brien?

  No one does. I have the personality of a very small man.

• 1:18:25Speaker 02

  Yeah, but in the paint. Yeah.

• 1:18:28Conan O'Brien?

  Oh, yeah.

• 1:18:29Speaker 02

  Not paint?

• 1:18:31Conan O'Brien?

  Arsenio, please come back, okay? Because people are gonna love this episode and we gotta keep it going. Okay?

• 1:18:37Speaker 02

  Thanks for letting me come.

• 1:18:38Conan O'Brien?

  Are you kidding?

• 1:18:39Speaker 02

  Thank you. He looks like one of New Kids on the Block, you know?

• 1:18:44Conan O'Brien?

  It's worth it.

• 1:18:46Speaker 02

  Which one? Oh, there's a, there's a dude in New Kids on the Block who looks like you.

• 1:18:54Speaker 04

  My sister's loved New Kids on the Block.

• 1:18:57Speaker 02

  Yeah, you look like his son because he's, he's about 50. But uh.

• 1:19:01Conan O'Brien?

  I think he's 80.

• 1:19:02Speaker 02

  But you look like the son of one of New, one of Mark Wahlberg's guys. Anyway, but I hope we're off the air at this point.

• 1:19:13Speaker 05

  Conan O'Brien Needs a Friend with Conan O'Brien, Sona Movsesian and Matt Gourley. Produced by me, Matt Gourley. Executive produced by Adam Sachs, Jeff Ross and Nick Liao. Theme song by The White Stripes. Incidental music by Jimmy Vivino. Take it away, Jimmy.

• 1:19:34Speaker 05

  Our supervising producer is Erin Blair and our associate talent producer is Jennifer Samples. Engineering and mixing by Eduardo Perez and Brendan Burns. Additional production support by Mars Melnick. Talent booking by Paula Davis, Gina Batista and Britt Kahn. You can rate and review this show on Apple Podcasts and you might find your review read on a future episode. Got a question for Conan? Call the Team Coco hotline at 669-587-2847 and leave a message. It too could be featured on a future episode. You can also get three free months of SiriusXM when you sign up at siriusxm.com/conan. And if you haven't already, please subscribe to Conan O'Brien Needs a Friend wherever fine podcasts are downloaded.

• 1:20:23Conan O'Brien?

  Technology can generate salary recommendations in seconds, but building an offer that lands skilled talent, that takes more than just an estimate you came up with.

• 1:20:32Speaker 01

  Yeah, you're right.

• 1:20:33Conan O'Brien?

  That's where Robert Half's new 2027 Salary Guide can help.

• 1:20:37Speaker 01

  That's good.

• 1:20:37Conan O'Brien?

  Did we use a salary guide with you, Sona?

• 1:20:39Speaker 01

  Uh, no, but maybe-

• 1:20:40Conan O'Brien?

  For several years, I just gave you groceries, remember?

• 1:20:43Speaker 01

  I know, I remember that. That was not good.

• 1:20:45Conan O'Brien?

  Uh, well, anyway, now you've got Robert Half's new 2027 Salary Guide. As a staffing firm placing talent every day, Robert Half combines compensation data with the experience of local recruiters. You can hire with the confidence that comes from experience. The new Robert Half Salary Guide is here. Visit roberthalf.com/salaryguide.

• 1:21:07Conan O'Brien?

  When you hear Alka Seltzer, you probably think heartburn, right?

• 1:21:09Speaker 03

  Yep.

• 1:21:10Conan O'Brien?

  Well, did you know Alka Seltzer has a line of cold and flu medications known as Alka Seltzer Cold?

• 1:21:16Speaker 03

  Ooh.

• 1:21:17Conan O'Brien?

  Did you know that, David?

• 1:21:17Speaker 03

  No, but I feel like we need it.

• 1:21:19Conan O'Brien?

  Why didn't you know that, David?

• 1:21:20Speaker 03

  I know, you expect me to know everything.

• 1:21:22Conan O'Brien?

  I knew this.

• 1:21:23Speaker 03

  Did you?

• 1:21:23Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah, I've tried it, it's really good. And I like that fizzy, fizzy, fizzy when you drop the Alka Seltzer Cold into the water.

• 1:21:29Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 1:21:30Conan O'Brien?

  Alka Seltzer Cold: Fast Dissolves Tablets Are Designed to Deliver Cold and Flu Relief Fast. Just drop the two tablets in water and hear those bubbles bursting into action. Ready to work faster than pills. Bubbles faster than pills. Pills take time to dissolve, not bubbles. Next time a cold or flu strikes, quick! Alka Seltzer Cold: Nothing Works Faster for Cold and Flu Symptom Relief. Among Oral Products: Use as Directed.