Alan Yang

[0] Hi, my name is Alan Yang, and I feel like I'm weirdly fulfilling a childhood dream thing about being Conan Bryan's friend.

[1] That's how I feel right now.

[2] This was something that was prophesized.

[3] You met an old man on a bridge, and he said, one day!

[4] It was a troll, and it was underneath a bridge.

[5] Fall is here, hear the yell, back to school, ring the bell, brandy shoes, walking loose, climb the fence, books and pens I can tell that we are going to be friends I can tell that we are going to be friends Hey there I'm Conan O 'Brien Welcome to Conan O 'Brien Needs a Friend We have a terrific episode for you today And as always I'm joined by Matt Goreley Our fearless producer, hey Matt Hi boss That's nice of you to call me boss To acknowledge my alpha status Well you get one of those a year as opposed to the hey shithead.

[6] You get 50 of those a year.

[7] I get 50 those a year.

[8] And of course, filling in Fersona, who's off -minding.

[9] She calls them the two little gentlemen.

[10] Those are Mikey and Charlie, her twins.

[11] She says, they're my little gentleman, which is a very nice way to describe two infants that are just shrieking and pooping all over the place.

[12] That's all they're doing.

[13] Speaking of shrieking and pooping, here is...

[14] Oh.

[15] Well, I'm sorry.

[16] You do both.

[17] Okay.

[18] David Hopping.

[19] Hi.

[20] You're doing a great job, David.

[21] Oh, thank you.

[22] Yeah, you really do.

[23] Just as we were starting, I was about to tell the group that I saw this great documentary last night on the painter who used to be on PBS and he would paint portraits.

[24] I don't know.

[25] You're a very young fellow, David.

[26] I don't know if you're aware of him, Bob Ross.

[27] Yeah.

[28] Do you know what I'm talking about?

[29] I do.

[30] Yeah.

[31] Did you see this documentary, Matt?

[32] Yes, I sure did.

[33] I'm a huge fan of Bob Ross, not only.

[34] as an artist, but just like someone to put on in the background when I need to like calm anxiety.

[35] He's just like, yeah, he's incredible.

[36] It's a really great documentary about Bob Ross.

[37] I never knew the whole story, but it's all about where he came from, how this guy came to be just painting landscape portraits on television and how it went on for years and years and years.

[38] And he just became incredibly successful.

[39] But of course, the part of the documentary that's kind of tragic is how he was exploiting.

[40] by these people around him.

[41] And this husband and wife team sort of exploited him and got his name and likeness and they got the rights to all of it.

[42] And they really screwed him over and screwed over his family.

[43] And it's just a very powerful documentary.

[44] And it just got me thinking, what if this happens to me?

[45] Because I was watching it.

[46] And you know how you have this tendency, Matt.

[47] Whenever I look at anything, I immediately make it about me. Yeah, I do know that.

[48] Yeah.

[49] Yeah, that's sort of, that's called pulling a Conan.

[50] So I'm watching this, and I'm watching this really sweet, just font of creativity and talent.

[51] That's where your theory falls apart, though, I think.

[52] Excuse me. What, sorry.

[53] I'm not done yet.

[54] Let me just get through this before you start with your zings and your barbs and your har -hars, okay?

[55] I saw Bob Ross was well known as being just this incredibly talented guy and just a magnetic, you know, once in a century talent and he's on television and people love him and he's very sweet and all he cares about is the work.

[56] Sound familiar, Matt?

[57] All he cares about is making a good podcast or a good late night show.

[58] I'm sorry, I forgot, I'm not talking about Bob now.

[59] But all he cares about is putting out quality and connecting with people and being real and spreading his infectious joy.

[60] and connecting people to his God -given talent and bringing people of Earth closer together.

[61] But then these people come along and say, hey, we could monetize this, you know?

[62] Who are you getting at?

[63] Well, I'm just saying it's something I worry about, but, you know, our podcast guru, Adam Sacks, I don't even know if he's here.

[64] Is he here?

[65] Is he here at all?

[66] I'm always here.

[67] Oh, my God!

[68] For God's sake, announce yourself if you're here.

[69] He's right behind me. God!

[70] He's in the apartment with you!

[71] He's calling from inside the podcast.

[72] Adam, I'm just going to ask you right off.

[73] Have you been secretly conspiring to get full rights to my face, likeness, and vocal characteristics?

[74] Yes or no?

[75] No, no, no, absolutely not.

[76] Spoken like someone who was doing exactly that.

[77] Like, two weeks ago, it was very late at night, and Adam showed up at my house, and he said, quick, sign these papers.

[78] Now, Adam knows I start drinking at around 7 p .m. That's true.

[79] You start drinking and wielding an ink pen around in the air.

[80] Yeah.

[81] Well, it's one of my affectations when I've been drinking a lot is I get a Montblanc pen and I wave it around and I say I'll sign anything.

[82] Sign anything I will.

[83] Ding dong, it's 11 o 'clock at night.

[84] My wife says, who could that be?

[85] I open the door and it's Adam with all these papers.

[86] And I didn't see much.

[87] I saw a name, likeness, ownership, for all of eternity, something like that.

[88] And then I just start signing stuff.

[89] And I said, what is this stuff, Adam?

[90] And Adam said, don't you worry.

[91] Don't you worry.

[92] Sleep.

[93] So I did.

[94] I went to sleep.

[95] So anyway, then I see the Bob Ross documentary, and I start to worry.

[96] Now, Adam, I don't know what's going on, but I just beg you, please, if you're conspiring to destroy me, because I'm up there.

[97] I'm not, no, I'm not conspiring.

[98] I think it's my job to protect you.

[99] That's what I'm doing is protecting you.

[100] Oh, man. Oh, man. That's what the people say.

[101] I protect the talent.

[102] Like a godfather protects small businesses.

[103] All Adam ever says to me is, don't you worry, I'll protect you.

[104] And I'll say, well, just tell me what's going on.

[105] He goes, sleep.

[106] And a lot of the time, it's like, when he's saying that to me, it's one o 'clock in the afternoon.

[107] And we're standing in a brightly lit parking lot.

[108] Los Angeles.

[109] And I'm like, sleep.

[110] And he just goes, sleep.

[111] Is he petting you?

[112] No, he has this, it's weird.

[113] He takes out what I thought at first was a watch fob, but it's just a little medallion, and he swings it like a pendulum in front of me, and he says, sleep.

[114] And I always wake up like three hours later.

[115] Just wherever you are.

[116] And there's ink all over my hands, because I guess I've been signing like crazy.

[117] Yeah.

[118] I can't wait for this documentary.

[119] I want to pitch this as a documentary of a, and a documentary that will just infuriate people because it'll be presenting me as in this way that people don't see me. Adam, why don't you make it?

[120] You have his rights.

[121] And you're loaded now.

[122] This will be my first project.

[123] Yeah, this will be your first project is the destruction of Conan O 'Brien.

[124] A beloved national treasure.

[125] Immediately, reviewers like, what the fuck?

[126] It goes straight to some unknown streaming service.

[127] Yeah, it goes, yeah.

[128] And then sell it to a streaming service that may not even exist.

[129] CISO.

[130] Coming soon on CISO, the destruction of Conan O 'Brien.

[131] Wait, so how will you ever know if Adam has given up or cease control of your name and likeness?

[132] You know what?

[133] I go by sitcom logic.

[134] If you watch any sitcom from the 60s or 70s, the minute a character comes into money, any money, that character immediately enters the set wearing the same thing every time which is a yachting cap and a blue blazer that was the 1960s and they always say things like well I know such and such a character just came into a lot of money but he saw it as a rock it won't change him and just then they go hello it's yotting cap and blue blazer so I'm always looking and that goes for like all the way through all the sitcoms in the 70s and 80s yawning cap blue blazer that's when you know people have come into a fortune.

[135] So I've got my eyes peeled.

[136] I don't have an accountant.

[137] I don't do any forensics on the books here at Team Coco.

[138] I just look for any employee who's wearing a yachting cap and a blue blazer and suddenly talking in a very cocky accent like Thurston Hell of the Third.

[139] That's how well know.

[140] All right, well, I'm very excited.

[141] My guest today is an Emmy award -winning writer, director, and producer who has worked on such shows is Parks and Recreation, the Good Place and Master of None.

[142] Now, he's hosting a new podcast with Rob Loe right here on the Team Coco Podcast Network.

[143] It's called Parks and Recollection.

[144] And it is the definitive Parks and Recreation Rewatch podcast.

[145] It premieres tomorrow, September 14th, and the trailer is already up.

[146] So check it out and subscribe now so you don't miss the premiere episode.

[147] I am very excited to talk to this gentleman today.

[148] He is very talented.

[149] Alan Yang, welcome.

[150] You were interested in comedy at a very early age, right?

[151] Yeah, it's a thing where, again, this is just, we were talking about David Letterman earlier.

[152] For me, you were like Letterman because I didn't watch Letterman.

[153] So I just, that was comedy.

[154] To me, it was The Simpsons, S &L, Seinfeld, and Conan was late night to me. So this is a weird thing for me. Well, that's very cool of you to say.

[155] And we're just going to put that on the loop, if you don't mind.

[156] We're just going to put that over and over and over again.

[157] Truly, it's more of a function of my age.

[158] It's not like I like you better than let it.

[159] Exactly.

[160] It's really just my age.

[161] No, exactly.

[162] Exactly.

[163] You just weren't alive when Dave was hitting it out of the park.

[164] That's all.

[165] I'll start, first of all, by congratulating you on the podcast you're doing with Mr. Rob Lowe.

[166] and it's called Parks and Recollection.

[167] This is a show that I'm very excited about.

[168] Yes, full disclosure, it's part of our Team Coco empire, if you will.

[169] But you guys talking about that show, which I really admire, which you wrote on, and so you have all this access to how it was put together, as does Rob from a different angle.

[170] Sounds like a very cool project.

[171] Yeah, and you producing has nothing to do with me being here.

[172] Zero.

[173] Oh, not at all.

[174] I had, you know what, let me tell you something.

[175] Alan, I'm at a point in my career where I don't even know what I'm involved in anymore.

[176] It's an empire.

[177] It's an empire.

[178] It's a chandelion, you know.

[179] No, it really is.

[180] It really is.

[181] I am.

[182] And so there are there are times where people remind me, hey, Conan, you have a big part of ExxonMobil.

[183] Right.

[184] Like you're a major stockholder.

[185] And I'm like, oh, I didn't know.

[186] And that's when you encourage them to just forget safety precautions, send the boats out there no matter what the weather and are just hey they're getting paid the last time I checked they were getting money and I say if there's a rough seas uh in the North Atlantic get out there and get the oil that's what I say to them who cares where the icebergs are no but the podcast no the podcast has been really fun we just started recording it and and uh god at first to be honest I was like I don't know if I want to watch all these episodes again it's a lot of time let's let's bring people up to date you yeah you worked for were you there the entire time I was there for 125 episodes.

[187] As far as writers go, Mike Sher, the co -creator and me, I think we're the only ones who were there the whole time.

[188] Right.

[189] Yeah.

[190] So, yeah.

[191] And so you were there at that show, and I remembered I'm obviously very good friends with Greg Daniels, who was responsible for bringing the office to the United States.

[192] And then, of course, you know, had a hand in getting Parks and Rec going.

[193] And so I was very familiar with both shows.

[194] And I remember the office had kind of a slow start initially and then took off.

[195] Parks and Rec, it didn't happen right away for Parks and Rec.

[196] It's still taking off now.

[197] It's 2021.

[198] It was, though, season one, it was definitely almost an identical trajectory to the office.

[199] And I think for similar reasons, because if you look at the office, what Greg gave with the office, again, a brilliant show, he's adapting it from a British one.

[200] And so the first season is a little bit closer to the British one.

[201] and then the second season kind of sprouts its wings and flies on its own and becomes its own thing.

[202] And Parks and Rec started, was conceived at first was maybe going to be an office spin -off, and then it wasn't.

[203] And so that first season, I think Mike and Greg were still trying to work out kinks and trying to feel, okay, how different from the office tonally, et cetera.

[204] And then second season, it really starts taking off.

[205] And part of that was taking on Amy Palmer's personality as well and making use of her.

[206] A really good TV show, in my opinion, is not a finite thing.

[207] It's an organism.

[208] The shows I've always really loved.

[209] If you look at The Simpsons, for example, you can look at the first season, and Dan Castlenetta does not have Homer's voice yet.

[210] His way into Homer was he sort of thought of his voice as being a Walter Mathau kind of voice.

[211] And you can listen to that first year of The Simpsons.

[212] And that's a lot of boy.

[213] Yeah, it's a lot of boy.

[214] Boy, get here, boy.

[215] Now you listen to me. And then it changes.

[216] And then they find it.

[217] And I think shows, like a lot of things, and probably like a restaurant or, you know, so many endeavors, you need to figure it out.

[218] You need to, you find it by doing it.

[219] And I think people sometimes misunderstand and think it's a widget.

[220] It's something that's manufactured, and you're cranking them out, and you do 22, and then the next 22.

[221] The only way you really know what your show is is by doing it.

[222] My late -night shows were constantly changing and morphing, and often sometimes not by design.

[223] It was just sheer desperation.

[224] We don't have anything today.

[225] I know let's, what if a bear, masturbated?

[226] And then suddenly you're off on that, and you've hit what many call a renaissance.

[227] Of the form of television, of television in general.

[228] Well, just as far as masturbation humor goes, I think quite fairly a renaissance.

[229] But yeah, it's fascinating to me that these things and evolve, and it's, it was not all assigned on day one.

[230] It's fascinating.

[231] It's exactly what you said, which is, and you lived on the long end of this, right?

[232] You're doing a daily show, a show, you can really react to what the audiences think, you know, how they're reacting, what you're like as a host, what Andy's doing, whatever.

[233] All of that stuff, you can react.

[234] It's a read and react type thing.

[235] And so with a show like Parks, they don't make that shows that run that long anymore.

[236] So, you know, we went on to do.

[237] Master of Nunn, it's been six years.

[238] We've done 25 episodes of Master.

[239] You know, it's like, it's so crazy.

[240] Aziz, Aziz is now, I tuned in the other day, he's 65 years old.

[241] Yeah, it just keeps going.

[242] And he's on his third hip.

[243] Yes, that kind of television where you're just cranking it out every day and going through massive arcs, sort of creative arcs, over three -month periods.

[244] Yeah.

[245] And, you know, people saw it or they didn't.

[246] There was no checking it out later on online.

[247] And now when you go back and watch it, and for a lot of people for the first time, they say, wait a minute, there's something going on here.

[248] And I think that's what's happened with Parks and Rec is that it's enjoyed a renaissance.

[249] I'm friends with Nick Offerman, and he's said the same thing.

[250] Like, this is fascinating that people are finding the show now.

[251] And we, it's been, what has it been, 10 years since you guys made one?

[252] Yeah, and it's a fun as hell rewatch.

[253] That's what I'm realizing while rewatching it.

[254] It's almost perfect.

[255] designed for right now, 2020, 2021, the darkest time in a long time where everyone's indoors.

[256] You're looking for something warm, something heartfelt, something comforting.

[257] It's a great rewatch.

[258] I sound like an NBC executive right now, but literally like while watching it, it's...

[259] Yeah, I was going into night terrorists.

[260] Yeah, yeah.

[261] Just for something, I smell sulfur in the room.

[262] There are people like Nick Offerman, as good as he is, there's going to be part of him that's always Ron Swanson because the show was so written towards him.

[263] I knew Nick before he did Parks and Rec and I had once gone on a bicycle ride with Nick and his chain exploded while we were riding and this was in Seattle, long story.

[264] And I didn't even know him.

[265] He wasn't a famous actor.

[266] He was still a couple of years away from doing Parks and Rec.

[267] And he went and he found a stone and said, well, hang on now.

[268] I have to rebuild this story.

[269] chain using a stone, and I watched him forge a new chain using stones.

[270] Come on.

[271] I'm not kidding.

[272] And he fixed the chaining, and he went, well, there you go.

[273] Off we are now.

[274] And yeah, and with his mustache, and I thought, this is unbelievable.

[275] What an unbelievable character.

[276] It's like if Theodore Roosevelt came back to life because he's so self -reliant, so self -sufficient.

[277] And then you guys wrote to him, which is fantastic.

[278] The bike is faster now.

[279] It's better than it was before.

[280] I just made it into an electric bike.

[281] I found some carbon and I was able to make a crude but effective battery.

[282] It also purifies water as we go.

[283] Yes.

[284] Would you like some fresh water made from my urine, but now free of all nitrogen?

[285] But I was actually going to mention something very similar, which is you go back and rewatch that show.

[286] And you see Nick Offerman as Ron Swanson.

[287] You see Amy Poller.

[288] You see Aziz.

[289] You see Aubrey Plaza.

[290] You see Chris Pratt.

[291] You see Rashida.

[292] You see Roblo.

[293] see Adam Scott, I think every one of those actors has gone on to lead their own show or star in movies or both.

[294] And that is extraordinary.

[295] It's extraordinary.

[296] It's a fantastic cast.

[297] What cracks me up is, of course, Rob Lowe.

[298] I know you're doing this podcast with Rob Lowe, and I always have, Mike, my, I'm very different from Rob Lowe.

[299] How so?

[300] Well, let me explain.

[301] I have what you'd call a normal person's bone structure and face.

[302] It's rotting as I age.

[303] It's.

[304] I age.

[305] I have things about me that don't look so good.

[306] You know, beady eyes, thin lips, a massive prominent eye vein, a pallid complexion.

[307] And then there's Rob Lowe, and it's hilarious.

[308] He's been the most handsome man in the world forever.

[309] And I remember talking to him once, and I made some just sort of off -handed remark about, I just imagine you, Rob, reaching into your pocket and being able to pull out of small vials of creams and oils that you rub into your skin constantly, and he looked at me with that great, Roblo, Deadpan, reached into his pocket and pulled out a vial of creams.

[310] Yes.

[311] Squeeze them out and then applied them under his eyes.

[312] And he went, it's actually my own brand.

[313] You might like to check it out, Conan.

[314] And of course, it wouldn't work on me. My head would just catch fire.

[315] But Roblo is not like you or I. He is a different species altogether.

[316] He exists outside of time and space.

[317] I was doing a Photoshop yesterday for just for this podcast.

[318] And his photos were done.

[319] And I was like, I'm a little younger than Rob, but I'm like, God damn it.

[320] Like, why does he look better?

[321] There's no way you're ever going to look like that.

[322] There's just no way.

[323] So, you know, you accept it.

[324] You're like, this is a movie star.

[325] This is a guy who looks like a movie star.

[326] God bless.

[327] But also, you know, in terms of the pod and like knowing him as a guy, it's very, it's just interesting, similar to just even talking to you where, you know, Rob Lo was in movies, right?

[328] Right.

[329] When I was a kid and you don't ever expect to meet someone like that.

[330] But he is so funny on the podcast because he's just.

[331] genuinely excited and enthusiastic, much like his character in the show is, about everything.

[332] And by the way, he's not in a lot of the episodes to start, and then he starts joining the show in season two.

[333] So is his commentary when he's not in the episode, this could sure use some Rob Lowe?

[334] He's like, you know what?

[335] There's a lot of handsome guys in the show could use a little more.

[336] Could use a little bit more handsome.

[337] You know what this show is missing?

[338] Rob Lowe, because you worked pretty closely with Rob, obviously.

[339] Yeah, yeah, definitely.

[340] I think he says he remembers the first time he came to set, Mike assigned me to take him around and, like, give him a tour of the set, and I think he kind of took a liking to me, and, like, we exchanged info, and he would call me some time.

[341] So, yeah, you know.

[342] What if he mistook you for his – he just thought, like, well, I guess you're my personal assistant.

[343] Well, here we go.

[344] You got to drive me to work from – he's like, why isn't Alan outside my house of Santa Barbara to drive me to work?

[345] Alan, could you carry me to the men's room, please?

[346] I don't like walking there myself.

[347] But it's interesting because I don't know if this is true, but I've heard that Rob's character, Chris Trager, was somewhat based on how people perceived you.

[348] Is that true?

[349] I would say there are very sort of bits and pieces.

[350] Because I would say I would credit a lot of it to Mike Shore who came in and was like, what if he's like kind of a health nut and, you know, very positive and all this stuff.

[351] But certainly I did a few things in the room that I think were probably fairly annoying to people.

[352] But I was always a pretty upbeat person, but I had an office that had joined the writer.

[353] room, which is like a big area with couches where people sit around, pitch ideas for the show.

[354] And I'm a very active person.

[355] I like to walk around, like to walk in circles.

[356] I just need to burn off energy.

[357] I put up a pull -up bar in my office door.

[358] And again, I'm retroactively apologize to the people in the room.

[359] Why don't you just put up a sign that says don't like me?

[360] But I would do pull -ups all day on the pull -up bar.

[361] Oh, my God.

[362] Which is really like, I know it's annoying.

[363] So, but by the way, I continue.

[364] Shirtless?

[365] Will you shirtless?

[366] Well, at a certain point, you know, so we kind of put that in the show as something that Rob Lowe's character did.

[367] And then at a certain point, Chris Pratt was trading to do, you know, Zero Dark 30 and Jurassic World and Guardians and all this stuff.

[368] And then he would come in and sometimes do pull -ups on it.

[369] So we had, again, this is kind of antithetical, I think, to a lot of writers' rooms where it's like, how much can I lie down and how many snacks can I eat?

[370] Yes, this goes against, I mean, every writer's room, I think things have probably changed.

[371] I know they've changed.

[372] but in my era, which encompasses almost three decades, or over three decades, actually, it was always fried food, writers not moving or moving as little as possible, and then every five or six years, one of the writers would get their cholesterol checked and go through a health phase for a month and then go right back to the fried food.

[373] I never did pull -ups.

[374] You need muscles in your upper body, technically, to do a pull -up.

[375] That's what's always discouraged me from doing it.

[376] This is the worst superhero origin story ever, is like a meaningless superhero.

[377] So when I was a kid, I couldn't do any pull -ups.

[378] Like, my upper body might be hard for you believe, was very weak, I was very skinny.

[379] I was like 50 pounds.

[380] I was like four -foot -nothing.

[381] I think just to become normal, I had to try to start, like, lifting weights and working out a little bit.

[382] Again, Cohn is looking at it right now.

[383] I am not a big man. I'm probably 140 pounds.

[384] But what I got...

[385] You fainted three times just walking to the podcast studio.

[386] We had to bring you around with smelling salts.

[387] I'm pretty slight.

[388] But no, I got the pull -bar, I literally like, you know, it's like, okay, now I want to work my way up, so I do 100 a day.

[389] That's good.

[390] That's fantastic.

[391] You know, I went from zero.

[392] You ever do, remember what Robert De Niro did in Cape Fear when he's upside down and he's doing these crunches hanging upside down from a rod or early?

[393] He's suspended in his apartment alone.

[394] And he has all these crazy tattoos.

[395] I do that and I do all of the attempted murdering.

[396] So I do.

[397] Which burns a lot of calories.

[398] Yeah.

[399] You know, attempted murder burns more calories than murder.

[400] Yeah, it's the running around, it's the missing.

[401] It's a lot of swinging and missing.

[402] That really gets you shredded, man. Failing to kill someone burns 1 ,500 more calories and actually killing them.

[403] Hiding under people's cars, like sneaking out of their boats.

[404] That's my next workout.

[405] That's my next thing, man. He clung to a car that drove like 800 miles to the bottom of a car.

[406] You're holding on tight, man. Yeah, yeah.

[407] Isometric.

[408] Every time I see that movie and it's a fantastic.

[409] movie, Cape Fear, starring with the Robert De Niro, Scorsese version, but whenever he climbs underneath the car and just decides to hang on to it for 800 miles, you know, Nick Nolte's driving over those things that prevent you from backing up out of a parking lot without paying.

[410] He's just getting shredded.

[411] You could splice in little clips of him driving over increasingly high slash sharp things.

[412] I think we did.

[413] Oh, it's so funny.

[414] No, when I was at The Simpsons, we did a Cape Fear parody.

[415] And sideshow bob clung underneath a car And I don't remember And I'm sure people right now are being like Oh, you totally, of course that's what happened But I remember, I think I think the family did probably drive over shit Yeah, you just plagiarizing yourself Yeah I plagiarizing yourself I plagiarized an episode that I worked on And there you go Time to hang it up It's time to hang it up Trust me, it was time for me to hang it up in 2006 But you'll see in show business The joy is to keep hanging hanging around long after, no one wants you.

[416] That's the part I love.

[417] Yeah, the grim aftermath.

[418] There you go.

[419] We should call this the grim aftermath with Conan O 'Brien.

[420] Your next part.

[421] Yep, I'm still here with Conan O 'Brien.

[422] You've accomplished a great deal at a very young age.

[423] We have the same alma mater.

[424] We both went to Harvard College.

[425] I graduated at 22, like a normal person.

[426] And you majored in biology, wrote comedy for the lampoon, and graduated at 19.

[427] How does one do that?

[428] I think I had turned 20.

[429] So, you know, look, I may have turned 20.

[430] I think your bio says 19.

[431] So someone's fudging on my behalf, and it wasn't me. But, yeah, I went to college young.

[432] And how does one go to college young?

[433] Were you moved up a grade early on because you were?

[434] I actually skipped senior year of high school.

[435] So it was probably, I don't know.

[436] know why I did this.

[437] So I went to, I grew up from Riverside, California, and I went to a bunch of massive public schools.

[438] They weren't like the best academic schools in the world.

[439] You know, my, my high school is probably, you know, 2 ,500 kids or something.

[440] Right.

[441] Very, very diverse socioeconomically.

[442] That's 2 ,500 kids in one classroom.

[443] In one, in English one.

[444] It's a big auditorium.

[445] Everyone has headphones.

[446] It would just throw ground beef into, into the aisles to feed everyone.

[447] Yeah, exactly.

[448] It's like, you're, you basically got a better education.

[449] if you sat towards the front because you could hear the teacher.

[450] But no, it was, so, so near the end of my high school was, my counselor was just like, you're running out of classes.

[451] Like, you don't have, you don't have, like, math and science classes to take, so they're like, one option is you could apply to college and just take your tests and stuff.

[452] So I was really torn because I liked high school and, you know, I would miss my friends and stuff, but I figured, you know, do I stay one more year and just take English and five electives, or do I apply to college and just see what happened?

[453] You were like someone who got drafted earlier in high school and decided it's time to go pro.

[454] It's basically me, Kevin Garnett, LeBron James, Colby, yeah, yeah.

[455] Got it, got it, got it.

[456] So, your name is always listed with them.

[457] It's the same kind of guy.

[458] But when they talk about comedy writing, that's the weird part.

[459] But I was scared.

[460] So I applied to these colleges, and I ended up getting to Harvard, and I was terrified.

[461] I was terrified.

[462] I was like, these kids went to good schools, they went to private schools, and I got there, and my fears were kind of upheld because I'm like, yeah, a lot of these kids know each other.

[463] They're like, they like know each other, and they're like doing it.

[464] I went to prep school together.

[465] Yeah, yeah.

[466] So I was like, man, I'm a Taiwanese kid from Riverside, and I didn't know anyone there.

[467] So I kind of just, I put my head down and tried to work, right?

[468] So I was like, trying to do biology, whatever, doing this, working in labs.

[469] And then I was like, I got good grades freshman year.

[470] I was like, damn, I did it.

[471] And then I was like, I'm miserable still.

[472] Like, I don't want to do this for my life.

[473] Like, what else can I do?

[474] So that was when I started pursuing other creative stuff.

[475] You know, I played in a punk rock band, and, you know, we would tour around the Boston area.

[476] and I tried to get on the lampoon.

[477] And then when I got on the lampoon, that really changed my life.

[478] Yeah.

[479] So I want to explore this for a second.

[480] Your parents are from Taiwan.

[481] Is that right?

[482] Yeah, they're immigrants.

[483] They're immigrants.

[484] And so what were their lives like in Taiwan?

[485] What was your dad's life like in Taiwan?

[486] So my dad grew up in a really, really small town, almost like a village.

[487] It's called Huay in the English translation.

[488] There's Tiger Tail.

[489] And he grew up really poor.

[490] So he grew up, his mom had three kids and his dad passed away when he was one and so everyone in the sort of village told her to give him up for adoption because it's like you can't take care of three kids she worked at a sugar factory so she worked on she like made the bags that the sugar came in and uh she was stubborn so she's like I'm not giving up my youngest son I'm keeping him it turned out to be a good decision because my dad was a really bright kid so he was really bright um he grew up and you know he helped her out in the factory a little bit but but he was really good at school so he in Taiwan it's all test base so he took a test and like at a certain point, he didn't really well in a test, and he got to go to college.

[491] And so he not only went to college, then he went to medical school.

[492] So, like, this was all test -based in Taiwan.

[493] So he kind of helped out and took care of the family.

[494] You know, he ended up moving to America.

[495] He met my mom in Taiwan.

[496] So my mom was, her family was a little better off, but, you know, still not crazy.

[497] So they moved to America and they moved to the Bronx.

[498] So they moved to, like, a tiny apartment in the Bronx, and that's where my, you know, my dad and my mom had my sister.

[499] So all of this is chronicled in a movie that I directed called Tiger.

[500] which is my dad's hometown.

[501] But it's, you know, it's just kind of a love letter to my family and an homage to some, some Asian cinema as well, some Juan Carwai and Edward Yang and Hosh Hashan.

[502] And so, yeah, because I just remember very distinctly my dad telling me those stories.

[503] And I would consider the fact that in one generation, he didn't have enough food to eat as a kid.

[504] And then the next thing, you know, his son gets to create TV shows and host podcast, which is absurd.

[505] His son gets to sit with Conan and talk about his life, which is totally absurd.

[506] Yeah, but what's, no, to be fair, your dad, even when he was very poor and young, he said one day my son is going to have a podcast.

[507] One day, Team Coco, Team Coco and Stitcher are going to come ringing at Allen's door.

[508] That's the dream of many immigrants is I want my child to have the podcast I couldn't have.

[509] Well, this begs the question, though, which does fascinate me. When immigrants come from great poverty and they come to this country and they have to figure it out and they have to make themselves and this struggle is so, so difficult, and the stakes are so high, and then their son is accepted to, you know, the oldest and one of the most prestigious colleges in the country and goes and is going to major in biology, what happens when you go to them and say, I've got a different an idea now.

[510] I want to write comedic light situations for television.

[511] I want to be broken unemployed in Hollywood.

[512] Basically, I will give my parents credit for this.

[513] They hid their profound disappointment at the time when I told them.

[514] I mean, they, they, they, I told them.

[515] And again, I was, again, like I said, you know, before I was younger.

[516] And I think they were like, look, let him get this out of his system, right?

[517] Let him be hungry for a while.

[518] And, and, and we'll see what happens and you know my mom is really funny my mom you know she's gone through her her life arc is so interesting she she you know she my dad got divorced when when i was like 15 or so and she uh she's like what do i do like i you know i came to this country like my english isn't the strongest not fluent and so she she she kind of put her head down and started learning she went to you know junior college she went to college and she ended up getting a teaching credential and and she began have a teacher.

[519] So she became like a high school teacher and started teaching math.

[520] And her thing with her students, she's a great teacher, but she's a great teacher.

[521] But she would say like, this country is so easy.

[522] You have no idea.

[523] She's like, my kid don't even work that hard.

[524] They're all going to Harvard.

[525] They're all going to Harvard.

[526] She's like, that's your best college.

[527] That's the best you got.

[528] Like, that's the best you have.

[529] So they kind of had a sense of humor about it.

[530] And they were like, I'm joking, but they're always so supportive.

[531] And I think really in the back of the of their minds, because I think they're at their core, very, very open -minded people, I think they were like, why did we come this country?

[532] Except for the fact that our son would have the freedom to make a choice as stupid as this, right?

[533] It's like, make that choice and try.

[534] And I think they were, I think they're actually weirdly kind of, they didn't say anything at the time, because they, they would never say this in person, but they were, I think they were kind of weirdly proud that I was taking the chance.

[535] Yes, I'm sure they are.

[536] I mean, it's worked out so well.

[537] You know, I go back to this idea because you're doing good work.

[538] And sometimes I've encountered people that have said to me, really, you went to this really good school and, you know, why aren't you off curing cancer?

[539] And I think, well, first of all, I didn't have that brain.

[540] So it's not that there was a cancer cure out there.

[541] I could have figured out and supplied it.

[542] And second of all, there are plenty of people that graduate from these high flute in schools that go out and invent napalm and stuff.

[543] Or come up with...

[544] I like that counterfactual.

[545] Yeah, yeah.

[546] It's like, I'm not Ted Kaczynski.

[547] I'm not the Unabomber.

[548] Yeah, I mean, you feel lucky, you know.

[549] Or, you know, I didn't figure out a way, I didn't invent fracking.

[550] There are plenty of, uh, and so, um, you know...

[551] That's the bar, Supervillain.

[552] Well, I'm sorry, but all the good supervillains went to Ivy League schools.

[553] They really, if you look it up.

[554] That's true.

[555] Yeah.

[556] Yeah, Dr. Evil went to Brown.

[557] The same guy who played Mark Zuckerberg played Lex Luthor, right?

[558] It's like, that's not a coincidence.

[559] No, it's not a coincidence, by the way.

[560] So I always notice when people, they're not just flailing around saying I wrote for these 35 terrible shows before I started writing for good shows, when people sort of have a sense of where they might fit in.

[561] So the Parks and Rec gig, was that the first show where you felt like, yes, I fit into this world?

[562] It was extraordinary to get that job, number one.

[563] and number two, it definitely felt like, wow, it's a great fit.

[564] I'm learning a lot, and I credit Mike and Greg.

[565] I mean, you know those guys really well.

[566] They really look at it as a place, a writing staff is a place where they can nurture younger writers and guide them and teach them.

[567] And that is where I learned so much.

[568] And I talk about that, you know, with the Zs all the time, it's like, man, thank God we got a show when we were 30 instead of 24 or whatever and worked on 100 episodes of TV.

[569] You know, it's like I start as a staff writer, which for those of you who don't know, that's like a first year writer essentially.

[570] And, you know, by the end of the show, Mike let me run the room sometimes.

[571] I directed episodes.

[572] I helped edit, you know, all that stuff.

[573] And then you get to make your own show.

[574] You're not quite as lost.

[575] You're still lost because you don't know what it's like to be the actual boss.

[576] But you know, that helps.

[577] There are different kinds of showrunners out there.

[578] It's one of the things I always loved about Sound Out Live is that Lauren would say, you're in charge of the sketch.

[579] I know you're 23 or 24 years old and you just got here and you know nothing but you thought of the sketch so you're, it's up to you to go talk to wardrobe it's up to you to talk to the set designers it's up to you to watch the blocking of it it's up to you to check out the props and I thought this is insane none of us know any but it was you're a producer now yeah, that's what it is, you're a producer and throw you in the water and say you're either going to drown or you're going to swim and I thought when you give someone to talk about ton of responsibility and says it's yours to fuck up or be a hero, it's amazing how quickly you can grow if you're determined to make it.

[580] And hopefully you're the right person, right?

[581] Because like that's, but by them giving you that confidence, it's kind of self -perpetuating in some ways.

[582] I remember being on set of Parks and Rec and I was there, it was probably my second or third episode that I'd written and I was there with Dean Holland, who was an editor on the show but then started directing.

[583] So it was his second episode.

[584] And we didn't, there was some problem we didn't know what to solve.

[585] And we looked around.

[586] No one was, Mike wasn't there, Greg wasn't there, Morgan Sackett, the line producer wasn't there.

[587] We're like, this is it, man. You and me got to figure this out, and we just do it.

[588] And the same thing happened on a master's.

[589] Like, I mean, Aziz would look around.

[590] We're the dads.

[591] We're the mom and dad of the show, right?

[592] We're going to do it.

[593] So let me ask you about this, because you're working on Parks and Rec, and then you gravitate, obviously, to Aziz.

[594] And it's funny because you guys have, you have a similar energy to Aziz, you know?

[595] In some ways.

[596] In some, no, yeah.

[597] Yeah, but like you guys, there's a, there's a certain.

[598] I see it.

[599] I see how there's like a faux cockiness to the sense of humor which can be really enjoyable and fun.

[600] And you gravitate towards Aziz and then you guys find your way into making Masters of None and that ends up being sort of this pitch perfect show.

[601] And I do think that show, you know, it was a good fit with Netflix too because Netflix had three shows.

[602] It had a, when we pitched to Netflix, they had House of Cards, They had Orange is the New Black, and they had that show Lillehammer, which was about a gangster in Norway.

[603] It was the Steve Van Zant show.

[604] Yeah.

[605] So.

[606] That was the show I pitched.

[607] Yeah, that was.

[608] I was like, you know what America wants to see Steve Van Zant in Norway?

[609] I mean, actually a pretty good hit rate.

[610] Two out of three, we're like made it.

[611] I still consider that show a hit.

[612] And the money's just pouring in.

[613] I mean, that's $66 I made last year.

[614] Most of their market cap, right?

[615] Ted Sorondo still calls you about Lillyhammer.

[616] Can we get the Lilyhammer reboot?

[617] What about a gritty lilyhammer reboot?

[618] What if it's a Norwegian gangster in New York City?

[619] I want to ask, who watched Lily Hammer?

[620] Did anyone?

[621] I never checked it out.

[622] I just saw a scowling Steve Van Zant, who I knew from the Sopranos and from the East Street band, scowling in a snowbank, and it just said Lilyhammer, and I never checked it out.

[623] You're going to get so many angry Lilyhammer fans.

[624] The hammerheads are going to get after you, the hammerheads are coming for you.

[625] They're going to come after you.

[626] No, but it was...

[627] Bring it on, I say.

[628] Bring it on.

[629] Weirdly, we got lucky, Because we were talking about Master No, and we were going to make the show.

[630] Netflix bought it.

[631] We were so excited.

[632] We're going to make the show.

[633] And then Parks and Rec got picked up for another season.

[634] So got picked up for its final season, essentially.

[635] And we were kind of bummed because we were like, oh, well, we were going to go to our own show.

[636] Netflix was cool about it.

[637] They said, it's okay.

[638] You put a pin in it.

[639] So we went and worked on Parks first season.

[640] But during that whole time, we were just freaking out because we were like, oh, my God, we have this show.

[641] And to be totally honest, the show we pitched Netflix was completely different.

[642] It was his ease.

[643] It was like, you know, kind of more of a normal show.

[644] And it was just like a comedy, a standard show, like maybe he's dating, whatever.

[645] And then we started panicking.

[646] And we said, oh, my God, we're going to get to make the show.

[647] Parks was ending.

[648] Parks was ending.

[649] But is this the show we want to make?

[650] It's just a normal -ass show.

[651] Like, could it be better?

[652] Like, we really pushed ourselves.

[653] And that was when, you know, we took a trip to New York and we're walking around, just racking our brains.

[654] Be like, oh, my God, we got pressure on us.

[655] We got to make this show.

[656] And we went back to our hotel room.

[657] We were talking about the show, and, you know, I kind of talked to my dad, who I alluded to earlier.

[658] He was like, man, he didn't even have no food to eat as a kid.

[659] Like, you know, he had pets.

[660] He had pet chickens, and he killed the chickens and ate them for dinner.

[661] And it made him really sad.

[662] And he's like, is that story really true?

[663] And I was like, yeah, man, like, he lived in a hut like the size of the corner of his room.

[664] And he's like, forget everything we're talking about.

[665] Let's just make that show.

[666] I don't care about my life in New York City eating at good restaurants.

[667] Like, that's actually interesting.

[668] Yes.

[669] So that became the second episode of the show.

[670] And that really sort of broke open in terms of any, episode could be about anything.

[671] You know, I'm curious about, because now with the Parks and Rec podcast, you're looking back at shows, and you're a very young guy, especially from, I mean, by any stretch of the imagination, you're a young, very young man, but from my perspective, you know, you're fetus.

[672] I'm the oldest guy in the writers room right now.

[673] No, I'm close to it.

[674] You're a very charming and sharp fetus, and I think you're going places fetus, but we've been through like six, I feel like six cultural revolutions just in the last five years.

[675] Last three months.

[676] Yeah.

[677] And then you look at TV shows from 10, 15 years ago, and you must already be seeing things where you think, well, we wouldn't do that today.

[678] Yeah, man. In multiple episodes, Poller's character asks Aziz if he's Libyan.

[679] He's like, no, I'm Indian.

[680] It's like, you can't do that.

[681] He's like, I'm Indian from South Carolina.

[682] There's tons of stuff you would never do today.

[683] There's tons of stuff that, like, but by the way, like, I think some things.

[684] things to me fall in the category of like, yeah, I don't want to watch that anymore, right?

[685] Like, there's tons of stuff where it's like, I don't think I can watch that anymore.

[686] Parks for me, when I watch it, it's like, yeah, there's the odd joke every few episodes.

[687] Like, I don't think that would fly in 2021.

[688] But for the most part, it's like, you know, it's a pretty warm show.

[689] It's pretty diverse.

[690] And like, yeah, it's hard.

[691] It's in the right place.

[692] And I'm not just saying that because I worked on it.

[693] But it is.

[694] You're saying it because you're doing a podcast now about it.

[695] I'm doing a, I'm doing a rewatch podcast.

[696] I'm sitting with Team Coco's people talking about trying to monetize it again.

[697] No, no. It's basically, you know, it really is what you said, which is all the...

[698] I mean, you look at airplane, you look at blazing saddles, you go even further back, you look at stuff, like, are we not going to watch Billy Wilder?

[699] Are we not going to watch...

[700] You know, how far back you want to go.

[701] Again, it's all context, right?

[702] It's all context.

[703] There was a piece the other day in the New York Times that really stunned me because the I think the headline was in the art section was which classic classical paintings or paintings from the Renaissance era should get a pass and I said I thought what I don't know that flipped me out but to be fair like most things I didn't read it so you read the subhead you're like you know what it's worth bringing up with Alan though no I'll bring it up with Alan and look maybe it goes on to say really brilliant things and I wasn't paying attention I just want people to know, I read the headlines of the New York Times pieces, but who has time to read all that stuff?

[704] I guess the takeaway is Conan doesn't want you to look at Botticelli anymore.

[705] You can't look at it.

[706] I just don't.

[707] It's over.

[708] I just think it's offensive.

[709] It's over.

[710] No birth to Venus.

[711] I just think it objectivize Venus.

[712] Close that shell up.

[713] Close that shell up.

[714] You have the misfortune slash fortune of being the writer who wrote the iconic treat yo self.

[715] episode of Parks and Rec.

[716] Oh, yeah.

[717] And I remember that episode, and I remember it also, you know, feeling like, oh yeah, that's going to be a catchphrase.

[718] And then it became a catchphrase.

[719] And it's a mixed blessing, probably not as much for you, but for Aziz walking around.

[720] And again, when you say I wrote, I put in quote, and wrote in quotes, because my name might be on that episode, but everyone pitches for every episode.

[721] And I don't even know who came up treat yourself like I credit I attribute that to the room so but I will say it is wild to walk around like Trader Joe's and it says treat yourself and then I'm sure Ziz and Reda when they walk around and move through the world they get it a lot because it's like what was that not even it wasn't a thing before the show right like it wasn't really a thing it was you're asking I'm you know I don't even I just read the headlines of the newspapers so I yeah the New York Times had a piece around about it before until the New York Times has a headline about it that explains itself completely in the headline, I can't help you.

[722] No, but I do think that's, there's an interesting thing for there to become, like, a catchphrase out of it.

[723] I talked about it with Rob a little bit, where his character had literally, right?

[724] So, like, his character, people would say literally to him now.

[725] So it's like, okay, well, that's his, it's a gift and a curse, right?

[726] It can be a burden on you.

[727] Hey, mine, I don't know when I said this, but when I walk around, people say, you suck.

[728] And I guess that was my catchphrase at one point.

[729] You gotta own it.

[730] It's a legendary.

[731] I know you mainly for you suck and masturbating bear.

[732] The legendary, you suck.

[733] Conan, you suck!

[734] Shooverine, masturbating bear, and you suck.

[735] Ah, shoevoreen.

[736] Those were good times.

[737] This was really fun.

[738] I admire you.

[739] I think you're a really nice, talented guy, and I'm happy that you're out there making good stuff.

[740] It just fills me with delight.

[741] So thanks for hanging with me, and thanks for, you know, many of us don't want to sit next to Rob Lowe because we just look like, like those plastic turds that you could buy as a practical joke.

[742] Yeah.

[743] You're a good man. I'm taking the bullet for all those normal looking guys, man. I'm taking that bullet.

[744] Let's get a two shot.

[745] Normal look.

[746] Let's get Alan Yang and Rob Blow in a two shot and see which way the camera goes.

[747] Actually, you clean up pretty nice, so I think you do all right.

[748] I'm all right.

[749] I'm all right.

[750] I'm all right.

[751] Well, I just tricked you into compliment yourself.

[752] You know, thank you so much for having me. You know, so we'll see.

[753] We'll see if we'll steal our main friends.

[754] Well, last episode, David, you kind of, you're a youth with your finger on the pulse, right?

[755] And you helped us understand a little bit about what TikTok is.

[756] Team Coco now has a TikTok.

[757] It's at Team Coco on TikTok, and you're going to...

[758] And by the way, I'm going to be really honest with people listening.

[759] I didn't even know this.

[760] This is...

[761] I didn't either.

[762] This is how out of touch I am.

[763] In the end, they say Howard Hughes really didn't understand what was happening in his business because he was naked.

[764] sitting in a reclining chair, watching the same movie over and over and over again and being attended to by Mormons and collecting his urine.

[765] I'm at that stage.

[766] Yeah, he is naked right now.

[767] I am naked.

[768] I have jars of urine around me. Mormons attend to me and I'm watching Ice Station Zebra again and again and again.

[769] I just watched that.

[770] I'm sure you did.

[771] And I'm a crazy germaphobe with really long fingernails.

[772] And that's the stage I'm at.

[773] And now I'm being told that I have at Team Coco, I have a TikTok account and that you say it's blowing up?

[774] Yeah, you're doing really well.

[775] Okay.

[776] I mean, I'm not...

[777] Whether or not you know it.

[778] No, no, please.

[779] It's just stunning to me. And as I said, in the last installment, I thought TikTok meant people singing, lip syncing, and dancing around and making fools of themselves and posting it and embarrassing their children.

[780] And you say that is a chunk of TikTok but that there's so much more to it.

[781] A lot more, yeah.

[782] You're going to take us through some of those.

[783] Yeah, show us some of your, are these TikToks you've made?

[784] Yeah, so I had started to, you know, like I said, I was super addicted to it.

[785] And then I had posted a video from the Madam Tussaud's Wax Museum that did really well.

[786] So then they invited me to come back to the museum to take more TikToks.

[787] So I think that this next one is a video of the Kylie Jenner.

[788] So this little curation is like the first ever on podcast TikTok film festival, basically.

[789] This is crazy Okay, so this is fascinating So you're going to play us now This is Madame Tussauds And you went there And who are we looking at here?

[790] This is going to be Kylie Jenner And which Jenner is that?

[791] I don't know There's like 75 Jenner The youngest one The one who's like a billionaire No, she's not a billionaire Is she not?

[792] No, didn't they expose that she?

[793] Let's just say they monkeyed around with the numbers there She's still doing really well though No She only has like $22 ,000 in the bank This is true and then the mom Chris manipulated the numbers and said it was a billion and the Forbes list fell for it but she only has $22 ,000 in the bank and they just repossessed her old Dodge I don't know and I saw she's pregnant again so that's bad timing yeah I mean you just heard it here first but she's really got next to nothing that's an exclusive yeah it's an exclusive yeah she lives in a she's one of nine people that lives in a studio apartment in a TikTok mansion in a TikTok mansion okay wait get us up to speed how many views does this video have and how many followers do you have on TikTok I think I have a hundred and twenty six thousand followers and this one got I'm sorry I'm sorry how many did you say that I had oh you have you have 158 thousand wait a minute okay I'm sorry you just told me Conan you're killing it on YouTube you've got 158 thousand my assistant in the the room has almost the same number.

[794] Yeah.

[795] No, I'm sorry, this is not me, this is not me putting you down, but it's absurd.

[796] I am an entertainer who's been working in one capacity to another to entertain America and the world for well over three decades.

[797] Sure.

[798] And how old are you?

[799] 29.

[800] A 29 year old can come in and say, oh, I like this platform too.

[801] And let me give it a Try.

[802] Oh, look.

[803] As many as Conan O 'Brien, a man who if I lived in England would have been knighted by now.

[804] You also only have $22 ,000 in the bank, though.

[805] I know.

[806] I made really crazy investments.

[807] It's my fault.

[808] Theme restaurants.

[809] It's my weakness.

[810] So, well, congratulations, David.

[811] You're doing really well.

[812] And so show us this TikTok and tell us about it.

[813] So this one got over one and a half million views.

[814] Jesus.

[815] Good God.

[816] What are these people doing?

[817] Really liked the Kylie Jenner.

[818] wax figure.

[819] Okay, so explain what we're about to see.

[820] Okay, so it's the Kylie Jenner Wax figure, and then a whole part of TikTok 2 is figuring out the best audio to put behind it.

[821] So I had seen a video clip of Kylie singing, so I saved that audio and then used it for this.

[822] I'm going to get wasted.

[823] I just finished a whole cup of 42 and I'm about to go from my second one, Courtney, what the fuck are you on?

[824] I don't know.

[825] And that's me with Kylie for a second.

[826] Wait, that's it?

[827] That's it?

[828] That's all it is is you took...

[829] Mm -hmm.

[830] A video of a Kylie Jenner wax figure, and then your big contribution was to add a song that's out there of her singing to it, and it lasts, I think, six seconds?

[831] Because nobody can figure out the TikTok algorithm.

[832] So sometimes it works in your favor.

[833] That one just got sent out to a bunch of people.

[834] And then you peek in at the end.

[835] Of course, you're wearing a mask.

[836] She is not.

[837] You know, she's not.

[838] The wax statue is rife with COVID.

[839] The wax statue is made of solid COVID and some wax.

[840] and that got how many a million and a half people and then like one of the ones I did it was like a whole view of like the entire floor of the wax museum and so part of TikTok too is you can do video replies to comments so someone saw your wax figure so then I tried to get the same success with Kylie out of yours and I had someone had posted a clip of you and I on the show so I use that audio friend of the show working on in David I forgot that there's a wax statue of me Oh my God That one didn't do as well as Kylie Jesus, thanks a lot David So you bring it up And then with the minute you get me to bite You dump a giant bucket of manure on me How many views did that one get?

[841] I don't I think like a thousand Maybe two thousand A thousand!

[842] Wait, what?

[843] What?

[844] As opposed to a million and a half?

[845] See, that's the thing.

[846] Nobody knows how it works.

[847] I don't know why.

[848] I don't know why that one then it gets sent out.

[849] No, part of it is that that wax statue looks like Larry King.

[850] It doesn't even look like you.

[851] Yeah, it's Larry King with an orange wig.

[852] So that's an easy idea, though, that you could do because you can just reply, like I just reply to that person's comment.

[853] You could go and reply to people's comments with the video.

[854] No, I'm not going to reply to, I'm not going to engage in this.

[855] I was just humiliated and I had nothing to do with it.

[856] I did nothing.

[857] You followed up a very wildly successful Kylie Jenner TikTok by shooting my Wack statue and instead of getting a million and a half which is what Kylie got, I got a thousand.

[858] That's not my fault.

[859] You did this to me. You put me out there and then you shamed me. I've been made you made a fool out of me on.

[860] And he did it all on your time.

[861] So sorry.

[862] I had on your dime.

[863] I love this.

[864] While you were destroying my credibility, you were being paid by me. Wow, you funded your own shame.

[865] This is an amazing coup.

[866] This is, wow, this is, I cannot, I don't understand any of it.

[867] I'm very, I don't understand.

[868] I don't understand and I'm very worried.

[869] Yeah.

[870] Other people are worried about things that I think are legitimate, you know, global warming and, you know, just, the polarization of our country.

[871] I'm worried about this now.

[872] I think this is going to destroy us.

[873] Because everyone's just walking around.

[874] You're just walking around, and everyone is, I guess, shooting their water bottle and then and putting like a three stooges track to it for eight seconds and it gets seven million views.

[875] And meanwhile, no one's manning the cash registers, no one's growing the food, no one's driving the trucks, no one's doing anything.

[876] Yeah, how do you feel, David, about ushering in the decline of civilization?

[877] Well, here's the thing.

[878] I did post a video about being that you had me on the podcast, and Melissa Joan Hart liked it and then followed me. So I'm fine with it because I got that follow from Melissa Joan Hart.

[879] Wait, Melissa Joan Hart is following you?

[880] Yeah, if you look at it, it says that we're friends now.

[881] Supreme of the Teenage Witch.

[882] I've tried to be her friend for years.

[883] She's at my place right now.

[884] This is ridiculous.

[885] And she commented, she must listen because then she commented on something that, she was going to Disney with her family.

[886] Okay, so.

[887] You're so depressed, right?

[888] I'm so depressed.

[889] Oh, I just, it's over.

[890] It's over.

[891] It's over for me. David, why am I?

[892] It's not.

[893] We're going to get you on here.

[894] No. Why?

[895] Here's the question.

[896] Why isn't this, hey there, with David Hopping, and I'm your sidekick.

[897] This is all backwards.

[898] I'm an old, wretched fool who doesn't know what's happening.

[899] My wax, I'm going to say it.

[900] My wax statue got a thousand, a thousand, a thousand.

[901] Likes.

[902] Is that what they're called?

[903] Yeah.

[904] Likes, views, yeah.

[905] And I don't even want to know what the comments are.

[906] I'm sure they are dreadful.

[907] That's crazy to think that David's TikTok of Kylie Jenner got a metropolitan area's worth of people and yours got a small high school that sat down in an assembly and watched that TikTok video.

[908] Do you want to describe this in more detail, Matt?

[909] You're satisfied with that?

[910] This is, I am being very honest with everyone listening right now.

[911] I'm shattered.

[912] This is a watershed moment for me, you know.

[913] The talk show, I left the talk show I thought with some grace and a plumb.

[914] And now just weeks later, I'm being forced to realize that David Hopping is a superstar and I am an old husk dried out husk lying in the on a dirt road crumbling in the wind but everyone should follow you on yes yes follow me at team cocoa hey if you want more drying husk follow me at team cocoa you guys you should put up at TikTok of just a husk in the wind.

[915] Conan O 'Brien needs a friend.

[916] With Conan O 'Brien, Sonam of Sessian, and Matt Gourley.

[917] Produced by me, Matt Gourley.

[918] Executive produced by Adam Sacks, Joanna Solitaroff, and Jeff Ross at Team Koko, and Colin Anderson at Earwolf.

[919] Theme song by The White Stripes.

[920] Incidental music by Jimmy Vivino.

[921] Take it away, Jimmy.

[922] Our supervising producer is Aaron Blair, and our associate talent producer Jennifer Samples.

[923] Engineering by Will Beckton.

[924] Talent booking by Paula Davis, Gina Batista, and Brick Con. You can rate and review this show on Apple Podcasts, and you might find your review read on a future episode.

[925] Got a question for Conan?

[926] Call the Team Coco hotline at 323 -451 -2821 and leave a message.

[927] It too could be featured on a future episode.

[928] And if you haven't already, please subscribe to Conan O 'Brien needs a friend on Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, or wherever fine podcasts are downloaded.

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