Taylor Tomlinson Returns

That's really sweet.

Yeah.

That's very nice.

Fall is here, hear the yell, back to school, ring the bell, brand new shoes, walk in blues,

climb the fence, books and pens, I can tell that we are gonna be friends.

Yes, I can tell that we are gonna be friends.

Hey there, and welcome to Conan O'Brien Needs a Friend, and I've got my two chums with me

right here.

Hi.

Oh.

Sorry, let me put my glasses on.

Oh, Matt, you're here, too.

Gosh.

No, Matt Gorley, of course, here, and Sonim of Session.

Yeah.

How are you?

I'm doing great.

How are you?

I'm doing great.

Are you?

I am.

Okay.

You were asking me, how do I feel?

Are you okay?

I am fine.

You ate a lot of spicy food on Hot Ones.

Yes, I went on the show Hot Ones, and I did not, I was aware of the show, obviously, it's

a very successful show.

I hadn't really, can't say I was an expert on the show.

I went in thinking, well, whatever happens, I just have to eat all the wings and just

go for it and make a fool of myself.

I kind of had that plan in mind, but didn't know much beyond that.

The host, very good, excellent.

I like that guy a lot.

He's a very good interviewer.

He is.

And they do a really good job on that show.

So Sean's asking me questions, and I was just determined to just keep stuffing these wings

in no matter what.

And then, of course, me being me, I start drinking the sauce and rubbing it around on

my face and my chest and everything.

So when I walk around now, because a lot of people have seen this, people keep asking

me if I'm okay.

I wonder the same thing.

Well, I also just watched Conan Must Go, which is fantastic, by the way.

And in Thailand, you get pretty floored, albeit comedically, by some sauce.

So I thought, you're going to go down when I see hot ones.

Yeah.

No, well, we played that up for comedy, and then you're allowed to, in a sketch world

or comedy world, you can fake things a little bit.

I'm aware of.

Yes.

Is that how comedy works?

That's how comedy works, really?

When I look at you two, I think an explanation might be in order.

So what's the deal?

Do you not have taste buds or something?

How did you do that?

I have never seen you eat spicy food.

I don't eat spicy food.

There's people who put Tabasco or Tapatio on stuff.

I've had so many meals with you, and I've never seen you eat spicy food.

I have a theory.

It's that the only thing worse than that amount of thermal spice would be you not somehow

getting the attention that eating all of that would give you.

And all joking aside, and also I've had a bunch of people posit that I have the red

haired gene.

When I go to the dentist and they give me Novocaine, they then go to drill and it's

like, I haven't had Novocaine.

And I'm always saying, I feel everything right now.

And they always say, oh yeah, you're a redhead.

I don't know if that's-

Whoa.

But I've had many dentists say that to me, and they give me a lot more, and they say

that redheads have whatever, higher pain threshold or something.

I don't know what it is.

Meaning you feel less pain, you feel more pain.

You feel nothing.

Well, you don't feel, I don't know exactly how it works, and I'm just freewheeling here.

I just know what I've been told by people.

I don't think it's it.

I think you have it, Matt, which is I've always been, if I think something will be funny,

I'll do it and deal with it later.

And did you?

Yeah.

I did deal with it later.

It was dealt with later.

How did it manifest itself?

I spot welded an iron.

I spot welded-

We're all thinking the same thing.

I spot welded, I went to a, I went, I wanted it to be useful.

What and how much did you shit?

How much did your butt hurt?

Here's what I decided to do.

And do you have butt taste buds?

Here's what I decided to do.

Okay.

I decided that I wanted, after I ingested all that, I wanted it to be useful.

So I found a construction site where they were doing spot welding and I went there and

I said, gentlemen, if you want, I can weld these girders for you in about, I'm guessing

about 15 minutes.

You'll need to avert your eyes cause I'll be dropping my pants.

And they said, okay.

And I said, I will need someone to stay behind and light it.

And then we'll be all set to go.

So there's a building in the mid Wilshire district that's going up.

And I, um, I think I did about 65 rivets in the building.

And people were driving by saying, Conan O'Brien, his pants are around his ankles.

And I think fire is shooting out of his ass and he's welding a building.

And here's the biggest problem.

I had to join the union.

But that way everybody wins.

There's a building and trust me, that section of the building will never fall.

That's it.

That's the best.

And they've had an engineer say, whoever did this, these are heat temperatures we've never

seen.

So every time you're going to weld something, you just have to eat a lot of hot wings.

Yes.

I'm in the union now.

And all I have to do is I've got all the sauces from Hot Ones.

You are the saddest X-Man ever.

Yeah.

Meet the X-Men.

Really?

He's on the X-Men?

What do we do with him?

His name's Ass Weld.

And I just and you know what it is?

I have a bandolier and instead of ammunition, it's just sauces.

The bad guys have sealed us in this lead safe.

Hold on a second.

You have to pull your pants down.

Does your uniform have a compartment?

Oh, yeah.

The uniform has what's actually it's a very tiny flap.

That's the exact circumference of an anus.

It's a tiny circle that unflaps and then just a beam of the whitest light you've ever seen

comes out of phosphorus.

Yeah.

And and everyone has to put on welding goggles.

Oh, God.

But but no, I did.

Well, if you've known like there are many times where I've done I would do sketches

and they would if I think it's funny to get thrown out of a window.

Yes.

Even at my age, I will say, no, no, no.

I want to do it.

Jeff Ross always goes, oh, come on, come on.

Don't let's get on.

I'm like, no, no, I want to do it.

You're the Tom Cruise of comedy where he does action that way.

You will do comedy.

Yeah, but he does it well.

And he does cool things.

But he does cool things.

But I love to still because I don't know, I was in a lot of brothers

and I like to be tossed around.

I like to smash through things.

I'm very happy to do it.

And then if I if I feel something, give I'll just keep doing it.

If if I think people are laughing and we used to have years on the show,

it always come out in animal segments because people would come and they would bring.

I don't love I, you know, I get creeped out around snakes

and I get creeped out around insects and spiders.

They would bring them.

And I would I would say, oh, no, no, just put it on my forehead.

And I would do it because audiences really liked it.

And I knew, oh, in a single, this is funny.

But in in real life, if there's no one there to laugh at it,

I would be horrified and never do it.

So what was the immediate the immediate response to the being on was

I think my eyes were incredibly runny and my mouth really hurt.

The thing that was the most interesting is that my wedding ring, some sauce,

because I was rubbing my hands around in the sauce.

Yeah, you rubbed it on your nipples.

And some got because you washed your hands right afterwards.

But some of the sauce got underneath my wedding ring.

David Hopping was driving me home and he was like, are you are you OK?

And I'm like, I'm fine.

But I noticed that my wedding ring was burning.

And it hasn't.

Well, it hasn't burned like that since they put it on me at the altar.

Take that, Liza.

It was burning and burning.

And then I took it off and I saw like, oh, right, there's acid underneath it.

So but the craziest thing about that is that the hot ones

generated all these nice things that people were saying online

and retrospective about, oh, I really like the thing Conan did in 98.

I like the thing he did in 2004, which is all very sweet.

But I had a bunch of friends who saw my name all over Twitter.

And the first assumption is he's dead.

So I had I did have people say, oh, my God, I thought finally

we can all talk now.

Liza immediately got into another relationship.

Immediately. She has a guy on deck.

Yeah, for sure. Oh, yeah, yeah.

Sorry. Can I also say Jose was so funny as the doctor?

I mean, he really made me laugh a lot.

So this is the story of that Jose Arroyo is extremely talented comedy writer.

And Jose's been a writer for me for years.

And he's worked on travel shows and the show.

And he's just he's brilliant.

Jose is brilliant. And I love him to death.

Jose, whenever we did a sketch where someone had to be in a white coat

and be an authority figure like a scientist or a doctor, Jose would play that.

And so I the day before or maybe two days before Hot Ones,

I thought, I don't think anyone's done this, but I want to show up

with my physician, Dr. Arroyo.

So I call Jose and I said, Jose, I'm going to go on this show.

Hot Ones. He's like, yeah, I know Hot Ones.

And I said, and I love Jose because he just knows exactly when.

And so I want to bring you on.

He's like, yeah, yeah, you're doctor.

And I said, and I said, you know, we're not even doing a show.

You know, Jose is not working for me technically right now.

I said, do you have a lab coat?

And he went, yeah, I have a medical coat.

Yeah. And he's not a doctor.

And he's like, and he's got a stethoscope because he knows.

And if anyone wants to see him, one of the reasons I really wanted him to do

that was because, Jose, we shot a segment.

We did a travel show in Australia and we're on Bondi Beach,

which is and there's that iconic shot.

There's that famous lifeguard show that's from Bondi Beach.

And so I wanted to train to be a lifeguard there.

So we got an iconic shot of me running on the beach in slow motion.

And then you widen out.

And I'm running with my dermatologist

in slow motion who's running alongside me.

And it was Jose in full Dr.

Arroyo regalia.

So if you want to see a very funny clip, look up.

This must be out there somewhere.

Yeah, the funniest line he had on the hot ones was so many.

You go like, what do you study?

And he goes in the 90s, in the 90s.

Yeah. Where did you go?

Where did you go to school?

Yeah. Where'd you go to school in the 90s?

Oh, yeah. In 1990.

When you check your pulse and he just chokes you.

And he says, it's no, he is.

He is so funny.

And eternal thanks to Jose Arroyo.

And also just another he is brilliant across the board.

He's a great writer, but he's also a really funny cartoonist.

He's had cartoons in The New Yorker a couple of times.

I think one one time I gave an idea for a cartoon and he drew it up

and submitted it under both our initials and it got in.

And I was like, as delighted.

Jose is a force.

I just wanted to quickly ask, was there a moment at which you were like,

this is a bad idea while you were doing it?

No, I don't know.

I got through a bunch of the wings and I thought I can I can do this.

And even if I can't do it, I'm going to do it.

Does that make sense?

Yeah. Like, yeah, you're in the zone.

You're in the zone.

Because early on, I'm I'm I'm taunting Sean.

Oh, baby, you know.

And so once you do that, there's only one way you can go.

You can't stop after the fourth wing

and then start talking about, you know, I'm really excited about my new.

Did I have to smash everything?

Probably not.

Did I have to rant and have milk come out my mouth?

Not sure. Yeah.

But those are things that you do so that your children never look you

in the eye again.

Anyway, we should get into the show because we have a wonderful show.

My guest today is a hilarious comedian.

So funny. She does not have to resort to such bullshittery.

She hosts after midnight weeknights on CBS.

Her latest special Have It All is now streaming on Netflix.

I am thrilled.

She's here today, Taylor Tomlinson, welcome.

I have a very clear memory of the first time I met you, which is

you showed up on the tour.

I don't remember which city it was, but they said Taylor's here and she's not.

Well, you were really sick with some bug.

And I went back and you were about as sick as anyone I've ever seen.

Right. You were quite ill.

And I was like, oh, my God, this poor woman.

Physically and mentally. Physically and mentally.

But we mean physically. Yeah. In this case.

And they said you were fine before I walked in.

And then no, but you were really sick.

And then I said, are you OK to do it?

And you went, yep, I'm fine.

And then you went out and killed it.

You were very I mean, you're still really young, especially.

Yeah, you are. What are you talking about?

I'm 30. I feel like it's over.

OK, he's not like, well, young anymore, is it?

To me, it is. You are an embryo.

You are you are a frozen egg as far as I'm concerned.

I just have to keep clearing milestones in order for people to think I'm young.

They're like, you're young for like a late night host.

Yeah. OK, there you go.

Yeah. I watched your first episode this morning on YouTube.

That's because you were 30. Right.

I was I had just turned 30.

Yeah, same.

And you had the little calendar and it was September 1993.

Yeah. So six weeks before I was born.

Oh, that's so crazy. Isn't that crazy?

Well, see, I think that puts into context just how young you are.

That my career, my show started six months before you were born.

But I remembered you having I was really impressed with

and obviously you had just amazing material, but you would march out there.

And you were at the time, 20, 21, a long time ago.

I was twenty four.

And I had done I had done your show.

You know, you had done my show, but you marched out, killed it,

walked off stage, was really sick.

And I was very impressed.

I said this to you in the hall and I said to myself, say that again on Mike.

But I want to congratulate you for like 15 things, because you've just did

your third Netflix special.

You have a late night show.

People have found you.

You made this whole thing happen.

I'm so happy for you.

I want to start on that like nice note and then we'll devolve into petty grievances.

That's so nice.

No, but but also you've you're you're terrific.

You're absolutely fantastic.

And I was just I don't know.

I'm just everything that's been happening for you.

I just am watching now from the sidelines and just saying,

oh, my God, yes, go, Taylor, go.

This is totally deserved.

This is the right.

All the best things are happening to someone good.

And that doesn't always happen.

Oh, that's really nice.

We're going to cut all this out, right?

No, no, no, no, we're not.

We're not recording compliments. Oh, terrific.

I don't even mean any of this.

I'm practicing for someone I really like.

We have real stars coming on later this week.

This is sort of a warm up for me.

This is for one of the Wayans brothers.

You know, I've just got this whole thing memorized.

I don't even know which one.

It kind of can go with any way.

When you were doing your show,

did you ever have episodes where you're like, oh, thank God,

I'm not nervous to talk to this person at all.

Like, however this goes, it's fine.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Well, it's it's funny because I can talk shop with you,

which I love.

I mean, there's so many things to talk about.

I loved the special that you just did for Netflix

and thought there were so many, so many great jokes.

You had this thing that you said at one point.

My brother is trans.

My sister is gay.

And I identify as afraid.

And I thought, well, you really watched it.

Yeah, no, I was.

You know, you started you're like, it was great.

It was so you.

And I'm like, I know.

Well, no, I I really identified with you.

Tell a story in your special.

I'm I'm I'm wary sometimes to not give away stuff,

but you tell a story that's really funny about Hugh Jackman.

And I was watching it and I was really laughing

because you're talking about how he's he's like a surreal,

ethereal creature, you know, not of this earth.

And I have my own Hugh Jackman story,

which is not part of a Netflix special.

I pitched it many times.

You'll get there.

No, you'll get there.

Don't worry.

They said, I think the quote is no appetite for Conan

on the algorithm.

But I mean, I've already given it away, but I was in a gym.

I was I was in Atlanta on some job and in a hotel.

And I found out they had a gym.

And I'm like, I'm going to go.

You know, I'm trying to take care of myself lately.

I'm going to hit the gym.

And I'm always inordinately proud of myself

when I can hit the gym, when I'm on the road or something.

So I hit the gym.

And there's this machine where it sort of helps lift you up.

But you're kind of using your body weight,

but not all your body weight.

You know that one.

And you're kind of going up and down

and you're working your lats.

And I'm like, I'm doing really.

And then I in my peripheral vision became aware

that someone was doing what I was doing, but twice as fast

and without the assistance of the little hydraulic thing.

And I look over and I swear to God, it's Hugh Jackman.

He's lifting his own body weight

and he's got this perfect V-shaped torso.

And he is the handsomest man you'll ever see.

Yeah. And he turns to me and he recognizes me

because he'd been on the show a couple of times.

He's just like, hey, how are you, Conan?

Good to see you.

But didn't even break his stride.

And I had a little hydraulic thing going like, I'll help you.

And I just looked at his body and looked at mine.

I think I called it quits.

And just I think I tried to see if they would open the bar

at 10 in the morning.

But I mean, I there's so many things in your special

that I could relate to.

And the thing that I love so much about your comedy

is that you are so brutally honest, but it's always to a purpose.

That's so nice. Yeah.

Again, this will all come out.

This is for Damon.

That's for Damon Wayans.

That's really, really nice.

But yeah, there's so much we can.

I know it's like hard to know where to start.

I mean, I also have a lot of questions.

Well, I would love to ask questions because

that's those are some of my favorite interviews because it's about me.

Right.

And how do I feel about Conan?

I love him. He's great.

I love you. Don't.

What's that? Oh, that's true.

I have a lot of misgivings about Conan.

But you are you are a lovely name drop for me when people are like,

yeah, I love Conan.

I'm like, and then I just put on sunglasses and start swirling wine.

And I'm like, he's exactly he's exactly what you want him to be.

He's just a great guy.

And, you know, Conan, I'm like that, you know, on tour.

We went on tour together.

We went on tour together.

We had some really good times.

We did some we did some times on a bus.

You I don't know.

It just felt to me like you arrived fully formed, completely.

Like you had it all.

It's not like, well, I saw you when that banana is still kind of green.

It needs a little more time.

Like, no, no, no.

You were just ready to go.

That's so nice.

And what a great transition.

Have it all streaming on Netflix.

Had it all, have it all.

You'll probably lose it all.

Yeah, that's really, really nice.

Yeah. I mean, obviously getting this late night gig,

which is so different than your show, because it's like a fake game show.

And it's, you know, like a reimagining of at midnight.

And there were a lot of people because we did so much press

after it was announced before we were actually doing the show.

And so I did all these interviews where people

like weren't totally sure what it was or like a lot of people online

when it came out were like, we thought this was a talk show.

And CBS screwed Taylor Tomlinson.

And I'm like, we were never doing a talk show, everybody.

Like I tour on the weekends like I'm not going to do a show Monday through Friday.

And it's funny because people keep saying like, oh, it's your show.

And I'm like, it's really not like this is like, if anything, our show,

like it's such a great team of people.

And it's why I wanted to do the show, because I wanted to like have these coworkers.

It was like, yeah, I'm like, I want to have fun with all these people

and make a new thing every day.

But like they were asking me questions like, so when you designed the set,

I'm like, I designed the set.

When you're booking the show, I'm like, I don't book the show.

They're like, well, when you hired the writers, I'm like,

I didn't hire the writers, and I want them to like me so bad.

I'm like, I had no, I'm like, I can't take credit for anything about this show.

I don't dress myself.

Like I show up, someone does my hair and makeup.

They put me in clothes.

I'm like an American girl doll that they just kind of cart around.

Like I really, I'm like, everyone on that show, I think,

probably has a harder job than I do.

And also like, I don't know if you felt this way.

I mean, you were using cue cards, right?

Yep.

OK, we have a teleprompter.

It's like a little computer.

They type out.

It's like a cue card, but it's like a machine, like a machine.

You know, I never had a teleprompter ever.

Never. No, because we change things too much at the last second.

And so we always did cards.