Conan O'Brien Ends an Era of TV Comedy with All the Feelings
Before you hit the play arrow on this video, be forewarned that the first 12 minutes or thereabouts are Conan naming the names of the people who've worked on his show. Which, after doing it five nights a week for 28 years, he and they are more than entitled to. And even then, because this is Conan, he manages to work laughs in there and prevent it from being a typical maudlin, self-important, Hollywood circle jerk. With self-deprecating put downs, referring to his staff as sex predators, saying his kids have no interest in his career ... basically doing Conan O'Brien.
And with that, he ends an era in late night talk shows. I honestly consider Conan to be the last of the late night hosts for whom comedy came first. And last. And everything in between. The whole existence of these shows is weird in that the set up of them hasn't really changed since the 1950s TV executives realized Americans were staying up past midnight and would be interested in having something on to watch. So they'd put a bunch of celebrities on a set with a host sitting at a desk in front of a backdrop that looked like the skyline of a city. And sometimes they'd just chat away about whatever for two hours, and it worked because it was cheap programming. Eventually comedians started hosting these shows, added monologues and sketches to the formula, which Johnny Carson perfected and David Letterman updated for the Boomers who grew up in front of their TVs and eventually begat Conan. As my friends younger brother put it to me back in the show's early days, "Conan is to guys my age what Letterman is to you guys."
And it seems to me he was the last of that generation of hosts who was all about the joke and nothing else. I've heard him on his podcast talk about how, for the current crop of late night hosts (he didn't name names), it's become about some other thing. And I couldn't agree more. Jimmy Fallon is trying to be the non-threatening doofus who appeals to Middle America. James Corden is trying hard to be the Nice Guy Celebrity Worshiper. Jimmy Kimmel and Stephen Colbert have both done some incredibly funny and clever TV comedy in the past. But over the last few years got lost in the weeds of proving their progressive bona fides. Playing for applause breaks instead of actual laughs. I mean, show me where anything remotely resembling a joke is in this cringetastic song parody.
Excruciating. There's plenty of humor to be gleaned from anti-vaxxers. This ain't it. This song is something you'd hear on The Morning Zoo between a "Crazy Phone Calls" bit and John Mellencamp's "Jack and Diana." And the kind of thing that never would've made it out of the writer's room on Conan.
Because, again, O'Brien's show was all about the comedy. Stupid, sophomoric, goofy, inane, silly and childish. But inventive and fucking hysterical. I've also heard him describe what he thinks is funny. And the prime example he used for the essence of comedy is this bit from Pink Panther Strikes Again:
Which explains a lot. You could draw a through line from a pompous police inspector taking a digger down a flight of stairs and trying to act like nothing happened to most of his best bits. His show never took itself seriously, but never played it safe, either. He never tried to save the world, he just went for trying to make people who work hard all day and have a million other things to worry about a few goofy laughs. And in that respect, he was the last of a species that has gone extinct.
But like the saying goes, explaining comedy is like dissecting a frog. Few people are interested and it kills the frog. It's called Show and Tell, and so far we're just hearing a lot of talking. So here are one man's picks for some of the best bits Conan has ever done:
Conan Spins His Wedding Ring. During the 2008 writer's strike, the show wasn't allowed to have written sketches, so he began to get a running bit out of seeing how long he could keep his wedding ring spinning on his desk. And it became oddly fascinating to watch:
Masturbating Bear. A bear. A bear that masturbates. Practically writes itself.
Conan Plays Old Timey Baseball. There's a league in Bethpage, Long Island that plays Civil War-era baseball. The way he savages these cosplaying history nerds was golden.
Slipnutz. A parody of Slipknot that is all about guys in khakis and sweater vests singing about slipping. On nuts.
"Walker Told Me I Have AIDS." Eventually it inspired The Walker, Texas Ranger Lever, which also could've made this list. But this original clip is my personal favorite. A masterclass in timing and reaction.
Triumph. The Haley Joel Osment bit might be my favorite, but any list that didn't include Triumph the Insult Comic Dog would be null and void.