Ben Stiller Returns

Actor and filmmaker Ben Stiller feels…hmmm…about being Conan O’Brien’s friend. Ben sits down with Conan once more to discuss the process of enlisting Tom Cruise for Tropic Thunder, producing a documentary about his parents Jerry Stiller and Anne Meara, and bringing the question of what he’d like to see on TV to the second season of Severance. Later, Conan responds to a voicemail regarding a burglar who was wearing his merch. 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?

  The holidays are supposed to be about making memories, not managing the mess that comes with them. Between winter weather, road trips, shopping and family gatherings, your vehicle can take a beating. Mine sure does.

• 0:13Speaker 01

  Same.

• 0:14Conan O'Brien?

  Especially when I'm back in the Northeast, driving around. I mean, I grew up with that.

• 0:18Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 0:18Conan O'Brien?

  Cars were red, the salt on the road, people throwing rocks at me.

• 0:22Speaker 01

  Whaaat?

• 0:23Conan O'Brien?

  That's not a weather thing. That's more of a me being, making people angry. Problem. WeatherTech helps protect your vehicle from snow, slush, salt and seasonal messes. They also make the best gifts for automobile protection, from floor liners and cargo liner to side window deflectors, even gift cards. Great for today and to prevent future messes. Everything is built to last, easy to clean and designed for harsh winter conditions, okay? I grew up with this.

• 0:49Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 0:49Conan O'Brien?

  And the salt would eat away the car. We actually did have a Chevy. My dad had a Chevy Impala and the floor rusted out and you could see the road going by.

• 0:56Speaker 01

  Oh, what?

• 0:58Conan O'Brien?

  We were praying for WeatherTech and we didn't even know it. That was before it existed.

• 1:02Speaker 01

  That's cool.

• 1:03Conan O'Brien?

  So get a gift today at weathertech.com.

• 1:10Conan O'Brien?

  Your child's clean credit history can make them a target for identity thieves. Well, guess what? With LifeLock, you can add family members to your plan, giving you the power to block identity threats targeting your children. Now, Sonya, your kids are pretty young still.

• 1:23Speaker 01

  They are.

• 1:24Conan O'Brien?

  Five, but within a couple of years, you know, they're gonna be buying heavy machinery online.

• 1:29Speaker 01

  What?

• 1:30Conan O'Brien?

  I'm just imagining them buying, they're gonna be, become tractor fanatics. They're gonna be buying tractors online. So 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. So join now, save up to 30% off your first year. Go to lifelock.com/conan. That's lifelock.com/conan to save 30%. Terms apply.

• 1:56Speaker 02

  Hi, my name is Ben Stiller.

• 2:01Speaker 02

  And I feel...

• 2:06Speaker 02

  Hmm. About being Conan O'Brien's friend.

• 2:10Conan O'Brien?

  Wow.

• 2:12Conan O'Brien?

  Devastating.

• 2:36Conan O'Brien?

  Hey there, welcome to Conan O'Brien Needs a Friend. Got a nice little podcast humming along here. Got Son of a Sessian joining us.

• 2:44Speaker 03

  I don't normally say this, but that was adorable.

• 2:47Conan O'Brien?

  Didn't you think? It's a nice little podcast we got.

• 2:49Speaker 01

  Humming along.

• 2:50Speaker 03

  We got this nice little podcast humming along here.

• 2:52Conan O'Brien?

  That's how I feel about it.

• 2:54Speaker 03

  Wow.

• 2:54Conan O'Brien?

  I do. I do feel like we got this nice, nothing grand, nothing fancy, nothing you could, you know, you put this on the lot, it'll be the last car to go, but it's a, I think it's a sweet little ride, you know? I like it. I think it's an adorable little podcast and I'm proud of it.

• 3:08Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 3:09Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah.

• 3:09Speaker 01

  That's cute.

• 3:10Conan O'Brien?

  Hey, I got a question for you guys. What do you think of my jacket?

• 3:12Speaker 03

  I like your jacket.

• 3:13Conan O'Brien?

  Okay, let me tell you something. Here's a story of this jacket.

• 3:14Speaker 01

  What if I said I didn't like it?

• 3:15Speaker 03

  Yeah, I hate it.

• 3:16Conan O'Brien?

  I've had people say that before, not about this jacket, but I've had people be very frank with me.

• 3:20Speaker 01

  No, you haven't.

• 3:21Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah, a few other people, if I'm wearing something, they tell me they don't like it.

• 3:24Speaker 01

  Oh.

• 3:24Conan O'Brien?

  I saw this jacket, it was not even, wasn't that much money. I saw it, it was a nice color of brown corduroy. Let me describe it for those of you who can't see it right now. It's a very rich.

• 3:34Speaker 03

  It's got a sheen.

• 3:35Conan O'Brien?

  It's got a sheen to it.

• 3:36Speaker 03

  It's got a nap, I believe they call it.

• 3:37Conan O'Brien?

  What's that?

• 3:38Speaker 03

  A nap. You can rub it one way and it'll go dark and then rub it the other way, it'll go light.

• 3:42Conan O'Brien?

  Wow. Keep talking, I'll take a nap.

• 3:45Speaker 01

  It's like.

• 3:46Conan O'Brien?

  And. Cablooey.

• 3:48Speaker 03

  I also want to say this, I've never said this before.

• 3:50Conan O'Brien?

  You're absolutely right about that.

• 3:51Speaker 03

  Yeah, yeah.

• 3:52Conan O'Brien?

  Uh, anyway, this is a jacket that it was like the day before Christmas and I saw this jacket in a store and I tried it on and thought, that's a nice jacket. So I just bought it and I drove home and I handed it to my wife and said, just give this to me tomorrow. And she said, okay. She said, should I wrap it? And I went, you don't even have to wrap it. And I thought, is that, do either of you two relate to that? Is that something that happens? I've been married now 22 years.

• 4:22Speaker 01

  No.

• 4:23Conan O'Brien?

  Is that what happens?

• 4:24Speaker 01

  Tac and I send each other exactly what we want. And we don't even take it out of the box that it comes in. Like, I send him the link exactly for what I want.

• 4:32Conan O'Brien?

  My son did this as a kid. He was really into tech stuff. And he would send us, like, here are the nine things. This is the XC755G, uh, whatever, something board, motherboard. Just click here and it will be delivered. He took all the joy out of, just click here.

• 4:52Speaker 01

  That is joy. You know you're getting something exactly, you know you're getting exactly what you want.

• 4:58Conan O'Brien?

  I disagree. So, so I, um, I didn't used to do that. But I think it's just because I'm now in a different stage of life. Where I'll see something, you know, this isn't that much, it's not, I'm not splurging. It's a, it's a corduroy jacket. It's perfectly nice. I would like to wear that, hand it to my wife. She, I think she kept it in the bag. I handed it to her.

• 5:20Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 5:20Conan O'Brien?

  You guys don't want any surprise? No, no, no, I do want some surprise, but. How often does a surprise go wrong?

• 5:26Speaker 01

  All the time.

• 5:27Conan O'Brien?

  It goes wrong all the time.

• 5:29Speaker 03

  In a gift from your spouse, it can't go that wrong.

• 5:31Conan O'Brien?

  Yes, it can.

• 5:32Speaker 01

  Unless, unless she's got diamonds on it, I don't want it.

• 5:36Conan O'Brien?

  Oh, wow.

• 5:37Speaker 03

  My wife is giving you gifts.

• 5:39Conan O'Brien?

  Hello, Zsa Zsa Gabor, joining us today on the podcast. What, what, what kind of awful person are? This is not the person I hired to be my assistant. Unless it's got diamonds on it. You've, fame has changed you.

• 5:52Speaker 01

  No, it has. I'm being, unless it's like, nice jewelry that marks a very special occasion. I think that's what I was trying to say.

• 5:59Speaker 03

  That's no better.

• 6:00Speaker 01

  No, no, it is. But it's like, you know, a 10 year anniversary, or maybe it gets me, whatever. I don't know. But if it's like clothes, ugh.

• 6:10Conan O'Brien?

  Oh, you mean, so if it's. You want to get the clothes yourself?

• 6:13Speaker 01

  I just know exactly what I want. And I don't think other people, including Tac, really know that. And I think, rather than winging it, here's something I wanted, and here it is. Get it for me and I'm gonna be appreciative.

• 6:26Conan O'Brien?

  That emasculates, Tac.

• 6:28Speaker 01

  No, because he does that with me.

• 6:29Conan O'Brien?

  Are you taking his penis away?

• 6:31Speaker 01

  No, what?

• 6:32Conan O'Brien?

  Then you have to get a new penis, then you know what to ask for.

• 6:34Speaker 01

  If you get your penis from doing that, then you shouldn't have a penis.

• 6:38Conan O'Brien?

  I bought you this gift, what is it? A penis!

• 6:40Speaker 03

  I sold my vagina.

• 6:42Speaker 01

  You don't deserve a penis if that's what you need.

• 6:45Conan O'Brien?

  I sold my vagina to get you this penis. I sold my penis to buy you a vagina. Oh, Henry's worst story.

• 6:53Speaker 01

  You get stuff for Amanda and she's like, "Yay!"

• 6:57Speaker 03

  She does not do that.

• 6:58Speaker 01

  Okay, I bet you she stores. Yeah, she is.

• 7:02Conan O'Brien?

  No, but when you get her her ninth... Look, it's a chess set made of cork. They've only made a few of these in the 30s.

• 7:09Speaker 01

  Horrible gift.

• 7:10Conan O'Brien?

  You know, does she go, "Oh, my God, this is amazing," or do you ever see a single tear?

• 7:16Speaker 03

  The one time we got in a fight because I bought her an espresso machine and she thought it was too extravagant and she got mad at me.

• 7:24Conan O'Brien?

  She got mad at you because you spent too much money.

• 7:26Speaker 03

  Yeah, maybe I shouldn't tell this on the podcast.

• 7:28Conan O'Brien?

  No, it's okay and you're keeping it in because, you know, that's fine. And you know what? We love your wife and I take her side. But it was really expensive.

• 7:37Speaker 03

  It wasn't... I mean, as espresso machines go, it's a mid-level espresso machine.

• 7:44Conan O'Brien?

  Well, but maybe times were tight, maybe she knew that...

• 7:48Speaker 03

  We were fine.

• 7:48Speaker 01

  Does she like espresso?

• 7:49Speaker 03

  Yes. And she has since come to love that machine, but we got in a fight that day because she was... I can't tell the story.

• 7:57Speaker 01

  If Tac gets me an appliance like that, I'll be like, "What? Where do we put it?" Do you know what I mean?

• 8:03Speaker 03

  That was her big issue.

• 8:04Speaker 01

  There's limited real estate in the kitchen and it's this machine that you got me. It's like a burden, kind of, but also, you know...

• 8:11Conan O'Brien?

  You know what? I'm gonna say this. If I get anything for the kitchen, I know I'm in very dangerous territory because my wife runs the kitchen. And if I walk in the door and I'm like, "Look, it's a giant juicer that only does pineapples."

• 8:29Conan O'Brien?

  And it's made of quartz!

• 8:33Conan O'Brien?

  You know, we got a problem. We have to take part of the sink out for it to fit. But if you got pineapples, we got pineapple juice. Then I know we've got a... Problem.

• 8:47Conan O'Brien?

  It runs on gasoline. Old fashioned gasoline. It's been badly stored. Yeah, I know. I've done that. I've purchased a a few things for the kitchen and I noticed that she was very pleasant about it at the time and then it went away. It got exchanged for something else.

• 9:07Speaker 03

  Our Christmas has like slightly decreased. We're now, since we've had a kid too, we kind of are just like three gifts for each other and that's it. And it, you know, one's like little or something.

• 9:18Conan O'Brien?

  What?

• 9:19Speaker 03

  You know, we don't, we just get three gifts.

• 9:20Conan O'Brien?

  What is it? The Great Depression?

• 9:23Speaker 03

  What are you talking about?

• 9:24Conan O'Brien?

  That's too, no, with three gifts, what? No, kids are supposed to be, there should be endless.

• 9:29Speaker 03

  No, not for the kid.

• 9:30Conan O'Brien?

  Oh.

• 9:31Speaker 01

  Wait, how many ki- how many, what are you talking, how many presents do you get kids?

• 9:34Conan O'Brien?

  Kids have to be flooded with presents.

• 9:36Speaker 03

  I agree.

• 9:37Conan O'Brien?

  Now, first of all, I'm not saying expensive presents, but I'm sorry, on the holidays, when kids come down, little kids, it has to be so many presents, it's mind boggling. And I don't care. I know people are gonna say, well, this is terrible. What if people can't afford it? Steal them if you have to. Kids have to be just spending hours.

• 9:55Speaker 03

  I agree.

• 9:55Conan O'Brien?

  The room has to be filled with crumpled paper when the, when the day is over.

• 10:00Speaker 01

  They had a lot, but like, eh, also, I also, the point now is, yeah.

• 10:04Speaker 03

  Not for the kid.

• 10:05Speaker 01

  For each other.

• 10:05Speaker 03

  For, from Amanda and me. We get each other, we limited our, this is her idea. Look, I'm not a board. I want to do more.

• 10:12Conan O'Brien?

  This is awful.

• 10:13Speaker 03

  But I know.

• 10:13Conan O'Brien?

  Three each. And I bet one of them's a walnut.

• 10:17Conan O'Brien?

  Here's your walnut.

• 10:19Speaker 03

  I agree. I like to go big for Christmas. I've, I've been tailored back a little bit.

• 10:24Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah.

• 10:25Speaker 01

  I like to just chill. I don't like things. I don't want new purses. I don't want new jackets.

• 10:31Conan O'Brien?

  Oh, I know that. You've been wearing your Dr. Zaya special for like 20 years now.

• 10:37Speaker 03

  Dr. Zaya's?

• 10:38Conan O'Brien?

  She's got this jacket that's got weird. I know, but I mean, for God's sake, I'll pay for it. Get a fucking jacket.

• 10:46Speaker 01

  I get things. I like them. I use them all the time.

• 10:49Conan O'Brien?

  I know, but that's too much. I mean, now, it's really.

• 10:52Speaker 01

  What kind? I mean, what do I need?

• 10:54Conan O'Brien?

  Looks like you slept in a bus station or something. For God's sake.

• 10:57Speaker 01

  In a bus station.

• 10:58Conan O'Brien?

  I bet you have. But the question is with who?

• 11:02Speaker 01

  Myself.

• 11:03Conan O'Brien?

  Ah, myself, eh? So you were just having a ni- I like trying to still do the sexy leering talk. Long after the sexy part's over, so you weren't just by yourself having a nap, huh? Yeah.

• 11:15Speaker 01

  Yeah, just in front of myself.

• 11:17Conan O'Brien?

  Wearing a bulky jacket by yourself.

• 11:19Speaker 01

  It's not bulky. Why is it bulky?

• 11:21Conan O'Brien?

  Listen, I, uh, you've worn that jacket too long. We're not gonna get stuck on that. But, um, get a new jacket.

• 11:27Speaker 01

  It says leather jackets. It's nice and broken in it. It's perfect. You have jackets that you've worn forever, too. So, I don't know.

• 11:36Conan O'Brien?

  I have more than one jacket.

• 11:38Speaker 03

  Can I just, can I just get you guys to shut up?

• 11:42Conan O'Brien?

  I do have jackets I've had for a long time, but I wear them. But I have more than, I have more than one. More than one. More than one. If someone stole your jacket, you're freeze to death. It's the only jacket you have.

• 11:51Speaker 01

  Oh, yeah, in Los Angeles. I don't like purses and I don't like jackets. Freeze to death in Los Angeles. It's sixty-seven degrees outside.

• 11:57Conan O'Brien?

  It gets cold at night, into the forties, some say. All right, listen, we...

• 12:02Speaker 01

  I won that one. You guys should do a gift exchange this year.

• 12:05Speaker 03

  Oh, I'd be so afraid to buy her a gift. She'd get mad at me.

• 12:07Speaker 01

  I won't like it.

• 12:09Speaker 03

  Oh, my god.

• 12:10Speaker 01

  I'll email you exactly what I want.

• 12:11Speaker 03

  I'm not interested in buying a gift for someone who's forcing me. A gift should be about what another person would think would make you happy.

• 12:18Speaker 01

  No.

• 12:19Speaker 03

  What?

• 12:19Speaker 01

  I know. Well, that would make me happy. I'm sending him something I know I want, and when he gives it to me, I'll, I'll know I like it.

• 12:28Speaker 03

  But what if it's something you didn't see? Like, I'll go shopping sometime for Amanda, or I'm out and I see...

• 12:33Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah, and you get an espresso machine, and the whole thing blows up in your face.

• 12:37Speaker 03

  I know. I know.

• 12:38Conan O'Brien?

  I mean, no, that was, uh, you took a chance, uh, didn't go well.

• 12:41Speaker 03

  I am gun-shy since then.

• 12:43Conan O'Brien?

  Exactly.

• 12:43Speaker 01

  I buy my mom and dad stuff all the time, and my mom has returned a hundred percent of the presents I have given.

• 12:49Conan O'Brien?

  I bought your dad a new mustache and he wears it every day.

• 12:52Speaker 01

  Okay. You know what?

• 12:54Conan O'Brien?

  It's more real than the one he's wearing.

• 12:56Speaker 01

  Won't stand for it?

• 12:57Conan O'Brien?

  Ridiculous.

• 12:57Speaker 01

  Won't stand for it.

• 12:58Speaker 03

  What are you gonna do about it?

• 12:59Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah, what are you gonna do? What are you gonna, what are you gonna storm out?

• 13:02Speaker 01

  I'm gonna be like, I'm gonna stand here, sit here, upset about it.

• 13:05Speaker 03

  Oh, so you won't stand for it, is you're literally just gonna sit down?

• 13:08Speaker 01

  I'm gonna sit down.

• 13:11Conan O'Brien?

  All I have to do when I do an impression of her dad is put a finger under my nose and there he is. There's Gil right there.

• 13:17Speaker 01

  That's not Gil. Gil's cooler than you are. Gil's so much cooler than you are.

• 13:21Conan O'Brien?

  He is cooler than I am.

• 13:21Speaker 01

  You have to have the thing and you have to be cooler and you can't do that.

• 13:24Conan O'Brien?

  You just did it. You just put the finger under your nose to be your dad.

• 13:27Speaker 01

  Dad, make me do that!

• 13:27Speaker 03

  I put this wrap sign up hours ago.

• 13:29Conan O'Brien?

  Alright, we're gonna wrap it up. Anyway.

• 13:30Speaker 01

  Stupid.

• 13:30Conan O'Brien?

  Find out from your spouse about presents. Don't buy that espresso machine, it's too expensive. Never wear the same leather jacket for more than 30 years in a row. These are our suggestions. Good night. My guest today is a tremendously accomplished actor, filmmaker and showrunner. You know him from, of course, Meet the Parents, Zoolander and Dodgeball and just, just the tip of the iceberg right there. He's the director and executive producer of Severance on Apple TV Plus. Season two premieres January 17th. I am very excited about it because Severance was my jam.

• 14:10Conan O'Brien?

  Ben Stiller, welcome.

• 14:16Conan O'Brien?

  I've contacted you many times through your people. Yeah, I often get just, we'll get back to you.

• 14:22Speaker 02

  That's why I have people.

• 14:24Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah.

• 14:27Conan O'Brien?

  But what's weird, but can I just say something what's weird? The people sound suspiciously like Ben. It sounds like Ben picking up and he says, let me get Ben's people and then the people sound a lot like you.

• 14:38Speaker 02

  It's like the guy from the, the Donald Trump who called into the post. Whatever that guy's name was.

• 14:44Speaker 03

  David Barron or John Barron.

• 14:45Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 14:48Conan O'Brien?

  Well, I've known you a very long time and I was very excited you're coming in today because you're one of my all time favorite comedy people. Your body of work is fucking crazy stunning. We're gonna talk about Severance, which was my favorite show. That first season was perfection and I am delighted that Severance is coming back. So much so that your people said, I can watch a few episodes. And they said, you can watch a couple of episodes of this new season. We'll make them available to you. And I'm like, no, no, I'm rewatching season one to watch season two.

• 15:25Speaker 02

  Okay, good.

• 15:25Conan O'Brien?

  And I don't want to watch it on a computer.

• 15:28Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 15:28Conan O'Brien?

  I don't want to watch it. I want to watch it because I think the direction, which is you, is, I know some other people direct, but you direct the majority of these episodes. Is absolutely fantastic. The art design, the acting, the whole thing is through the roof.

• 15:43Speaker 02

  Thanks, man.

• 15:43Conan O'Brien?

  It's delightful.

• 15:44Speaker 02

  Thank you.

• 15:45Conan O'Brien?

  And.

• 15:45Speaker 02

  Conan, I really appreciate that. Thank you.

• 15:47Conan O'Brien?

  No, no.

• 15:47Speaker 02

  That means a lot because you know how much I respect you. Seriously.

• 15:50Conan O'Brien?

  Well, I.

• 15:50Speaker 02

  No joke.

• 15:51Conan O'Brien?

  I'm, well, now people think it's a joke because you said no joke.

• 15:55Speaker 02

  I know. I said no joke too quickly or something. I don't know. I think seriously was the first place I went. And then no joke is trying to save it.

• 16:03Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah, yeah. No, I, um, we're gonna, we're gonna talk about it because anyone who's listening to this right now, if you're not watching Severance, if you didn't see season one, go and watch it. It is, uh, it's, it's just, I think, flawless and there's so many images in it, um, moments in it, and it's got me thinking about so many things. Uh, so I'm very psyched for season two, but along those lines, I just wanted to go back to, um, I'll just touch on it. Met you for the first time. We mentioned this last time, but I think it bears repeating. I met you when you came to SNL. And right away was doing one of the funniest things I had seen when you played a grown up Eddie Munster.

• 16:44Conan O'Brien?

  With the whole outfit, but you're jaded now.

• 16:47Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 16:47Conan O'Brien?

  You had done a, uh, you had done a Tom Cruise, uh, film, which was a parody of Color of Money. And I looked at that film and I remember thinking, well, why isn't this, this is what Saturday Night Live should be, which later on, if you look at what Please Don't Destroy. And a lot of the shorts from Lonely Island, it became more, these short films, which are just, you know, became more and more of the DNA of the show. When you first came along, I was remembered, the first thing I saw you do was that short that you had made, I think yourself, self-funded or something.

• 17:19Speaker 02

  Yeah, I made it on my own.

• 17:20Conan O'Brien?

  This is before Ben Stiller's show?

• 17:22Speaker 02

  Yeah, no, this was before anything. I was, I had, I was in a play, uh, called The House of Blue Leaves off Broadway and the cast, the play was doing really well. And it moved to Broadway and John Mahoney was in it and Stocker Channing and Chris Walken and all this amazing cast. And I made this short takeoff with these two guys, Steve Clayman and Ralph Howard. And we put, I kind of put all my money into it that I was making from the show. And we made this short and then we were like, okay, let's take it somewhere. And this was, I mean, it's just a proof of how old I am and we are.

• 17:59Conan O'Brien?

  Not me.

• 17:59Speaker 02

  I met you.

• 18:00Conan O'Brien?

  I met you when I was four years old.

• 18:01Speaker 02

  I know, I know, I forgot.

• 18:03Conan O'Brien?

  I'm thirty nine years old.

• 18:06Speaker 02

  But there was nowhere to go. It wasn't, there wasn't, you know, anything to upload it to at that point. So it was like a video cassette and Lovitz had come to the show. He'd seen the show and he, and I reached out to him. Because he came backstage afterwards and he knew my parents and was very nice and he, you know, and I reached out, I said, hey, I've got this short. Can you, is there any way you could get them to take a look at it? And he literally like met me in the lobby at Thirty Rock and took the video cassette upstairs.

• 18:34Conan O'Brien?

  I remembered watching it. All of us were.

• 18:36Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 18:37Conan O'Brien?

  Blown away. Your Tom Cruise impression was fantastic.

• 18:41Speaker 02

  I couldn't believe that they were putting it on the air because there was nobody from the show in it.

• 18:44Conan O'Brien?

  Yep.

• 18:45Speaker 02

  And it was Jim Downey.

• 18:46Conan O'Brien?

  Yep.

• 18:47Speaker 02

  You know.

• 18:47Conan O'Brien?

  Jim Downey, great. Who's been on this podcast, amazing head writer. When he saw something that was great, he knew this has to just be on. I find it so interesting that people can go back and look at that Color of Money parody that you did and you should, you should look it up and, and check it out. But to me, it was saying, it occurred to me today, oh, this was the way to go. You were, you were ahead of your time, in my opinion, like it's.

• 19:12Speaker 02

  I don't know. I was just sort of like, honestly, I've probably talked to you about this before, but you know, it was for me trying to do what Albert Brooks, who I think was ahead of his time for sure.

• 19:22Conan O'Brien?

  Very much so, yeah.

• 19:22Speaker 02

  In terms of like what he did, his first movie, Real Life, which was about reality television and making fun of it. And what he had done on the show and watching that when I was younger and wanting to do that kind of thing.

• 19:33Conan O'Brien?

  When I first saw you, you were doing a spot on Tom Cruise impression. And then you flash forward all these years with Tropic Thunder.

• 19:41Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 19:42Conan O'Brien?

  And Tom Cruise plays this executive in Tropic Thunder. And it is, I mean, I've talked to Tom Cruise about it. It is one of the funniest cameos. He comes out of nowhere, and I know that he came to you when you, I don't know if you approached him about playing this, this character. What's the character's name? Is it Lou?

• 20:03Speaker 02

  Les Grossman.

• 20:03Conan O'Brien?

  Les Grossman.

• 20:04Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 20:05Conan O'Brien?

  He had like two.

• 20:06Speaker 02

  Jewish.

• 20:07Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah.

• 20:08Speaker 02

  I mean, it's never really stated, but. Kind of implied.

• 20:13Conan O'Brien?

  Occurred to me now, that's a Jewish name. But he had requests, right? He had two requests. Correct me if I'm right, or you could say he wanted his hands.

• 20:23Speaker 02

  Yeah, he wanted to have big, thick forearms that were hairy.

• 20:28Speaker 02

  He wanted to be Jewish.

• 20:30Conan O'Brien?

  And he wanted to.

• 20:31Speaker 02

  And, and he wanted, and he wanted to dance.

• 20:34Conan O'Brien?

  And he wanted to dance.

• 20:35Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 20:35Conan O'Brien?

  And so.

• 20:36Speaker 02

  Again, Jewish.

• 20:37Conan O'Brien?

  What's, yeah, what's crazy to me is that when he said those things to you, you might have been thinking, oh, what? I don't know, did you right away say?

• 20:45Speaker 02

  No, I was, I mean, it's a strange set of circumstances, the way that this happened. We had done this little short for the MTV Movie Awards where I played as Stuntman. And that's where we, and we had met a couple of times over the years before that. But then we had real, had a great time doing that together and had stayed in touch since then. And I had had this idea for the movie for a long time. I'd been working on it with Justin Theroux.

• 21:11Speaker 02

  And E. Tom Cohen came on later and we finally had the script and I had talked to Tom about it. Originally, I wanted Tom to play my part.

• 21:20Conan O'Brien?

  Oh, really?

• 21:20Speaker 02

  Yeah, yeah. But I was like a little, I was like too, really too nervous to ask him to do it.

• 21:26Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah.

• 21:26Speaker 02

  Cause he's Tom Cruise.

• 21:27Conan O'Brien?

  Sure, yeah, yeah.

• 21:28Speaker 02

  He has other stuff to do.

• 21:29Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah.

• 21:30Speaker 02

  And we were friendly and hanging out. He was so nice and like just the greatest guy. And, but I didn't like want to bother him really with this. Uh, but I, eventually I sent him the script and he was like, this is, this is, uh, this is great. Uh, I'd love to be a part of this. And I was like, well, maybe you could play, there's like an agent role. He's like, well, no, I've played an agent before.

• 21:50Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah, yeah.

• 21:50Speaker 02

  Jerry Maguire.

• 21:51Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah.

• 21:51Speaker 02

  He said, but it was his idea, this character. He said, you don't have a studio exec in the movie.

• 21:56Conan O'Brien?

  Perfect.

• 21:57Speaker 02

  Yeah, so this was like three months or maybe like two and a half months before we started shooting. And Justin and I were like, well, Tom is, you know, would like to be in the movie. And he had this idea of playing a studio exec. And so we went back and came up with Les Grossman. And it changed the whole plot of the movie, but made it so much better.

• 22:15Conan O'Brien?

  Oh, it's.

• 22:16Speaker 02

  And I think he has a very, you know, an amazing instinct about movies. He's so smart, like it's crazy how, you know, he's a really, is a student of, of movies. And he's just, he had this feeling like there, you need this element to the story. So there was no element where what was happening back in the States, the whole time in the Tropic Thunder story. And so we, we came up with this and Justin wrote a bunch of those monologues where he just goes off and.

• 22:42Conan O'Brien?

  But at the end, when he starts.

• 22:44Speaker 02

  And then he said he wanted to dance, yeah.

• 22:45Conan O'Brien?

  When he starts dancing. First of all, I, uh, I talked earlier, we started out about your, your body of work and it's, it, it is crazy. There's so many movies that you've directed, which have so many moments in them where I go like, okay, that's one of my favorite comedy moments. Zoolander, the gasoline station fight.

• 23:03Speaker 02

  Oh, God.

• 23:03Conan O'Brien?

  When they're throwing gasoline on each other and laughing in slow motions. It is one of the funniest things I've ever seen. It delights me every time I think about it. Also, when you and Owen are trying to hack into a computer and you become more or less apes. So there's all this.

• 23:24Speaker 02

  The 2001.

• 23:25Conan O'Brien?

  Yes.

• 23:26Speaker 02

  Yeah. But I have to tell you something, cause I was actually for another project, I'm working on this documentary. I, I was looking through some of this old behind the scenes footage from Zoolander that I have. And, uh, and I, I found an old, this was literally last week, I found an old cut of the gasoline fight. And I had forgotten that originally, you know, they like, he lights the cigarette. And I think the way it is in the movie, I watched for, is like, he lights cigarette, I go, oh no. And then boom, they blow up.

• 23:56Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah.

• 23:57Speaker 02

  But originally it was, he lights a cigarette and I go, oh no. And you watch the flame, kind of like, he drops the match on the floor. And you see the flame like, you know, kind of track under the, the car and go up. And then it goes up and it starts engulfing each one of the models.

• 24:11Speaker 01

  Oh, Jesus Christ.

• 24:14Speaker 02

  And it literally goes on for, I'm not kidding, for like, um, like maybe like two minutes where they're just like dancing in pain.

• 24:23Conan O'Brien?

  But you know what's great? That is, but you know what's great? Ben, that's a masterclass in the difference between this, this way is funny, this way is not.

• 24:32Speaker 02

  It's awful.

• 24:32Conan O'Brien?

  And, and you can't really explain why, but...

• 24:37Speaker 02

  No, no, when you watch it, you see it's awful.

• 24:41Speaker 02

  And also, this is like, you know, the year 2000. The year 2000. Where four real, like, you know, CG effects where, like, we had three stuntmen doused in those, like, the jelly, where they put the jelly on and actually be... Screaming. So they're on fire for real, doing this. And then the explosion was a real explosion that like knocked the windows out of the buildings across the street, because it was like bigger than our guy, uh, thought it was gonna be.

• 25:09Speaker 01

  Oh my god!

• 25:10Speaker 02

  It's just like a different time.

• 25:11Conan O'Brien?

  But, but that is a great... Like I say, if you ever teach a class on comedy.

• 25:16Speaker 02

  Right.

• 25:17Conan O'Brien?

  Which, which would sell out, just the idea of, this is the way we showed it in the movie. Yay! Let me show you a way that we didn't go with people crying and screaming.

• 25:31Speaker 02

  If it bends, it's funny.

• 25:32Conan O'Brien?

  Yes, no, it's true, yeah.

• 25:42Conan O'Brien?

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

• 25:44Speaker 01

  Yeah, I love awards.

• 25:45Conan 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.

• 25:59Speaker 01

  Nice.

• 25:59Conan 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.

• 26:08Speaker 01

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

• 26:12Conan O'Brien?

  I've been tooling around in an Ioniq 5N, which I love.

• 26:16Speaker 01

  Mm-hmm.

• 26:17Conan O'Brien?

  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?

• 26:32Speaker 01

  Hello.

• 26:32Conan O'Brien?

  They're gonna rename that the Sona. The Palisade Hybrid.

• 26:36Speaker 01

  It should.

• 26:36Conan O'Brien?

  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.

• 27:07Conan O'Brien?

  This fall, I want to try something different.

• 27:09Speaker 01

  What?

• 27:09Conan O'Brien?

  I like to change it up. I like to learn things, so I'm gonna try and make apple cider.

• 27:13Speaker 01

  Ooh.

• 27:13Conan O'Brien?

  Every morning.

• 27:14Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 27:15Conan O'Brien?

  This fall, just to see if I can do it.

• 27:17Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 27:17Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah, fall's the perfect season to try something new, like joining T-Mobile.

• 27:21Speaker 01

  Oh, that's good.

• 27:22Conan O'Brien?

  See what I did?

• 27:22Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 27:23Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah, there are 250 reasons to join T-Mobile right now. You want to hear what they are?

• 27:27Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 27:27Conan O'Brien?

  They're America's best network.

• 27:28Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 27:29Conan O'Brien?

  True story. Plus, T-Mobile has got off-grid satellite coverage. That comes in really handy. I like to just wander in the woods sometimes.

• 27:36Speaker 01

  Oh, that's weird.

• 27:36Conan O'Brien?

  When I'm thinking about, like, making apple cider.

• 27:38Speaker 01

  Oh.

• 27:39Conan O'Brien?

  And that's when it comes in handy. Here's another reason. High-speed data in over 215 countries and destinations. I travel a lot for the

• 27:46Speaker 01

  You travel a lot.

• 27:46Conan O'Brien?

  travel show that I do.

• 27:47Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 27:48Conan O'Brien?

  Stream this podcast while ignoring local landmarks. That's always fun to do. Like, oh, look, there's the Mona Lisa. Yeah, check it out. I'm in the Louvre. I should, but I'm listening to Conan O'Brien Needs a Friend.

• 27:58Speaker 01

  That doesn't seem like a good idea.

• 27:59Conan O'Brien?

  It's a great idea.

• 28:00Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 28:01Conan O'Brien?

  You know, you can see art anytime. But how often can you listen to this podcast?

• 28:06Speaker 01

  My god.

• 28:07Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah.

• 28:07Speaker 01

  What?

• 28:08Conan O'Brien?

  No, all these reasons make T-Mobile a great choice.

• 28:11Speaker 01

  I agree.

• 28:11Conan O'Brien?

  T-Mobile is stacking up reasons to join. Go to tmobile.com and find yours best, based on analysis by Ookla of speed test intelligence data first half of 2026. Can't believe I read that. T-Satellite with capable devices in most outdoor areas in the U.S., where you can see the sky. High-speed international data with qualifying plan. Visit tmobile.com. Consult a physician. I just threw that in there.

• 28:35Speaker 01

  Oh.

• 28:39Conan O'Brien?

  Coca-Cola Zero Sugar is so good. It's almost impossible not to finish it before the meal arrives. It's just too good to wait. That happens to me sometimes. Me too. You can try rules like no sipping until the appetizer arrives, or you tell your friend, "Don't let me touch my glass." But every time you're staring at an empty glass. So if you've ever finished your Coke Zero before the first fry hits the table, you're among friends. It happens. Occupational hazard with Coke Zero. Yeah. Real Coca-Cola taste, zero sugar, too good to wait. Enjoy an ice cold Coca-Cola Zero Sugar today.

• 29:19Conan O'Brien?

  Entropic Thunder, when you're running across the bridge and you... When the kid gets thrown, I got on the floor. It's so wrong in every... It's so wrong in every way.

• 29:32Speaker 02

  Like, there's not anything else that's wrong in that movie?

• 29:34Conan O'Brien?

  No, no.

• 29:36Conan O'Brien?

  There's so much that's...

• 29:37Speaker 02

  Nothing comes to mind.

• 29:38Conan O'Brien?

  Nothing comes to mind. But absolutely, uh... So just the body of work, Reality Bites, Cable Guy, has so much funny shit in it. You know, and...

• 29:48Speaker 02

  Well, like, all those are, you know, collaborations with people. And for me, that's always been the thing. It's like, I love working with people who are funny. And, you know, it doesn't just come from me. It's, you know, it's...

• 30:02Conan O'Brien?

  Well, I could always tell that because all those years when I was doing the late night show, through all your different stages, you would always show up and want it and say, "Okay, let's do something." And you would come with ideas. And then you would spend a long time making this great idea come to life, working with other people, working with us. And then you would do this thing, and it would be on at, you know, 12:50 at night on NBC, and you either saw it or you didn't. This was before internet. And it was, I mean, it was great. It was just great.

• 30:33Speaker 02

  And I have, for this documentary I've been working on, I've been looking at some of that old stuff. And it's just, I mean, I'm like, what was I thinking? Because it's such a commitment. And I, I mean, besides just looking at myself thirty years ago, whatever it is, and just like, kinda like my attitude and like, coming in with like, "Hey, I'm gonna be funny," and you know what I mean? Or like, "I'm gonna like, have an attitude with you."

• 30:55Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 30:56Speaker 02

  Uh, but you were great. You played along, and you were always so open to it, and you were always like, "Okay, let's go for it and let's do it."

• 31:03Conan O'Brien?

  Right. It was, it was, it was, now I look back on it and I think, "Wait a minute." We were doing a twelve thirty show and Ben Stiller would come by and work all day on doing a nine-minute comedy piece for us? You know?

• 31:17Speaker 02

  But I was thinking-

• 31:17Conan O'Brien?

  Well, how did I, how did, how did that happen? Like, that's, I mean, I, I, I did something right in a previous life.

• 31:24Speaker 02

  Yeah, but also, you know, I was thinking about it, cause like, I had to do a talk show next week, and I was thinking, "Okay, what am I gonna do?" And I should think of something, and then I'm like, "Uh, we'll just, we'll talk and we'll be fine." And I'm just like, I don't have the energy for that.

• 31:37Conan O'Brien?

  No, it's-

• 31:38Speaker 02

  At all anymore.

• 31:39Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah, yeah, exactly.

• 31:40Speaker 02

  I'm like, "It'll be good, we'll come over."

• 31:41Conan O'Brien?

  No, I, that's the problem, is the late-night host now would look at like, "Oh no, I saw you, you did Jesus Christ Superstar with Conan, so we thought, maybe you could do a thing where you're Godzilla," and you're like, "No, I just wanna come out in a good Tom Ford suit."

• 31:56Speaker 02

  Exactly.

• 31:57Conan O'Brien?

  Chat about my work?

• 31:59Speaker 02

  Yeah, I'm tired.

• 32:00Conan O'Brien?

  Are you, I heard you were working on a documentary about your parents?

• 32:05Speaker 02

  Yeah, that's-

• 32:05Conan O'Brien?

  And I wanted to talk about that because, because I grew up watching your parents, the great Anne Mira, Jerry Stiller, and, um, I remember they were kind of ubiquitous when I was a kid. I thought they were really funny. I'd see them on like, Love American Style, or they'd be these different, they'd be in ads.

• 32:23Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 32:23Conan O'Brien?

  And I just knew, oh, these are these really funny people, but I didn't know exactly who they were, and then later on, they came on the show in their own right. Of course, your dad was on Seinfeld. Not very well-known that way, and, um-

• 32:35Speaker 02

  Yeah, I mean, they had, yeah, they were a comedy team and, uh-

• 32:39Conan O'Brien?

  An old-school comedy team.

• 32:41Speaker 02

  Old-school comedy team from this, you know, they started in the late fifties, early sixties, and were two young actors who met and fell in love, got married really quickly, and then were, became starving actors in New York, and after five or six years, tried to figure out a way that they could make some money, and my dad was the guy who always wanted to be a comedian. Grew up during the depression. Idolized Eddie Cantor, people like that. And my mom wanted to be, just wanted to be a serious actress. But she was really funny and really talented. And my dad had this idea that they should do an act. So he pulled her into it.

• 33:18Conan O'Brien?

  Interesting.

• 33:19Speaker 02

  Yeah, and.

• 33:20Conan O'Brien?

  Did they do like Sullivan and all those shows?

• 33:23Speaker 02

  Yeah, they did Ed Sullivan. I think it's thirty, I always get it wrong. It's like thirty six or thirty seven times.

• 33:31Conan O'Brien?

  Wow.

• 33:31Speaker 02

  And it kind of, it kind of made their career.

• 33:33Conan O'Brien?

  Yes.

• 33:33Speaker 02

  And that's, that's.

• 33:34Conan O'Brien?

  I had a memory, I have a sense memory of them. Because there was that era where, you know, a comedy team could come into people. And, and talk about like half the country would be watching.

• 33:44Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 33:45Conan O'Brien?

  Them do a routine.

• 33:46Speaker 02

  I mean, it was, yeah, that's part of the, the story is that, you know, the pressure that was on them as live performers. Which, you know, a pressure you know as, you know, doing what you do. It's, but, but for them, not like every time they went out, they had to get re-invited back by Sullivan. And they had to do well. So, you know, that was, and then they had to do like five, it wasn't like two minutes. It was, it was like six or seven minutes, you know?

• 34:08Conan O'Brien?

  It's hard for people to know now because there's seventy five, there's an infinite number of outlets. So there's no such thing as, well, I, I came on Conan, or I came on one of, you know, Conan's late night show. A couple of years ago and he wasn't pleased, so we're through in the business. Well, no, there's a billion other places to go. There's no such thing as, you're, you're through kid, you displeased me. But this was a different era where if Sullivan didn't like you. And you, there was a problem, that was it. That could be it.

• 34:40Speaker 02

  Yeah, and, and luckily he liked them. Uh, they, they did a number of different, you know, sketches every time they come out. But then they finally hit on this one sketch where basically they played off the fact that my dad was Jewish. My mom was Irish Catholic. And they had, you know, it's these two characters meeting off of a computer dating. And it was Hershey Horowitz and Mary Elizabeth Doyle.

• 35:03Conan O'Brien?

  Funny now, still funny.

• 35:05Speaker 02

  And it was controversial at the time because, you know, they didn't know if people would go for it. But Ed Sullivan's wife, he was Catholic, but his wife was Jewish.

• 35:13Conan O'Brien?

  Oh, wow, okay.

• 35:14Speaker 02

  And he loved it. And that was sort of, you know, he kept on inviting them back. And that's, yeah, but you know, you're in the documentary because there are so many, you know, these talk show appearances. You know, I'm kind of also looking at it through the lens of, you know, for me, over the years, being asked about them.

• 35:33Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah.

• 35:33Speaker 02

  You know, and so many times and really trying to figure out like, well, what is it? Like, what was it like being their, their son? You know, what, who were they? What, what was, you know? What's the core of what my experience was with them as parents? And stuff I never really questioned until you start doing something like this and you start looking into it. But we went on with you once and there was a bit that I was sick and my mom was taking care of me. And my mom and dad came out with me on the show.

• 36:04Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 36:05Speaker 02

  And it's so funny. It's so great.

• 36:07Conan O'Brien?

  Those are, I mean, you know, the...

• 36:11Speaker 02

  And then I have to tell you another thing, too.

• 36:12Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah.

• 36:13Speaker 02

  So I've been working on this thing for like four years. And as, as a documentary develops, you start to, I've never made a documentary before. And what I'm learning is that as it goes along, you start to figure out really what it's about through the process of editing.

• 36:28Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah.

• 36:28Speaker 02

  And then you think it's one thing for like a year or two and then you realize, oh no, I gotta have more of this story or, you know, how I have to have more. For me, it's been more of like, oh, personally, like really like getting into like what is, what's my experience with them? Because, you know, that's, I'm the one making the movie. And we figured out this part of it that I've always felt, which was my dad on Seinfeld was, you know, he was so angry, right? And that was so funny was to see him blow up and scream and yell.

• 36:56Conan O'Brien?

  So funny shouting, yeah.

• 36:58Speaker 02

  Yeah, amazing. And I always felt it was because he had all this suppressed inner rage in him. That he kind of kept down, you know, he loved my mom. They were like, you know, he was the most loving, generous guy. But he had like, he had to... Blamade a lot. And over the years, doing their act together, the, the, the sort of the dynamic between them was that she was kind of like, you know, shut them up a lot, you know, like Jerry, Jerry, stop talking, stop talking.

• 37:22Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah, yeah.

• 37:22Speaker 02

  And I have all these clips, you know, from the seventies of them on all these talk shows doing that. And I thought, you know, when he finally hit it with, on, on Seinfeld, it was because he was able to let out all of that inner, you know?

• 37:36Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah, makes sense, yeah.

• 37:37Speaker 02

  And, and I was trying to find a soundbite, uh, to, to sort of, you know, explain that, where he talked about it and I couldn't find one and I was driving home. This was like, literally like a month ago. I'm driving home and I put on, you know, your Sirius XM station. And it's literally, it's my, it's a clip of my dad on the show, on your show. And you're asking him about, you know, Costanza and why is he so funny? And my dad said, this was like, literally, he says, as I turned it on, he says, it's because I had all this inner rage.

• 38:10Speaker 01

  Jesus!

• 38:11Speaker 02

  Yeah. And I literally like pulled the car over and like, you know, texted my editor and yeah. Isn't that insane?

• 38:19Conan O'Brien?

  That's fantastic.

• 38:20Speaker 02

  And we pulled the clip out and it's in the movie along with the other thing.

• 38:23Conan O'Brien?

  Well, I don't give you permission to use it.

• 38:26Speaker 02

  That's actually why I'm here.

• 38:28Conan O'Brien?

  And I'm editing this part out of the podcast. Let's come up with a number, gang.

• 38:35Speaker 02

  I need a tone.

• 38:36Conan O'Brien?

  That is, that is, uh,

• 38:37Speaker 02

  I, I, I honestly, I felt like it was my dad and the ether or something, just like this moment was happening.

• 38:43Conan O'Brien?

  Well, first of all, I, I love that. I love that. And, uh, I do think that it was so nice that your dad got to have that, that role. And then, uh, he's in King of Queens after that. And so he has this whole, Yeah, it changed his life. There's a whole generation that knows him from that stuff. You know what I mean?

• 39:01Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 39:01Conan O'Brien?

  Which is sweet.

• 39:02Speaker 02

  He always wanted that, you know, he had, had so much success with my mom, but then there was a period of time after, you know, when being a comedy team was not something that was as viable in show business. You know, as, as you go into the eighties and the nineties, it's not like there are shows that are, you know, like the Merv Griffin Show or that Sullivan Show. It's just so, they were having to figure out their, their careers. Separately, and then, you know, Seinfeld happened for him in his seventies and it changed, you know, it just fulfilled everything that he'd wanted. And my mom, it wasn't as important to her because she was, I think, happier to kind of stay at home and write and, you know, read biographies, do the Sunday Times crossword puzzle.

• 39:42Speaker 02

  But my dad, that's what was, it was, you know, if, he was so connected to the audience to being recognized, it meant so much to him.

• 39:49Conan O'Brien?

  Yes, yes.

• 39:50Speaker 02

  Because he was so deprived as a kid, he, his parents, he had such a tough childhood. His dad was a cab driver, you know, they lived, they moved thirteen different times when he was a kid over the course of a few years and, you know, so he, he was just like both loving and needy, but like in the, in the most generous way. And, you know, he, they would like, someone come up to him on the street and, you know, recognize him. He'd be with my mom and he'd talk to them for like fifteen minutes. And my mom would be like, Jerry, let's get the fuck out of here, come on.

• 40:18Conan O'Brien?

  This guy knows me.

• 40:19Speaker 02

  Exactly.

• 40:23Conan O'Brien?

  I'll do a dance for you, whatever you want. Boy, do I relate to that.

• 40:27Speaker 02

  I didn't, I didn't get any of that, by the way.

• 40:31Conan O'Brien?

  It's funny because I know you did, um, early on, you were a musician, drummer.

• 40:36Speaker 02

  Well, just sort of.

• 40:38Conan O'Brien?

  Super early on, but was, did you ever think that was going to be it or did you always know?

• 40:42Speaker 02

  No, I was not a great drummer. I was just.

• 40:44Conan O'Brien?

  I was a terrible drummer. I know you were in a band called Capital Punishment. Right, I was in a band called The Bad Clams and I was a drummer. And then I told them, I'm out. I, I don't have time for this. I've got other things. And I, and I remember thinking, good luck without me. And they replaced me with a drum machine.

• 40:59Speaker 02

  Oh.

• 41:00Conan O'Brien?

  And it's not like a little.

• 41:01Speaker 03

  Can we do that on this podcast?

• 41:05Conan O'Brien?

  And people were just like, whatever, it's, it's better. It's keeping time correctly. But yeah, that was just a, that was a, that was a moment for you.

• 41:12Speaker 02

  Yeah, it was, I had a friend in high school who was the bandleader and he was really talented. We're still friends, Chris Roebling, and, but I, I was not a great drummer. I really wasn't great at keeping time. What's that documentary about Ginger Baker?

• 41:27Conan O'Brien?

  Ginger Baker, yeah, yeah, from Cream.

• 41:28Speaker 02

  Yeah, there's a great documentary about him and he's like so like hard ass in terms of like. You gotta like either you have time or you don't have time.

• 41:35Conan O'Brien?

  Oh, and in that documentary, they're saying things like, you mean great, like a great drummer like, uh, you know, um, Keith Moon from the Who, and he goes, no, I'm talking about real drum. I mean, people are mentioning icons to him or John Bonham from Let's, and he's like, no, I mean, a real drum. And then this guy who thinks of like maybe three people in the universe are real drummers and everyone else is just shite. Um, yeah, uh, you have just in addition to all these movies you're directing and you had all this crazy success as an actor. And then it you've sort of made a conscious decision to step back a little from that.

• 42:14Conan O'Brien?

  Let's say in the last five, seven years and say, okay, what I really want to do is craft things, direct, produce. Was that was a conscious decision?

• 42:24Speaker 02

  Yeah, it was a moment that kind of hit me. Um, I've always, I always loved directing since I was a kid. So like that. And then, you know, I was directing a lot of these movies I was in over the years, but I never, except for Cable Guy, I'd never directed anything that I wasn't in. But I always thought of myself more as a director than an actor, really. I felt like that was more where I was, um, I thought I was better at that. Definitely not a live performer from my short time on SNL. It was so nerve wracking for me to be. It's still anytime doing something live. It's like, you know, I don't enjoy it. I'm happy when it's over. Um, and if it goes well, it's great. But, um, so directing to me was always like a comfort area and just happy.

• 43:08Speaker 02

  You know, it just made me happy. Uh, and so it was really after Zoolander two came out. That was like sort of the inflection point where it's like the movie, you know, didn't do well. It was a, it was not well received. And it was this moment in time where I was like, ah, man, you know, like, what am I gonna do? What do I want to do next? And I had some space just to kind of like think about it. And then this project that I'd been developing kind of right when the movie came out, um, Escape at Dannemora, this.

• 43:38Conan O'Brien?

  Yes.

• 43:39Speaker 02

  Yeah, this, uh, limited series about this prison escape in New York that happened in 2015. I think that was there and I had the time to work on it because I wasn't doing other stuff.

• 43:49Conan O'Brien?

  First of all, Escapadänamora, I love that and I loved, to me, it's about you get to craft something. You get to take some, some time. I know how much telling a story visually is important to you. And so you get time to, let's get this exactly the way we want it. And I always think the, the plus and minus of doing things that are live or done quickly is we'll grab it. It may not go our way. Sometimes when it goes well, you get the rush. When it goes badly, it's over and it's time to do another one. Um, but if you get to really craft something, it's a very different feeling, I would guess. Over a long period of time, you get to think about, what is this going to look like? How am I going to tell this story?

• 44:32Speaker 02

  Right. And which is daunting too, you know, because it's like, all right, how do I do this? But it's also, to me, it's like sort of the most subjective thing where you just go, okay, you know, how would, how do I see this? How would I want to see this? I think when I just got to the idea of like, basically like, what would I want to see? What would, because I do love comedy and I, I loved comedies growing up. But I also really love just dramatic movies.

• 44:57Conan O'Brien?

  Sure.

• 44:57Speaker 02

  Um, so I just started thinking like, well, what would I want to see? And with Escapadänamora, I was like, yeah, I would love to see this. If it was a movie, limited series, whatever, and the vibe and the feeling, I think for me was so much, like it was so clear. And yeah, then you just take the time and, and work again collaboratively with people who you think are really talented and you have a similar sensibility. And, you know, you have these partners, your cinematographer, production designer, costume designer. Um, Danamora was Michael Tolkien and Brett Johnson, these two great writers. And, you know, the truth of what happened in that story was to me was sort of like what I was like most interested in. Cause it scared me too, because I'd never done a prison escape.

• 45:41Speaker 02

  Movie and I was like, all right, well, I have no idea how to like, how do I do this and make it real? How do I make it feel authentic? And so I just went to the real facts and the and and the more I learned about what actually happened and got to the real places. I just said, all right, I'm just gonna go for the real thing because that was what was fascinating to me about that story. Was that how could a prison escape like this happen in 2015? It feels like something out of like Escape from Alcatraz or something.

• 46:05Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah, you don't think it's possible anymore.

• 46:07Speaker 02

  Yeah, and then you realize, oh, there's like the the system that's in place at this old prison. You know, it's it's there's so many places where, you know, things can go wrong. And also the hierarchy of how it works there in terms of with the the guards and the prisoners and you know, the, I mean, the dynamics in a prison, it's a huge prison too. So, you know, it's like its own little, you know, city or something. And so the more I talked to real people who experienced it.

• 46:35Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah.

• 46:36Speaker 02

  And got the details, I was just, that was really fun for me. And then cinematically, yeah, it's fun to like figure out how to do something that, you know, hopefully look cool and be intriguing.

• 46:44Conan O'Brien?

  Did you ever consider being imprisoned for several years? Do you really?

• 46:50Conan O'Brien?

  I mean, if you really, I'm sorry, if you really, if he really wants to capture the story.

• 46:54Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 46:54Conan O'Brien?

  I think you should have, if you took it seriously, I think you would have done three years in prison.

• 46:59Speaker 01

  Years?

• 47:00Conan O'Brien?

  If you want, how, you know what I mean?

• 47:02Speaker 01

  Not like days?

• 47:02Conan O'Brien?

  I thought you did a fantastic job, but think about what you could have done if you had been in prison.

• 47:06Speaker 02

  If I'd actually experienced it.

• 47:07Speaker 03

  Would you ever consider going to prison for three years?

• 47:09Conan O'Brien?

  I would like to be put in prison. Many of our listeners want me in prison right now. Well, this this leads me nicely to Severance because I'm lucky enough to be friendly, friends with and encounter people all the time, especially in the comedy world and acting world. And so I kind of semi know Adam Scott and my wife and I watch Severance when it comes out. And I shortly after that, I see Adam Scott and I said, that was the best thing that's been on television in in in memory. That was fantastic. He was like, oh, you know, thanks a lot, man. And I was like, no, no, no. And I like, I think I put my hand on his chest, like, no, no, no.

• 47:46Speaker 01

  Jesus.

• 47:46Conan O'Brien?

  You don't understand.

• 47:48Speaker 01

  Why?

• 47:48Conan O'Brien?

  I know there's a show business thing. I wanted, he's, have you felt his chest, Adam Scott's chest?

• 47:52Speaker 01

  I have not, no.

• 47:53Conan O'Brien?

  You haven't lived that. No, but my, you know, the way there's a show business thing of, hey, man, I saw your thing. It was really good and it's it's, you'll say it about me at some point, but.

• 48:04Speaker 01

  That's so sad.

• 48:05Conan O'Brien?

  But it'll come out naturally or we'll edit it in.

• 48:08Speaker 02

  And I'll touch your chest.

• 48:11Conan O'Brien?

  But I, it was very important to me to, to let him know, no, no, no, no, I'm not doing that thing.

• 48:17Speaker 02

  Right.

• 48:17Conan O'Brien?

  I'm doing this other thing where, and he was, you know, appreciative, I think, and then just wanted to get away.

• 48:25Conan O'Brien?

  But, um, but the quality of the storytelling, the intricacy of it, the respect, the respect it has for the audience. It's so smart and there's so many layers to it that there's, I mean, I've, I've gone into deep dives where people discuss, you know, just various levels of it and it all holds up because when you put that much thought into something, it's really beautiful when people appreciate it and see it.

• 48:50Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 48:51Conan O'Brien?

  And start to go like, oh, wait a minute, what do you think's going on? And the whole concept of Severance is fantastic.

• 48:57Speaker 02

  Yeah, that's great to hear in that the trust you can have for the audience, which you, you have to sort of like take a, sort of runner on and kind of, you know, just go, okay, I'm gonna believe that they're gonna get this. But, you know, you never go bad when you don't underestimate the audience.

• 49:14Conan O'Brien?

  Yes.

• 49:14Speaker 02

  You know what I mean? Because, because people are smart and, and especially now, people watch television so closely and they appreciate it so much and they look forward to it. And I, so that's, that's a great thing to know that people will pick up these little things. But we made the show in a, in a bubble during COVID with no, you know, no, you know, you make the whole series and then you put it out. So there's no feedback.

• 49:38Conan O'Brien?

  You don't, you don't know, you've basically built this giant contraption and you put it out there and you don't know, is it going to work?

• 49:45Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 49:45Conan O'Brien?

  What if people watch the first episode and say, I don't care?

• 49:48Speaker 02

  It's not like, like the opposite of doing like a late night show or something where, right? You're getting feedback every day.

• 49:53Conan O'Brien?

  Every second.

• 49:54Speaker 02

  Right, right. And so it was one of the, a great experience making it. Um, and then near the end I was like, oh, I, wow, I hope people, I hope people get it. I hope they like it. This is, we've been working on this thing for a couple of years. Like this could be either good or it could just be like, oh, you know, maybe nobody's gonna even see it.

• 50:14Conan O'Brien?

  Well, the reaction was insane.

• 50:15Speaker 02

  It was great.

• 50:16Conan O'Brien?

  Insane.

• 50:16Speaker 02

  It was great. It's as great as anything I've been a part of and, you know, and you know. Being in the business so long, like you never know how people are gonna react to stuff. And when it's great, it's so great. And when it's not great, it sucks. But you're and but it's not that different, the experience of whatever you make, you know, it was something that gets well received or not. It's you're still putting your all into it.

• 50:36Conan O'Brien?

  Well, I've always said it takes a lot of talented people working really hard to make something shitty. Meaning when you see something and we everyone sits around and hate watches it or says this is bad. That was a lot of often times very talented people working really hard and it just didn't come out quite the way they want it to, or it came out at the wrong time, or whatever.

• 50:55Speaker 02

  Right, whatever it is.

• 50:55Conan O'Brien?

  Whatever it was. And then those same people can work on something and it can be absolutely amazing.

• 51:02Speaker 02

  And you're all in on it the whole time.

• 51:04Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah.

• 51:04Speaker 02

  So you can't go back. And it's just sort of like, okay, so this is it.

• 51:07Conan O'Brien?

  There are these moments, I talked to you earlier about there are always these moments in your work where I I remember them. They're really fantastic. There was a moment, there's so many moments in the first season of Severance that were, first of all, the look of it. And there are moments as where I think you as a director, the use of corridors and ceilings, like I, when I watch this show, I feel like I'm I'm down underground and I'm in that place. And it's a very specific, the lighting, the look of it, the vibe, you've got these great wide like flat shots sometimes, and it it does feel a little bit like Kubrick or something.

• 51:49Conan O'Brien?

  It's just like all the references are absolutely incredible and bears rewatching, like you can rewatch it over and over and over again. It's really hypnotic. But there's a moment with the actor, he plays Lance, is it Tremel Tillman?

• 52:02Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 52:02Conan O'Brien?

  There's a moment, I'm not giving anything away, where he goes into a dance in this first season. And it's my favorite moment in television of that year, because it's not part of his character. But then he goes into this kind of dance and the way you shoot it, and I think I've watched it like 20 times. I don't know this gentleman. He, I please tell him I'm his biggest fan. But that was my favorite moment. It was so, it came at me in such a weird way from the side. You know what I mean? It came through my peripheral vision. And it was so fantastic. And the way it was scored, the music and, and the tension building while he's doing this, kind of what's supposed to be a joyous thing.

• 52:46Conan O'Brien?

  It was, it's sort of David Lynch. It's, it's everything. It's like 15 different flavors.

• 52:52Speaker 02

  A confluence of events that came together. I didn't even know he was gonna dance like that.

• 52:56Conan O'Brien?

  It's dancing. Dancing is fantastic.

• 52:59Speaker 02

  Same thing Tom Cruise dancing. Like I didn't know Tom Cruise was gonna dance like that.

• 53:02Conan O'Brien?

  Did this guy have in his contract though?

• 53:05Speaker 02

  No, but it, you know, that was also, yeah, one of those things where it was just like, I was, I felt the same way watching it. I was like, oh, this is so cool. And I love watching this. I could watch it over and over again. And I think as a director, you kind of, not to, it's not like you wanna like say, oh, my work is great. It's like you, as you're almost like an audience. You have to act as an audience and you're the sort of, like you have to make the choices based on being in an audience that you're projecting would be watching something.

• 53:30Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah, yeah.

• 53:30Speaker 02

  So I was, I love it too. I was like, I love watching. I was like, oh, this is really fun. I could watch this all day.

• 53:35Conan O'Brien?

  At the heart of this show is this concept. And again, this isn't giving anything away because anyone who's listening to this and you, you need to watch this show, but you, you also, if you haven't seen the first season, watch that. And the, the concept is people working at this company and to go into this company there, they descend and they're disassociated from their previous life. And they, so their work life and the person who's up above ground, they're the same person, but...

• 54:02Speaker 02

  Yeah, there's just a chip that's inserted into their head and it gets triggered when they go in the elevator down to work that they don't remember who they are upstairs.

• 54:09Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah.

• 54:10Speaker 02

  And they just know their reality at work. And then when they leave, the chip gets triggered again and they don't remember what happened to work.

• 54:15Conan O'Brien?

  And you see, there's a subtle thing you do with the lens when you're going, when Adam Scott's going down the, when the, the elevator. And, you know, I don't know what it is. I don't technically understand it, but something happens where you can see the focal point kind of changed just a little bit enough to know that they've gone through a transformation. So they're, everyone's severed from what's happening, what's happening to them in the top of the world. And there are so many analogies to that, which is why would these people choose to do that? And one of the things, and I might be fishing here, but it very much felt to me like, oh, this is like alcohol or drugs, people that, something happened in their life, they want to disassociate from it, and

• 54:58Conan O'Brien?

  anyone who's had issues with drugs or alcohol knows that there's a reason you're doing that. You want to be somebody else because being who you are and feeling that's too painful. It's just really, I mean, there's like 35 different scholars could talk about all the different things that are brought up in one way or another in Severance.

• 55:19Speaker 02

  And that's all Dan Erickson, the creator, the writer, you know, it was the first script that he had produced. It was a spec script he'd sent around. And Jackie Kohn at our company read our, read it and thought it was good. And, and I read it.

• 55:33Conan O'Brien?

  That's a spec script?

• 55:34Speaker 02

  That was a spec script, yeah. Yeah, it's good, good to know, right? For aspiring writers. And, and he had this amazing idea and this amazing facility in terms of how, you know, the tone of what, of his writing. But I agree with you, there's that analogy. You know, just the idea for me also of, these people are like coming into work and doing their thing and having their banter and kind of, you know, it's very like, kind of, you know, like an office comedy kind of vibe, but they don't know who they are, they don't know why they're there, and they don't know what they're doing. To me, that's like the life analogy. Yeah. Like, you know, that's, we're all here, you know? And we get settled in and we figure out how to get through and do it, but like, we don't ultimately know what it's all about. So I thought that was what was always resonated.

• 56:18Conan O'Brien?

  And the work they're doing is so, I mean, it's, it's really funny, what they're, the work they're doing on their computer screens is hilariously, I mean, it is analogous to how a lot of people feel about their jobs. Yeah. You know, I'm here moving these numbers around.

• 56:33Speaker 02

  Kind of widgets.

• 56:34Conan O'Brien?

  Widgets. I don't, and, and it doesn't make sense. When I watch it, it doesn't make sense, but when someone does it, they're like, good for you, you did it. And. I think many people, many Americans watching would say, uh, that's what it feels like.

• 56:50Speaker 03

  My daughter was role playing going to work the other day. I said, what do you do for work? She goes, I push buttons.

• 56:54Conan O'Brien?

  Yes. She's gonna go far, that kid.

• 56:58Speaker 02

  Well, Dan worked at a door factory when he came out to LA and that was where he got the idea. Cause he was just going crazy every day working at this door factory and he wanted to forget about it.

• 57:08Conan O'Brien?

  So he wrote, I mean, to me, it's also, it is a great message for people that there are a lot of people that say, oh, it's all who you know. And it's like, no, if you have a really good story to tell and a great idea and you write it, the cream does, the truth does out. The cream does rise to the top. If you put something out there that's of real quality, it's gonna bounce around and someone like he was gonna find it.

• 57:27Speaker 02

  Yeah. I mean, it's hard. It's hard to get the access for people, you know, to get that, that script in someone's hands. But I feel like in this business, everybody's always looking for that next thing, you know? Always looking for talent, looking for something that they're gonna read and is gonna excite them and feel, you know, feel new and different. And that's just always gonna be.

• 57:50Conan O'Brien?

  Also this cast you have, I mean, I mentioned Adam Scott and Britt Lauer is amazing and incredible in it. But also you've got John Turturro, you've got Christopher Walken. I mean, you've, you've got there. There's something really fascinating about this show, which is that people naturally, when they work together, want to create community. And there's something happening here at Lumen where they kinda really don't want people talking, they don't want people getting too close to each other.

• 58:18Speaker 02

  Right.

• 58:19Conan O'Brien?

  And that's another mystery. And I know, I think the reward of a show like this is that you get really smart fans online. And there are so many of them that are all arguing about what does this mean? And Eduardo, when I came in, Eduardo was, no, but, no Eduardo, you said, you said, you.

• 58:41Speaker 03

  I said, don't fuck this.

• 58:42Conan O'Brien?

  Don't fuck this up. This is severance, man. Don't fuck this up. And I'm like, well, Ben Stiller has been around a long time and we could shoot the shit about a lot of things. And I do intend to spend half the time talking about severance. You're like, you don't fuck it up.

• 58:57Speaker 02

  By the way, Eduardo, I totally get it. I know Conan a long time.

• 59:01Conan O'Brien?

  He's seen me fuck up a lot of stuff. But I read that, I read an interview with Patricia Arquette, who's amazing in the show, and she has this quote about you as a director. It was just about your tenacity, your, how hard you work, how important it is to you that you get it, that you get it right. It was just, it was really lovely.

• 59:18Speaker 02

  Yeah, oh, that's nice. Well, she's amazing. I mean, yeah, you know, I think we're all going through life and try, I feel like a kinship, seriously, to Conan, because I know how hard you work and how much it means to you, but you're also trying to figure out the work-life balance, which is part of the show too. And that's, that's important too. And I hope over the years, over the, I don't know, last whatever, you know, 20, 30 years, that I like, I've figured out that a little bit more, because you have to, there's a point where you work, work it and work and work it, but then you also have to like, also then be able to step back and go, okay, I can only control so much.

• 59:54Conan O'Brien?

  Yes. Yeah. I haven't gotten to that point yet. But I've heard tell, you can only control so much.

• 59:59Speaker 02

  I've learned the hard way, you know?

• 1:00:00Conan O'Brien?

  Well, but I will say on a personal note, like, when you walk in the door, you seem happy.

• 1:00:06Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:00:06Conan O'Brien?

  And I know that you're someone who, one of the, maybe the subtitle of this podcast could be, sometimes I want it to be, be careful who you envy. Like, I want to talk to people and let everyone know, everyone's got shit. Everyone has got things that they're dealing with. And predominantly, I get to talk to people like yourself who are very talented and have done this amazing work, and you're trying to figure out most of the things that everyone else is trying to figure out. So when you walked in, after all these years, to see that you look great, you seem happy, this, this is incredible work you're doing. And I love that you're able to say to yourself, yeah, I, I can go back and be in something again. I think you're gonna go back and maybe do a cameo in...

• 1:00:48Speaker 02

  I'm doing Happy Gilmore. I've got this little movie I did with David Gordon Green called Nutcrackers, that's on Hulu, and that I, we did, like, super low budget, and it was really fun.

• 1:00:58Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah. I mean, that's...

• 1:00:59Speaker 02

  But you can dip into that when you want, but you can enjoy this, and also enjoy your life. Yes. Well, that's, that's the big part of it, enjoying your life.

• 1:01:09Conan O'Brien?

  I mean, and that's, that's...

• 1:01:11Speaker 02

  And you and I are talking about it as if we don't know what that is.

• 1:01:13Conan O'Brien?

  I know, exactly. We've heard tell of this life thing. My agent tells me my children are thriving.

• 1:01:20Speaker 02

  You guys are severed.

• 1:01:21Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah, we are severed. We don't know what's happening. I don't, I think I'm told I have kids. I have to go up in the elevator and.

• 1:01:28Speaker 02

  No, you know, it's, you know, I have my, your kids are older too. I mean, my, my daughter's 22, my son's 19. And they will tell you, they'll give you feedback.

• 1:01:38Conan O'Brien?

  Oh, yeah.

• 1:01:39Speaker 02

  On how you're doing, you know, and I appreciate it. And we've actually, like, working on a documentary, I interviewed both my kids and Christine and, you know, we talked about stuff that's worked in our lives and stuff that hasn't worked in our lives. And um, my kids were very honest with me. You know, about times when my work was, I put my work in front of the family.

• 1:01:59Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah.

• 1:01:59Speaker 02

  And I'm very grateful that I'm in a place now where I still like have these relationships with them that we can work on and talk about that stuff and, you know, and adjust. Cause uh, cause it's true, you know, it's cliche, but it's true. But like, at the end of the day, that's what it's all really about. My joy comes from working and being creative, being creative, but sharing that with my family and like if you, like going home and not having anybody to share that with. I've had that because Christine and I were separated for a few years.

• 1:02:29Conan O'Brien?

  That's right.

• 1:02:29Speaker 02

  And, you know, that there's, you, it can, if it's, if that's the right thing for people, sometimes that's the right thing. But, you know, for me, having, being together with her and our family being together, I am so much more appreciative of it. So I feel really grateful.

• 1:02:43Conan O'Brien?

  Well, I am delighted for you. I'm really delighted.

• 1:02:46Speaker 02

  I figured it all out. I have no problems. And uh.

• 1:02:50Conan O'Brien?

  Why are you crying?

• 1:02:52Conan O'Brien?

  You're crying as you say it and it's tears of blood. It's just fucking weird.

• 1:02:58Speaker 02

  I just figured it all out.

• 1:03:01Conan O'Brien?

  Ben, just a uh, absolute joy to see you again and.

• 1:03:06Speaker 02

  You too, man.

• 1:03:06Conan O'Brien?

  I'm so uh, I'm so delighted for you. I really am.

• 1:03:10Speaker 02

  Thanks.

• 1:03:11Conan O'Brien?

  Genuinely, and, and I have a very just nice, funny little memory of I lived on, predominantly on the Upper West Side for years, all those years I was doing late night. And for some reason I would always run into your mom on the Upper West Side and she was so lovely to me and such a, and such a real person on the Upper West Side. You know, such an Upper West Side.

• 1:03:28Speaker 02

  And a fan of yours. She loves.

• 1:03:29Conan O'Brien?

  Oh, she was absolutely, you know, we Catholics have to stick up for each other.

• 1:03:33Speaker 02

  By the way, I just have to say also, there's, there is one scene at the end of the last episode of season two of Severance that I'm really looking forward to you seeing.

• 1:03:42Conan O'Brien?

  Oh, I'll.

• 1:03:43Speaker 02

  Because I feel like you of all people.

• 1:03:45Conan O'Brien?

  I will text you.

• 1:03:45Speaker 02

  Yeah, I know, we'll appreciate this little scene.

• 1:03:48Conan O'Brien?

  Okay, okay.

• 1:03:49Speaker 02

  And it might even seem to others who watch it maybe weird or indulgent, but I feel like it's like made for you.

• 1:03:56Conan O'Brien?

  If it's weird and indulgent, if it's weird and indulgent, I'm going to love it.

• 1:04:00Speaker 02

  All right, good.

• 1:04:00Speaker 03

  That's, that's what you are, weird and indulgent.

• 1:04:02Conan O'Brien?

  Okay, uh, I think I spelled it out enough. Yeah. Hey, Ben, thank you so much.

• 1:04:07Speaker 02

  Yeah, man.

• 1:04:07Conan O'Brien?

  And congrats on Severance.

• 1:04:09Speaker 02

  Great to see you. Thanks, man.

• 1:04:17Conan O'Brien?

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

• 1:04:19Speaker 01

  Yeah, I love awards.

• 1:04:20Conan 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.

• 1:04:34Speaker 01

  Nice.

• 1:04:35Conan 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.

• 1:04:43Speaker 01

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

• 1:04:48Conan O'Brien?

  I've been tooling around in a Ioniq 5N, which I love.

• 1:04:51Speaker 01

  Mm-hmm.

• 1:04:52Conan O'Brien?

  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?

• 1:05:07Speaker 01

  Hello.

• 1:05:08Conan 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 US News Best Cars at cars.usnews.com and call 562-314-4603 for complete details.

• 1:05:42Conan O'Brien?

  This fall, LL Bean is celebrating the moments people look forward to all year. The first school drop-off, the first sweater weather day, and the first chilly evening around the fire pit. For over 100 years, LL Bean has been part of these traditions. Crunching leaves in Maine-made Bean Boots, cheering from the sidelines in Scotch plaid flannel, and walking the dog in a rugged field coat. So grab the layers and people you love and get outside, because that's what makes fall feel like home. Visit llbean.com to shop the fall collection. LL Bean: Be an Outsider.

• 1:06:21Conan O'Brien?

  Coca-Cola Zero Sugar is so good, it's almost impossible not to finish it before the meal arrives. It's just too good to wait. That happens to me sometimes. Me too. You can try rules like no sipping until the appetizer arrives, or you tell your friend, "Don't let me touch my glass." But every time you're staring at an empty glass... So if you've ever finished your Coke Zero before the first fry hits the table, you're among friends. It happens. Occupational hazard with Coke Zero. Yeah. Real Coca-Cola taste, zero sugar, too good to wait. Enjoy an ice-cold Coca-Cola Zero Sugar today.

• 1:07:02Speaker 03

  Okay, we found that something very interesting happened with a fan of yours, and more specifically, some merchandise from this podcast.

• 1:07:11Conan O'Brien?

  Okay.

• 1:07:12Speaker 03

  And this comes from Instagram. We're gonna take a listen to it, or watch it if you're watching this on YouTube.

• 1:07:17Conan O'Brien?

  Okay, let's take a look.

• 1:07:19Speaker 04

  I fought a burglar for wearing my Conan O'Brien Needs a Friend t-shirt. There was a man in my house. And I told him, you know, "This is my house, get out." Then I saw he was wearing my Conan O'Brien t-shirt. I ordered him to take it off. He did not, and so I did a stupid thing. And I went up to him, I pushed him a little bit, and yanked the shirt right off of him. You might be... Thinking, yeah, that is stupid. Why would you react that way? It's just a shirt. And I think it's partially because what that shirt represented to me at that time.

• 1:08:01Speaker 04

  All the comedians I had watched, I told them they they saved me. When I saw him wearing a shirt that represented why I like living. I love laughing, I love comedy, I love all of that. All the friends that I made. I snapped. Oh, my God, happiest day of my life. I did meet him. Best day of 2024. Um, he still doesn't know the story because he just signed my shirt, took this picture and left. It was like midnight.

• 1:08:34Speaker 03

  So this comes to us from an Instagram username True Travels of Hope. My first thought is that were you the burglar just trying to get the shirt?

• 1:08:46Conan O'Brien?

  Yes, I do try to reuse merchandise as much as possible. Because we know where our merchandise is sent. And so I try to go there. So I'm often in my downtime, patrolling the Midwest, the southern states, the southwest, the Pacific Northwest, looking for people wearing Conan Merchant. And I just try to reclaim it as best I can. So we can sell it a second time.

• 1:09:11Speaker 03

  That's what it was.

• 1:09:12Conan O'Brien?

  And I do sometimes take other stuff while I'm in the houses.

• 1:09:15Speaker 03

  Might as well. I noticed because she's wearing one of those shirts for the podcast that say, I feel blank about being Conan O'Brien's friend. And there's a spot where you can literally fill it in with a marker. And she has not done that yet.

• 1:09:26Conan O'Brien?

  She's still not sure how she feels. Well, what do we think of this story?

• 1:09:31Speaker 01

  I really wish she wouldn't have confronted this robber.

• 1:09:35Conan O'Brien?

  Yes, I'm going to say that, too. I think, and I want to say this to all my fans. If someone, and first of all, let me start by saying to this woman, True Travels of Hope. I want to say to True Travels of Hope that I very much appreciate that you're a loyal fan and that our nonsense has meant something to you. And so this comes from the bottom of my heart. Our merchandise is not worth risking your life for. This is very shoddy material.

• 1:10:05Conan O'Brien?

  It's often repurposed.

• 1:10:06Speaker 03

  Some of it might be toxic and endangering your life.

• 1:10:09Conan O'Brien?

  Exactly, yeah. That's an old Friday Night Lights shirt. That we, yeah, that we spray painted over. Using a, really, an out of date spray paint. So, no, do not risk your life, do not approach a burglar. If, if anyone approaches you and says, you know, "Give me that Conan O'Brien merch", just give it up. Just give it up.

• 1:10:32Speaker 03

  It's funny, you should say that she shouldn't approach him, because I feel like the first thing that you would do-

• 1:10:35Speaker 01

  I would absolutely approach him.

• 1:10:37Conan O'Brien?

  Not for a Conan O'Brien shirt.

• 1:10:38Speaker 01

  Not for, no, but like-

• 1:10:40Conan O'Brien?

  But if someone was wearing like your Cher shirt-

• 1:10:42Speaker 01

  Oh, if someone was in my house, and like, first of all, he just put a shirt on?

• 1:10:47Speaker 03

  I know.

• 1:10:48Conan O'Brien?

  Also, here's another thing. She said she ripped it off, like he's a stripper. Like it's a tearaway shirt.

• 1:10:55Speaker 03

  I think the shirts are so threadbare and cheap that you can just rip them off.

• 1:10:59Conan O'Brien?

  Or, most Conan, most people that own Conan merch are so, and I'm speaking about myself in the third person, so love Conan, that they rarely take it off, and it becomes threadbare more quickly, hence easily to tear. So I think that's a possibility. I don't know. I, I, I don't think people should be, should be risking their lives for Conan merch.

• 1:11:21Speaker 03

  No.

• 1:11:22Conan O'Brien?

  Especially the mugs. I mean, the mugs often explode. That's been proven.

• 1:11:26Speaker 03

  Mugs could be good weapons.

• 1:11:28Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah. No, not, not our mugs. They just turned to powder the minute you hit someone. But it's, it's nice. She did say we met, but she doesn't say where we met. She said it was midnight, and I can't tell from the picture where we were. So maybe it's when I broke back into the house to get the shirt back, after my initial failed attempt.

• 1:11:45Speaker 01

  It would have been really funny if you were just like an absolute dick to her. If you were just like, "Ugh, I don't like taking pictures, dumb fans."

• 1:11:54Speaker 03

  He broke back into the house so he could get a selfie, and so he could force her to sign-

• 1:11:58Conan O'Brien?

  I'm the guy that asks people, "Would you like a selfie",

• 1:12:01Speaker 03

  Yes.

• 1:12:02Conan O'Brien?

  when often, they don't even have a phone.

• 1:12:05Speaker 03

  Like the sirens are down the street, and he breaks back in going, "I haven't signed your shirt yet." Would you like me to sign it?

• 1:12:12Conan O'Brien?

  That would be more likely.

• 1:12:13Speaker 01

  Oh, okay.

• 1:12:13Conan O'Brien?

  But, um, well, I, I'm, I'm glad she got her shirt back.

• 1:12:17Speaker 03

  I'm glad she's okay.

• 1:12:18Conan O'Brien?

  I'm glad she's okay, but I do think we should take a lesson away from this that, you know, look, if it's Marvel merchandise, yes, fight for your life to get it back.

• 1:12:27Speaker 03

  That's the weird thing. What's the motivation of the burglar? What, this is what they decide to take, you know?

• 1:12:32Conan O'Brien?

  Well, first of all, okay, that, now you're being a dick.

• 1:12:34Speaker 03

  Well, I'm on this podcast too.

• 1:12:34Speaker 01

  What I used to steal.

• 1:12:36Speaker 03

  Yes.

• 1:12:36Speaker 01

  I used to just be like, can I do it?

• 1:12:39Speaker 03

  Oh.

• 1:12:39Speaker 01

  And so it wasn't about what I was stealing. It was about, could, like, and also I got very arrogant. Like, I would wear a bracelet in the store and I'd just be like, I'm gonna walk out wearing the bracelet.

• 1:12:50Conan O'Brien?

  I remember once Sona, I, Sona and I were in Worcester, Massachusetts, and there is, uh, an armory there and it, there's a, an armor museum. A museum of, like, Flemish, British, uh, French armor from 18th and 19th century. And we were in there, and this is during Sona's, let me see if I can get away with this phase. Sona walked out wearing a full suit of armor.

• 1:13:20Speaker 01

  If you act like you were wearing it in, they would just be like, oh, she's just leaving in the outfit.

• 1:13:25Conan O'Brien?

  It was from 1622. And it had all this fancy filigree on it. And so the guy said, excuse me, miss, I think you, and she was like, what? What? I was wearing this on the way in. You're racist.

• 1:13:38Speaker 01

  Oh, my god.

• 1:13:39Conan O'Brien?

  Remember when you said you're racist?

• 1:13:40Speaker 01

  No.

• 1:13:41Conan O'Brien?

  And you had the visor down, so he didn't even know, right? He didn't know who you were.

• 1:13:46Speaker 01

  Right? Look, I liked just like showing, hey, I just took it.

• 1:13:52Conan O'Brien?

  Yeah.

• 1:13:52Speaker 01

  And it's, you know, most of the time if you walk out confidently, people are just gonna be like, okay, it belongs to her.

• 1:13:56Conan O'Brien?

  It was a suit of armor that you stole from Worcester, Massachusetts. And you, you should give it back.

• 1:14:03Speaker 01

  That was such a buildup to what you were gonna say. There was so much just information.

• 1:14:08Conan O'Brien?

  Well, listen. Always appreciate.

• 1:14:11Speaker 01

  Did we go to?

• 1:14:12Conan O'Brien?

  There's a, there's a, can you look up the, uh, what's this, the Museum of Armor?

• 1:14:16Speaker 03

  We're fact checking this?

• 1:14:17Conan O'Brien?

  Yes.

• 1:14:18Speaker 03

  This fake story?

• 1:14:19Speaker 01

  It's not fake.

• 1:14:20Conan O'Brien?

  It really happened.

• 1:14:21Speaker 01

  It really happened.

• 1:14:22Conan O'Brien?

  Worcester, Massachusetts, Museum of Armor. Come on. What do you mean, "I'm working on it"?

• 1:14:28Speaker 01

  Once I had a headband.

• 1:14:29Conan O'Brien?

  Higgins Armory? Yes! Higgins Armory. It was the one thing when I would go visit my cousins, every time, my aunt would say, it would be raining out, and we'd be like, "We got nothing to do, and what is there to do in Worcester?" And she'd say, "Go to the Museum of Armor." Oh my god. And so we'd drive over to the Higgins Museum of Armor. And there was no attempt to make it look interesting, just literally a giant warehouse, and someone had lots of suits of armor that they just laid out. They didn't even put mannequins in them.

• 1:15:01Speaker 01

  I feel like you would enjoy that, though. Did you act like you weren't excited because you didn't want your cousins to think you were...

• 1:15:07Conan O'Brien?

  Truth be told?

• 1:15:07Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:15:08Conan O'Brien?

  Greatest days of my life.

• 1:15:11Conan O'Brien?

  Boy, did this little orange-haired boy love a suit of armor. Oh, look, it's Dutch! Hey, Luke! Hey, Neil! I found one that's Dutch!

• 1:15:25Conan O'Brien?

  And then the beatings commenced. Anyway, take care, fans. Don't stop crime. And visit the Higgins Armor Museum in Worcester, Massachusetts.

• 1:15:42Speaker 03

  Conan O'Brien Needs a Friend with Conan O'Brien, Sonam of Sessian, 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.

• 1:16:03Speaker 03

  Our supervising producer is Aaron 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.

• 1:16:52Speaker 03

  Hey, it's me, Teddy Swims. You hear that? That's life. So go grab it. Grab your old friends, grab new friends, grab a White Claw. Grab flavor for everyone in your group. Grab music, laughter, and moments you'll never forget. You'll never regret it. Oh, hey, man. Grab new friends, grab old friends, grab life by the glow. White Claw. Please drink responsibly. White Claw Celta Works, Chicago, Illinois.

• 1:17:22Conan 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.

• 1:17:31Speaker 01

  Yeah, you're right.

• 1:17:32Conan O'Brien?

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

• 1:17:36Speaker 01

  That's good.

• 1:17:36Conan O'Brien?

  Did we use a salary guide with you, Sona?

• 1:17:39Speaker 01

  No, but maybe...

• 1:17:40Conan O'Brien?

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

• 1:17:42Speaker 01

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

• 1:17:45Conan O'Brien?

  Well, anyway, now you 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.