Conan O'Brien

Conan O'Brien
O'Brien in Helsinki, Finland in February 2006.
Birth name	Conan Christopher O'Brien
Born	April 18 1963 (1963--) (age 44) Brookline, Massachusetts, U.S.
Medium	theatre, television, stand-up
Nationality	American
Years active	1985 - present
Genres	Improvisational comedy, Sketch comedy, Physical comedy, Surreal humor
Influences	Johnny Carson, Woody Allen, David Letterman, Robin Williams, Rodney Dangerfield, Mel Brooks
Spouse	Elizabeth Ann Powel (2002-present) (2 children)
Notable works and roles	Writer for The Simpsons (1992-1993) Host of Late Night with Conan O'Brien
Website	NBC.com/Late Night with Conan O'Brien
Emmy Awards
Outstanding Writing in a Variety or Music Program 1989 Saturday Night Live 2007 Late Night with Conan O'Brien

Conan Christopher O'Brien (born April 18, 1963)^[1] is an Emmy-winning American comedian, writer and television personality best known as host of NBC's late-night talk/variety show Late Night with Conan O'Brien.

Background

Conan was born in Brookline, Massachusetts, a suburb of Boston, Massachusetts, to Ruthe Reardon, an attorney, and Thomas Francis O’Brien, M.D.^[2] He has 5 siblings: Neal O'Brien (b. 1960); Luke O'Brien (attorney, b. 1961); Kate O'Brien (teacher, b. 1965); Jane O'Brien (writer-producer, Futurama, b. 1967); and Justin O'Brien (businessman, b. 1972). Denis Leary is his third cousin.^[3]

O'Brien excelled at English; he served as managing editor of his school newspaper and interned for Rep. Barney Frank.^[4]

After graduating from the Brookline High School as valedictorian, O'Brien entered Harvard University and, in his three upper-class years, lived in Mather House. Throughout his college career, he was a writer for the Harvard Lampoon humor magazine. During his sophomore and junior years, O'Brien served as the Lampoon's president, making him only the second person ever to serve as president twice, and the first person to have done it in 85 years. He graduated magna cum laude from Harvard University in 1985 with a B.A. in History and Literature.

While attending Harvard, O'Brien was roommates with Damon Krukowski, who later became drummer for the indie band Galaxie 500. O'Brien had previously bought himself a drumkit, but had only recently given up playing it and instead earned his talent in playing the acoustic guitar. He lent his drumkit to Krukowski, whom he knew would get more use out of it. O'Brien's drum kit can be heard on many of Galaxie 500's early recordings.

Career

Television writer

O'Brien moved to Los Angeles after graduation to join the writing staff of HBO's Not Necessarily the News.^[5] He spent two years with that show, and performed regularly with improvisational groups like The Groundlings. He also acted in corporate infomercials to earn money during this period.

After Not Necessarily the News, O'Brien partnered with Harvard classmate Greg Daniels (who went on to be the executive producer of King of The Hill and The Office) as staff writers on the short-lived Wilton North Report for Fox Broadcasting.^{[citation needed]} He also occasionally served as that show's live audience warm-up person. Wilton North, with former Letterman producer Barry Sand as executive producer, lasted only four weeks, and is noteworthy mostly as the show that bumped the Arsenio Hall-hosted Late Show off the air.^{[citation needed]}

In January 1988, Saturday Night Live's executive producer Lorne Michaels hired O'Brien as a writer. During his 3 years on SNL he wrote such recurring sketches as "Mr. Short-Term Memory" and "The Girl Watchers," the latter of which was first performed by Tom Hanks and Jon Lovitz.^[6] O'Brien also co-wrote the sketch "Nude Beach" with Robert Smigel, a sketch in which the word "penis" was said or sung at least 42 times.

While on a writers' strike from Saturday Night Live following the 1987-1988 season, O'Brien put on an improvisational comedy revue in Chicago with fellow SNL writers Bob Odenkirk and Robert Smigel called Happy Happy Good Show. While living in Chicago O'Brien briefly was roommates with Jeff Garlin and lived a few blocks away from Wrigley Field.^[7]

In 1989, O'Brien and his fellow SNL writers received an Emmy Award for Outstanding Writing in a Comedy or Variety Series.

O'Brien, like many SNL writers, occasionally appeared as an extra in sketches, including a role as a doorman in a sketch in which Tom Hanks was inducted into the SNL "Five Timers Club" for hosting his fifth episode. Years later, when Hanks was a guest on Late Night, O'Brien showed the clip and jokingly claimed their appearance together was the source of all of Hanks' subsequent success.^{[citation needed]}

From 1991 to 1994, O'Brien was a writer and producer for The Simpsons,^[6] credited as writer or cowriter of four episodes^[1] Of all the episodes he wrote while writing for The Simpsons, he considers "Marge vs. the Monorail" to be his favorite.^[6] Years later, in his speech given at Class Day at Harvard in 2000,^[8] O'Brien credited The Simpsons with "saving" him, a reference to the career slump he was experiencing prior to his hiring for that show.^[9] As of 2004, Conan's office at The Simpsons was being used as storage.^[10]

Late Night

O'Brien closes out his audition on the set of the The Tonight Show with Jay Leno at NBC Burbank Studio 1

On April 25, 1993, Lorne Michaels suggested O'Brien try out to be David Letterman's successor as host of Late Night with David Letterman, with Andy Richter signed on to be his sidekick. Conan auditioned on the set of The Tonight Show, where he interviewed Mimi Rogers and Jason Alexander.^[11] O'Brien resigned his position on The Simpsons, despite the fact that his contract had not expired.^[11]

Premiering on September 13, Late Night with Conan O'Brien received generally unfavorable critical reviews for the first 2 to 3 years after its debut. O'Brien himself, an almost total unknown among the general public before being named host, was seen by many as not being worthy of the program. NBC even poked fun at this perception in a radio ad which aired shortly before the show's debut and had Conan relaying an anecdote where someone recognized him on the street and said, "Look, honey, there's the guy who doesn't deserve his own show!" Another source of criticism was the fact that Conan himself appeared to be very nervous and awkward during the show's early days. As a self-depreciating nod to this, the original opening sequence for Late Night With Conan O'Brien was animated and featured a caricature of Conan who sweated and pulled at his collar nervously.

The show remained on multi-week renewal cycles while NBC decided its fate. By 1996-97, O'Brien's writing and comedic style was thought to have improved, and he began to develop a growing fan base, especially with high school and college students, as well as the respect of critics and his peers. O'Brien would later poke fun at the first three years of the show when on his 10th Anniversary Special, Mr. T appeared to give O'Brien a gold necklace with a giant "7" on it. When Conan tried to point out that he's actually been on the air for ten years, Mr. T responded, "I know that, fool...but you've only been funny for seven!"

Since then, O'Brien and the Late Night writing team have consistently been nominated for an Emmy Award for Best Writing in a Comedy or Variety Series, and finally won in 2007. In 1997, 2000, 2002, 2003, and 2004 he and the Late Night writing staff won the Writers Guild Award for Best Writing in a Comedy/Variety Series.

In 2001, he formed his own television production company, Conaco, which has since shared in the production credits for Late Night.

On the first episode after September 11th, O'Brien went out of character and told a story of how he went to pray for the first time in eight years, the previous time was after he was announced as the host of Late Night. O'Brien was reported to have been shaken up and talked about a need to have faith.

A promotional poster for Finnish tabloid Ilta-Sanomat, featuring Conan and Tarja Halonen. The heading under pictures of Conan and Tarja says "I want Tarja to the President!". Conan supported to her behalf in the 2006 Finnish Presidential election

After meeting Finnish actor/director Lauri Nurkse on October 11, 2005, O'Brien discovered that he was popular in Finland, and began a long running joke that he resembles the first female President of Finland, Tarja Halonen. After joking about this for several months (which led to the reoccurring segment "Conan O'Brien Hates My Homeland" and his highly advantageous endorsement of her campaign [including campaign ads he made on her behalf, many people think Conan helped Tarja considerably on her presidential campaign]), O'Brien traveled to Finland and appeared on several television shows, and met President Halonen. The trip was filmed and aired as a special.

Conan ad libbed the fictional website name "hornymanatee.com" on December 4, 2006, after a sketch about the fictional manatee mascot and its inappropriate web-cam site. NBC opted to purchase the website domain name for $159, since the website did not previously exist. The network was concerned that someone might register the domain name and post content with which NBC would not wish to be associated, or that people would get upset and sue NBC when they found out the website is fictional.^[12] NBC now owns the rights to www.hornymanatee.com for 10 years, as per Conan O'Brien. According to Conan, it was decided that, since NBC owned the name, they might as well create the website. Late Night has since developed an actual website, which now has received millions of hits, reaching 4 million page views in four days. People send in "horny manatee" artwork, poems, and other content. According to the Alexa website ranking system, Hornymanatee.com has had over 10 million web hits.

As of October 2006, Late Night with Conan O'Brien had for eleven years consistently attracted an audience averaging about 2.5 million viewers.^[13]

In 2006, Conan was named as Jay Leno's replacement when he leaves the "Tonight Show" in 2009. Leno stated on the show that he wanted to avoid a repeat of the controversy and hard feelings that resulted when he was chosen by NBC to host the Tonight Show over David Letterman. According to speculation, NBC had asked Leno to do this so Conan, who was a vital asset to the network, wouldn't jump ship for a more lucrative offer. It was rumored that at the time of the announcement ABC was talking to Conan about possibly replacing Jimmy Kimmel.^{[citation needed]}

Other work

O'Brien appears as a character in the 1999 film, South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut, voiced by Brent Spiner. O'Brien mentioned, when South Park creators Trey Parker and Matt Stone were guests on Late Night, that he loved the appearance and only wished he had done the voice.^{[citation needed]} O'Brien later appeared in Hell in the episode "Do the Handicapped Go to Hell?". In 2006, he voiced himself in a short South Park scene as part of the opening of the 2006 Emmy Awards.

O'Brien is an avid guitarist and music listener. When Bruce Springsteen appeared on the show as a musical guest, O'Brien joined several members of the Max Weinberg 7 and played acoustic guitar and backup vocals for the song, "Pay Me My Money Down".

In 2005, O'Brien appeared in The White Stripes' music video, "The Denial Twist". The band had previously been a week-long musical guest on Late Night when they were promoting their 2003 album, Elephant.

He has appeared on another late-night talk show, Space Ghost Coast to Coast (SGC2C), in Episode 77: Fire Ant, in which he and Space Ghost argue about a number of topics, including whether or not anyone actually watches SGC2C. Space Ghost later quips, "Well, that's very stupid, and you won't make it in television," an obvious parody of early reviews of O'Brien's show. A short time later, Space Ghost leaves the interview in order to follow a fire ant that bit him. As Space Ghost is crawling out of the studio, O'Brien gripes that "For all these people know, my show is a cop show on Fox or something!" Space Ghost replies, "Isn't it?"

Conan made an appearance on the Robot Chicken Star Wars Special on June 17, 2007 as the voice of the bounty hunter Zuckuss. In a parody of Late Night, Zuckuss hosts a talk show called "Late Night with Zuckuss. Conan's "Fake Celebrity Interviews" segment was even spoofed when Zuckuss did a "fake interview" with Emperor Palpatine. He also appeared in Season one on the show in two roles. First as a pizza delievery man who is not aware of his customer's sexy advances; and as a wrestling announcer with historical figures as pro wrestlers.

On March 7, 2006, NBC announced that it had ordered a pilot episode for Andy Barker P.I., a new comedy which O'Brien was executive producer of, who also co-wrote the pilot. The show starred O'Brien's former sidekick Andy Richter. After several episodes and low ratings, the show was canceled.

Conan also hosted the 58th Primetime Emmy Awards on August 27, 2006, to critical acclaim.^[14][15] He had previously hosted the Primetime Emmys in 2002, and Co-Hosted in 2003.

Personal life

On January 12, 2002, O'Brien married former advertising copywriter Elizabeth Ann 'Liza' Powel of Seattle, Washington. O'Brien met Powel, an ad executive, in 2000, when she helped create a comedic TV ad for the show.^[16] The couple dated for nearly a year and a half.^[17] Officiating at the wedding was O'Brien's long-time friend, Father Paul B. O' Brien, with whom he founded Labels Are For Jarsan anti-hunger organization based in Lawrence, MA. O'Brien has stated on air that he has a disagreeable temperament in real life. [1]

Conan and Liza have a daughter, Neve, born October 14, 2003^[18] and a son, Beckett, born November 9, 2005, both born in New York City.^[19]

Comedy and mannerisms

On Late Night, Conan has become known for his more active and spontaneous hosting style. His stage habits include but are not limited to pantomime, self-deprecation, dramatic expressions, various impressions and use of awkward pauses or responses. He frequently makes fun of the audience. He commonly makes light of his own appearance including his hairstyle, his pale skin and he jokes about his height being 6'4.

One of his trademarks is the "string dance," which is often recreated by his guests who have seen him do the dance. He also does unique impressions of celebrities; some of the most common are Arnold Schwarzenegger and Donald Trump. They have also included Anna Nicole Smith, Bill Clinton and George W. Bush.

Partial list of film and TV appearances

• Saturday Night Live - 1991, 2001
• The Simpsons - 1994 (as himself)
• Space Ghost: Coast to Coast - 1994 (as himself)
• Mr. Show with Bob and David - 1995
• The Single Guy - 1996
• Arli$$ - 1996
• Spin City - 1998
• Futurama - 1999
• Storytelling - 2001
• Andy Richter Controls the Universe - 2003
• Bewitched (film) (as himself) - 2005
• Robot Chicken - 2005
• 30 Rock (as himself) - 2006
• O'Grady - 2006
• The Office (cameo) - 2006
• Queer Duck - the movie (as himself) - 2006
• Robot Chicken (Star Wars special) - As Zuckuss) - 2007

References

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to:

Conan O'Brien

Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to:

Conan O'Brien

• Conan O'Brien at the Internet Movie Database
• O'Brien's Horny Manatee Website

Donate to Wikimedia