Conan O’Brien Needs A Friend XX
[0] My name is Pat Nalswold, and I'm feeling 100 % not embarrassed about being Conan O 'Brien's friend.
[1] Hi, my name is Meredith Salinger, and I feel so blessed about being Conan O 'Brien's friends.
[2] See, it's always better to go with pure enthusiasm.
[3] I thought mine was I introduced math into my not embarrassment.
[4] It had a negative.
[5] Oh, okay, so the negative.
[6] And that's where the eye goes.
[7] Where does the ear go?
[8] Because it's a podcast, so.
[9] The ear strangely goes to the positive.
[10] I think it might.
[11] Fall is here.
[12] Hear the yell.
[13] Back to school.
[14] Ring the bell.
[15] Brand new shoes.
[16] Walking blues.
[17] Climb the fence, books and pens.
[18] I can tell that we are going to be friends.
[19] I can tell that we are going to be friends.
[20] Hey there.
[21] Welcome to Conan O 'Brien.
[22] needs a friend.
[23] The podcast that tries to build bridges to a better world.
[24] I don't know.
[25] Oh, that's new.
[26] I needed to say something and I said that and it's just not true.
[27] No. We're building nothing.
[28] No. This is the dam buster.
[29] We're the dynamite at the base of a very big dam and there's a whole civilization beneath us that will be flooded once this podcast airs.
[30] joined, as always, by Sona Mofessian.
[31] Hey, Sona.
[32] Hi.
[33] And, of course, Mad Gourley.
[34] Hey, by the way, Dam Busters is what we call it when my newborn daughter has a poop that explodes out the back of her diaper.
[35] Well, that's terrific.
[36] That's great.
[37] Oh, man. It's great.
[38] These are some good poops.
[39] That's good.
[40] That's good.
[41] We're building a bridge to a better world.
[42] Yes, out of excrement.
[43] Would you want to go to, I don't know why I thought, if, if.
[44] If one of those billionaires said, hey, Conan, do you want to go to space?
[45] Would you do it?
[46] Would I go to space?
[47] No, I'm very happy with Earth.
[48] Okay.
[49] I'm very happy with Earth.
[50] I have never had any desire.
[51] And I have lots of friends that would say, oh, my God, I would love it to go into space.
[52] I have a friend that wants to be on one of those Mars missions where you're pretty much assured you're never coming back.
[53] Oh.
[54] I like it here on Earth.
[55] I do, too.
[56] This is where I was millions of years of evolution.
[57] I'd go.
[58] I'd go as long as I didn't have to go with all the weirdos that are the first ones to go up there.
[59] You would definitely go?
[60] Yeah, I think if it were proven safe for a few missions.
[61] Oh, for God's safe.
[62] You can't.
[63] You can't.
[64] It's not.
[65] So you'd go as long as it's 100 % safe.
[66] No, I didn't say that.
[67] I said proven safe.
[68] Like, you know, give it a few years.
[69] And then all the weird tech moguls aren't going up there.
[70] I don't want to be dying with those people.
[71] You're kidding?
[72] Your estate can sue them.
[73] You want to be on the one with Bezos that.
[74] So this is like suicide by orbit?
[75] So my family gets insurance claims and settlements?
[76] They get to call the Basos estate and say, hey, it's because your husband pushed the blue button instead of the green button that my husband didn't make it.
[77] So, and they're like, fine, whatever, here's a billion dollars.
[78] Don't call again.
[79] And you're in the clear.
[80] I would certainly throw up, though, just from the motion of it, I think.
[81] Maybe not.
[82] They probably worked it out.
[83] It probably just feels like a Tesla accelerating.
[84] I'm sure that's exactly what it feels like, you know.
[85] No, I have no desire.
[86] Sona, do you want to go into space?
[87] I would do one of those missions where you go up, you're like, hey, Earth, and then you come right back down.
[88] You just want to do like the Tower of Terror version of that.
[89] Yeah.
[90] You want to go on a spaceship that goes 300 feet into the air and then lands gently and they open the doors and they serve you pizza, right?
[91] That's what you want.
[92] And say, like, you went to space, trust us.
[93] Trust us.
[94] Oh, boy, did you go to space.
[95] Really?
[96] Because I felt like I just went up 300 feet.
[97] Yeah.
[98] It was just like a tip of Mount Baldy.
[99] Mount Baldy.
[100] No, I'm not going to space.
[101] I have no interest.
[102] I'm tired of people asking me. Please go to space.
[103] Please leave Earth.
[104] Please get out of very...
[105] Why do you think I want to go to space?
[106] You don't even want to go.
[107] You just are trying to lure me into going.
[108] I want you because you can have Earth.
[109] I need to get away.
[110] Yeah.
[111] Okay.
[112] All right.
[113] Well, I'm very excited.
[114] My guest today are a very funny husband and wife duo who host their own podcast.
[115] Did you get my text?
[116] New episodes are available every Tuesday, wherever you get your podcast.
[117] I'm excited to chat with them today.
[118] My old friend Patton Oswald and Meredith Salinger.
[119] Welcome.
[120] Now, I like an origin story.
[121] So, Patton, obviously, I've known you for a long time.
[122] I think you first came on the late night show in 1998 when you were, I think you were six years old.
[123] Yes, I was, that's right.
[124] I was, I was the six -year -old who could recite Ned Beatty's speech from Network.
[125] That was my thing for a while.
[126] And I toured the country with that.
[127] So, yeah, I remember that you had me on.
[128] And then when you were seven, you came back and you did his scene from deliverance, and it really bum people out.
[129] And that's what that, and then there was a 10 -year low.
[130] Yeah.
[131] People, it could not get work.
[132] I couldn't get work.
[133] It was rough.
[134] It was a little rough.
[135] People blamed me. And then, so I know your story.
[136] And then Meredith, I've been very happy because Patton, since he met you, has been, he's been in a good place.
[137] He's flourished.
[138] He is.
[139] Wow.
[140] Okay.
[141] He's gone to the next level of his evolution.
[142] Yeah, exactly.
[143] He now has arms.
[144] He didn't have arms for, I love how she's doing it.
[145] He's in a good place.
[146] He's flourished.
[147] He's flourished.
[148] Excuse me. He has flourished.
[149] Yeah.
[150] You just hit me with your handbag when you said that.
[151] Bam.
[152] Flourished.
[153] He's flores, I tell you.
[154] But I want to know your origin story.
[155] Like, I don't actually don't know how you two met.
[156] I know we're going to talk about the podcast you have together, but I want to know how you two got together and got it on.
[157] I'm the Chuck Woolery of my generation.
[158] Oh, my God.
[159] Well.
[160] Because we need a Chuck Woolery.
[161] No, we actually don't.
[162] It should have ended with him being mentioned in the Beastie Boy song, and that's in this case.
[163] What do they rhyme with Woolery?
[164] Tom Fullery.
[165] Tom Fullery.
[166] Yes, they did.
[167] They rhymed comfoolery with Chuck Woolcock.
[168] Oh, my God.
[169] I love it.
[170] Anyway.
[171] How did we meet?
[172] Well, you know, I had gone to a very, very bad time, as we know.
[173] And I, Meredith and I have a mutual friend in a woman named Martha Plinth, an actress, activist, really just a very dynamic person who loves to.
[174] Martha and I have been friends since I was 15 years old.
[175] So they were teenagers.
[176] Yeah.
[177] So she likes to pull together these salons where she invites.
[178] various friends from various circles.
[179] You're making the story so long.
[180] Well, you look, Martha started her career on a little production of Godspell when she was seven.
[181] No, she likes to bring different people together.
[182] Martha had a dinner party, and she invited 15 people on a Facebook text thread.
[183] So you could see everybody who she invited on Facebook on a text thread.
[184] I went to the dinner party.
[185] Everybody went but Patton.
[186] So the next day on the text thread, I wrote, best dinner party ever.
[187] Dude, you missed the...
[188] Are we allowed to curse?
[189] Dude is not a curse Dude you miss the best fucking I was not to say dude No no no I wrote Best Dinner Party ever Dude you miss the best fucking lasagna And he happened to be online At the same time And messaged me Oh my God I was supposed to be there blah blah blah And we ended up because we were online At the same time texting back and forth For two hours And then and not like flirting or anything No just wanted to talk to someone It was nice And so we texted And then he was like This was really nice Same time tomorrow I was like All right So then the next night at 9 o 'clock And then for three months straight every night for two hours, we texted.
[190] I'd put Alice to bed and I would go, Alice is asleep, are you here?
[191] It was almost like I was walking into a cafe, but it was just this message to it.
[192] And then we would, I had someone to talk to in the dark for two hours every night.
[193] Like Trump had just been elected, inaugurated, and it was horrible.
[194] And it was like, oh my God, can you believe he's a fucking spy?
[195] Russian spy, Russian asset.
[196] We would talk about that.
[197] No one talks about, he had so many things happen in four years that no one even remember.
[198] Remember when he was an asset?
[199] Remember when there was a thing about, you know, Trump in the hotel room and being peed on?
[200] And people got past that within days.
[201] I know, because every single day there was something worse.
[202] He just ate a raccoon on the south lawn.
[203] Yeah.
[204] And blood was coming out its neck.
[205] But at the very beginning, I mean, I knew of him.
[206] I have never really, I didn't, I mean, I think I had seen King of Queens like once or twice.
[207] I just didn't remember it all that well.
[208] I only know Patten from King of Queen.
[209] I've never, I'm not even aware that he does comedy.
[210] Well, then I watch, so about two months and, well, about a month and a half.
[211] Yeah.
[212] I was, we were talking about a movie or something and he's like, oh, that actress.
[213] I said, oh, that actress is so pretty.
[214] He's like, you're so pretty.
[215] I'm like, oh, shit.
[216] Does he think this is, are we flirting?
[217] What's happening right now?
[218] Right.
[219] And then.
[220] And then I didn't think I meant it in a flirty way.
[221] I just was stating a fact, because it's a fact.
[222] That was a little flirty.
[223] Anyway.
[224] It's a little flirty online.
[225] So like, too.
[226] By the way, I do that.
[227] a lot when I'm just trying to buy stuff online.
[228] And I'm like, I'm always like, you're so pretty.
[229] And it gets me in trouble.
[230] It's the space bar on my, yeah.
[231] Anyway, that got put in the back of my head.
[232] And then the next, I was like, this is the nicest, smartest, best man in the universe.
[233] And I slowly was falling in love with him.
[234] And I, I, you haven't met in person.
[235] No, we never met in person.
[236] Didn't even speak on a phone.
[237] Never even spoke on the phone.
[238] Didn't hear each other's voices.
[239] And so I went, I went to lunch with my best friend and I burst in a tear.
[240] and she's like, why are you crying?
[241] And I said, I think I love him.
[242] And she's like, then why are you crying?
[243] And I was like, because I'm going to meet him.
[244] And I'm not going to like him.
[245] I know me. I don't like anyone.
[246] That's the wrap on you, Patton, by the way.
[247] It is.
[248] Everyone's like, he's so funny, but don't meet him.
[249] Try to just text.
[250] I just figured.
[251] Keep it at text length.
[252] Remember for years, I only would have Patton on the show through text.
[253] I would text into the show.
[254] He would text into the show and he would kill.
[255] And then whenever he would come on the show, it was like, out of old booze.
[256] Yeah, just the minute I walk.
[257] out.
[258] Just people hissing, a lot of hissing, a lot of foot stomping.
[259] Get him out.
[260] It was rough.
[261] So this is fascinating to me because you haven't.
[262] Now, what about looking into his work?
[263] I did.
[264] You must have done that.
[265] Oh, I did.
[266] I looked at some of his comedy bits online.
[267] And then I knew that he had done young adult with Charlize Theron.
[268] And I knew he had a sex scene in it.
[269] And I was like, well, I should probably check that out.
[270] Isn't that incredible?
[271] I mean, first of all, I have told people that.
[272] that I have a sex scene out there with Charlize Theron.
[273] It's not true.
[274] Right.
[275] And I always say the footage has been lost.
[276] Yeah, yeah.
[277] Or it's not available, which doesn't exist in the modern era.
[278] All footage is immediately available at all the time.
[279] Yeah, yeah.
[280] And I've been, Charlize's people have contacted me. And so you've got to stop telling people that you have a sex scene with Charlize Theron.
[281] Well, you know what?
[282] What also sucks is that she's checking out my sex scene with Charlize Theron.
[283] So there is a, I have a sex scene with one of the most genetically perfect beings like I couldn't do a scene with like John Goodman or Paul Gimani.
[284] Like I'm in a scene that just highlights how not physically perfect I have to do it with this Nexus 6 Android.
[285] Can I just, can it be with Richard Kind?
[286] That'd be a good thing.
[287] Shout out for Richard Kind.
[288] This guy's an Adonis.
[289] Wow, I got to get on with him.
[290] So yes, I checked out his stuff and I, and finally we decided to meet and we were planning to meet.
[291] That's a lot of pressure.
[292] And I was so nervous because I really did love him like.
[293] I was like, and I've never been married.
[294] I mean, I've had four billion boyfriends.
[295] I've dated everybody.
[296] But I've never been married.
[297] Wow, you sound like you have no bar at all.
[298] You've dated everybody.
[299] Well, everybody, every good buddy.
[300] Every good, every good.
[301] You said four million.
[302] There aren't four million good guys in the world.
[303] No, there's like 10 good ones.
[304] Anyway, we planned to meet and we did.
[305] And I was like, you're so cute.
[306] And then I just knew.
[307] And then once I saw him, I was like, if we had chemistry when we met, I was like, that's my husband.
[308] And then we did.
[309] And she was smart.
[310] I said, we should go to dinner somewhere.
[311] She said, well, let's go somewhere near like a beach or something.
[312] No, I didn't want to have dinner and sit down an order.
[313] What if I didn't like you and then sit there for two hours and have to talk to you for, yeah.
[314] You just had an online relationship for six years.
[315] Right.
[316] And you don't think you can handle 40 minutes at Wendy's?
[317] Well, I didn't know if I'd be attracted to him.
[318] And I did.
[319] And I was just very concerned.
[320] that I would be like, yish, what have I done?
[321] Right.
[322] And you'd actually say that out loud.
[323] Yeesh.
[324] Right, yeah.
[325] That would have been amazing.
[326] You know, like into the multiverse with Spider -Man, if the multiverse exists, there's one where we met in the lobby of that hotel, and she went, yish, like he looked right in my face with, nope, sorry.
[327] Can you validate my parking?
[328] I got to get out of here.
[329] I had three blind dates in my entire life, and each time the woman made the exact same sound.
[330] Oh.
[331] And then she would, they'd always say the same thing.
[332] I'm planning to have diarrhea soon.
[333] I better go.
[334] Who plans diarrhea?
[335] So anyway, okay, but let me hear from your perspective, Pat and you went through this tragic loss.
[336] And I don't know, I don't know if you were even thinking of another stage in your life.
[337] No, I was, my head was in what I thought.
[338] was a good place, but it was actually a very bad place.
[339] I had reached this point through some really bad months and weeks where I had hit a level where I said, I can now merely exist.
[340] And that's fine.
[341] I'm not going to experience joy, but at least not experiencing despair and pointlessness anymore.
[342] I can wake up.
[343] I can make my daughter breakfast, take her to school, pick her up, maybe get on stage and tell some jokes.
[344] Maybe I'll just function as an actor.
[345] Like, I was basically a, I was a presentable robot, if that makes sense.
[346] And I thought that was how I could live.
[347] And then I met, and I remember I went to a grief group and there were people in there saying, I know it sounds weird.
[348] You know, you've just come out of, I don't think I can live.
[349] Well, now you can live.
[350] And now you're going, I don't think I can experience joy or, you know, happiness again.
[351] And you will.
[352] You just don't, you just can't see it right now.
[353] Right.
[354] And it took first just meeting her through, just meeting her mind, basically.
[355] It was, you know, one of the things you miss when you're with someone you're supposed to be with is someone to talk to in the dark at the end of the day.
[356] And just, am I going insane or did that happen today?
[357] Oh, yes, it did.
[358] Like, you have someone to reassure you about the reality you're in.
[359] Yes.
[360] So just to encounter her mind, just her mind that way was so, it's so agile and original and amazing.
[361] So to have that and then go, oh, this is the joy that I'm missing.
[362] So then everything else was just a bonus on top of already what was.
[363] this, I don't wanna say a Sunday, that sounds a little weird.
[364] Like, it's an extra cherry and a Sunday with a cherry already on it, but it just felt like, oh, everything else after this is a bonus on top of.
[365] I just wanna say, and it's a lovely thing you just said, but if someone sent me a Sunday that had three cherries on it, I'd send it back.
[366] Yeah, it'd be a little, I'd say this is too many cherries.
[367] A little much, you're trying too hard.
[368] Yeah, and, and I have done that.
[369] I've often said, really.
[370] Or I've eaten it all and said, I'm not paying for it.
[371] There were three cherries on.
[372] Then they've always point out you ate, all three cherries.
[373] And I'm like, yeah, well, fuck you.
[374] I'm a terrible, terrible person, right?
[375] Terrible.
[376] You've been with me many times, Sona, when I've done it.
[377] You've thrown the cherries at me when there's three cherries.
[378] Yeah, I said, I'm going to eat two of these, but not this third one.
[379] And then I whip it at Sona as hard as I can.
[380] And then as you do it, you're looking at the waiter and I'm not doing this to hurt her.
[381] I'm doing this to teach you.
[382] I want you to keep this pain and humiliate.
[383] Look at her face and see this every time you're about to put three cherries on.
[384] See this face.
[385] I think it was a missed opportunity for you with the three cherries.
[386] You take one and you say to your friend that you're with, can you tie this in a knot with your tongue?
[387] And in the meantime, you take the other cherry, you tie it in a knot, sneakily put it in your mouth, and then they can't do it, and you're like, let me try.
[388] And then you take the third one, you put it in your mouth, and then the one that you just tied, you then take that one out.
[389] You know what you are?
[390] You're a natural grifter.
[391] That is so grifty.
[392] It's so grifty.
[393] That is so grifty.
[394] We had an innocent rifted.
[395] rift going on and you immediately saw the way to exploit it as a grift and I'm looking at my wallet's gone Sony your pearls are missing Oh my pearl!
[396] Yeah, those beautiful Armenian pearls.
[397] Why am I hearing Marvin Hamlish as the entertainer in my world?
[398] What is happening here?
[399] My God.
[400] Well, didn't you at one point you worked as a got a job as a waitress because you want like I want to and then you're like I know I can't like let me Let me be a shot girl because you were good at talking people into buying shots.
[401] I would make them for everyone else.
[402] I'd leave a tiny bit for me that didn't have any alcohol in them.
[403] Again, a grift.
[404] And then I would walk around and I'm like, jealous shot, they're only a dollar.
[405] And then people are like, I'm good.
[406] I'm like, I'll do one if you do one.
[407] And so they give me $2 and then I would take.
[408] Oh.
[409] The non -alcoholic one.
[410] I see.
[411] I see.
[412] That's brilliant.
[413] Listen, it's marketing.
[414] It's marketing.
[415] But you know what?
[416] I'm a marketing genius.
[417] I feel like I could do that job.
[418] No. It was such a fun job.
[419] I know.
[420] Why couldn't I do that?
[421] I don't think anyone would want to buy a jello shot from you.
[422] I wouldn't have the same approach as you.
[423] My thing would be like, you should try it.
[424] It's jello with alcohol.
[425] Come on.
[426] Come on.
[427] That's the problem.
[428] That was a fun real job.
[429] I would be very uptight and I would have a long story about how they have my dog, prisoner.
[430] You've got to do.
[431] You would create all these scenarios every night and then people.
[432] Although, what if that ended up?
[433] Clicking and people go, have you been down to strap?
[434] There's some dude.
[435] And you know he's lying, but every night there's some insane story.
[436] He's so desperate.
[437] So people are coming up just to see what story you make up every single night.
[438] Family kidnapped by ninjas.
[439] Wow.
[440] So I guess we should probably buy a jello shot off of you, right?
[441] That's right.
[442] Oh, this guy's so sad.
[443] Didn't you used to dance here?
[444] Tasty, pasty.
[445] Yeah.
[446] There's a question I have for you, Meredith, which is, first of all, You referenced these movies.
[447] What movies were you in?
[448] What would I know you from?
[449] Well, the very first movie I ever did, which you can hardly see me in, but it was the movie Annie that John Houston directed.
[450] Right.
[451] It was actually a big dance audition, and I brought my sister, who's a dancer, but she's super shy.
[452] She didn't want to be in it.
[453] And it was like 500 people, 500 girls were auditioning at this dance thing, and the choreographer picked 30 girls and didn't pick me. Like, you, you, you, and he picked my sister.
[454] And so they were filming at the Columbia a lot, and all the girls are dancing.
[455] like the day of their film, after they've rehearsed all summer, I went to watch the...
[456] That's got to feel bad.
[457] And I was just sitting there like, forlorn.
[458] And John Houston walked by and he looked at me and he's like, we need another orphan.
[459] You, come on.
[460] And they put me in the rags and dirt on my face.
[461] And then I ended up being in it and then ended up having more part in it.
[462] And anyway, that was little, but then...
[463] How'd you like to be an orphan?
[464] I think you would be a fantastic, struggling weight.
[465] He used to say that to people and they would think, Are you going to murder my parents?
[466] How would you like to be an orphan?
[467] Leave my parents alone.
[468] That was super little, but then I did a movie for Disney when I was 14 called The Journey of Natty Gann.
[469] Oh, yeah.
[470] About a little girl during the Depression, traveling the country with a wolf and her dad.
[471] You like, your era is Depression era.
[472] Annie's Depression era.
[473] I am really good just covered in dirt.
[474] That's my favorite.
[475] Like, I'm going to be Dirty Cinderella for Halloween.
[476] Not slutty Cinderella.
[477] No. cinder, dirty, poor cinderella.
[478] And last year I was a mechanic with, I like being dirty.
[479] My favorite roles are the dirty rolls.
[480] I would like a slutty, dirty Cinderella.
[481] A really slutty Cinderella who's also kind of covered in ashes.
[482] And I'm like, oh, I bet you're all dirty.
[483] I'll get you clean.
[484] But she's like, I've always called her, she's like the Tom Waits of Disney princesses.
[485] Yeah.
[486] Like, she's a Disney princess that's eating cold beans out of a can and smoking.
[487] Yeah.
[488] Rives the rails.
[489] And then I did, like, I just.
[490] I just can't believe that you were directed by John Houston.
[491] You were directed by someone who directed Humphrey Bogart.
[492] That's one of those things where every now and then there'll be a fact, like, did you know that?
[493] You want to hear a good fact?
[494] I just shook hands with someone who shook hands with someone who shook hands with Lincoln.
[495] Like, you know.
[496] She's about to blow your mind.
[497] Okay, let's hear.
[498] You can tell the fact.
[499] No, no, no, you tell it because it sounds amazing.
[500] But this is true.
[501] Go ahead.
[502] I was the last person to see Orson Wall's alive.
[503] So you killed him.
[504] I killed him.
[505] You know, he was stabbed to death.
[506] I killed him.
[507] And a woman, an orphan was seen fleeing with a knife.
[508] With a wolf.
[509] I actually.
[510] On wolf back.
[511] I might not have been the last person.
[512] Wait, so explain that.
[513] Yes.
[514] When I was fifth.
[515] So I did that movie, The Journey of Nat again, and it was very well received.
[516] And I did all these talk shows back then, one of which happened to be the Merv Griffin show.
[517] And I was on the Merv Griffin show the same night as Orson Wells.
[518] And we were hanging out in the green room and talking and everything.
[519] And I was, and Merv Griffin was like, how about Orson Wells?
[520] Now I'm 15, my favorite movies, Breakfast Club.
[521] Like Ali Sheedy is my favorite actress at the time.
[522] Right, you don't care about Orson.
[523] I didn't know anything.
[524] And he's like, how about Arson Welles?
[525] I was like, oh, yeah.
[526] And he's like, what's your favorite movie?
[527] And I was like, you know what?
[528] I just love all those old movies.
[529] I just didn't know what the fuck to say.
[530] Was Orson Wells looking for you to say Citizen Kane, undoubtedly?
[531] Anyway.
[532] What's your favorite movie that starts with Citizen?
[533] Did you enjoy my voice work in the Transformers film?
[534] So anyway, the show was over.
[535] We were talking backstage, and he, he, he, he lit, maybe I'm romanticizing this, but I feel like he looked at me and he was like, you're going to be a great actress one day kid or something like that.
[536] It felt like I got.
[537] Or strike me dead.
[538] Yeah.
[539] Oh, I'm going to hell.
[540] Oh, my God.
[541] Cohn, it's funny.
[542] Anyway, then he got in his car.
[543] So maybe the limo driver was lost.
[544] And then he was dead the next morning.
[545] Yeah.
[546] It could have been the poison that.
[547] Or could have been Bogdanovich song.
[548] or something.
[549] Yeah.
[550] You know, I just saw a young talent earlier, Peter, that is going to be, is going to rip this town to shreds.
[551] I'm going to write a movie for her.
[552] I know a town field where peas grow up.
[553] You know, I believe my show may have killed George Plimpton.
[554] What?
[555] Yeah.
[556] And you mentioned Martha Plimpton earlier.
[557] Related.
[558] Wait a minute.
[559] I don't know if they're related.
[560] I believe they are.
[561] I believe they are.
[562] Are they?
[563] Yes.
[564] Because Martha Plimpton's Keith and.
[565] Carradine's daughter.
[566] Well, now I'm all confused.
[567] Yeah.
[568] You know, now it's just this gourdia knot that we'll never escape.
[569] All I can tell you is that George Plimpton, who I loved and adored, used to do little weird bits for us every now and then on the show.
[570] And it was just marvelous to have George Plimpton, the great author, Racconteur.
[571] Oh, my God.
[572] What a life that guy lived, too.
[573] Yeah, and he had met everybody and seen everybody, and he was kind of a zealic.
[574] He'd been everywhere.
[575] He's in the background of every photo.
[576] And he would do little bits for our show on late night.
[577] And then I think we got him to do one bit, and then it needed some narration.
[578] And one of the writers who was just very anal kept making him go over it and over it and over it in the booth, I think, a couple of times.
[579] And then I think he was, I mean, I'm probably exaggerating, but he left the voiceover booth after having to do it like five times, went home and passed away.
[580] And the next day I was saying to the writer, you killed George Clinton.
[581] You're a murderer.
[582] And he was like, no, I just hadn't do it three times.
[583] What's wrong with one take?
[584] You know, you don't make him do three takes?
[585] You are the Meredith Salinger to his Orson Welles.
[586] You took him off this earth.
[587] Is it true that Orson Wells, as he left the room, said, Well, off to die now.
[588] And that beautiful voice he has.
[589] Ah, the French champagne bottles in California.
[590] I remember I had this book of haunted places in America kind of break down my cities, and apparently Sweet Lady Jane's is, you know, they have the mirrors on the back wall, the whole back wall's mirror that.
[591] You're talking about the restaurant.
[592] The restaurant on Melrose, Sweet Lady Jane, it's a bakery, and these mirrors.
[593] And the legend is sometimes employees see his ghost in that mirror.
[594] Orson Wells' ghost.
[595] Because he would come in and have lunch.
[596] And so I went in there one day, and there's an older woman that works from like, hey, I'm reading in this book about, apparently you guys can see Orson Wells' ghost in the mirror.
[597] She goes, I've never seen his ghost, but he used to come in here for lunch.
[598] And you know the Sweet Lady Jane cake that, you know, the famous cake they make?
[599] It's a giant cake.
[600] Yeah, he would order one of those and sit with a pot of coffee and write and eat the entire cake and drink the pot of coffee.
[601] That was his lunch.
[602] And all of his screenplays at that point were just about cake.
[603] The cake slides down the go -ins.
[604] This is called Citizen Cake, which is a wonderful, wonderful new film.
[605] Oh, my Lord.
[606] Yeah, like, but that idea that they were, and everyone's sitting there like, it's Orson Wells over there.
[607] He's just eating, he just ordered a whole cake and he's just, what, do we, do we take a picture of him?
[608] What do we do?
[609] This is insane.
[610] Yeah, now everybody has a camera on them at all times.
[611] If anything bad happens, there's 35 different angles on it.
[612] Correct.
[613] And it can all be repurposed as we found out, we got invited to the Vanity Fair Oscar party a couple of years ago.
[614] And really quick story.
[615] We're in line because to get in, you have to go down this photo line.
[616] We would have been happy to just go in.
[617] Then when you got to go to the photo line.
[618] It's a red carpet line and there's three little circles on it at the Vanity Fair Oscar thing.
[619] The celebrity is supposed to go to the first circle and there's a set of photographers that take your picture there.
[620] Then you move to the second circle and then those photographers.
[621] So we were about to step on to the first circle.
[622] And they go, do you mind if these people go right in front of you?
[623] It's Kim and Kanye.
[624] Kim Kardashian and Kanye West they go in front of us the photographers go berserk they go berserk they're on the first circle they moved to the second circle they put us on the first circle no not yet what they didn't put us on the first circle yet okay hang on they went to the second circle everyone's taking their pictures they go we're still kind of waiting and then Kylie Jenner comes and cuts in front of us and then she goes on the first circle and so we're just waiting and watching this madness then she goes to the second circle and the publicist says to the two of us, hey, you guys, okay, your turn.
[625] Go to the first circle.
[626] And meanwhile, we're looking at the photographers in front of us, and they're all looking at Kylie.
[627] No one is looking at us.
[628] Then they go to, she goes to the third circle.
[629] They're still looking at her.
[630] Then she gets off the third circle, and they are looking at their phones to see if they're just, their cameras to see if they got the shot.
[631] So all the pictures of us from the red carpet that day are like, are you guys going, like, are you guys going?
[632] We're all laughing because I started going, uh, ah, ha, ha, ha, ha, hello, basic cable actor.
[633] And to their credit, some of them started laughing because it was like you have to follow the, how do you, you know.
[634] Oh, but the funny thing was.
[635] Then later, when Kim and Kanye announced their divorce, somebody.
[636] They took footage from that night of them on the red carpet doing it at that moment.
[637] They took footage of them.
[638] And for some reason, they walked in front of us and someone got a screen grab of, is it, does it say famous couple files for divorce or something?
[639] It says filing for divorce.
[640] Oh, yeah, it says filing for divorce.
[641] But it's, Meredith and I perfectly.
[642] We're centered, and Kim and Kanye are, you can't even see them.
[643] They're just a blur walking before.
[644] So it's, are we?
[645] It just looks like.
[646] That's how I thought you guys were through.
[647] That's, yeah, and I even, that I tweeted, I was like, is this how I find out, Meredith?
[648] But it was, everything can be re -contextualized.
[649] They can take any photo, whatever they want.
[650] And then the reface app, the deep fakes and all that kind of stuff.
[651] I know that people are so amused by the deep fake stuff where there's a guy that does the Tom Cruise deep fake stuff.
[652] That terrifies me. No, because.
[653] A politician.
[654] Well, also, forget someone doing an impression or anything.
[655] They can digitally take our faces.
[656] I'm going to be, after I die, my kids are going to sell my image, and I'll be put on the body of a really incredible porn star.
[657] And I will be in a lot of pornographic films.
[658] Wait, you're just saying that to cover for the fact that you actually did the porn.
[659] So you're like, this is a deep fake.
[660] It's not real.
[661] When you see this guy's body, you'll know that my head was put on there.
[662] You know, rippling muscles, olive skin.
[663] Yeah, actually, Conan, I agree.
[664] Someone, when I die, someone will take my face and make it look like I did this weird porn and they'll make the film look like it was shot in the late 80s, even though it clearly wasn't.
[665] Meanwhile, all your fans online are like trying to do it right now and they're going to start putting it on the internet.
[666] Look, well, you know what?
[667] I don't feel bad about it, Paton, because we did what we had to do.
[668] We did get into the business.
[669] Damn it, you do what you got to do.
[670] I mean, not everyone gets a John Houston grabbing you off a street corner.
[671] John Houston said to you, I'll make you an orphan.
[672] Some people get a nod from John Houston.
[673] Some of us have to be in a knockoff movie, the journey of naughty gan.
[674] There's a million ways into it that doesn't matter.
[675] There's that movie.
[676] Then there's the journey of nasty gan, which is very, very bloody.
[677] I didn't make that audition.
[678] I flinch when they brought out the bucket of squid.
[679] Now, I have a question for you guys.
[680] You do this podcast called Did You Get My Text?
[681] And you live together.
[682] You are married, and yet your primary mode of communication is texting.
[683] Is and always has been.
[684] Yes.
[685] Well, we know that that's how you met, but you think that that would wane once you're in physical proximity.
[686] If anything.
[687] Okay, here's how crazy it got.
[688] Because we're in the same house, but I'll be my office and I'll think of something.
[689] I don't want to walk upstairs and tell her, I'll text her.
[690] And one night, we were in bed and I saw our backs were to each other.
[691] Our backs because she had found this perfect position.
[692] But I found this amazing picture.
[693] I'm like, Meredith, you got to look at this.
[694] And she's like...
[695] And he's like telling me like, now I have to get...
[696] Now I have to like undo my perfect position and lean over and go to look at the thing on his side.
[697] I'm like, I'm so comfortable.
[698] Can you either put it in front of my face, please, or just text it to me. Because she had gotten...
[699] You're in the same bed.
[700] In the same bed.
[701] And you can't swivel your neck.
[702] No. And her, by the way, in her defense, her position involved like five.
[703] five pillows.
[704] She had arranged a ergonomic thing.
[705] I've got big boobs and long hair and my back hurts and I have to like get everything into its spot without it being uncomfortable.
[706] There's stuff to deal with.
[707] She had arranged four boob pillows, five neck, but it was a huge, it was a whole thing.
[708] Yeah, it was a lattice work if it would, if, if you would have been easier if you just did it and leaned over and showed me. So what happens is you're in the same house, sometimes you're even in the same bed as each other or the same house and you're texting each other.
[709] Yeah.
[710] And so your only way of really communicating is you get together with the microphones.
[711] Yes.
[712] And you record a podcast where you go through the text.
[713] We go over.
[714] What was this?
[715] What did this mean?
[716] I'm like, oh, did you get the one about this one?
[717] Yes.
[718] Well, can we talk about that now?
[719] Yeah.
[720] And so then we talk about it.
[721] It's the age we live in, man. It's the age we live in.
[722] We're commenting on our time.
[723] This will be a great artifact in 500 years to explain these times we live in where everyone's always on their phone, always texting each other when they could be talking to each other.
[724] Correct.
[725] It's better for us that we don't speak to each other.
[726] It's better that it's only hour a week.
[727] All my wife's text to me are she knows I'm out and about and she'll want me to stop off at the grocery store.
[728] And it's always to get a product that doesn't exist or is not readily available.
[729] So she'll say, can you just stop off at the Ralph's on the way home?
[730] And she said, you know, what I want is I want salt install non -zincinct shortening.
[731] And I'll say, what's salt and stall?
[732] And she'll go like, well, it's an English brand.
[733] It's made actually near the border with Wales.
[734] But it's got to be non -zinc.
[735] And it comes, the other ones are orange.
[736] This one has a blue stripe.
[737] And I'll go and I'll, actually, I'll find an aisle that says shortening.
[738] Then I'll find another aisle that says European shortening.
[739] And it's not there.
[740] And then they'll have one salt install, but it's got now with more zinc.
[741] And so, and then I come home and I say, this doesn't.
[742] exist, she'd be like, yeah, I thought it was a long shot.
[743] Oh, I just spent, I just spent two hours there.
[744] I was questioning people.
[745] So you rolled the dice with my time is what you did.
[746] Like, let's see if it happens.
[747] Yes.
[748] And she just wants, I think she just doesn't want me around.
[749] Well, I have, can you go get me a velocopede that's made of licorice?
[750] What?
[751] A one -wheel bicycle from the turn of the century made of licorice that has a bell and the Kaiser's face is on the bell.
[752] What?
[753] Go find it.
[754] I'm sorry, what?
[755] I have a similar thing with Meredith where I call it Manchurian candidate, where if she sees a food item depicted in media either as a drawing, and it sparked something, she must have that food item immediately.
[756] Wow.
[757] If she sees it, get it, I need it now.
[758] I'm an advertiser's target audience constantly.
[759] But also, like, Alice came in our room.
[760] This is back when she was eight.
[761] She came in the room, and she had her.
[762] her jammies on and they were trying some donuts on them.
[763] And then I got her.
[764] You were taking her to school.
[765] And I was like, make sure you bring on to donuts.
[766] She just called me, I need donuts.
[767] I'm like, why?
[768] Because they were, I saw, I saw them on the jammies.
[769] I need the donuts now.
[770] And so there have been times where she'll see some.
[771] And so if there had been a turduckin depicted on, on her jammies, you'd have said, I need a turduckin.
[772] Immediately.
[773] Exactly.
[774] Well, also she'll get these nostalgic cravings.
[775] And I will go too far where she'll like, oh my God, I want a Twinkie.
[776] So I'll buy a box of Twinkies and then she'll have one and go, I just needed the one.
[777] I got it.
[778] Like, I think that it's what she wants now.
[779] There's a recording studio in Los Angeles that we both record at.
[780] And so he was saying he was recording at the studio and I was like, I know in the kitchen there they have Twinkies.
[781] I was like, can you just bring me home a Twinkie?
[782] Yeah.
[783] And you did.
[784] And then you had to go there another time.
[785] And then you brought me home like two.
[786] And then you went to the store and bought boxes.
[787] A box.
[788] And then for my birthday, he had this amazing chef, like make me a first.
[789] Brickin' cake made out of twinkie thing.
[790] I'm like, it's disgusting.
[791] I only wanted one.
[792] It was the benign version of making a kid like smoke a pack of cigarette so he doesn't smoke any friendly.
[793] Oh, you're going to smoke a hundred in front of me, kid.
[794] Well, it worked.
[795] And you're never going to do it again.
[796] Yeah, but she does have these weird.
[797] They're not even cravings.
[798] It's a, it's like a trigger mechanism.
[799] It's impulse.
[800] I have no impulse.
[801] You know what I am?
[802] I am, my weakness is like an REI.
[803] Any kind of thing that comes from REI, I have to have.
[804] Hey, R -E -I.
[805] Conan O 'Brien likes your stuff.
[806] I think you should probably sponsor.
[807] I think a lot of people do, actually.
[808] I am very, I put together these go -bags in case of the apocalypse.
[809] Oh, dear God.
[810] They are so.
[811] Heavy.
[812] How on earth are we going to?
[813] Way overboard in what.
[814] So which in your go -bag?
[815] Tell us.
[816] Every thing.
[817] Way too much stuff.
[818] I have.
[819] You have a lot of comic books.
[820] That's, I bet your go -bag would be very little, there'd be like no food or water, but I'd be like, this is the Iron Man before Tony Starry.
[821] had his heart repaired.
[822] He made three of them, one for each of us and Alice.
[823] And when I tell you, they're like 80 pounds each, and they each have a hatchet, a hatchet.
[824] Oh, you got it?
[825] I'm giving a hatchet to Alice.
[826] It's a mini hatchet with a hollow handle that has other tools in it.
[827] Oh, my God.
[828] It's a multi -tool, a little hatchet.
[829] And I got it, RRI.
[830] Yes, it's the best.
[831] Orii.
[832] I love it.
[833] Oh, you'd love the hatchet.
[834] Oh, I'd love it.
[835] Oh, God.
[836] I would keep just, I would empty out the tools, and I would just, I would put rum.
[837] in the handle of the axe.
[838] I have, in each one, there's an empty whiskey flask that in my mind once goes it down, I will fill each with whiskey because you've got to have whiskey with you.
[839] In my mind, I'm going to be cutting a bullet out of someone, so here, take a shot of this.
[840] Here we go.
[841] I have packed equipment that I'm not qualified to use.
[842] Right, right.
[843] And by the way, there was a huge blackout, and I have these little mini generators that they're solar powered and you also crank them to do energy.
[844] But then when the power went on, I can charge my phone with this generator and I couldn't get it to work because I hadn't read all the instructions.
[845] So I own there's equipment in these things that I don't.
[846] Also, there's a, I got one of those leatherman, the multi, the leatherman multi tools.
[847] I have many of those.
[848] I got the biggest one.
[849] I was messing around with that.
[850] I open up the saw.
[851] There's a saw you can saw and I can't figure out how to close it again.
[852] Oh, no. Has a saw just sticking out that I can't put in the bag because it'll cut everything else open.
[853] I have a life straw you can like drink contaminated water through and it like.
[854] That's a good idea.
[855] That's actually the best idea.
[856] You know what it is?
[857] They have a straw where you drink it and whatever liquid you're sucking up, it turns it into chocolate milk.
[858] So you can literally be sucking up liquid uranium from a spill and it becomes a liquid.
[859] REI has one where you could just press the buttons on it and like if you want Coke, if you want...
[860] It's like you just choose the flavor and yeah, REI sells that one.
[861] Strawberry Quick, whatever you want.
[862] Oh, I love strawberry quick.
[863] I mean, I have friends who know how to...
[864] that have taken like EMT courses and taught themselves how to fly hell helicopters, for God's sakes.
[865] You know, in case, but, and I have a, I have a earthquake and you have a helicopter in your backyard that you can just escape for.
[866] I have a multi tool that I can't close.
[867] That's going to be my use in the apocalypse.
[868] My wife was really laughing at me because a bunch of years ago, I decided, I need to know how to ride a motorcycle because that's a skill that you need to know how to, you need to do it.
[869] So I took a motorcycle course and I learned how to ride a motorcycle and really liked it.
[870] And I kept thinking, this is going to come in so handy.
[871] And now I'm, there's part of me that's, this sounds terrible, but I'm like, bring it on.
[872] Because I want to jump on a really cool.
[873] I want to show people that wasn't a waste of time.
[874] Yes.
[875] And I want to be the guy, you know, in the, in the Walking Dead.
[876] With there's traffic everywhere.
[877] You're the only one who can get through.
[878] I'm the one that can weave my way through the zombies because I've, you know, I can do that now.
[879] You want to be Norman Redis.
[880] I want to be Norman Redis in so many ways.
[881] Yeah, I get that.
[882] But a Norman Reedis who shaves constantly.
[883] But, like, I have this weird, I have these very occasional anxiety dreams because I don't know how to drive a stick shift car.
[884] So in my dream, there is some kind of disaster, but the only car that's there is a stick shift that I don't know how to drive it.
[885] And, you know, like, I remember watching there's a movie called Trucker, a little indie movie with Michelle Monaghan, who learned how to, she qualified on an 18 -wheeler.
[886] She plays a female trucker.
[887] And I'm like, I need to get a movie where I learn how to drive.
[888] Like, just have that skill.
[889] I love that you need to get a movie that teaches you that thing.
[890] You're not going to learn it unless you have a reason.
[891] It's so funny.
[892] Like Patton was like, I'd like to know how to make chocolate chip cookies from scratch.
[893] I need to get a movie where I make chocolate chip cookies.
[894] You know, you want to do a movie where you have to play an amazing piece on the piano.
[895] You don't want to take piano lessons for 75 ,000 years.
[896] You just want someone to actually teach you that one song so that you can just wow your friends.
[897] Yeah.
[898] Yeah.
[899] I remember I did a movie where I had to be a. a blackjack dealer, and I was so nervous about, I didn't want to seem like I didn't know what I was doing.
[900] So I sat with the dealer for a few hours, and he showed me how to cut and, you know, deal it all out.
[901] And then when they show the movie, it's all, they just show me from here up.
[902] And then they would cut to another guy's hands doing that.
[903] I was like, what the guy?
[904] The guy who did it was black.
[905] It's you going, sure.
[906] Yeah, there you go.
[907] Sure, yeah.
[908] Crazy.
[909] What if it had been a woman with, like, very feminine fingers?
[910] I would have been glad.
[911] I would have taken it because my hands were weird.
[912] That would have been great.
[913] Now, I'm curious, Meredith, how do you handle the fact that I am on this?
[914] I'm not going to get too specific, but I'm on this.
[915] There's this text chain that Patton is on.
[916] And Patton kindly invited me into it.
[917] I think it's called The Nerd Thread.
[918] Is that what you call it?
[919] There's two.
[920] Oh, thanks for inviting me. I have a text thread with all my comedians.
[921] And then there's an email chain with the biggest old Hollywood and history.
[922] That's what I'm on.
[923] That's the one I'm on.
[924] And these people know everything.
[925] Now, I have areas of sick, deep, deep interest, but I'm talking, first of all, it's, I don't think you people do anything else.
[926] I'm constantly, and I don't want to out anybody else who's on it, but everybody's very funny, very sharp.
[927] Yes.
[928] But literally, someone will mention a character actor like Bert Muston, who was an old man. I'm just, like, I just know some weird, I have a little weird pockets.
[929] Bert Muston played the old man in every 70s sitcom for a while.
[930] And if you saw a picture of me, go like, oh, right, that guy.
[931] And he literally was about 95, and they would always, he was on, you know, all in the family.
[932] He was always the old, old, old man who'd come in.
[933] And someone will mention Bert Muston.
[934] Somehow that will come up.
[935] Suddenly, hundreds of people on this thread are chiming in with weird archa information about this person and they've got photographs of check out Bert in 1932 when he was a ventriloquist insane you know and and suddenly and I'm people have said to me sometimes hey Conan you don't chime in that much and I'll say because it's like putting your hand into a blender if your hand isn't moving as fast as the blender you're going to get shredded right and I get intimidated I cannot keep up with you guys there are times when I just lean back and watch there are people on that thread that can sling clippings and photographs at the snap of a finger.
[936] They have, I don't know what they have axed to.
[937] Maybe they have access to Google.
[938] You type in the guy's name and you just go to the images.
[939] I can do it.
[940] No, this is, there are clipping services you can subscribe to where you get stuff you don't just get on a Google image search, like a Nexus, Nexus searches like that.
[941] Yeah, yeah, yeah.
[942] That you have to have a subscription to.
[943] Uh -huh.
[944] And these guys, like any old celebrity dies, they have like newspaper clippings of a dinner theater thing they did back in the 70s.
[945] Yes, they have weird appearances they made.
[946] And I swear to God, I could randomly type into this chain.
[947] Just, I'm just randomly, hey, wonder if Dean Martin ever wrote an elephant completely naked.
[948] And literally, a second later, there's a black and white photograph of Dean Martin in 1958 naked riding an elephant.
[949] And they'll be like, you mean this paparazzi shot when he's goofing around on the set of, you know, All aboard, you're like, how did that, how did, who are these people?
[950] Somebody made a joke about Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis, and someone had pictures that Dean and Jerry had taken as a goof.
[951] They're both nude and a shower together.
[952] That was upsetting.
[953] Fully frontal nude.
[954] I'm like, wait, what?
[955] In the 50s that like didn't get around, but this guy has them.
[956] And here they are.
[957] I was like, how do we have these?
[958] I wasn't prepared for that.
[959] No, not me. My daughter leaned over my shoulder and said, Daddy, what are you looking?
[960] Ah!
[961] Oh, God.
[962] Yeah, it was.
[963] Yeah, the stuff that they find, these weird, Mort Saul just passed away.
[964] Mort Saul, he was in 1937.
[965] Yeah, yeah.
[966] But someone had a clip of a talk show he did.
[967] I guess it was a talk show that he hosted that never aired where he basically started screaming at this guy.
[968] I saw that clip.
[969] These clips are fascinating.
[970] Wow.
[971] And I will sometimes get drawn into something.
[972] My weirdest experience was I was doing a show shooting one of my travel shows, and I was in...
[973] Africa.
[974] I remember this.
[975] And I remember it so clearly.
[976] And there's this famous, there was this act that was big back in the 30s and 40s.
[977] People don't know them today nearly as well as they know the Marks brothers, you know, or some of the other brother.
[978] But they're called the Ritz brothers.
[979] And they were quite well known.
[980] And I went down this rabbit hole of my feelings about the Ritz brothers.
[981] And I never forget, I am, I'm lying on the floor in Africa.
[982] And it's three in the morning where I am and I can't sleep.
[983] And I've been shooting all day.
[984] And I'm lying on the floor and I'm getting very impassioned about how we can't judge this now.
[985] In the context of the 1940s, you know, this work was quite indelibly good.
[986] And so we have to keep in mind, and I'm going on and on about how.
[987] Harry Ritz, and Harry Ritz really did influence Sid Caesar, and you've got to understand that Harry Ritz, and I just thought, you guys sucked me into this thing.
[988] I think even at one point, one of the responses on the thread was, Conan, aren't you in Africa right now?
[989] How are you writing these paragraphs?
[990] Aren't you literally sleeping in a tent out on the Savannah?
[991] What is happening?
[992] Yeah, I will start going down these rabbit holes, and she, you can see just, oh, God, here we go.
[993] That's what I'm curious is your perspective on.
[994] you come by and Patton is going down.
[995] I mean, I'm just getting seconds of it here and there and engaging occasionally.
[996] He's always in this world.
[997] He has an encyclopedic brain.
[998] It's shocking.
[999] It's incredible.
[1000] But we will be doing our podcast, and I'll just say one thing.
[1001] And then he'll just go down this rabbit hole of what you were just talking about.
[1002] And literally, after a while, I'm just like, and then he's like, what you should?
[1003] about that.
[1004] And I'm like, I actually, you know what?
[1005] I tuned out.
[1006] I'm sorry.
[1007] He's like, we're doing a podcast.
[1008] You're supposed to pay attention.
[1009] I'm like, it's so boring to me. My old thing is you leave and make a sandwich and come back.
[1010] Yeah.
[1011] Well, what'll happen is I'll start off on a rabbit hole.
[1012] Like, well, you know, funny you mentioned Dean Martin because at one point, he was in talks.
[1013] See, Francis Coppola had the rights to Dr. Strange.
[1014] And then I go on, and then after like two minutes he'll go, so I'm sorry, what, Dean Martin?
[1015] Like, she just had the beginning part.
[1016] I'm not calling any of your other bullshit.
[1017] He yelled at me. He, because I It was like, wait, what?
[1018] Yeah, I know what?
[1019] This is gold!
[1020] He's like...
[1021] You're not paying attention to this gold?
[1022] He's like, this is our podcast.
[1023] You're supposed to like listen and...
[1024] I'm like, it's so boring to me. Yes, because I don't know what you're doing.
[1025] I don't know.
[1026] I'm like, I tuned out.
[1027] I'm sorry.
[1028] That's half of our podcast is me. Well, that's when you have to call me. And I love how I say call.
[1029] That's how out of it I am.
[1030] You should pick up a Bakelite telephone and call me. Oh, I love Bakelite.
[1031] Oh, my God.
[1032] I love the backgammon pieces.
[1033] Andy Richter years ago gave me. he found this company that takes old Bakelite phones from the 40s, the big heavy ones with the dials that make that cool zipping down.
[1034] And they repurpose them so they have modern electronics inside, but it's the old phone.
[1035] And so I have it on my desk.
[1036] And it goes like, but the thing is I'll be on Zoom calls talking business or with different people on Zoom, work, you know, different stuff we have to work out.
[1037] But because my Bakelite phone is right there, I keep picking it up and going, Hello, hello, Rangley 5 to 5.
[1038] And they're like, we just, you did bits with the phone last time.
[1039] Put it down.
[1040] It's not that funny.
[1041] I can't help it.
[1042] I love it.
[1043] All right, guys, I got to wrap this up.
[1044] Oh, no. This has been too much fun.
[1045] We just did a ton of time.
[1046] Time happened, man. Time happened, man. This is what happens when you have a guest on your show and you're not just talking to your wife.
[1047] This is, like, time goes by.
[1048] I'm like, come on, let's get, this is slogging along.
[1049] What's happening here?
[1050] Did you get my text?
[1051] Check out, did you get my text?
[1052] I love you guys and I'm really happy that you've found a way to communicate face to face and you're basically you're using it you found a way to monetize your time where you're talking to each other it's a whole new level of our relationship you know things are really getting intimate when you have to break for commercially Oh this was so fun thank you for having us on me this is awesome yay Sona, I ran into you recently and you told me that your mother said something very special about our children.
[1053] Yes.
[1054] So we make a joke that, you know, that your daughter is going to marry one or both my boys.
[1055] Right.
[1056] And then I was telling my parents, so I was like, oh, yeah, this is the thing we were talking about.
[1057] My mom and dad both looked at me very seriously and they're like, oh, like a, and they said a word in.
[1058] And I think either Armenian or Turkish, and they're like, yeah, this happens in the villages.
[1059] They arrange marriages at infancy.
[1060] And then I asked her more about it.
[1061] And the direct translation is a bassinet engagement.
[1062] Yeah.
[1063] Whoa.
[1064] Yeah.
[1065] Like the parents are like, you got a baby?
[1066] I got a baby.
[1067] They'll get married when they're older.
[1068] And then it just...
[1069] Yes.
[1070] I mean, arranged marriages, obviously have existed for thousands of years.
[1071] And I think they still exist.
[1072] Yes.
[1073] In some cultures.
[1074] Yeah.
[1075] So, and what's strange is they work out a lot.
[1076] Did you know that?
[1077] I mean, you'd think.
[1078] Yeah.
[1079] But I've heard often people say, you know, actually in a strange way, because you know who you're going to marry for most of the time you're growing up.
[1080] It's no secret.
[1081] Yes, I know it could probably go very, very wrong, very off the rails.
[1082] But sometimes it works out really nice.
[1083] And I'm thinking, look at all these kids today with their apps, all the misery.
[1084] Do I swipe left?
[1085] Do I swipe right?
[1086] How is this going to go?
[1087] I've dated 15 people on an app recently and none of them went well.
[1088] Arranged marriages.
[1089] There should be an arranged marriage app.
[1090] An arranged marriage app.
[1091] And I bet you at first people would say this is terrible, but then it would blow up, destroy all these other, you know, bumblebee and happy tree and fiddle d. those would all be gone instantly.
[1092] Who's arranging them?
[1093] Who's doing it?
[1094] Your mother.
[1095] No, an app.
[1096] Well, okay, your mother could do it or you could get a really sophisticated logarithm, but your mother, yeah, your mother, we could say it's a sophisticated logarithm, but it's really just your mom.
[1097] Your mom is on the app with you.
[1098] No, no, no. Your mom, Sona, links everybody in the world together in an arm's marriage.
[1099] Your mother specifically, Nadia, Nadia Mosessian is in a room with a headset on, and she is pairing at very fast speeds.
[1100] That face and that face, bang.
[1101] This one and that one, bang.
[1102] This one and that one, bang.
[1103] She has those Tom Cruise gloves from minority reporters.
[1104] Yes, she's got those special gloves, and she's just swiping, and you know what?
[1105] You'd get back, this statistic.
[1106] People would say this is insane.
[1107] You'd find out 97 % of them are happy, and they married, and they were happy for 50 years together.
[1108] Do I need to, like, prepare a dowry for my daughter for one or both of your sons?
[1109] Yeah, you do.
[1110] Which one?
[1111] My mom had a dowry.
[1112] She did?
[1113] I think so, yeah.
[1114] Your mother, what do you mean?
[1115] What was her dowry?
[1116] She had, like, a chest full of stuff.
[1117] What?
[1118] What did she, what was in there?
[1119] Like a Pez dispenser and some, you know, you know.
[1120] Yeah, like, you know.
[1121] Yeah, I mean, what did she have in there?
[1122] Well, it's very old school.
[1123] But you also know when I married Tack that in order to get out of the house, his best man had to pay my brother for me. Leave the house to get married.
[1124] Sona had to be purchased.
[1125] Yes, Sona, this is true.
[1126] Sona had to be purchased on her wedding day.
[1127] Well, that's really essentially what it is.
[1128] Yeah.
[1129] How much?
[1130] I don't know.
[1131] I'll double it.
[1132] Well, that would be $40.
[1133] We're going to get that kind of cash.
[1134] 40?
[1135] No, it was more than $20.
[1136] And you know what?
[1137] Close.
[1138] But anyway, they just had an old phone with the cord wrapped around it.
[1139] that was broken.
[1140] No, Sona, that was part of the tradition and you were pissed at the time because you were a modern, forward -thinking woman and you said, this is disgusting, I'm not going to take part of this.
[1141] And then they did it and it was actually kind of sweet and goofy.
[1142] I mean, it was just a, they didn't actually buy you, of course.
[1143] It was just a funny little ritual like, you know, that has existed for thousands of years.
[1144] It was a fun little throwback to a horribly barbaric tradition.
[1145] Yes, yeah, 100%.
[1146] But yeah, obviously, we're really.
[1147] we were going to leave the house.
[1148] I mean, we had all the, like, we paid all the deposits and stuff, so we were going to get married.
[1149] But I think that there's something about, I hated it, but yeah, everyone else did to like it.
[1150] I loved your wedding.
[1151] And I think you can go online and see me dancing like a madman with your father.
[1152] Yes.
[1153] That's, if you're interested, I danced up a storm at that wedding.
[1154] Yeah, people were throwing money on you.
[1155] Yeah.
[1156] Yeah, I got really excited until I realized they were all ones.
[1157] And I'm like, oh, great.
[1158] I'm a stripper again.
[1159] They were just paying Sona's brother to get you to leave.
[1160] Yeah, they were trying to get me out.
[1161] Yeah, those were good times.
[1162] Well, this is fascinating that your mother didn't take it as a joke and really will marry off Gourley's daughter to one of your boys, Mikey and Charlie.
[1163] Which is the one that you think is you would marry off?
[1164] Did she get to make that call or you?
[1165] Yeah, who's it going to be?
[1166] That's a good question.
[1167] I don't know.
[1168] Who's the, Who's, of the two of them, which one's the real player?
[1169] Uh, I would have to say Charlie.
[1170] Or, you know what, but Mikey's also, like, sensitive.
[1171] Like, no, boo.
[1172] Boo, no, no, Mikey's the one who's going to, he's the, he's the catch.
[1173] I'm sorry.
[1174] Yeah.
[1175] I love Charlie, but he's going to be in the, his whole life, he's going to be like, ah, gee, I don't know.
[1176] I don't know.
[1177] I don't know if it's a good idea.
[1178] Mikey's going to be like, hey, what's the problem?
[1179] Check her out.
[1180] Yeah, my daughter likes a bad boy.
[1181] Oh, yeah.
[1182] Up on my tricycle, we'll go for a ride.
[1183] Yeah.
[1184] My daughter loves baby Andrew Dice Clay.
[1185] Yeah.
[1186] Hey, Icarid, dickerad doc.
[1187] It's just the mouse ran up the clock.
[1188] The mouse ran up my cock.
[1189] Oi, way, what does he do?
[1190] Oh, no. Yeah, I like that you're, that Mikey's a filthy little Andrew Dice Clay.
[1191] Oh, he's got a leather, death.
[1192] Little Miss Muffet, little Miss Muffet sat on a tuftit, eat in her guts and way.
[1193] Oh, hey, it's time for you to go to sleep, Mikey.
[1194] Yeah, you gotta cut it out, Mike.
[1195] Charlie, that's his business, not yours.
[1196] Oh, he upsets me. Some of those rhymes are misogynistic.
[1197] I wrote a little poem about his rhymes.
[1198] Oh, Mikey, your words they hurt so.
[1199] But you both have to go to bed.
[1200] Look at him over there with this poems.
[1201] Put away the pen.
[1202] Emerson, what's going on here?
[1203] Those are your kids exactly at four months.
[1204] I'd steer clear of both of them if I were you, Gurley.
[1205] Yeah.
[1206] All right, we just, there you have it.
[1207] I savagely lit into two children who are barely five months old.
[1208] Oh, what layer of, what circle of hell.
[1209] What's, I keep finding lower and lower depths of Dante's Inferno.
[1210] I just found a new low one.
[1211] Wow, Conan really tore, tore into those two five months old.
[1212] The defense was...
[1213] Right now, they're just quietly spitting up on each other, doing no one any arm.
[1214] Yeah, they're practicing rolling over.
[1215] Yeah, exactly.
[1216] Yeah.
[1217] Poor babies.
[1218] Conan O 'Brien needs a friend with Conan O 'Brien, Sonam of Sessian, and Matt Goorley.
[1219] Produced by me, Matt Goreley.
[1220] Executive produced by Adam Sacks, Joanna Solitaroff, and Jeff Ross at Team Coco and Colin Anderson and Cody Fisher at Earwolf.
[1221] Theme song by The White Stripes.
[1222] Incidental music by Jimmy Vivino.
[1223] Take it away, Jimmy.
[1224] Our supervising producer is Aaron Blair and our associate talent producer is Jennifer Samples.
[1225] Engineering by Will Beckton.
[1226] Talent booking by Paula Davis, Gina Batista, and Britt Kahn.
[1227] You can rate and review this show on Apple Podcasts, and you might find your review read on a future episode.
[1228] Got a question for Conan?
[1229] Call the Team Coco hotline at 323 for.
[1230] 451 -2821, and leave a message.
[1231] It too could be featured on a future episode.
[1232] 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.
[1233] This has been a Team Coco production in association with Earwolf.