Chelsea Peretti
2024-03-04 01:04:38
After 25 years at the Late Night desk, Conan realized that the only people at his holiday party are the men and women who work for him. Over the years and despite thousands of interviews, Conan has never made a real and lasting friendship with any of his celebrity guests. So, he started a podcast to do just that. Deeper, unboundedly playful, and free from FCC regulations, Conan O’Brien Needs a Friend is a weekly opportunity for Conan to hang out with the people he enjoys most and perhaps find some real friendship along the way.
Hi, my name is Chelsea Peretti and I feel excited about being Conan O'Brien's friend.
I'm not buying it, I'm totally there. Was, it was the delivery, the delivery was way over the top.
Should I do another take?
Nope, we're going to go with that one, okay?
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 going to be friends.
I can tell that we are going to be friends. Hello, it's Conan O'Brien needs a friend. I'm Conan O'Brien. Usually I say, welcome to, but today I just said, it's Conan O'Brien needs a friend.
Is that okay? Well, it's true, it is. Conan O'BriEN Yeah, it's like saying, it's Dragnet or....
Why would I use such an old reference? I should use a...?
We're going to get so many letters.
No, I'm going to use a new reference because that was too old. It's saved by the bell. What, what are you talking about? Let's bring us in the late 80s.
Who did that? I'm trying slowly to try, what's that? who did that, did what?
What are you talking about? It's saved by the bell.
Who said that? No one did? yeah.
Yeah, no one's going to notice you said something different.
Well, they are now. So now I made a big thing of it. You shouldn't have done that. I said, it's Conan. O'Brien needs a friend, and that felt a little strange to me, and then I started commenting on it, Yeah.
I want to do the thing where we take it again. And I tell you that I'm going to edit that first part out, but leave it in.
So you're definitely going to edit this out, right? Absolutely, boss, you know, I wouldn't lie to you.
How often have you done that? Seriously, I think every time, so you've never. Any time I've stumbled or fumbled and said, you'll take it out and you say, Yeah, don't worry, boss, you leave it in unless it....
Yeah, if it's to comedic effect, I absolutely leave it in, but unless it's like a sensitive, so you lie to me, yeah, okay, yeah.
I'm okay with that, actually. Yeah, yeah, and you know, you're-.
People are going to clean it up and people are going to think we're.
It's not like I rush around listening to the podcast. No, you don't, so you can get away with murder. I don't think you even know how to find it right. I have tried every dial on the radio.
I saw you at Amoeba Records the other day looking for the podcast in a rack. Yeah, but you know what's weird, there is now a vinyl of the podcast that came out. And I realized my radio joke doesn't work either because we're on Sirius XM 104, so all of my quips don't work.
Full circle, because we're everywhere, we're on vinyl, we're on the radio. You know? What else has happened, too, is that when you ask a parent, have you checked out the podcast?
Yeah, you know, that now is true because the podcast is on YouTube, so most people are watching it. And now the parents are right. This is horrible.
This is great.
Yeah, how are you doing, Arlo? I'm doing great, I'm doing really well. Shona left and made a very large sandwich while we were talking.
When you guys go down these kinds of avenues, I'm just like, let him just go, let him just stop talking.
That's why I'm constantly saying to Matt, before we start, I'm going to stop for a second and think about a good thing to talk about. And you always say, just go, just go, just go, just go.
Fly by the city of Gold. This isn't good, this isn't good. No one's going to say, Oh man, that was a sweet treat they just served up. This is a dog's breakfast.
It's a mess. People don't want good podcasting, they want real podcasting.
Okay.
Is that true? I don't know, I made that up. That's like saying, I'm glad you're not a car manufacturer. I'd have to recall this podcast over and over again.
Exactly what is this car? Hey, hey, I just was driving the car and the wheels fell off and it crashed and a bunch of people in the car were killed. I feel terrible and I'm badly injured myself, yeah.
This car was just we improvised, we just threw it together and that's real, man. I would say since I've been doing podcasting since 2006, I should be trusted, but the sad truth is, I should be put out to pasture. Right? Because you, you're now a 2006..
That makes you you were in on the very first podcast where you talked about the moon landing and stuff, right? that's the very, the very early podcasts. Yeah, ladies and gentlemen, President Eisenhower has died.
That's the kind of podcasting you did at the beginning, that's right. Fireside chats. Incredible, yeah.
When they were on pods.
That's right.
IPods, yeah, which is why they're called podcasts.
I never thought about that. Are you serious? I didn't. Yeah, it's a pun on broadcast, but podcast.
Yeah, and now the iPod's been gone for what a decade. how long has it been gone for 15 years?
Mine was stolen really from my car, yeah.
That was me, Oh, come on, what are you stealing? I thought it was funny. I smashed your window and I took your iPod and threw it away.
That's a prank. isn't that a prank? or is it just a crime? That's a crime, okay?
I get confused what they are a lot. I pulled a prank on an old woman last night, I knocked her down and I took her purse. No.
Yeah, did you hear about those pranksters that robbed the bank the other day? That was me.
What?
Yeah, it was just my friends. Oh, it was just a prank, you were wearing a nun mask.
You never go back and say it was a prank, you just keep what you steal, okay?
Cool, all right. I call it a lucrative prank.
That's my defense. It's a prank, you know how many people are always doing that. They're going around, they have like some YouTube channel they're trying to start and they'll go around and prank people.
And I just think, yeah, although often you look at them and go, I think that's a kind of a crime.
Yeah.
That's a fine line.
Fine line there really is. Some of them because they have to do whatever they can, and now some of them are like, they're getting desperate.
They're stealing stuff.
Yeah, you know, yeah, but they're not pranks. I think they're just like, I can do this.
So I'll do it.
I think this started out as a prank, this podcast, yeah, and then, you know, it grew into whatever it is now.
It may still be a prank. I don't know well. The big prank is, we've told you, this thing goes out and it never does. No one's listening to this. Oh my God.
We come every day, so you hire people to drive by in cars and shout out the window, which just happened in Dublin. There was talk of gerbils that happened. I mean, sorry.
That was in Dublin. I was walking along the Liffey River. And people are shouting stuff out from the podcast. And I think, Wow, Gourley is just paying people out of my own pocket, yeah.
Infestation, that's ridiculous.
What?
I don't know that people yell that in, like foreign countries. If they're like, there was talk of Gerbils, why do you make you make people do that? and you said, do that to me.
Yeah, first it was catechized, God made her, now it's. There was talk of gerbils. Pretty soon we should move on to a new one.
I like there was talk of Gerbils so much that I want to stay with it for a bit and it's still one of my favorite fan. Encounters is when someone came up to me and I don't know where they were, and they had an accent, I can't remember which country they were from.
And they said there were rumors of hamsters, like they put it through Google Translate, there were rumors, there were rumors.
And he said it like, Oh, I've got it, there's Conan. There were rumors of hamsters and I said, Dude, you are so close, I'm going to give it to you.
But it's talk of Gerbils, and you saw his whole face fall, catechized as Zeus Fashion for.
It's catechized as Corncob released her kit, Kat.
You should have just let him have it.
I should have, but I'm a stickler, I'm a stickler. I'm like, Yeah, one of those uptight deans in one of those movies you are.
You are that guy in like.
Animal house, Animal House, Dean Wormer.
PCU yeah, or old school?
You're that guy. In old school, I'm obsessed with those characters, and one of the Simpsons episodes I wrote, it was an obsession of mine. That Homer's has to go to college, and his only knowledge of college is from those movies. So he's convinced that he's like, we got to take the starch out of this Dean's shirt.
He's obsessed with that and he shows up. And I just wanted the Dean to be. the Dean is the nicest. He's a young guy, he's like, Hey man, I used to, you know, play bass with the pretenders if you want to jam.
He couldn't be nicer and Homer's like, we're going to get him and get him good. That was my obsession, so that's great.
Yeah, well, a long time ago. long, long time ago. Well, should we do it? should we get into the old Shizzo?
The old Shizzow. I haven't been drinking yet.
What if we're laughing now, and two years from now, I'm in a catatonic state? Come on and they're, and they're going through all of these hints with Gourley and they're saying, you didn't know that his cerebellum was just wanted to hasten it.
This is all going to be played back for you one day by a neurologist, and both of you are going to be in the hague as war criminals. You could have saved him when he said, It's time for the Shizzo, you didn't know that he was bleeding into his cortex.
You just laughed.
And now he's dead.
All right, my guest today is a hilarious comedian whose podcast, called Chelsea Peretti, releases new episodes every Thursday.
Chelsea Peretti welcome.
I'm thrilled to have you here.
I really am, I am really, genuinely happy to be here. I am. I swear there's no way to sell it, but I am.
I first of all, I first of all want to thank you for your stunning portrayal of my assistant Sona in your character as Gina Linetti on Brooklyn Nine-nine. Because I will say something. You played this iconic character and it's one of your thousand accomplishments, but you play this character who is a terrible assistant. And I swear to God, I always felt like this character is so much like Sona, who's been my assistant forever, yeah.
Brilliant, gorgeous. Oh, thank you.
Yeah, but then there's an episode where Gina gets an assistant, so Gina doesn't do anything. And then she has an assistant who's basically just writing down her insults. You know? And Sona got an assistant who works for me.
And, by the way, is a massive fan of yours and Brooklyn Nine-nine.
She also he.
H.e.
Can he co-assist and also split assist me? yes.
Yes.
My current assistant lives in Joshua Tree, and he's building like a hobo camp with yurts. I'm kind of, I'm kind of in dire need. Let's get the word out. He, like, remote assists me, and he's not good with like dates and time.
That's me, too. That's how I was. It got so bad and the fans got to know Sona and they got to know that our relationship. So we did a remote once where I brought in a was. It was an HR HR, an HR rep from TV, as an actual HR rep, who's a real person.
And she was kind of just talking to both of us and she said to Sona, What do you think your issue is? And she said, I have a real mental block about helping Conan. And I said, You're my fucking assistant. But I love when when because David Hopping's the guy who took over for you.
And when that episode came out, David and I were talking about this. Because it's just hilarious that you got an assistant and you refused to help me, that's true.
It's the long con, it's very, very clever, yeah.
Thank you anyway. It's a very incredible portrayal of something that really happened in my life.
I love that.
Yeah, well, goodbye, that's all I needed. Thank you for having me. Oh my goodness, thank you for being here.
We have a lot to talk about because I am, in addition to somewhat being in comedy, I'm also a lover of comedy. I was looking at all the points of intersection that you've worked in in comedy, and it's crazy. How many different shows you've been involved in, how many different? Like, whether it's Stand up or whether you've worked for a bit of brief stint on SNL, working with people like Sarah Silverman, like, you've kind of, kind of been everywhere and done a lot of amazing stuff.
And yet what happened with me? You know, you're here.
No, I'm just kidding. This podcast is the sign that your point still stands. The point still stands, that your career is in terrible trouble.
Yeah, it's in tatters. I need this more than you know. Yeah, I mean, I love comedy, I always I think it's like my religion.
I don't I envy people who have a religious base, although lately not as much, but anyway, I just comedy is everything to me.
So was it always, like when you were a kid?
I think so, I mean, it kind of shifted in junior high because I was, I was like, weird in elementary school.
How weird, because usually I can beat people that say they were weird when they were a kid.
Well, I didn't self-identify as weird, let's say that.
I was listed on, like, if you went to the supermarket, if someone passes a bad check. It would just say, like, weird kid, there was a photo of me, I was. I was identified, not self-identified, identified by everyone as weird kid.
That's how I was identified by others that way, and I didn't, and I. For example, I wrote a play called Gertrude's Revenge, and the subtitle was all popular Kids beware.
Never a more heartbreaking play to be written by your child in elementary school. And yet no intervention of any kind.
Also, any child in the modern era who's named Gertrude would be justified in seeking revenge.
Why would I choose that name for my protagonist?
Enid evens the score.
But like, I chose a weird name, it was in my blood, so yeah, I don't know. I just felt very uncomfortable in elementary school, then junior high, I became.
I flipped weird to funny, and so that was when I started to feel really funny.
What was your appearance like? how did you dress?
Horrific, horrific, ugliest. I've ever been. Junior high, I had a perm, but straight bangs and braces. Wait, wait, wait.
How do you pull that off? Yeah, do you go to two different salons? Well, bangs grow fast. I did that too.
Bangs grow fast and I would curl them in one like hard, shiny, curl like forward, and then my nose would be like protruding out. I was so skinny that I had no face to balance anything. It just looked like a piece of paper, you know, under a sheath of bangs, and, you know, my knees were bigger than my legs.
Like, it was just bad. Seventh grade was the all-time low, eighth grade, it got a little better, but yeah.
And what are you wearing? what kind of things are you wearing?
Okay, this was the era of, you know, gap clothes, big, huge plaid, gap shirts, big jeans. I mean, kids at my school were wearing Oakland Raiders jackets, starter jackets. And Elise. Are you familiar with Elise Conan?
I'm not familiar with Elise, and I say that proudly, What is Elise?
It's a shoe brand that was popular in Oakland in that era, and Nike Cortez, I'm sure you had a pair.
Oh, sure, I'm wearing them now, but not on my feet. Don't ask any questions.
Where's that HR lady bring her in, right? Hey, that's a very vague joke.
No, I just love HR people, they're fun to talk to.
They really are.
They're a good time.
They really are fun to talk to. I love it when they come and speak to me for things I've done. Yeah, it helps everyone. We've talked, Conan.
Why? Yeah, well, I used to pretend to be the HR person.
Oh, I hated your HR person.
Because what was it?
Because you would just do this with your hands.
You'd be like, shut up.
Go have a baby.
Wait a minute.
I would not say that, Oh my God.
Who are you? She would say, Why is there no HR here? And I'll say, I'll go get him. And I would leave and I would come back and I would be like, what's going on?
Just suck it up, just suck it up, and she'd be like, That's you making glasses with your fingers. That is not HR.
Yeah, HR sucks.
Admit that your crimes were greater than mine. No, all right, you're fired.
So you were very interested in comedy, but did you? When I was a youngster, I never thought there's no way this could be a living. I didn't think it was a way. Is that something you thought?
I mean, unfortunately, I wanted to be rich and famous when I was young, so I think I did have. I thought it would be easier, but I don't know. I guess it is weird to want that and then achieve that, that's pretty, pretty weird odds.
The best part about being famous is.
People at the checkout line stopping you and saying to someone else at the checkout line who's working another register, Hey, you know this guy?
That's who it is.
And the other guy is like, No, come on, think, rack your brain. Remember, it's the weird kid from the bulletin board.
Exactly, but they would. I've had that, that's my least favorite thing would be, oh yeah.
Would be someone going, Hey, you know this guy?
You don't think it's worse when they go up to you and go, What are you? You're from something you probably don't experience that.
I don't experience it as much because I'm no one else looks like me.
I don't know, people have either.
I'm racking my brain to think of someone who looks like you so I can say it.
But it's like, I've said this before. But it is like if big Bird from Sesame Street was walking through a supermarket and someone said, I know you from somewhere, you know, you either know big bird or you don't.
So, yeah, I hate the charade of having to, like, supply my resume. Yes, that's stressful, but what I love is going to restaurants and having an easy time going to restaurants, OK?
I have a friend who is enraged that she won't be able to get into a restaurant. So she'll call me, yeah, and I'll say, Well, I'll go with you, and I go with her and we get in.
And she's sitting there enjoying this really nice meal. Being like, this is not right.
This is unfair.
I'm like, Hey.
Amy.
Yes, I knew what you were talking about.
But yeah, she'll go to the trouble of making me take her, but then be enraged, this is wrong. Could I have more Brené sauce? Please thank you.
Not wrong enough. I thought you were going to say that once you walk her in, you leave, and then she eats alone.
I wonder if that move works, you could start a side business, that would be a great business.
The restaurant's like, we're going to have to take that table back.
Do you think that would work?
No.
You walk in and you sit with them for a second and then you say, I have to go, I have diarrhea.
Yeah, exactly.
No one ever questions diarrhea because no one wants to get into it. They can't take that table back, and then they find out that I've been doing that at restaurants all over town. And also I like the idea that I'm not like Leonardo DiCaprio, you know?
So there'd be plenty of restaurants where I wouldn't get in. Hold for laugh, but anyway.
Sorry, got to go.
Let me guess diarrhea, that's right.
Yeah, that would wear out fast.
The word's all over town.
Diarrhea O'Brien.
Diarrhea.
So would you say, because I know that you stand up, you did stand up for years. Who was your influence, who was the person that you were watching when you were young? That made you? You were like, I got, that's who I want to be.
I mean, honestly, it wasn't so much standups. Like I loved Gilda Radner and Eddie Murphy, like I would watch his VHs of You know, Best of Eddie Murphy Saturday Night Live, Yeah, and Steve Martin.
And, you know, I do remember watching Eddie Murphy rock with my grandmother for some reason.
But it was at her insistence.
Yeah, we're not going to watch it again. I'm like, No, yeah, she influenced me. I remember Adele Givens on Def comedy jam.
Def comedy jam I used to watch a lot of, but yeah, I wasn't like a crazed standup fan like a lot of standups.
You and I were at a social function. There were a lot of standups there and everyone was going on listing the standups that influenced them. And I remembered, I can't remember what you said.
But I just we were going around the room and I was thinking, it wasn't for me. It wasn't standups that excited me the most. Yeah, it was sketch players and comedic actors that made me really excited about comedy.
Yeah, I mean, listen, lately I've really been. I don't do standup as much, and what I really think about it is there's almost no one I want to hear talk for an hour straight.
You know what I mean, like, I think it's a flawed art form.
This podcast is 55 minutes, so we just get you in under the wire.
That's different, though. It's like an interplay, it's like someone standing on stage and talking.
I always want there to be another reality to come in. So I was so happy doing late night because I could be talking and a man could interrupt me from the audience. Who's dressed in a beekeeper's outfit?
And a whole other reality could come out. That's the world I always wanted to live in. I wanted to start doing something or talking as a normal person, but then I wanted to be stopped.
By either a bear wearing a diaper or a guy preying to be a gold miner. And then I wanted maybe some tape to be involved. That took us to a different reality. That was the world that I was always happy with.
Yeah, I like that interplay and the whole comedy game and the playfulness of those kinds of moments. And so I think, for me, stand-up, it was one of these things where I kind of love-hated it.
And I kind of just kept doing it and I was kind of good at it. But I never, you know what. I realized I would get off stage and I don't feel good, but most comedians I know get off stage.
And feel incredible about themselves, you know, they're like on a high. Whereas I'm like the one person who didn't laugh the joke, I forgot. Whatever it is, I feel like I'm fixating on, you know?
What didn't happen?
Or comparing it to my best show I've ever had and it doesn't live up.
I have found at times, there were times when it wasn't clicking. And I would, almost in a masochistic way. The way you like, pick at a scab or a wound. I would be like, Oh man, they're not with me.
I'm going to enjoy this, I'm going to enjoy this silence right now. I didn't. I found it usually wasn't the way to go, but there were times when it felt like it saved my sanity anyway.
Yeah, I think that that's what people loved about you, because I feel like then it feels like we're on your team, right, right? We're relating to, like, yeah.
In acting, comedy, acting, I like to be the person that's like, This is crazy, you're all crazy, you know? And I feel like I feel like you are doing that a lot as well.
You're clearly approved.
I was there at rehearsal, my favorite thing was to act like, what is happening? Yeah, like balking at it, Yeah, no, this is wrong.
And it's like, No, no, no, I was at rehearsal, I was there the night before. I'm part of all of this, but I love pretending, yeah.
Whereas actually, a lot of the madness here is, I mean, there is no script with this. But there are many times where I'm quite upset with both of you. Yeah, many, yeah, most of the time.
Yeah, that seems to be the secret formula. Yeah, me just raging.
I was curious because you and I have a similar experience, which is you did you tempt for a while?
I did yes.
I tempt also in the leaner times of my career, I was a temp.
Yeah.
When I was either a student or when I was working a serious job, I wasn't at all funny I was, just did what people needed me to do and kept my mouth shut. To the point where, later on, when teachers found out that I was in having success in comedy, they were stunned.
Yeah.
And I remember it as a temp, just doing the work, and then I was in between writing jobs with my partner Greg Daniels. Who, you know, who I love? Yeah, let's just say you know him, I love the guy.
You know why I get lemon cakes alone? Yes, lemon cakes, Christmas lemon cakes. I did get those for a span of years.
I've never gotten one from Greg, really, no.
I don't think he sends them anymore or I'm not on the list anymore, but they're delicious.
Greg, He did one of the funniest things, which is that he showed up at one of my Christmas parties about seven years ago. With this giant tower wrapped in plastic of like, fruit and nuts, and it's all very exotic. And I look at it. And it says to Greg from the sound editing team at You know, you know, H and B. And Greg had crudely crossed it out and wrote Love Greg, making no attempt to hide the regift. And I loved that more than any real gift.
It was so funny that he could have gotten me.
Yeah, that's pretty good. One time I was at Aspen Comedy Festival and I received a large fruit basket and I was like, Oh my god, the festival sent me this fruit basket. And all my friends were like, what? We didn't get one? Everyone's like, jealous and upset.
And then my mom was like, Did you get the fruit basket? and I realized it was from my mom. And it was another crushing blow in a series of crushing blows.
Shouldn't it have been nicer that it was from your mom?
No, I thought it was like, Hey, best of the fest, here you go. Pineapple.
A phone call, there's a phone call here, someone's saying they love you very much. Is it the industry? No, it's your mother.
Then fuck it.
Send it to the voicemail.
I love you and I'll always cherish you. Is it Warner brothers? No, it's your mother and father, fuck.
What's wrong with us?
I know it's really broken.
Broken people in the heyday of the Aspen Comedy Festival. I don't know who was running this thing, but they just threw money at it. And I'd be in New York and they'd say, Hey, Conan, do you want to come out and interview Steve Martin and all of your comedy heroes? And I'd be like, Yeah, and they'd say, great.
And then they'd fly me out there and they'd say, Here's a, you know, here's a parka. That says Aspen Comedy Festival.
Diamond Encrusted Skis.
And I'd say, Are these blood diamonds? and they'd go like, maybe?
And no, it's just you just were like, What is who's paying for all this? And then I guess some someone took over the festival and looked at the books and said, This is insane. The books were cooked. I don't know what was happening there. This is actual cocaine on these mountains.
Yeah, exactly, it's actual cocaine. On the mountain, and they would. There was a whole slope where you could just ski on rolexes. And I was like, This just feels wrong, but okay, I guess I'll go.
Yeah, all the affluence of yesteryear, like every writer's room I was in. They're like, we used to eat steaks every day, you know? And like, then it would be like, like, even at Brooklyn, they would cross out a certain dollar amount. Entree like you could only order.
No, it's funny. I come to NBC in 1993 to do the late night show and my introduction is to go to an upfront, which is where all the advertisers get together.
Love upfronts.
Oh my god.
So chill.
Love upfronts No, but I go to an upfront because they say, Oh, it's this new kid. Gunnar O'Brien, You know, it's. You'll see, it's going to be something you'll see, and I, which was a terrible slogan, by the way, you'll see.
That's the best they're out. Yeah, you'll see, he'll be something, I suppose. I don't know why Norm MacDonald is saying it, but I show up and huge ice sculptures of peacocks and then, you know, you got to think about.
It was friends, it was cheers it was, and so giant fountains that, you know, I've heard it, I'd heard of liquid chocolate fountains, but just craziness. It looked, it was madness.
And then I'll never forget when I one of the last upfronts I went to. It was a tent that was leaking because it was raining and it was a cash bar and that was over. I want to say that was like a 15 year period, but that was just how things changed. And now I don't, you know, now, it would be like an individual camping tent and everyone gets to go inside. I don't know.
It was, uh, yeah, it wasn't. There was a crazy time there where there were three or four networks. And they would do things like, I, I missed this phase. But they would tell me, Oh, two years ago it was a cruise and all the advertisers were taken on a cruise and massive stars mingled with them. And everybody was eating, you know, squab, I don't even know what squab is.
It's delicious.
Yeah, but um it. It sounded like madness. And and uh, it is a very, very different times.
Yeah, it's like Robin Leach set up a promise. You know, in my youth, remember Run away with the rich and famous? And, like, I watched that, I'm like, Wow, like this is going to be me someday.
And then now it's like, Eat the rich. I'm like, ugh, wrong timeline, you know?
Where is Robin Leach? I'm sure he's passed on to his reward, he's in the best place in heaven.
A golden casket. I don't know where he is, he's definitely.
He died. Yeah, 2004 2018, I was a little longer than I thought.
Wow, well, anyway, I had the same thing where, uh, there's, yeah, there was.
You know, I thought, Dog the Bounty hunter died, and I used to do a joke about it where I go, Dog the bounty hunter died. Yeah, I know that one hurts, or this one hurts or something.
And then someone just told me he's alive and that was fake.
It was him at a show, he stood up, Excuse me.
It was fake. Can you look up another death? is this your death research? Yeah, yeah.
Yes, Eduardo, Hey Eduardo, am I still alive? This is death. Tales of the rich and famous.
Let's just spend the remainder of our time looking up celebrity deaths.
Dog is with two GS No, he's still alive.
It's not like the hog d-a-g-u-e.
You know what we should do, we should turn this whole podcast into Who's alive and who's Dead? That's a good one. His wife died.
Oh, maybe that's what it was, yeah.
Yeah, try not to be all smiley when you say that. Eduardo just said that with the biggest smile. That's a terrible, tragic loss. His wife died.
I was just glad I found the right information. Yeah, well, just think about what you're saying. What a win for you. That's why they won't let you work at the hospital anymore. Eduardo, your grandpa's dead.
Eduardo I was just happy that I had the right information.
Uh.
I was excited that I was right. He is dead. You've done something that absolutely terrifies me, which is you've directed.
Yeah.
I'm terrified of the idea of directing.
Yeah.
I feel like I'm a boss. I like to direct small things, but if I was the formal director of a movie, I would be very frightened.
Yeah, well, it's weird, because I think I am sort of an anxious person. I was thinking about trying beta blockers. You ever done that?
Sure.
Really, wow, you went dark.
Wait.
Let's define our terms, because I want to make sure we're defining our terms. Beta blockers are, for example. I don't know you're looking at me, yeah.
EDUARDO Right, that's who we want to ask.
What's that?
Has anyone ever died from beta blockers?
I don't think it was a blood pressure medicine.
I thought it was for an anxiety thing. Years ago, my dad told me to take it for stand-up.
It says that beta blockers cause the heart to beat a little more slowly.
Wow, they got to try it.
It also says Dog the bounty hunter has just passed. Oh yes, wait, no, he's back, he's back.
This is a site that monitors his heartbeats and it's very slow. According to Blaze research, also, a person may develop depression when taking beta blockers. Really?
That's a confusing mix.
Can I just say this? You brought up beta blockers?
Yeah, sorry.
It completely threw everyone off. Yeah, so have I taken medication for anxiety and maybe a bit of depression? Yes, I have.
Well, I wasn't going to. I wouldn't have presumed to ask you that. I thought that beta blockers was more like, Hey, I have a show, I'm nervous, I'll take this.
And it helps you be calm. I wouldn't be like, Are you on anti-anxiety meds?
Oh, I'm okay with telling people that because I'm a believer in people getting help. But the thing I do to help me before I have to go out in front of people is prepare. I think that is the best medication, prepare. And whenever I feel that's the thing that calms me down is if I feel like I put some thought into it and was prepared before I went up there.
Uh-oh, everyone's scrambling around in the background.
The beta blockers, they're like beta blockers, beta blockers. It's the new peas and apples.
Okay, difference is, beta blockers are typically prescribed to treat high blood pressure and heart problems, and they are prescribed off-label for anxiety. Xanax is a different kind of drug.
Benzodiazepine that is a type of tranquilizer widely prescribed for anxiety. Yeah, developed by the Nazis.
Always goes back to them, Sorry, is it really?
Well, there's a whole book about the Third Reich and how the Germans developed the Benzo drugs.
It's a handwritten book by a crazy person who lives in Vermont.
It's a book I found on a park bench after I wrote it. It's actually a very good and I think quite popular book. That you could look up, Eduardo, so we could tell people about it. Wait, so there's a Nazi drug. Now, this is off the rails.
I apologize.
No, you should. These are my favorite ones, my favorite ones are like this, where we bounce around, we talk about nazis, yell at each other.
The Nazis have to make one appearance.
Always.
What's it called? Blitz drugs in the Third Reich? Yes, blitz in the Third Reich. It's all about how the Benzo class of drugs. Why did I read it?
Blitz Nazi drug makers.
Because it was all about how they were all fucked up out of their minds. Oh yeah, yes, on various, and the Fuhrer was taking a million different things. And so anyway, I'm going to get this thing back on the rails.
Do you have, like one of those SS jackets in your closet?
It's not in my closet.
I wear it when I.
It's a jacket I regularly wear when I'm driving my vintage motorcycle with sidecars.
What's everyone so mad about?
It's beautiful leather.
Sona, you've written this many times and said, Cool long jacket, but not knowing what it meant.
Oh man, SS is just, you know, little lightning bolts. I was like, Oh, he likes thunderstorms. He works with the electrical company, right, right?
No, I did not.
OK, so you see what our podcast is like. I love it and it's a train wreck, but we like that part of it. Tell us about yours called Chelsea. Peretti? I want to talk about this because you're a delightful person.
I would listen to you for hours and hours and hours, I really would, so I want to hear about the podcast.
Great news, I've recorded many episodes. It is a reboot of a podcast that I started, I forget when, but a long time ago, like 2014..
Before there were podcasts.
Yeah, basically, kind of it was like the time where podcasts felt like zines and not that many people had them. Now it's like everyone's a brand and yada yada, but I take phone calls from random people.
I just post the number and people call and it puts me into my fight or flight mode, which I think is a funny place to be for me.
Great place to be, yeah.
Yeah, so I just take calls and then I have sound effects that I play and I have topics. I have an obsession with bear attack survivors.
Let's talk about that. Listen, I have just so you think that I read widely and weirdly, so I have read many books. I have read many books about bear attacks.
Sona lives in Bear Country, right?
I do. There's so many bears in Altadena, he read the book, called The Third Reich Bears Training Regiment.
Yeah.
All your books somehow tie in. When they invaded Poland, it was mostly bears that went in, and they were all hyped up on benzos, and they were wearing long leather coats.
Elizabeth Banks movie is loosely based on it.
Loosely based on the invasion of Poland, but anyway, so what have you learned about bear attacks? Because this fascinates me.
Well, they can run around 40 miles an hour. What?
Yeah, you can't outrun, don't try to outrun a bear.
Oh yeah, I've learned that groups of three are statistically much less likely to be attacked than one or two people. So if you're ever walking around in Bear Country, bring two friends.
But yeah, I mean, you know, the whole time I had my first run, I was like. Bear attack survivors call in not a smart strategy to get a bear attack survivor, because it's just statistically unlikely. You're a statistics guy.
I love that you because I come from improv. Yes, I am, I know my stats.
So you get that? So anyway, this time I just searched. I trolled around online and I found bear attacks, and I had my producer reach out to those survivors and see if they would come. So I've gotten two so far. Oh.
And so they were attacked and they survived.
Yeah.
OK, but what I'm saying is, were they at least chilling stories?
Well, that's the thing that I'm like, always trying to calibrate, like, what's the perfect level of bear attack for it to still be funny and register comedic?
Wow, very light attack, if it's still going to be funny.
A light mauling, Yeah.
Because there's a guy that has light mauling, that's a cuddle, you know, a swat.
But like the guy I just had, he was 17 and a grizzly bear attacked him. He was alone on a mountaintop and sees a grizzly bear barreling toward him. Can you imagine? And so like, See.
This is good, yeah.
So the bear, like, lunged at him to kind of like, see if he would flinch, you know? And then it slapped him. That was what I thought was comedic. It actually slapped him.
But keep in mind, a swat, a slap from a grizzly bear, can take your head off.
Yeah, it, basically, he said. I mean it, actually, I hate to say it. It really did sound cartoonish, and I'm really into sequences of actions as well as sounds, he said. The bear said, chomp or clack his teeth right by his head and then slapped him so clack, slap. Then his body flew up horizontally, and the bear, before he hit the ground, bites his thigh.
Jesus.
Now did he lose any limb?
No, but he lives with, like, constant pain.
Why did the bear let the guy go? They do sometimes.
He passed out. Yeah, so you know a little bit about this.
No, I've read a bunch of books about bear attacks, you really have, I have.
What are you supposed to do curl up?
Well, it depends. There's black bears, there's brown bears, you're better off. In general, encountering a black bear. Grizzlies are scary.
They're usually not a problem, they're just as afraid of us as we are of them.
Would you come on my podcast as a bear expert?
You know what I want to do?
I want to come on as a bear.
We're talking to a grizzly here, grrr.
Grrr.
Grrr.
I did have to ask the guy, Would it be triggering to you if I played a bear growl sound effect?
That's terrible. This man almost lost his life to a bear, and you said, lives in constant pain and you can't get that out without laughing. I feel better.
Now you feel better, Eduardo. Turns out you're not the sociopath in the room.
We are Kinfolk, you know? But yeah, so he, he listen, he came on a comedy podcast.
Yeah, he knew what he was doing.
So I figured he would be all right with it, yeah, but he was like the most kind, sweet guy. Couldn't have happened to a better person.
But the truth is is like, there's, there's really. Nothing you can do is really what it comes down to, unless you're holding bear spray for the entire hike. But he was on a 40 day camping trip.
Oh, that's on him, then.
And it was on, it was on day 29.
That's why I only stay in hotels, nice hotels, and still I've been attacked several times.
Offline, I'd love to know what your favorites are.
On the elevator.
No, that's. The other thing, too, is the more you read about bear attacks, the more there is no like certain rule. There just isn't there there. Mostly, it's don't surprise them. You always hear that, like, for a brown or a black one, you're supposed to play dead.
One you're supposed to get big and make a lot of noise is that that's not true.
If it's brown, play it down, that's what it is.
I'm literally confusing.
If it's yellow, let it mellow, you're totally, you're totally mixing these things up. if it's black, let it stack.
It's a mixed metaphor or something, yeah.
If the bear slaps, wear a cap, you know the that's why there isn't one thing you're supposed to, I mean it just, it varies so much, but I think the big things are. Make noise as you walk. Which is why when you're in Bear country, you're supposed to wear like a bell so that you don't surprise bears. And the other thing is, for all types of bears, this holds true.
It just feels like we should get this right.
You're supposed to hit a cowbell.
Like, how annoying would that get?
Then the bears attack because they really hate, they're annoying the sound.
They're like, I was trying to hibernate, and you're just.
Don't, don't, don't, don't. Also, you're not supposed to be rhythmically bopping from side to side.
You have to enjoy it, otherwise what's the point?
Jennifer Samples, who is a producer for Team Coco. And a huge outdoor person, just texted me saying, Black attack, Brown lay down, Oh nice, wait a minute, you're supposed to attack a black bear.
That's what she said.
And then she put a nerd emoji. Can I just say something I want to legally distance myself? Hey, if you see a black bear and it's hundreds of yards away from you, attack it. She's listening and texting me.
Why don't we just go on the offensive now? Let's go get all the black bears, she said. And then she, because she's listening to us right now, she says, Yeah, get big for the black bear.
No, but what I'm saying is this whole thing of you attack, it sounds crazy to me. I thought it was Black fight back.
Well, fight back, Fight back is different than Black, because, again, I just don't want people listening to this. And they're at the zoo and they see a black bear behind bars and they squeeze in there and start wailing on it. I see you remember, when it's Black, you must attack.
No, no, it's sedated and it's behind bars. Oh, no.
Like, are these official limericks from the Parks and Recreation department, like, who comes up with these?
Yeah, did they find the rhyme first? And they're like, Eh, it's a 50-50, but it's a good rhyme. Sometimes they have really good advice, but it doesn't rhyme, so they don't tell it to you. They're like, nothing rhymes with pigeon.
So we won't tell people about the killer pigeon, a smidgen.
We actually play this game with my son, we go well. When he was little, we'd go like, Nothing rhymes with Smidgen and then, and one was, Nothing rhymes with Pony. And I swear he was like three years old. And he said, Nina Simone No.
Prodigy.
And I was like, Holy shit, this kid. But I don't want him in the biz, he's really into it now.
Six years old, I'm like, don't do it. I really want him to be a marine biologist.
That's what we all want for our children.
Yeah.
I can't believe our producer Jeff Ross admitted to me once. For years, I've been doing a Jeff impression, which is basically Jackie Mason. Going like, let's get some soup, let's go. And then, you know, he's all about the business, and he's all about, you know, he's reading the trades. And let's go, you know, let's go to a good restaurant. And then he told us once, Yeah, I want to be a marine biologist.
And I said, What?
And then I just, I just pictured Jeff at the bottom of the sea, like texting different, different. Yeah, and the most and the most little bubbles, and when the bubbles hit the surface, it's like, let's get some soup, yeah.
But but the most exotic rare fish in the world will go by. But Jeff is busy texting, Can they get me into Craig's?
Craig's is not even that good. Don't say that.
You know what I love, there's, I know.
I've been to Craig's like twice, but one of the funny things is I once went and I didn't know this. But there's the paparazzi hanging out outside. And um, it was hilarious, cause I had just come from a Robert Caro event where I was reading. He was talking about his works. Famous, uh, biographer of Lyndon Johnson. That's what I'm doing in my spare time, and I walk from that event with the book that he signed for me.
And I step out and all the paparazzi put up their cameras to like, Oh, you know, it's Conan. Let's just get this in case he dies tomorrow. We got one. And, uh, I just hold up the book and cause they're clicking away, and because I'm holding up a biography of Lyndon Johnson, all the cameras go down.
And it was like putting up a cross in front of the paparazzi. I tried to turn my moment with the paparazzi into a teachable history moment.
Did you ever look for it?
Oh, if someone can find me holding, yeah. A Robert Caro book online, walking into a restaurant.
Search Conan Craig's Getty Images I think I'm very good at Google searching. I'm trying to come for your job.
My guess is it doesn't exist, cause I think, I think at that point they all smashed their cameras.
Yeah, they don't post the rejects.
All those guys quit the biz, they all, they all became missionaries after that day.
But they're all doing the Lord's work in various. Look, Eduardo can't find it. Of course, you can't find it. Wait, look up LBJ going to Craig's, maybe that'll work.
Keep this guy around.
Um, you know, it's funny, cause I heard in some interview you were talking about how you were pretty sure that when Get Out was released, you were like, you thought that. Or maybe it was just a joke, it's a joke, but that Jordan was writing about your family?
Well, the funny thing is, everyone was like, Oh, is this about her? and I was like, Yeah, it's a documentary like that was, that was a joke. But now, years later, I'm like, maybe it was like, you know, I would be too like, self-confident, that I'm not a monster, you know, to go.
No, it actually is about me. It's the perfect cover.
Assuming that my husband loves me, you know?
That is funny how the initial reaction of most people who are in the business is they want their kids to have nothing to do with it.
Isn't it because it's awful? I mean, I when I first started standup and like they would like they, I don't know who they is. But if there was a YouTube clip online, the comments like, when I first experienced what that was like, I cried for like two hours. And then you get a little better at it, it just makes you like, Oh, I remember I did your show and your social media team posted a photo and I was all gussied up.
You know, this is going to end badly. I was in like a sparkly dress and a makeup artist took like a big swing and did, like, like a bold, what I would call a bold eye. And one of the comments was, What is that? and I was like, there's really no, like, there's, there's really nothing that cuts to the quick faster than what is that? It's like three words and you decimated me.
But um, you know, so it's why would I ever want my child to experience that? That's why I don't post his photo. I mean, I've posted photos of myself as a kid. And people are like, you look like a boy. And I'm like, you're, you're, you're attacking a child. So why would I ever want to subject my own child to it?
I think, uh, yeah, I think, first of all, I, I. I came to the conclusion a long time ago. Uh. I've had guests on my show over the years, talk to me about, Oh, the previous time I was on, I got some negative comments. And they they will quote it now.
And it's you, it's actually you.
You're trolling all your guests because I want them to learn if they're annoying on the show. I thought Helen Mirren could get better and that's why I did it.
And make better choices. No, I, I, um, but my all my reaction was always, Why are you looking at that? because I don't I? I the last thing in the world I would ever choose to do. I got, uh, plenty of mean things said about me back in the old days pre-internet, when they were when it was critics saying, um, and uh. More than happy to bring up my physical flaws and all kinds of stuff.
Thank you, but, uh, but I, I, so I remember that at the time and thinking, Oh, this is terrible, so the idea now that, uh. And that was just when there were just a couple of hundred critics in America who were all saying terrible things, but now there's millions of people. I would, I would not choose to go looking for it.
I know, I mean, I don't really like I do limit it, you know? I've started playing Blockudoku, which I'm replacing a lot of my, uh, Instagram time on and stuff. And I don't read all of it, but I definitely read some of it. I just don't have the personality where I can't read stuff like I my movie like.
Some people wrote bad reviews. I'm like, Okay, I'm going to read it, I can't not read it, I need to. Like, I guess part of me does feel like I'm going to learn something from it, like your joke.
That's good, I mean, if if you can do it, if I think there's something that I can learn, then yes. I do want feedback, but I kind of want it to be constructive feedback, not not I hope you die feedback. I can't do anything with Hey, Conan, I hope you know, why are you still alive? I can't. That doesn't help me in my work.
Right, and it helps you in your mirror work, where you're just like, Why are you still alive?
Why am I?
Those things cut deep sometimes you really, it sticks with you. Yeah, but yeah, I don't know. I just don't have the personality of like, of being that evolved.
I don't know that it's evolved, I might just be afraid to look. I'm not saying what I'm doing is evolved. I'm just saying that's a choice I made a while ago to just, uh.
It seems, it seems like, you know what, I don't have willpower. In a lot of ways, it seems like a very like puritanical that you can do that.
I'm puritanical. you're a puritan in a way. I'm wearing iron underwear right now. I'm very puritanical.
And every time I disappoint myself, I turn these two screws on either side, which also is a little erotic. All right, let me make sure we get the word out. Call Chelsea Peretti. It's a podcast and I'm going to come on as a.
Bear Expert, Which is a all I know is, if you see a black bear thousands of yards away from you and it's walking away with its baby. Don't jump on your bike and grab a scythe and go after it.
I'm coming for you, bear.
That just seems cruel, but I adore you. I'm so happy that you came by and you're always, so nice. You came on my show, You're always hilarious.
And you've had a spectacular.
I'm glad you exist in the world.
That's very nice. Let's get that online.
That balances out.
Really, one of my biggest regrets was Joan Rivers used to do that show in bed with Joan Rivers, and they asked me to do it. And scheduling didn't work out. And then she died. And so now I'm like, you really do have to tell people.
So you're here because you thought.
I was going to die, guess what?
This is a great booking tool. Yes, yes, we should start putting out there Conan. we're a little worried about him, Conan's under the weather. Anthony Hopkins is here to talk at length about whatever I want to talk about.
Because he's worried you're going to go, he's worried I'm going to go.
That's funny.
Please come back, it doesn't take much time. I would love to because I love talking to you and go in peace.
We both want each other to die.
What's going on? No go in peace.
It's a stone's throw from Rest in Peace.
It's how they used to end mass when I was a kid. Go in peace to love and serve the Lord. Except our Priest would always have, he'd supposed to just say, Go in peace to love and serve the Lord, and our Priest was a real. He acted like Jimmy Cagney, and he jingled change in his pocket.
Have a nice day.
Have a nice week, see you around. Wow, that's the new New Testament.
Do you think he was on the spectrum?
I think he was on nazi benzos. Oh, no.
Sorry, Nazi priest. Nazi priest are the best kind of priest. All right bye.
Okay, this segment is airing after our conversation with none other than Chelsea Peretti. And in that segment we found ourselves talking about bear attacks. Quite irresponsibly, very irresponsibly.
We're here to clear the air, which is that no one in this studio, especially Chelsea. Peretti, but including myself, is an expert on what to do in a bear attack. We started saying some shit. But anybody who's tuning into Conan O'Brien needs a friend. To know how to survive in the woods is a fool, in my opinion. And no one should be listening to us. And keep in mind, no lawyers contacted us. We, even ourselves, were like, this is ridiculous.
We're going to get someone killed. Yeah, we are doing this because of our conscience. we just want to make sure that, well, collectively, the three of us together have one conscience.
Oh, okay, did you really read all those books on bear attacks?
I have read a lot on bear attacks, but do I remember with great authority what to do and what not to do? No, I don't.
Do you think anybody knows?
No, see, but that's just what the bears want you to think. You know what I mean? I think the bears are also online putting out a lot of misinformation. Yes, exactly, they've got a Russian server farm working for them.
They're typing on a computer. Grizzly bears love that whole thing of just lie down in front of the grizzly and we won't bother you. that's grizzlies sitting at computers, putting that out there. The best way to avoid a bear attack is to lather yourself in gravy and lie down in front of a bear. Bring a gravy boat, pour the gravy on you, lay down on a large platter with an onion in your mouth and lay still for the bear.
Signed I am not a bear.
So I don't know what to do in a bear attack. And we have a producer on the show, she's a researcher. Jen Samples does an amazing job, and she claims to know she texted him while we were talking to Chelsea. Peretti. And she said, If you see a black bear attack, which sounded crazy to me because it sounded like the black bear could be. Six miles away on a far ridge, smelling a dandelion. And your job is to race over there and start punching it, Jen Samples does. She goes hiking and, like every weekend, she's always doing outdoor stuff, always camping.
And she texted me during the Chelsea Peretti thing.
About a black bear attack. We can get her on the phone. Should we get her on the phone? Yeah, let's call her up. So my question is, what if it's a bear on the other line?
No, no, he's saying like, Jen's not here right now. All right, we got her on the phone here. You want to take the phone and you can hold it. Okay, why don't you hold it? I'm holding it.
Yeah, Jen, can you hear us? Yeah, Okay, Jen, you're not being patched through in any kind of sophisticated way that I would expect from Eduardo, who is a mastermind. Instead, Bley just is calling you on a cell phone and Sona's holding it.
I'm holding it, I just said, Sona's holding it.
I know, but I'm saying, of all people in here, I'm the one who's holding it.
Which is a really bad idea. Oh yeah, because you drop stuff.
Okay.
You drop your twins many times, so Jen, we want to clear the air because Chelsea Peretti was talking about what to do during a bear attack. We got the sense that she didn't know what she was talking about, she induced me to talk about it. I started saying, Shit, but I'm not sure I'm right.
And then you text in and say, when you see a black bear attack, which sounds crazy to me, you don't attack a bear. That's minding its own business.
Yes, but you want to make yourself big and bang pots and pans and kind of just make yourself taller than the bear.
That's what my wife did when I met her. When I met my wife and tried to talk to her in a bar, she started hitting pots and going la, la, la.
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