Conan O’Brien Needs A Friend XX
[0] My name is Michael Shore.
[1] And I feel, you know, fine about being Conan O 'Brien's friend.
[2] No exclamation point.
[3] No. Not underline.
[4] Is fine in italics?
[5] No, that's too much emphasis and stress on the word.
[6] It really has to be neutrally read and delivered.
[7] Fawn is here, hear the yell, back to school.
[8] Hello, brand new shoes, walking blues, climb the fence, books and pens.
[9] I can tell that we are going to be friends, because I can tell that we are going to be friends.
[10] Hello there, and welcome to Conan O 'Brien needs a friend.
[11] I'm Conan.
[12] It's probably obvious, and I'm joined, as always.
[13] That's not obvious by now.
[14] Something's wrong.
[15] joined by Sonam of Sessian.
[16] Hey, Sona.
[17] Hi.
[18] Okay.
[19] This isn't a morning show, a morning drive time show.
[20] Sorry.
[21] It has all the ingredients, though.
[22] Yeah, it sure does.
[23] We're doing some weather and traffic in just a minute.
[24] Matt Goreley, also joining us.
[25] Hey, Matt.
[26] You know what it would be great as if we did use part of the budget to rent a helicopter.
[27] You know, like the way someone else would talk about traffic patterns and what's happening.
[28] and we have a helicopter and it's flying around, but it's serving no function on the podcast.
[29] What's it doing?
[30] It's just every now and then I'm checking in with the, checking in with the corner by needs a friend chopper.
[31] You know, and I'm just like, hey, corner by needs a friend chopper.
[32] You know, we got Aaron Blair, it's up there.
[33] Hey, Aaron.
[34] And Aaron, you can come on, Mike.
[35] Hey, everyone, what's going on?
[36] And what we'd do is we'd put, you'd be in a chopper and you'd be flying around Los Angeles and we'd just be checking in with you every now and then, and it's a podcast, so people listen to it either now or six months from now, or they never listen to it.
[37] No, you're checking in on the web traffic.
[38] Yeah, how's the web traffic?
[39] Blay?
[40] Metrics are high, and the ones and zeros are looking pretty good, but I think we've got a hold -up on the packets coming from Netscape.
[41] Nice.
[42] Jesus.
[43] That was pretty good.
[44] That was pretty good.
[45] He's not commenting at all on what he's seeing in the helicopter.
[46] No, no. The helicopter.
[47] You're looking at a computer.
[48] Sona, please, I can't be more clear about this.
[49] The helicopter serves no function.
[50] And I want, when we play this, I want there to be helicopter noise, ambient helicopter noise around Blay.
[51] So you know exactly what it's like.
[52] And I just, hey, check in now at the Coonerbyne needs a friend Chopper again.
[53] Our man, Blay up in the chopper.
[54] That's our own chopper that we bought.
[55] That used to be, Chopper was formerly used in Operation Deserts.
[56] storm.
[57] We purchased it for $1 .6 million.
[58] We painted the Conan logo on the side and Aaron Blair is now high above Los Angeles or by the 101 freeway.
[59] How are the downloads going?
[60] The downloads are going great.
[61] Routers running pretty hot over here.
[62] Cat 5 cables, a little bit of a mess you can expect to slow down until mid -morning.
[63] Okay, thank you very much for that, Aaron Blair.
[64] We call him the Blayman up in the chopper.
[65] Rotor Blay.
[66] Can I, I have to go to the bathroom.
[67] Can I come down to the chop?
[68] No, no, we put a coffee can up there for a reason.
[69] That is a coffee can that has a specific purpose in mind.
[70] Okay, we'll be chucking in with the...
[71] Wait, can I ask him about what he's seeing?
[72] Like, can I be like, hey, how is the, how's the weather up there in the chopper?
[73] No, because that actually, then that gives there to be...
[74] That gives there to be.
[75] Great job, Conan.
[76] I think it's chopper fumes that I'm high on.
[77] That means that there's some purpose to the chopper, and it's important that the chopper have no purpose.
[78] So even if Blaze said clear skies, and people hear that when they listen to this episode seven months after it drops because they're on a long car trip and their favorite podcast doesn't have a new drop, then I don't even want them to know what the weather was like today.
[79] It's got to be useless information.
[80] Sona, why can't you get your head?
[81] wrapped around this perfect concept hey can you fix it can you fix it Matt so that sona's in a mini sub right now absolutely yes some sonar some sonar noises and of course for this episode sona is in a small this is a repurposed 1959 Korean mini sub that we purchased from the from the Korean government that's South Korean we try to get a North Korean one they are not not I guess we're it's illegal for us to trade with them.
[82] Anyway, Sona, how's it going?
[83] You are now, says here you are 35 leagues under the sea in the Pacific Ocean off the island of Moratu.
[84] I believe I just made up that island.
[85] What's up, Sona?
[86] What do you see?
[87] I just see a lot of water, and it's really, it's really cool and a little moist.
[88] Okay, very good.
[89] But I don't know.
[90] I'm not very good at being in a sub.
[91] I don't know what to tell you.
[92] Then clearly, I don't know why you volunteered to man the mini -sub.
[93] If you now confess to us, you're not very good at being in a sub.
[94] I did it.
[95] I did not volunteer.
[96] You made me go down here.
[97] Bad improv to deny what I just laid out.
[98] That could cause damage to your sub.
[99] Always yes and, Sona.
[100] Always yes and.
[101] That's the first thing you learn when you join the Navy.
[102] Yes and.
[103] So, let's try that again.
[104] Okay.
[105] Sona, you've clearly been drinking a lot.
[106] In the minisub, what kind of alcohol have you been drinking?
[107] Yes, and I had some, you know, I had a cup of martinis down here.
[108] We call it, yes, yes, just say T -Many Martunis, Ossifer.
[109] Tea -Many Martunis, Ossifer.
[110] That's the old joke, and it works even so far under the Pacific Ocean, the surface of the Pacific Ocean.
[111] Anyway, back to our chopper now.
[112] Aaron, um, tell us you're up in the chopper, very expensive choppa.
[113] I love saying chopper.
[114] Aaron Blaired up there in the chopper right now.
[115] Tell us, what do you got for us in the Conan O 'Brien Needs a Friend podcast, Chapa today?
[116] Seeing a lot of pixelation in the gifts, JPEGs, and the PNGs, but if you're going to be downloading stuff, make sure it's in raw format because that's going to get you the quality you need.
[117] Yeah, that's the kind of information that you need a helicopter to prove.
[118] provide.
[119] And Sona, of course, doing her best from, uh, now it says, doing her best.
[120] It says you are a hundred and twenty -two monocle, monocle, monocle miles.
[121] I don't know what my problem is today.
[122] Monocle Niles and too t -many -turtenis.
[123] Oh my God.
[124] Yes, and I am in the, in this submarine and it is, I am, uh, I'm exploring, uh, shipwrecks.
[125] Sona, you are taking on water very quickly.
[126] Yes, and.
[127] I forgot how to swim.
[128] Sona, for improv, you don't say yes and in every sentence.
[129] It's going the spirit of yes and, but you don't say yes and.
[130] That's terrible improv in its own way.
[131] Okay.
[132] All right.
[133] I am taking on water.
[134] I wish I brought schoolboy equipment instead of these martini glasses.
[135] Yes, and that would have been a good idea.
[136] See, it doesn't quite work.
[137] Yes, and let's get this show started.
[138] Yes, and.
[139] Yeah, I'm going to have quality control experts come and check the quality of this podcast open.
[140] I do fear.
[141] Oh, no. What if Blay wasn't a real chopper and we were doing this conceptual bit about how the chopper was unnecessary and then Blay crashed in that chopper?
[142] That would just be terrible.
[143] Don't make that thing.
[144] joke.
[145] No, no, he's not in a real chopper.
[146] I can make that joke.
[147] But what I'm saying is I would hate to have to tell his family, they'd be like, why?
[148] Why was our son in a chopper?
[149] He didn't have to be in a chopper.
[150] That's what was so funny about it.
[151] Why did you put me in a submarine and then actually ask me about what I was seeing in the submarine?
[152] I mean, I don't know why he can have a useless helicopter, but I need to actually like pay attention in my son's in my submarine.
[153] Also, what the fuck is going on?
[154] I invite anyone to edit this open into something that makes some semblance of sense.
[155] No. Go ahead.
[156] Anyone out there listening, feel free to edit this together to either A, make more sense or B, make less sense.
[157] And then send it in.
[158] We'll let you know how you did.
[159] All right.
[160] Well, listen, safe home to Sona.
[161] and to Aaron Blair in their dangerous, strange, unnecessary crafts.
[162] We have a terrific show.
[163] My guest today is an Emmy award -winning writer and producer behind some of the biggest television comedies of the last 20 years.
[164] He's worked on such shows as The Office, Parks and Recreation, Brooklyn Nine -Nine, and The Good Place.
[165] Good Lord.
[166] He now has a new book, How to Be Perfect, The Correct Answer to Every Moral Question, Available Now.
[167] I am thrilled.
[168] He's with us today.
[169] Extremely talented gentlemen.
[170] Mike Schur, welcome.
[171] First of all, I want to initiate any of the uninitiated out there who don't know about the great Mike Schur.
[172] You have been part of, and Sona, you put it best.
[173] Yeah.
[174] Literally everything Mike Schur has worked on and helped create and write has been fantastic.
[175] I've looked for a flaw in the armor.
[176] I can't find it.
[177] I can't find the one pilot you did about the talking rabbit with no legs that completely bombed.
[178] It ran for eight years.
[179] But it was terrible.
[180] It wasn't good, but it was on UPN.
[181] I like season six where he gets wheels.
[182] Yeah, that was a place.
[183] I'm glad you pointed that.
[184] Some people think that's where the show jumped the shark.
[185] But yeah, Mr. Quabbles, it was called.
[186] But no, I'm going to just go through it right now for everyone listening.
[187] The Good Place, the office.
[188] You worked on the office.
[189] You played Dwight's cousin Moses with the most improbable beard I've ever seen depicted.
[190] Is it Moses or Moes?
[191] It's Moes.
[192] It's Moes.
[193] I'm sorry, Moes.
[194] You messed that up.
[195] He was giving the formal name of the character.
[196] I call him Moses.
[197] But yes, his name is Moes.
[198] You play his brother, Moes.
[199] And, and.
[200] Live fact checking going on for Sona.
[201] He said brother.
[202] It's not his brother.
[203] I'll fix it.
[204] Yeah, thank you for listening to this podcast, but he doesn't watch your show.
[205] Is it SC -H -U -R?
[206] That's right, yeah.
[207] Let's no one fact -check him now.
[208] Let's just see.
[209] At the end, we'll do a review of everything he got wrong.
[210] He worked on a show called Parks Recreationally.
[211] But I got to say, on the good place, my favorite character was Chitty.
[212] Yes.
[213] I can do this all day.
[214] It's just you read, you just read the.
[215] Wikipedia is what we're learning.
[216] So you don't know how to pronounce it.
[217] I'm reading Wikipedia now on you.
[218] I didn't prep for you, sir.
[219] It says you were born in Ann Arbor, Michigan.
[220] You don't even know the U .S. states.
[221] This is now gone from you didn't do any prep to just you have a deficiency of education.
[222] Now, Conacticut.
[223] You moved to Conacticut, which is where you were raised.
[224] This is the whole pocket.
[225] We should do this for an hour and a half.
[226] But you've worked on all these brilliant shows, and your comedy pedigree is really superb, and I thank you for being here.
[227] But the purpose today, and I think this is something I've been really excited about, is you've written a book, How to Be Perfect, the Correct Answer to Every Moral Question.
[228] And you bring up in this book so many things that I've thought about, and I'm an immoral man. Right.
[229] The book is essentially for you.
[230] You know, I saw that It's dedicated to Conan O 'Brien in the hopes that he reads and learns Yeah, maybe this will help is what it says Yeah You called me the Dahmer of comedy writing Which I think of myself more as a Bundy Because my social skills are off the charts Right, you're very charismatic I'm charismatic And handsome and a psychopath Yeah Do you know how hard it is to get the door handle off the inside of a VW bug.
[231] It's not easy.
[232] Hi, things took a very dark turn very quickly.
[233] I remember you talk about something in the book where tipping at a Starbucks.
[234] And in this book, you really are trying to take people through ethical questions and you can learn from this book, but it's also very funny and light.
[235] You take them through these ethical questions and you talk about you're tipping at a Starbucks, but you want to see the person, the barista, to see you give the tip.
[236] Right.
[237] Yes.
[238] That was the thing that hit me was that I waited until the barista turned back around with my coffee before I put money.
[239] We have all done that.
[240] Sona, have you done that?
[241] Oh, yeah, I have.
[242] I want to say no, but I have.
[243] I don't think you tip.
[244] What?
[245] What do you mean?
[246] I've been with you, and you said, I got a good tip for you.
[247] I don't play in traffic.
[248] First of all, whenever you're with me, you pay for everything.
[249] That is true.
[250] That's a nice way to back into that, a little factoid.
[251] Well, done.
[252] I do.
[253] Thank you.
[254] I like the idea, though, of Sona waiting until the barista turns around and then not tipping, like aggressively not tipping, looking at him right in the eye.
[255] Yeah, and then she folds her arms.
[256] But she also, you do this thing sometimes where you show the barista how much cash you have.
[257] I have money.
[258] You show them tons of ones.
[259] Yeah.
[260] And you like to fan them out, like a poker player.
[261] And then I show where it goes, where I would have put the money.
[262] You start to show how easily it fits into the tip char, but then you'd take it out.
[263] Exactly.
[264] Yeah, I want them to see that.
[265] Right.
[266] And then you just say, do better next time.
[267] Next time.
[268] You know the ways in which you could have improved.
[269] You know what you did.
[270] So much in that same way, just as we were starting the podcast, and it's so embarrassing that I have to bring this up.
[271] But you mentioned that I'll just say it because now I'm a reporter reporting what happened.
[272] This was your favorite podcast.
[273] And I said, no, no, no. I never said that.
[274] Yes, you did.
[275] You did.
[276] I remember you said it.
[277] And I said, no, no, no, no, no. We say that on the air.
[278] So, listen, all joking aside, all joking aside.
[279] No, you don't have to do this.
[280] No, I do.
[281] All joking aside, despite what I said about how I feel about being Conradt Brian's friends.
[282] This is a, I'm very thrilled to be here.
[283] This is, honestly, no joke, my favorite podcast.
[284] There you go.
[285] I'm very starstruck to be sitting with Sona.
[286] I hear Matt Goreley's voice and it's, and it's right.
[287] He's over there.
[288] I can't look him in the eyes.
[289] him in the eye because, guess what?
[290] Mike, I'm a huge fan.
[291] I know.
[292] That's incredible that you just said that.
[293] No, it's true.
[294] Me and Matt's great.
[295] And I'm very happy to be here.
[296] So I just had to, let's get that out of the way.
[297] Let's get that out of the way.
[298] But much like, Conan, you can take 50.
[299] We're just going to do some talking.
[300] Much like the tip jar, the point I'm trying to make is I did the same thing.
[301] You talk about this in your book.
[302] And I'm like, no, no, no. If you're going to praise the podcast, if praise is given in the forest but no one's there to see it, was their praise.
[303] That's how I have always.
[304] interpreted that saying about the tree falling, if no one hears it.
[305] If no one hears someone compliment me, did they even happen?
[306] It didn't happen.
[307] Sure.
[308] And so that's why I'm going to need you to write out what you said, and we're going to need to somehow get it published.
[309] I don't even know how that.
[310] Just skywrite it maybe or something.
[311] We'll figure it out.
[312] Yeah.
[313] Countless pilots crash trying to write that.
[314] And I keep lives are lost.
[315] Me trying to, God, that pilot had six kids.
[316] I don't care.
[317] Get another pilot.
[318] All it said is, this is my favorite, and then it crashed.
[319] So let me ask you this, then, if you're saying you did this, because in the book I write about this long journey I went through, trying to figure out why I did it and what it meant.
[320] When you noticed yourself doing it, what was your feeling about yourself?
[321] Not good.
[322] And I'll tell you something.
[323] There was an episode, Leave It to Beaver.
[324] Okay.
[325] Famous black and white sitcom for a modern reference, contemporary reference.
[326] Sorry.
[327] I'm taking the younger people along with us.
[328] There was a famous sitcom that actually was quite good, quite single -camera sitcom from the early 60s called Leave It to Beaver.
[329] And there's an episode where the older brother, they ask everybody to donate to a friend of theirs.
[330] He's been in an accident.
[331] And the older brother has like $50 in his pocket.
[332] And it's like a $50 bill, which in 1960 is like a huge amount of money.
[333] And he's been saving it to buy a car.
[334] And it's the only bill he has.
[335] So when it's his term to put the money in the box and everyone's looking, he doesn't put it in.
[336] Then he feels bad and goes back later on and puts the money in, but no one saw him.
[337] Right.
[338] And that's what the whole episode is about.
[339] That burned into my brain.
[340] When I saw that rerun as a kid, I totally thought, yes, you have to go and tell everyone.
[341] By the way, I did go back and put the 50 in.
[342] But the point of the episode was, no, you don't.
[343] God knows.
[344] What you did was the right thing.
[345] And I realized in that moment as a kid that I was on the wrong.
[346] side of this issue.
[347] Yeah, I mean, the question when you see an enormous anonymous donation to a museum or a symphony or anything, I have, I copped to the feeling of moral curiosity.
[348] I just want to know who it was.
[349] Or just straight up gossip.
[350] Like, I just want to know who did that.
[351] And at times, especially in this city, I think that there are some anonymous donations that are made because maybe the people who are making them would know.
[352] that L .A. museum goers wouldn't necessarily like the fact that this particular person is donating to this museum.
[353] There's also people like the Sacklers who are...
[354] I was just going to bring up the Sacklers.
[355] Right, who are responsible, largely responsible for the opioid crisis in this country, who plastered their name over a million charities in order to kind of try to either whitewash their reputation or they're just egomaniacs.
[356] By the way, this podcast gets a lot of money from the Sacklers.
[357] I just want to do that right now.
[358] It's Raytheon, right?
[359] The Sacklers.
[360] We get Sackler's Raytheon.
[361] General Dynamics.
[362] Zuckerberg by himself.
[363] A lot of defense contractors.
[364] A lot of people that...
[365] We get most of the money from manufacturers of missiles.
[366] Anything that...
[367] Guidance systems, laser guidance systems, stuff like that.
[368] Landmines.
[369] We are hugely under...
[370] That's how we got these great, amazing microphones.
[371] Just a shout out to General Dynamic Landmines.
[372] Someone's going to win a Nobel Peace Prize for shutting this podcast down.
[373] But it's...
[374] This gets into a big thing that we're going through in our country.
[375] I have always thought that putting your name up and having it inscribed chiseled into stone is a bad idea.
[376] Yeah.
[377] And that is something I was thinking about before I read your book and your book in so many ways just fired all these different neurons of things I was thinking about.
[378] But for example, the Sacklers, when they gave to museums, were very controlling about this is where we want the money to go.
[379] This is how big our name has to be.
[380] Right.
[381] This is, our name has to be all over the place.
[382] It has to be in the men's room and the women's room.
[383] It has to be on the urinal.
[384] And this gets into the whole question of, why are you doing this?
[385] And performative acts of goodness and kindness, which is, I think, also been a huge issue during the pandemic.
[386] Sure.
[387] I've encountered many times where people have said, there's this crisis or there's that crisis.
[388] And so we would really love it if you wore this shirt or wore that shirt or said this slogan on the air, and I've felt very uneasy about it because I'm anti -vax, we all know that.
[389] I'm a dyed -in -the -wall racist.
[390] No, no. No, none of those things, but I never wanted my comedy to mean anything.
[391] You know, I never wanted, I wanted to try and make people laugh.
[392] Yeah.
[393] But I never wanted the comedy to, like, educate, elucidate, show you the right way to be.
[394] Very dangerous terrain for a comedian to be like, I'm, this is, you're laughing, but you're learning as well.
[395] Like that, and that's a scary thing.
[396] Part of the point of writing this book to me was these questions don't have answers.
[397] There's no, there's no, like, the title of the book is a joke, obviously, because the point is like, there's no answer here.
[398] There's no right thing to do.
[399] It's, you're always saying like, well, what's the, they're both bad.
[400] What's the slightly better version?
[401] And you try to aim at the slightly better version to the, the best of your ability.
[402] Social media has made it very tricky because anyone can hashtag do the right thing while they're taking, you know, a selfie of them in a thong burning a $10 ,000 bill.
[403] That's the right thing in this?
[404] No, no, what I'm saying is despite they can hashtag that and it's like, hey, I'm still good because I hashtag do the right thing.
[405] Very confusing situation.
[406] I was trying to imagine what bizarre version of the ALS challenge it would be to wear a thong and burn a $10 ,000 bill.
[407] I hope there's a $10 ,000 bill.
[408] Get on that.
[409] Would you, Matt, is there a $10 ,000 bill?
[410] And who's on it?
[411] Is it Tilden?
[412] Who is it?
[413] It's got to be some obscure political figure.
[414] It's Tilden.
[415] I think it's Tildon.
[416] It's got to be Tildon.
[417] Tildon.
[418] Tildon.
[419] Tildes Swinton.
[420] Tildon.
[421] Tildon.
[422] Tildon Swinton.
[423] Okay, the $10 ,000 bill featuring the portrait of President Lincoln's Secretary of the Treasury, Salmon P. Chase, yes.
[424] Salmon P. Chase.
[425] Yeah.
[426] Sammon P. Chase.
[427] Like the fish?
[428] Spelled that way, yeah, I believe.
[429] That's really not the thing to cling to in this story.
[430] But she's right.
[431] They then got onto a 40 -minute conversation about salmon.
[432] So to tie this back, to do your job for a second and make this podcast get back on the rails.
[433] Thanks a lot.
[434] I'm glad you're here.
[435] so when you're talking about the tipping thing like that's performative but it's a performance for one person that's what's interesting about it to me is like i when i found myself doing that it was like the only person who would even see this is the person who's receiving the tip and it's so it's it's a micro version of performative donation or giving or whatever you want to call it and yet it's still when i realized i was doing it and had been doing it for a long time I felt like gross about it I felt like sick about it because I was like am I so shallow I need even on an individual basis I need people to know that I'm a good I'm the good kind of person who tips that's a very odd human foible and I think as I wrote about this too I went around and asked I did a straw poll of all my friends and every single one of them copped to doing essentially the same thing yes it's a fascinating thing about humanity that we on a one to one basis we want other people I weirdly think it's an optimistic thing because I think what it means is we all want to do good things and we want to be seen as the people who do good things.
[436] There's something, even though it's kind of weird, I took some hope from it because I feel like if the instinct is in us somewhere to not only do a small kind gesture but to be seen as the kind of people who do those gestures, even if it's embarrassing, I'm kind of, I don't know, it makes me kind of hopeful or something.
[437] Well, because it's a societal glue.
[438] It's an adhesive.
[439] When you look at footage of January 6th, you can really feel what's going to hold this thing together.
[440] Right.
[441] And I think individual acts of goodness, even if they are done so that people can feel like a good person and they're getting, there's no such thing as a completely selfless act.
[442] If that's what holds us together, then fine.
[443] Yeah.
[444] I mean, the scary thing when you're talking about national or global events is like, you know, you think like this is, it's a nice idea that these little acts of kindness or societal glue can hold us together, but there are institutions that are far.
[445] It's a little bit like the global warming thing, right?
[446] Like drive an electric car, use less water when you water your yard.
[447] Those are all good things to do.
[448] And then you read an article that says like, well, 85 % of the water used in California is used for agriculture.
[449] So you turning off your faucet while you brush your teeth, like even if every single person in greater California did that, there's still enormous other things that need to happen.
[450] That to me is the danger is that you get into this zone of, well, nothing matters.
[451] Nothing matters.
[452] Then it doesn't matter.
[453] Then why should I bother?
[454] And I do feel that even though it is true, factually true, that turning off your water when you're brushing your teeth isn't going to solve the drought, that the mindset that goes along with acts like that, that's what's important.
[455] This gets into not just moral rules, but I have comedy rules.
[456] I know you have comedy rules.
[457] I knew our mutual good friend Greg Daniels has a lot of comedy rules, and we're a believer in comedy rules, and if we see other people not following comedy rules or we think taking shortcuts, it can make us, it can cause us some kind of pain, but if it looks like it's working than you think what causes you more pain it causes me more pain and rage and then i start to think well what am i have my stupid rules for and then i think that's not the point the point is i made these rules a long time ago i think these rules are important they're important to me they may end up being meaningless but i need to follow that path yeah well that's one of the hardest things about trying in any way to to be ethical in the modern world is that you can look around and see a whole lot of people who are not only not trying but are actively trying not to be ethical and they're like really rich and powerful and you're like yeah well what's the point then of of trying it's harder to make ethical choices very frequently it's the more difficult choice it's either more requires more time energy money concentration whatever and when you see a bunch of people who are wildly successful by flaunting the very concept of being ethical or caring or having any kind of moral compass it's a real bummer.
[458] It's just like, well, then why am I working so hard to figure out what the right move is where I park in this grocery store parking lot or whatever when that guy is the, you know, as a senator.
[459] It's like happily living his like life of insider trading.
[460] We have a, you know, the elephant in the room is we've had a president, Trump, even his followers, his ardent followers, don't think he's an ethical person.
[461] Right.
[462] They just think, oh, screw it.
[463] that doesn't matter.
[464] I like a swagger.
[465] Yeah.
[466] And so I think, and that's a hardcore MAGA hat wearing, Trump should serve 35 terms and should continue to serve after he's a corpse.
[467] He should still serve.
[468] That person, if you started to say like, well, can we just look at his ethics that say, ethics, schmethics, what are we talking about?
[469] That's not what we're talking about.
[470] And you think, well, I mean, yes, nobody's perfect, but this is someone who clearly thinks that that's a joke.
[471] Well, I also think that part of that is that we have now been through any number of presidents and senators and everybody else who's in power in this country who have claimed to care about ethics and then have been revealed to be deeply unethical people.
[472] And so I think part of that attitude is actually, to my mind, understandable.
[473] Yes.
[474] It's like, well, that last guy said he was, or not the last guy, the last guy, the last guy was ethical.
[475] You know, Bill Clinton said he was claimed to be a sort of like ethical upstanding guy, and he had certainly.
[476] has more than his share of problems, and so do any number of senators and Congress people who have put forward the idea that they are the good kind of people.
[477] Right.
[478] And then it's like there's a terrible scandal.
[479] Yeah, in a way that Trump's people would say, and maybe they're not wrong, is even, you know, like quasi -refreshing, this is someone who said, didn't pretend.
[480] Right.
[481] Didn't pretend.
[482] Said, hey, look, I've been in New York real estate.
[483] Yeah.
[484] And you don't know.
[485] He talked about it.
[486] He said, I know the system only I can work the system.
[487] Like, yeah, he was bragging about the fact that he knew how to get dirty and that, and the people, I think, were refreshed, felt a sense of like, this is refreshing, that he's, that he's just saying like, yeah, I'm going to do a bunch of weird stuff.
[488] You have no idea how terrible I can be.
[489] He told us that up front in his inaugural address.
[490] He said, just watch.
[491] You're not, you ain't seen nothing yet, guys.
[492] This is going to be awful.
[493] And you've got to give him that because, you know, we've been this, there's this, uh, contractual.
[494] in the last year, a year and a half, two years of taking down statues.
[495] We clearly have had these great people in history that have contributed great things and great ideas.
[496] We built statues to them and then we're confronted with great flaws in their character, terrible things they did, and there's a big debate.
[497] And I have long been of the opinion that there shouldn't be a statue of any human person.
[498] That the minute you carve something out of stone and put it up, you're at the same time, you might as well set a timer.
[499] Yes.
[500] Because there's an expiration date.
[501] There's an expiration date on all of us.
[502] And it's why I was raised very Irish Catholic and in the church and grew up seeing people, you know, put into caskets and there's a graveside memorial.
[503] And I, for a long time, I've just thought, I don't want a grave.
[504] I don't want, I don't want any piece of earth that says, here's where this matters.
[505] was because I think I'm okay with just going away.
[506] Here's where this man was.
[507] His, well, that was.
[508] Poetic.
[509] I spent a lot of time trying to sum up my life.
[510] And I came up with this, here's where this man was.
[511] So stirring tribute to you.
[512] Here's where this man was.
[513] Wait, so he lived here at his grave?
[514] No. Look, was it the best?
[515] I was trying to be poetic and it came out wrong.
[516] Just go with it.
[517] but it's written in stone certainly you had time over your life to change here's where this man was no I said it you wrote it into your will this is what you wanted the person to say you had the stone made nine years before you died had this notarized why is there a statue of him here one statue there's seven statues I've always wanted to be found left in a field somewhere where I can be found by people thereby like kids on a scavenger hunt finding me and then that traumatizes them and that's how I live on.
[518] You want to be the cold open of a law and order episode.
[519] A jogger.
[520] Someone stumbles on to you in a heart.
[521] It's always a jogger.
[522] It's always a jogger.
[523] It's always a jogger and then like, oh my God!
[524] And they're in the middle of some personal drama with their girlfriend and you and my mom never got along.
[525] And then what?
[526] Conan O 'Brien.
[527] Conan O 'Brien.
[528] Anyway, I've come to the no one should get a statue And I'm bothered I'm going to say when I drive by huge tracks of land That have been given up to graves I always think there's a timer on graves People visit them for a period of time And then those people pass on And then no one knows who that person was And there's all this beautiful land That could be a Chucky cheese And I think should be a Chucky cheese You got a little Boston with that.
[529] You were a little bit of Ameriquindy.
[530] Oh, I believe.
[531] Every funeral home and gravesite should be a chucky cheese.
[532] The things that I've put forward here, first of all, someone out there is going to use my gravestone saying, here's where this man was.
[533] Here's where this man was.
[534] And I think there will be a movement to turn most large graveyards into Chuckie Cheeses.
[535] It's a natural fit.
[536] Have kids playing video games on the pile of dead bodies underneath their feet.
[537] Instead of the bin, wait, so instead of the giant bin of balls, it's going to be just kids rolling around in skulls and bones.
[538] Yeah, like the pool and poltergeist.
[539] All right, so I have a number of things to say about this because I generally agree with you.
[540] I think that the problem with statues is that once a thing is carved in marble, and put on a pedestal and like one year goes by everyone loses perspective on the reason it was done to begin with so in this recent movement to take down some statues of people who maybe aren't deserving of them there's no difference there's no distinction being made between a statue of let's say Thomas Jefferson that was put up in 1807 or whatever and a statue to a Confederate general that was put up in like 1952 in New Orleans as part of a we wish segregation were still happening movement.
[541] Right.
[542] Because after a while, you look at those two things and they're just two stone or marble statues of famous people on horses and you don't understand that there was an enormous difference between venerating guy A and venerating guy B in terms of the motivation behind it and the people who did it.
[543] Yes.
[544] So that's one problem.
[545] Another problem is what you're saying about the countdown clock is real.
[546] my pitch for the for the statue industry for big statue the statue industry in America we also get a lot of money from big statue my pitch is if you put up a statue there is a border of review that after some amount of time 25 years 50 years whatever reviews it and says like do we still want this statue here and then you have to constantly check in because new information could have come to light or the world could have changed in some way that now means that that this person, the problem is that the veneration, the eternalizing and the veneration of these people without anyone being able to wave their hand a little bit later and say, hey, you didn't take into account this aspect of this person is problematic.
[547] And the last thing I would say is that it's very tricky to judge people from the past on the standards of the present.
[548] And we, this country has had this enormous reckoning in a lot of different ways, you know, not just Me Too, and post -George Floyd racial societal reckoning.
[549] But just in general, we're a very different country than we were, even call it 20 years ago.
[550] And so there is a temptation to take the standards that we have now and go back to 1776 and say, well, that person didn't live up to these standards.
[551] And it's like, well, no, of course that person didn't live up to these standards.
[552] And if you try to apply the current standards to everyone in history, no one will measure up, not just Thomas Jefferson.
[553] and John Adams and Abe Lincoln, but you and me, like if someone, you and I both worked at SNL.
[554] No, wait a minute.
[555] I would hold, I would hold up.
[556] No. I am a bedrock of morality.
[557] I think your statue would be torn apart immediately.
[558] I think the people sculpting it would get up to your tour.
[559] They would be tearing it down as they were building.
[560] Yes, they'd get up to, they'd get above the waist and they'd be still chisling away at the torso when they would start taking it apart.
[561] And mine would continue to exist long.
[562] after this planet doesn't exist.
[563] Sure.
[564] So I don't know what your point is.
[565] Here lies this perfect man. Here's where this perfect man was.
[566] I guess the only point is to say, like, that's my border of review thing.
[567] Yes.
[568] It's like, let's give ourselves a little bit of a break in terms of applying all of the standards that we now have here in 2022 retroactively to everyone who's ever existed.
[569] Yes.
[570] And say, like, we're not going to do that.
[571] But we're also going to say that every so often we're going to check in.
[572] and say, who are the people that we are choosing as a society to celebrate and venerate and who should be the people who represent our country?
[573] And if those people don't live up, and it's like, okay, well, it's time to move on.
[574] Like some people, some people are sacred.
[575] Like, look, George Washington owned slaves.
[576] There's no way around that.
[577] He also was the guy who founded the country.
[578] So you don't throw the baby out with the bathwater in every situation.
[579] Right.
[580] But, and this is the key, you also don't pretend he didn't own slaves.
[581] Exactly.
[582] That's the thing that drives me crazy in this, in the people who are complaining about the way that the country has gone and the way that we're doing this now, it's like they want to try to compartmentalize people.
[583] And there's no reason to do it.
[584] George Washington isn't offended by what we say about him now.
[585] He's been dead for 200 years.
[586] And I don't see the problem in saying, holding two ideas in our heads at the same time.
[587] Yeah.
[588] He was offered, he was offered the crowd.
[589] King for life.
[590] King for life, and he turned it down.
[591] Right.
[592] And so let's celebrate what is amazing and incredible about that guy.
[593] And when we do that, let's also remember that he was a flawed person who lived in a flawed way, who owned slaves, which is a reprehensible thing to do, and not try to pretend that either of those things isn't true.
[594] I'm reminded sometimes if there's a legal term of we will have zero tolerance, and that's something lawyers came up with, meaning we can't be sued if we say this company, you know, Evil Co. has zero tolerance.
[595] Also a supporter of the podcast.
[596] Big, oh my God.
[597] Don't get me started.
[598] Huge supporter.
[599] Their logos all around the studio.
[600] It's very impressive.
[601] They are, of the makers of evil, they're the best.
[602] They are.
[603] They really get it out there.
[604] But Evilco can say we have zero tolerance for any kind of shenanigans, and zero tolerance is not human.
[605] Right.
[606] And so we're in a place where I think people making mistakes.
[607] and forgiving them or putting that into the context of their larger life seems like it gets lost in moments.
[608] Yeah, I mean, look, I think that most of the people that I hear complain about what they now somewhat reductively and almost meaninglessly refer to as cancel culture are really complaining about essentially consequence culture, right?
[609] In the old days, meaning pre -19 or 2017, I could do whatever I wanted and I would never get in terms.
[610] for anything, and now suddenly I'm getting in trouble for things.
[611] What the hell?
[612] And that argument is extremely bad.
[613] It's a bad argument.
[614] I don't know what to say.
[615] I am 100 % in agreement on that.
[616] I think when I talk about forgiveness, where I'm trying to take it is there's a lot of people who are afraid to take on questions of morality, questions of ethics, questions of what's the right decision because it can inevitably lead to, well, here I probably made the wrong decision.
[617] And I think that needs to be accounted for, and you account for it in your book.
[618] You say that you can take on this pursuit and you can find yourself lacking and people can find one another lacking.
[619] And it doesn't mean they're damned to an eternal hell.
[620] Right.
[621] So the last thing that I wrote in the book, the last chapter in the book is about apologizing.
[622] And what I say is essentially this isn't really ethics but it's sort of like adjacent somehow which is like we're going to screw up when you screw up like it's hard apologizing sucks it's so hard and it's embarrassing and your face gets hot and you avoid it and you keep like having conversations with people you should apologize to and then not apologizing to you're talking about apologizing and meaning oh I was like I don't know what the fuck this guy's talking about sorry you were confused I didn't understand oh son I'm sorry I didn't pay you last year I mean, bookkeeping error.
[623] I should have clarified, sincerely apologizing.
[624] Oh, so tell me, so what's that like?
[625] Your face gets hot?
[626] You feel shame?
[627] What are you, what?
[628] So I wrote this chapter, and I talk about how the Catholic Church, to bring this back to your life, apologize to Galileo, like 360 years after they put Galileo under house arrest for saying that the earth revolved around the sun and not vice versa.
[629] and I wrote this chapter and I thought it was pretty good but I didn't have an ending for it and I didn't understand how to end it and then it was like a week before the book was going to be printed I suddenly realized oh I need to write something else and the thing that I added was okay you sucked it up and you apologized now you have to put yourself on the other side of the equation you have to understand that other people are going to screw up because they're also human beings and human beings grew up and so they're going to come to you occasionally and they're going to apologize to you.
[630] And what are they looking for when they apologize?
[631] When they face down that ugly feeling and that shame and that flushed face, what they're looking for is forgiveness.
[632] They're looking for you to say, it's okay.
[633] Like, this caused me some pain, this upset me, but you are sincerely coming to me. And again, I know you can't relate to this, but you are sincerely coming to me and saying, I'm sorry.
[634] So what they want is forgiveness.
[635] And so now that's what we should all strive for.
[636] Right.
[637] And the key is what is a forgivable action?
[638] Like that's the question that none of us can really answer.
[639] And it's a one, it's a individual decision and it's on, these things are on an individual basis.
[640] Whatever the person did that they're apologizing for, sometimes you'll find it forgivable and sometimes you won't.
[641] But the point is that you should start from a place of can I find it in myself to forgive this person for what they did.
[642] So I'm very hopeful about this.
[643] I really believe that it's going to be okay.
[644] It's just that both sides have to We have to get into a position where We get better at apologizing when we screw up And we get better at forgiving people When they have screwed up And if we can get to that point, I think we'll be in a good place You talk about this in your book And you talk about luck Yeah I think there are a lot of people Especially in show business And that's the only That's the world I know Right And it's really the only world I care to know Oh God It's the only world that matters Well, thank you.
[645] From your lips to God's ears.
[646] I don't want to, I hear there are other people doing other things, building things and digging things.
[647] I don't want to hear about that.
[648] But one of the reasons I bring this up is that I'm very conscious of the fact that there are people who really believe that they made their reality.
[649] And that's why they're a pop star or a top comedian that they made all this happen.
[650] or they're rich because they earned all of that.
[651] And I think, no, this gets very tricky for me, but there's a lack of shame.
[652] There's a lack of perspective.
[653] There's, you know, people that, this hubris that the reason I'm a billionaire or the reason I'm a millionaire or that I have the nicest house on the street is because I...
[654] Of what I did.
[655] of what I did, which is not the case, so many times.
[656] Yeah.
[657] I mean, the example that I give in the book is Michael Jordan, where legendarily the hardest working, the most competitive guy, right?
[658] He worked harder than everybody else.
[659] He wrote his teammates harder than anybody else.
[660] He practiced the most.
[661] He took the most free throws after games, you know, whatever.
[662] The idea of saying Michael Jordan didn't deserve everything he got seems.
[663] crazy and and i understand that but michael jordan was six six he didn't get six six because he worked really hard at being tall like he didn't put in the time in the gym he actually well i'm sorry he went to sweden and he had he had four vertebrae inserted in a very controversial a surgery in 1977 i see i should issue a retraction uh but also i too have had that surgery he you know it's not just his height it's also his parents being supportive of what he did as a child and being able to pay for equipment.
[664] It's his, it's the date of his birth.
[665] I mean, the thing I say in the book is Michael Jordan's born 50 years earlier.
[666] No one's ever heard of him because the NBA didn't really exist and he wouldn't have even been allowed into a non -integrated NBA.
[667] So it is, it does require this extra level of, like you say, Google Earth is zooming out to kind of understand this stuff.
[668] But it's something I think about all the time in relation to my own life.
[669] And it's because my particular path, I just always have focused on these weird sliding doors moments where I could have gone that way.
[670] I went the way I went because it seemed like, oh, I'll try this.
[671] And then it turns out that's the greatest possible way I could have gone.
[672] Like I happened to decide to leave Saturday Night Live after the 2004 season because my then -girlfriend now, wife had moved out here.
[673] We were dating long distance, and it was like, one of us has to move.
[674] So it's like, okay, I guess this is the year I'm leaving.
[675] And so I was like, I'll go to L .A. I'll try to get a job.
[676] And I essentially got one job offer.
[677] And that one job offer was from Greg Daniels, who was adapting the office.
[678] And I know that he picked me out of the giant pile of scripts because he liked my writing.
[679] Like, that's the part that I did.
[680] But then the success of the office was maybe 1 % due to me. and 1 % due to Mindy Kaling and 1 % due to B .J. Novak and 1 % due to 5 % due to Steve Correll and 4 % due to whoever.
[681] And 81 % due to Greg Daniels.
[682] Greg Daniels made that into the thing it was.
[683] And I just, my little floating dinghy happened to like float up next to his cruise ship at the exact right moment and he yanked me on board.
[684] So it's not self -deprecating to say that you're a lucky person.
[685] I think the reason people sometimes don't want to do it is because they feel like, but I've worked so hard.
[686] And I've done, I've made these choices and I put in, like, I worked harder than I've ever worked when I was on the office because I just wanted to do a good job.
[687] And it doesn't take away from what I did to say that also I was the benefit of this wildly good fortune that led to the whole thing.
[688] I think to try and, you know, there's some common themes here.
[689] And one is keeping two ideas in your head, seemingly contradictory ideas in your head.
[690] at the same time is a very wise definition of intelligence.
[691] And importantly, in terms of empathy, which I think is like a, we have an empathy deficit in the world right now.
[692] And if you can hold those ideas in your mind, then your next logical conclusion is there are people who work really hard who are not lucky.
[693] Yeah.
[694] And there are people who are really lucky who don't work hard at all.
[695] Yeah.
[696] And both of those things are painful in different ways.
[697] Like if you see someone who is rich and famous and successful and powerful and doesn't do any work at all, it can be really irritating.
[698] And if you see someone who you know who is incredibly hardworking and diligent and talented and has just been super unlucky and has a tough life, that can cause you pain as well.
[699] And it just helps you keep those things in perspective and remind you that like when you work really hard and are really lucky, that is itself its own kind of luck that is that you should.
[700] should bow down and be grateful for, you know, like that it helps you understand other people more, too, I think, to know that those two things are true, that some people have one and not the other, some people have both, some people have neither.
[701] I get on this thing about the internet, which is the internet as, it's a brand new tool, it's changing society more than the atom bomb did in 1945.
[702] Without question.
[703] It is, it is shoving us and our egos and ids, it's shoving it all up against each other, and that's why we're having this conyption fit right now to use a term that no one's used in well of our 140 years.
[704] I heard that on Leave it to Beaver.
[705] Yeah, thank you.
[706] I'm trying to educate.
[707] We're having a real connoption fit here.
[708] As my mother would say, it's all sixes and sevens.
[709] What?
[710] Don't ask me. I don't know.
[711] Her other one was, I think things have gone Randy Boo.
[712] No. Yes.
[713] Trust me, I grew up in a very strange house.
[714] But we're being shoved up against each other and I think that I attribute so much of this to the internet because I don't think, I think we will adapt.
[715] I don't think we've adapted yet.
[716] No, this is the rubber meeting the road and it hasn't settled.
[717] Like, you know, the way I think of it always is, you know that thing of like if you're angry, when we were kids back in the olden days, people would say if you're angry at someone write a letter, but then put it in your desk drawer overnight.
[718] Yeah.
[719] And if you still want to send it the next day then you send it and almost always you end up realizing like okay I've cooled down I don't need to send this letter the internet is like you get angry you write the letter you march over to the person's house and you shove it in their face and point to it and with the letter is a picture of your penis that's the big difference I don't understand why this penis is here well I added that because I was aroused my anger my anger My anger towards you over your Hyundai backing into my Excel angered me and aroused me and then I took this picture of my penis and taped it to the letter I put through your mailbox.
[720] But no, I think that's exactly right.
[721] The other thing is, I think the good news about humanity is most of us, I think, when confronted with a person who's in pain, we want to help.
[722] I've seen this time and time again, more people are good than are not good.
[723] I agree.
[724] And when someone's in pain, when someone's unhappy, when someone's uncomfortable, the urge is to help to help them feel better.
[725] And that's, I don't care who you voted for.
[726] I don't care if you're wearing a maga hat or not.
[727] That is most of us.
[728] Most of us want to help another human being.
[729] What the Internet's done is obviously made everyone seem not real.
[730] So that that person's virtual.
[731] They just said that my idea was stupid.
[732] So I just wrote back, I hope your mother dies.
[733] I mean, first of all, that's an exchange that I apologize for.
[734] And I was talking to my brother, which really made it fucked up.
[735] Oh, no. Fortunately, my mom's fine, but I just lost it.
[736] And I forgot that we had the same mother.
[737] But I do think it's making, it's the others.
[738] Yeah.
[739] It's too easy now for there to be others.
[740] Well, everyone's anonymous.
[741] It's not even, there's no, the picture is like a cartoon dog, and the name is a jumble of letters and numbers.
[742] And you're not thinking of people as human beings.
[743] I mean, I've often thought that the single best way to cure a lot of the, like, darkness and evil on the internet is just make it a law that everyone has to use their real name.
[744] Yes.
[745] I'm a tip.
[746] Yeah.
[747] And I say this, by the way, as a guy who's Twitter.
[748] handle is at Ken Tremendous.
[749] So it's like I'm not, I'm not guilty of this.
[750] You were born, Ken Tremendous.
[751] That's true.
[752] It's my...
[753] In Ann Arbor, Michigan.
[754] And it says here in 1952.
[755] God, you're old.
[756] I, um, you know, I'll say this.
[757] We have talked longer than I usually talk to anybody.
[758] Is that true?
[759] How long have we been talking?
[760] I, when I was talking to President Obama on this very podcast, when he got to 50 minutes, he was mid -sentence saying what he thought the new direction of America should be.
[761] And I said, that's, all the time we have for you.
[762] You gave him a swift kick in the ass.
[763] Yeah, and then I, well, I didn't kick him physically because there was Secret Service, but I did, I cut it short, and then I told people about this amazing service called Fracture, where you can get a print, put on glass.
[764] Oh, my God.
[765] If you've got a print and you want it on glass, make it fracture.
[766] By the way, President Obama also talked about luck when he was on this very podcast.
[767] Yes, he did.
[768] And it made me think, well, I should be president.
[769] That's what I really thought when I heard him.
[770] I thought the same thing.
[771] I said, Mike Schor should be president because I'd only ever seen your name written and not read.
[772] We've met many times.
[773] I know.
[774] I know.
[775] And trust me, I know how to say your name.
[776] Can I say one more thing before you give me a swift kick in the ass and kick me out of here is I'm a person, as you might have been able to tell from reading the book who is tortured.
[777] I'm personally tortured by my own failures, my own ethical and moral failures.
[778] And this isn't technically ethics, but the Emmys in like 2000 -something, I ran into you.
[779] This is literally 20 years ago.
[780] And you were with your wife, Liza, and you said, I came over to you.
[781] I had only met you maybe once or twice, but I saw you.
[782] And I think maybe you're writing staff at just won for the first time.
[783] And I went over to congratulate you.
[784] And I said, hey, congratulations.
[785] You said, thank you so much.
[786] This is Eliza, my wife.
[787] And I said, hi.
[788] and I essentially turned away from her and talked only to you for about eight minutes and she sat or stood next to you the whole time and it is a thing that has tortured me for 20 years that I was so rude and unpleasant to her and that I basically was talking to like the guy I knew but also like the famous person and I'm sure this is a thing you've talked to your wife about before but I it has honestly like I think about it probably once a month for 20 years.
[789] I thought about how, and I haven't seen her since, and I would like to apologize.
[790] It's so funny, because she thinks of it constantly.
[791] Yeah, I'll bet.
[792] And, no. No, but it's one of those things that you learn.
[793] I know what you mean.
[794] I know what you mean.
[795] We all have those.
[796] We all have those moments where, but fortunately, my wife, by the way, yesterday, we celebrated 20 years married.
[797] Congratulations.
[798] So it's time to move on.
[799] You got married on January 12th?
[800] Yeah, we did, in Seattle.
[801] And Greg Daniels was there.
[802] Why January 12th in Seattle is an odd date and time in place.
[803] Because most people worry will it rain on our wedding?
[804] And we knew it definitely will.
[805] And you wanted the coldest rain.
[806] We wanted a cold, dreary rain to make the rest of our marriage look great.
[807] My wife is a, remains the loveliest person I know.
[808] So she's, and very understanding and would not hold that against you for a second.
[809] So you stop worrying about that.
[810] I'm glad to hear you say that.
[811] I would like to hear her say it so I can actually believe that's true.
[812] Well, you're not going to get that.
[813] I'm not.
[814] She hates me. She's living.
[815] And also, she is a massive fan of your work.
[816] And as I said, the good place was required viewing for the entire family.
[817] And I also would be remiss if I didn't mention you brought up Greg Daniels in this interview.
[818] Greg was my writing partner when we started out, and I think if I hadn't started out with Greg and had him up my side, I would not have jumped into this business.
[819] I was way too scared, and it turned out that I chose just the nicest, most brilliant guy to help me get launched in this business.
[820] So I'm so glad that you have consistently said such nice things about Greg, because he deserves it, and he has done so much for so many people in their career.
[821] and unlike me doesn't demand praise on the air.
[822] No, he is confused and scared by praise.
[823] Yes, confused and scared.
[824] As opposed to me, while we've been doing this interview, I've had nine portraits of myself made and 35 statues have been erected.
[825] The statues I was going to bring up, yeah.
[826] You've had a lot of statues.
[827] You know what, my solution to the statues things is let's not make them out of granite.
[828] Choose a stone that dissolves over a 30 -year period.
[829] So the statue has to be rebuilt.
[830] All stones should be made of like a very hard soap.
[831] And then literally the guy starts to fall off the horse and the horse starts to collapse.
[832] The horse slowly is kneeling and kind of tips over on the side.
[833] Yeah.
[834] And that's my solution.
[835] All statues made of a very durable soap.
[836] I love this idea.
[837] And then you don't have to have a public referendum.
[838] It's just like, hey, two more rainstorms and we're done with this guy forever.
[839] Well, I'll say this.
[840] Mike, Sure, the world is a better place because you're in it.
[841] You've made so much great television.
[842] And by the way, just as a side note, when I watch your shows with my kids, occasionally I've seen them mouthing along with them because they've watched them 15 times.
[843] And that I find frightening.
[844] And I think of all the books they could have been reading.
[845] So fuck you.
[846] Anyway, Mike Schor.
[847] Yes, I got, Sona, I got it.
[848] I got it.
[849] You did.
[850] I wasn't sure whether he was going to say, fuck you.
[851] No, no, no. Congratulations.
[852] Trust me. The only guy to really give it to Obama.
[853] How to be perfect, the correct answer to every moral question is a tremendous book.
[854] Get it.
[855] You're going to love it.
[856] And if that's not enough, you can watch the good place, the office, parks and recreation.
[857] The list goes on and on and on.
[858] This was really fun.
[859] We got to do it again, like sure.
[860] Anytime.
[861] Thank you so much.
[862] Okay, I'm not sure when this is going to go out as part of the podcast, but it's an experience that happened to me yesterday, which is I was taking my dog for a walk.
[863] I have two dogs, but the other one's quite old.
[864] Whenever I say, do you want to take a walk, he says, go fuck yourself.
[865] Yeah, very, and he says it in perfect English.
[866] I might just not want to be seen with you.
[867] Probably.
[868] But then the other younger dog is always cool to go with me. So we went on this hike up through Will Rogers.
[869] National Park, and it was really nice.
[870] We're having this nice walk, and we stop, and I bring water with me so the dog can drink plenty of water.
[871] And this guy recognized me, and he came up to me, and he said, oh, hey, Conan, could you help me out?
[872] I'm about to propose to my girlfriend.
[873] Whoa.
[874] And I didn't know what part I was going to play, and he said, can you videotape it for me?
[875] What?
[876] And he handed me his phone.
[877] He handed me his phone, which was already set to video.
[878] Oh.
[879] You are the last person I would ask to video time.
[880] Because I feel like you would mess it up.
[881] I'm not saying that to hurt your feelings.
[882] Oh, is there another way that can be taken?
[883] I don't know.
[884] I feel like you would just forget to press the red button.
[885] No, it was going.
[886] I checked to make sure that it was going.
[887] He didn't trust me either, clearly, because he started it and handed it to me. So he has video of me saying, and I think I, and then the first thing I said to him was I looked at him and I saw that his girlfriend was up the trail just a little bit, chatting with someone else.
[888] And I said, are we sure about this?
[889] Oh.
[890] Because I just thought, you know, guy to guy, you just want to say like, and it was kind of joking, but I'm like, are we sure about this?
[891] And he went, yes, I'm sure.
[892] And then I realized, why did I say that?
[893] Yeah.
[894] Because what if you meant, are we sure about this, me as videographer?
[895] No. You know, no. Stop.
[896] Would you guys get off that for a second?
[897] I know how to aim something.
[898] I can aim something that's already running.
[899] All right?
[900] That's not, that's not a big claim.
[901] but let's just shut up about the, don't phones just explode when you hold them because they know you're so stupid?
[902] So no. They do not.
[903] Several did, but most don't.
[904] So I said, we're sure about this?
[905] And he went, yep, then I immediately was like self -conscious because I'm thinking, why did I say that?
[906] I'm going to mess this up.
[907] Sorry.
[908] No. Shut up.
[909] But then I realized, like, that's a rude question.
[910] Like, what if he had said, gee, I don't know?
[911] no one's asked me that yet I might have so but he was he was the surest young man I've ever seen and so I shut up so he goes up and he starts first of all he takes out he has a backpack he goes up to his girlfriend and he's like hold on a second she's like what's going on he takes out of his backpack he takes a knee pad straps it to his knee yes And then he kneels, hence the kneepad in the dirt.
[912] And she's like, what's happening?
[913] And then he takes out the box and then she puts her hands up to her mouth and she starts like, I think, crying.
[914] And you're standing there?
[915] Now, listen, I'm a distance away and I didn't want to blow it.
[916] If I go rushing up and I'm shooting, she's going to know something's happening.
[917] So I'm kind of far away.
[918] Not doing a pinch zoom or anything like that?
[919] Hold on, but then I start, I start, and you know what?
[920] I don't know to do the pinch zoom.
[921] Okay.
[922] Okay.
[923] And guess what?
[924] I don't, you're right.
[925] I don't know to do the pinch zoom.
[926] So what I do is I creep up and I'm moving closer and closer as he's proposing.
[927] And then there's a tree and the friend who's there is also shooting it.
[928] And the girlfriend's face is blocked.
[929] And so I think I should move around for a different angle.
[930] I'm actually putting some thought into this.
[931] So I come up, coming on the tree, and then I get this like nice side shot.
[932] And, you know, you.
[933] you can see that she says yes and everything and then we're done and they turn to me and they go thank you and I stop it and then I realize that the way I've shot it it was me being really conscientious about let's get in close let's move around the tree it's the point of view of a murderer who's killing from Halloween with the steady scene of any horror movie is a young man and a young woman kissing and Creepo is moving up and then moves around a tree to the side and then pushes in on them and comes in for the kill.
[934] So their proposal video is like by West Craven, you know?
[935] Oh, man. And so, um, yeah.
[936] This is crazy because you know what just happened to me?
[937] I'm not even joking.
[938] At Halloween, we were in South Pasadena where the literally the Michael Myers house is, the house from Halloween.
[939] And we walk by and two people, a guy proposes to his wife on the steps of the Michael Myers house.
[940] And And I started videoing it and gave it to them.
[941] And I shot it for them.
[942] Was he wearing a knee tattoo?
[943] It was the same guy who's just going around following and he's a super fan of his podcast.
[944] And he's just finding all of you.
[945] And he's like, I need you to film me proposing to my girlfriend.
[946] And it's the same person.
[947] So you were filming them without even being asked.
[948] I was asked to do it.
[949] You're a creep.
[950] You're a stalker behind the tree.
[951] Please.
[952] That's just, did they ask you or not to shoot it?
[953] No, but there was a question.
[954] That is a sacred moment.
[955] Both of you, shut your mouths and listen to me. Okay.
[956] This is the angriest we've all ever been at each other.
[957] There's a lot of, shut up.
[958] You shut up.
[959] Shut up, bro.
[960] I'll kill you.
[961] Quiet.
[962] Go stick a day.
[963] Fuck you.
[964] Shut up.
[965] All right.
[966] This was at Halloween, so there was a crowd of people at this house.
[967] Everybody was filming it.
[968] Like, it was a celebration.
[969] It was, you know, it's like a mecha at Halloween where everybody goes there that likes the movie Halloween.
[970] Yeah.
[971] Well, anyway, I just want to say to that couple, their names are Paula.
[972] and Hugh, and they just got engaged at Will Rogers State Park, and I was their videographer.
[973] I apologize that when you play the video, oh, please do this.
[974] Whenever you do look at that video, put scary music to it.
[975] It's going to look fantastic, because I didn't mean to do that, but it really does.
[976] I think you should definitely put scary horror movie to it as I'm creeping up on you guys.
[977] And that, by the way, that's a service I do provide.
[978] You can call me any time and hunt me down.
[979] And I will provide that service.
[980] Conan O 'Brien needs a friend with Conan O 'Brien, Sonam of Sessian, and Matt Gourley.
[981] Produced by me, Matt Gourley.
[982] Executive produced by Adam Sacks, Joanna Solitaroff, and Jeff Ross at Team Koko and Colin Anderson and Cody Fisher at Earwolf.
[983] Theme song by The White Stripes.
[984] Incidental music by Jimmy Vivino.
[985] Take it away, Jimmy.
[986] Our supervising producer is Aaron Blair and our associate talent producer is Jennifer Samples.
[987] Engineering by Will Bechton.
[988] 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.
[989] Got a question for Conan?
[990] Call the Team Coco hotline at 323 -451 -2821 and leave a message.
[991] It too could be featured on a future episode.
[992] And if you haven't already, please subscribe to Conan O 'Brien needs a friend.
[993] on Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, or wherever fine podcasts are downloaded.
[994] This has been a Team Coco production in association with Earwolf.