There he was, back on NBC at 12:35am: tall, fit, gingery, and entirely in his element.
A man in a chair being funny in late night. Quick-witted, silly, smart, bathed in affection and wild applause from a crowd that probably grew up watching him when their parents thought they were in bed.
He even teased them by suggesting he might stand up and do the string dance.
If you’re Conan O’Brien, why not? Remarkably, at 62 years old, you’ve never been hotter, never been a bigger star than you are at this moment, after chewing through lethal chicken parts on Hot Ones like Robin Williams chewing the scenery; after killing like an orange Godzilla at the Oscars; and after making the rest of the comedy world bounce their heads in laughter, acknowledging a career totally worthy of The Mark Twain Prize.
Why not return to where it all started? For the very first time since he appeared on David Letterman’s original iteration of Late Night in the spring of 1993, Conan O’Brien was a guest on the NBC show he fronted for 16 years—the one where he went from pumpkin to prince in late night.
The fourth talented comedian to host the show, its current star, Seth Meyers, could hardly contain his clear delight at being able to welcome Conan back to his old address, after long-naming him his white whale, the one guest he’d always wanted. He set him up beautifully across two interview segments, and of course Conan took it from there.
He spoke about his long history working inside 30 Rock. He said that labor added up to about 20 years between his 16 hosting Late Night, and almost four as a writer at Saturday Night Live.
He had been back in the building before. Most recently for the 50th anniversary of SNL and before that just last year as a guest of Jimmy Fallon’s on The Tonight Show. Conan hosted that one too, of course, but it wasn’t in 30 Rock, and the experience was far from the same.
On an earlier visit, he was shown his old studio which was then occupied by The Dr. Oz Show, which he likened to being told the old “little gingerbread” house you grew up in has been turned into a Jiffy Lube.
After Seth showed a photo of his own first appearance as Conan’s guest on Late Night—in which he looked no more than 12 years old—Conan said: “Oh my God, look at you! You look like a contest winner.”
He said he had met with some of Seth’s writers because, of course, he identifies with writers. That led to a prepared bit where Meyers said his writers often confront him by saying of a comedy bit facing host rejection, “Conan would have liked it.”
Which sounded provocative enough to O’Brien to say: “Yes, if Conan were alive today…”
Asked if he ever gave his old writing staff a hard time, Conan said sure, he would play the overbearing boss letting them know he didn’t like a bit.
That produced a great opportunity to cite some old favorites of his, which aren’t often mentioned with the classic material. The ones Conan recalled underscored how brilliantly silly his version of Late Night was:
The FedEx Pope, Shoe-verine (Wolverine with shoes on his hands.) But he said he didn’t like a recurring character, Otis K. Dribble, a basset hound dribbling a basketball.
Conan told one anecdote I had heard from him before: how he and his writing partner, Greg Daniels ( The Office, Parks and Rec—how’s that for a team?) used to go down to David Letterman’s empty studio late at night to write, and Conan would sit in Dave’s chair behind Dave’s desk. The fates were flying through the air on those occasions.
One anecdote I hadn’t heard was how he and his first head writer, Robert Smigel (aka Triumph the Insult Comic Dog), wanted to lessen the burden of following Letterman on Late Night by changing the show’s name to “Nighty Night.” (No joke, he said.)
This set up a startlingly good impression of the now-deceased exec in charge of NBC’s late-night programming, Rick Ludwin, who, as far as anyone knows, was never seen without a tie and buttoned-up blue blazer, becoming apoplectic about never changing the name of the NBC franchise show. (Ludwin was a major Conan advocate and O’Brien called him as a “saint” last night.)
This was how it went. Fast, witty commentary, the kind you don’t see very often in late night anymore, yet completely honest at the same time.
It was Conan on the mountaintop, comfortable in his skin and his abundant talent.
No reservations about his undeserved separation from NBC; no hint of “how do you like your flame-haired boy, now, chumps?”
Conan doesn’t need any of that. He ended up with the gold ring. He’s a performer of influence now, of unquestioned significance.
He praised Meyers sincerely for how he’s made Late Night his own and explained a bit of Buddhist-like philosophy he had applied to his own 16-year run.
“I used to feel I’m in a giant orchestra and there’s a lot of noise and I’m just banging my triangle and is anybody even hearing me?” Conan said. “And if you just stay true to what you believe in, and keep doing it with purpose, eventually they’ll only hear the triangle.”
This year it became a big bass drum, and nobody could miss hearing it.
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Conan got shafted by that humorless turd, Jay Leno, who never should have returned to NBC. He and Fuckface Fallon have shamed and embarrassed the Tonight Show brand!