Werner Herzog Returns

Summary

Conan O’Brien Needs A Friend – “Werner Herzog Returns”

Release date: September 29, 2025
Host: Conan O’Brien
Guests: Werner Herzog, Sona Movsesian, Matt Gourley

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Overview

In this returning appearance, celebrated filmmaker Werner Herzog joins Conan, Sona, and Matt for an expansive, offbeat conversation that meanders through Herzog’s philosophies on truth, technology, and storytelling, as well as lighter fare like dog mishaps and children’s TV voiceovers. Through a mix of playful banter and thoughtful reflection, Herzog and Conan explore the complexities of modern life, the nature of artistic truth, and Herzog’s storied career. Listeners are treated to classic Conan absurdity and Herzog’s trademark stoic wit, making this episode a rich blend of humor, sincerity, and philosophical inquiry.

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Key Discussion Points and Insights

Herzog’s Creative Process, New Works & Memoir

• On Directing & Recent Films

  • Herzog describes his latest feature with Kate and Rooney Mara, where the sisters perform in uncanny unison, emotionally and physically—“something you have never seen ever before.” (10:25)
  • Film highlights the complexity and rarity of such coordination:

    “To speak in unison, have the same emotion in unison. And yet I didn’t have more than two, three—maximum, maybe four—takes.” —Werner Herzog (10:36)

• Memoir & Enduring Themes

  • Discusses his memoir Every Man for Himself and God Against All, especially the “unfinished business” chapter, which inspired recent work.
  • His drive: pursuing truth through storytelling that goes beyond literal facts.

• New Projects

  • Herzog mentions another finished film, Ghost Elephants, exploring the spiritual connection between humans and elephants, premiering at the Venice Film Festival. (13:14)

The Nature of “Truth” in Art & Life

• On Truth As Elusive and Essential

  • Herzog clarifies his view that no one possesses objective truth, and that striving for it is the most meaningful aspect of art and existence.

    "Well, nobody knows what truth is... It’s something deeply inherent in us. And I always have struggled with it… I do not claim that I am in possession of the truth. However, I have found ways to approximate what we think may be truth." —Werner Herzog (19:42)

• Artistic Truth vs. Literal Facts

  • Uses Michelangelo’s Pietà as an example: by depicting Mary as much younger than Christ, Michelangelo reaches a higher emotional truth (21:50)

    “Would he have shown the Virgin Mary as, let’s say, a 55 year old woman? He would have created what I call the accountant’s truth.” —Werner Herzog (22:34)

• Emotional Resonance

  • Discusses how in Japanese “rented families,” although the relationships are fake, the emotions they evoke are real. Similarly, in opera, implausible stories generate real, powerful feelings through music. (23:19, 24:37)

Modernity, Technology, and Distrust

• Living with Minimal Tech

  • Herzog admits he reluctantly acquired a cell phone only because of app-based parking barriers on set, emphasizing he keeps it switched off and resists digital distraction. (15:54)

    “...it’s always switched off. Sorry. Yeah.” —Werner Herzog (16:51)

  • Conan and Sona riff on the absurdity of app-enabled products (self-cleaning litter boxes, smart socks), lamenting technology’s intrusion into everyday life. (16:52)

• Distrusting Information

  • Herzog strongly warns about the overabundance of digital disinformation and the importance of skepticism—“You have to doubt every single mail.” (18:05)

    “Younger people… have a natural acquired suspicion about things. And they would not pick the poisonous mushroom or the poisonous berry... You just have to maintain a complete level of suspicion.” —Werner Herzog (33:31)

  • Herzog’s stance: Stay curious, seek multiple sources, and always suspect manipulation, especially in the age of AI/deepfakes.

Simplicity, Consumerism, and The Influence of Scarcity

• A Minimalist Lifestyle

  • Herzog describes his aversion to materialism—old cars, a single pair of shoes, few possessions, adapting only what’s necessary to modern life (37:28, 38:45)

• Childhood Scarcity

  • Powerfully recounts hunger from his post-WWII childhood, how it shaped his values, and the pain of seeing food wasted today. (43:51)

    “If I could cut it out of my ribs, I would cut it out of my ribs, but I can’t...” —Werner Herzog, recalling his mother (45:02)

• Critique of Consumer Culture

  • Cites population growth and rampant consumerism as chief threats to humanity and the planet, praising self-reliant cultures like the Amish and Inuit. (40:40)

Artificial Intelligence, Doppelgangers, and Legacy

• On AI and Digital Doppelgangers

  • Herzog is unperturbed by AI clones of himself, or parodists ("at least 30 doppelgangers"), but sees existential threats in AI’s potential for war and deception. (46:41, 50:24)

  • He observes AI-generated art lacks soul:

    “They look completely dead. They are stories, but they have no soul.” —Werner Herzog (50:24)

  • Sees AI as another tool, like a calculator, but insists fundamental knowledge and skepticism are essential. (51:42)

The Search for Truth: Hope & Caution

• The Never-Ending Quest

  • Concludes that the search for truth is the point—truth itself “has no past or future,” but striving for it is vital. (36:52)

    “Truth has no future, but truth has no past either. But we will not, must not, cannot give up the search for it.” —Werner Herzog (36:49)

• Dual Nature of Reality

  • Conan notes that Herzog's worldview balances optimism and darkness—"a bright one and a darker one, which I think is probably okay.” (52:34)

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On Minimalism:
  “I just need four wheels, an engine, and a steering wheel. And Flintstone had it.” —Werner Herzog (38:45)

• On Rented Families in Japan:
  “The family is fake, but the emotions are truthful and that’s a significant thing.” —Werner Herzog (23:48)

• On Technology-Dependent Modernity:
  “There’s an app on our phone for cat litter… and I now have a new rule, which is—I don’t want to buy a product that requires me to have an app… it should be a federal crime.” —Conan O’Brien (17:32)

• On Artistic License:
  “Would he have shown the Virgin Mary as, let’s say, a 55 year old woman? He would have created what I call the accountant’s truth.” —Werner Herzog (22:34)

• On the Role of Striving for Truth:
  “The search is the point. Not giving up the search.” —Werner Herzog (35:18)

• On Storytelling:
  “The beauty about storytelling, the beauty about invention… the invention somehow enters your heart and enters your dreams, but not your books of the accountant.” —Werner Herzog (31:53)

• On Suffering and Resilience:
  “Kids get over it easily. It didn’t damage me that I was hungry. It made me alert. It made me… curious. It made me looking around what is not going right here.” —Werner Herzog (45:02)

• Conan on Herzog being his GPS:
  “If I could change the directions in my car to being Verner, I would happily do that. I would happily have Verner telling me to take a left on Crenshaw.” —Conan O’Brien (47:43)

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Timestamps for Important Segments

• (10:08-13:14) Herzog discusses his new films, memoir, and creative process
• (15:13-16:51) Why Herzog lives without a cell phone (and the parking-lot incident that forced him to get one)
• (17:32-18:05) Conan and Sona on the tyranny of “smart” appliances and apps
• (19:42-22:34) Herzog’s philosophy on Truth, “accountant’s truth,” and the example of Michelangelo
• (23:19-24:37) On emotional authenticity in “rented” relationships and in opera
• (33:31-35:18) The need for suspicion and comparison to prehistoric wariness of poisonous food
• (36:49-36:52) Herzog reads the final lines from his book:
  “Truth has no future, but truth has no past either. But we will not, must not, cannot give up the search for it.”
• (40:40-45:02) Consumerism, food waste, and the lingering impact of his hungry childhood
• (46:41-51:42) Reflections on AI, digital identity, and the soullessness of AI-generated culture
• (52:34-54:54) Balancing hope and despair; the intertwining fates of humans and elephants
• (54:58-56:45) Conan and Werner joke about animals: Herzog admits his fear of spiders after a traumatic jungle encounter
• (56:59-57:47) Call-back to Herzog’s iconic pronunciation: “Here Comes Honey Boo Boo”

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Bonus: Playful Banter & Personal Anecdotes

• Childrens’ TV Voiceover Gig

  • Light-hearted segment where Conan teases Sona and Matt about voicework for Disney’s Big City Greens (03:44), which Conan declined, explaining how such gigs rarely get finished before one’s kids outgrow the show.
  • “My own self interest is my North Star… If I’m lost in the woods, I don’t bring a compass. I bring a headshot.” —Conan O’Brien (03:44)

• Dog Stories & Staff Comedy

  • Sona’s dog Okie is a fixture and source of running jokes, including a mix-up where Conan interprets “okie shit everywhere” as a staff TMI confession (65:33)
  • Running gags about Armenian weddings, lost wedding money, and bed ham (68:03)

• Conan’s Wish for a “Werner GPS”

  • Ongoing riff about Herzog’s voice giving existential driving directions (“In 500ft, you just cease to exist… calmly, calmly intimidating. Turn left now.”) (48:05)

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Summary

This episode illuminates the quirks and brilliance of Werner Herzog’s mind, his deep suspicions about digital life, and commitment to the emotional truths of storytelling. He and Conan’s mutual respect and contrasting styles (Conan’s self-deprecating goofiness, Herzog’s laconic gravity) foster an alternately hilarious and profound exploration of art, reality, minimalism, and what it means to seek (but never quite find) truth in a complicated, ever-changing world.

Not to miss: Herzog’s deadpan recounting of his tarantula trauma, the operatic breakdowns, and his philosophical “GPS” guidance—all reminders of why he remains a singular voice in film and conversation.

Transcript

[Conan O'Brien]

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[Werner Herzog]

Hi, my name is Werner Herzog.

[Conan O'Brien]

And.

[Werner Herzog]

I feel elevated, I feel weightless about being Conan o' Brien's friends.

[Conan O'Brien]

You know what? You should. That chair you're sitting in actually is attached to a scale. You lost most of your body weight as you became my friend.

[Werner Herzog]

I don't know, but let's hope so. Let's hope that I'm gonna dwindle down to £20 or something like that. Fall is here. Hear the yell back to school ring the bell Brand new shoes walking loose.

[Sona Movsesian]

Climb the fence books and pens I can tell that we are gonna be.

[Werner Herzog]

Friends.

[Sona Movsesian]

Until we are going to be friends.

[Conan O'Brien]

Well, hello there. Welcome to Conan o' Brien. Needs a friend. I gave it a little extra today. Well, hello there.

[Werner Herzog]

Yeah, you did.

[Conan O'Brien]

Sonom Obsession. Hello, Hello.

[Sona Movsesian]

Hello.

[Conan O'Brien]

Matt Gorley.

[Sona Movsesian]

Hi.

[Conan O'Brien]

Hi. We've got much to talk about today. What was it you just said before we got on mic? Talk about that? Yeah, and I said, sure, but I didn't hear what you said.

[Matt Gourley]

It was that Sona and I did.

[Conan O'Brien]

Yeah. I have to pretend to be interested in your lives. Here we go. Hold on. Hey, this is interesting. I understand that you guys went off on a similar vacation.

[Sona Movsesian]

No, not that. What we did. We did voices for a cartoon.

[Conan O'Brien]

I forgot which thing I'm supposed to be interested in.

[Sona Movsesian]

Oh, my God.

[Conan O'Brien]

Hold on. I can do this. I can do this. Give me a second. Hey, you guys had an Opportunity recently.

[Sona Movsesian]

Oh, my God.

[Conan O'Brien]

Wow, that's exciting. I want to hear all about it.

[Matt Gourley]

Are your eyeballs painted on your eyelids.

[Conan O'Brien]

And you're sleeping right now? I just drew a face on a shovel I left hours ago.

[Matt Gourley]

It's funny, because Sona and I never want to plan what we talk about. And he always wants to plan what we talk about. Then we finally give him something and he fucking forgets.

[Sona Movsesian]

Exactly.

[Conan O'Brien]

Because it involved your lives. And I can't channel the enthusiasm. No, I am. Here's what I've heard. All I know is that something was offered to me, that I turned it down. Of course, it never got to me.

[Sona Movsesian]

Yeah.

[Conan O'Brien]

And that you guys took it. So tell me about this adventure you had doing the thing that I said no to.

[Sona Movsesian]

We talked so much about what it was and what we did. And you only remember it from the angle of how it involves you. Yes, yes, yes.

[Conan O'Brien]

My own self interest is my North Star. It's my guiding light. If I'm lost in the woods, I'll just remember who I am and that will lead me home. When I hike in the woods, I don't bring a compass. I bring a selfie, a headshot, and I just take it out every now and then, and it leads me north.

[Matt Gourley]

All of this is true.

[Conan O'Brien]

Yeah, it's true. I'm lost and I don't know what to do.

[Sona Movsesian]

I can't see the sun. Which way's home? Oh, wait a minute.

[Conan O'Brien]

I've got his head shot from 1998 from NBC.

[Sona Movsesian]

Is this you talking? Yeah. Let's see here.

[Conan O'Brien]

There it is.

[Sona Movsesian]

What a handsome fella.

[Conan O'Brien]

So young, full of promise.

[Sona Movsesian]

Oh, it's leading me to the future.

[Conan O'Brien]

Tell me about this gig. It was a gig that I turned down.

[Sona Movsesian]

Oh, my God. Yeah. Well, yeah. Do you wanna tell it or.

[Matt Gourley]

Why don't you tell it?

[Sona Movsesian]

So we both got an email from a show on Disney called Big City Greens, which is an awesome animated show.

[Conan O'Brien]

It's a kid's show.

[Sona Movsesian]

It's a kid's show.

[Conan O'Brien]

And the thing is, when young kids, trust me, I did this. I went through this phase when My kids were 2, 3, 4, 5. That age. I did so many voiceovers for shows that they were really into. But what happened is, because it's animation, it takes a while and then for it to come out. And by the time it would come out, I'd go, hey, guys, I just did Gilly Galoo Patrol. And aren't you excited to be like, what are you talking about, man? They're rolling a joint. What are you talking about my son's shaving in the corner with an electric razor? What? No one watches that anymore. That was last year. So I think four times I said yes to things that by the time it came out, my kids were onto the next show. Hey, guys, I taped a Caillou seven years ago. It's finally out. It's the one where Caillou gets a wig. They found the cure for his bone cancer.

[Sona Movsesian]

Oh, my God.

[Conan O'Brien]

I'm sorry. Caillou is a fucked up kid.

[Sona Movsesian]

Oh, my God.

[Conan O'Brien]

Go check out Caillou. I don't even know Caillou either. Have you seen Caillou?

[Matt Gourley]

I don't know what it is.

[Conan O'Brien]

Has anyone here seen Caillou? Someone jump on Mike. Who's seen Caillou go, yes. Am I on mic? Yeah. Yes, I. Caillou's a French bald guy wearing a yellow shirt who looks like he's a Caillou. I'm going to say this with all kindness and not much happens on Caillou, and he seems rather meek. That's Caillou.

[Matt Gourley]

So he's just French Charlie Brown.

[Sona Movsesian]

Oh, I was going to say French Arnold.

[Conan O'Brien]

No, I think he's French kid who's got an autoimmune disorder. But the point is, Caillou is French for please fucking help me. There's no protein. There's no protein. My body can't process protein.

[Matt Gourley]

It's just part of the sense of.

[Werner Herzog]

Caillou, help me please. Caillou, help me.

[Conan O'Brien]

Caillou, help me, please. Anyway, I would do things like that, and then it would come out and my kids didn't care anymore. So it does take forever. If I had young kids, I would know. What's the show called?

[Matt Gourley]

Big City Greens.

[Conan O'Brien]

Big City Greens. I would know about this show, but because my kids are now, you know, older than I am through some trick of time. Yeah, I don't know this show well.

[Sona Movsesian]

It's. It's great. And when they did send us the email offering it to us, they were like, we originally offered this to Conan, but he couldn't do it, so now we're coming to you.

[Conan O'Brien]

I could have done it. I have plenty of time.

[Sona Movsesian]

Oh, okay.

[Matt Gourley]

Does it sweeten the case anymore that Tom Hanks has done it?

[Conan O'Brien]

Yeah, but Tom takes a lot of shit. I wouldn't do. I was offered the first Toy Story. I was offered a part of Woody, and I turned it down. This was a long time ago. And I was just like, eh, Splash. I turned down. Oh, yeah, Forrest Gump. I turned down.

[Matt Gourley]

That makes more Sense.

[Conan O'Brien]

Yeah. Tom mostly has taken. They saw me and they said. And they wrote the script.

[Sona Movsesian]

They wrote the character for you specifically.

[Conan O'Brien]

They saw me running with braces on, and I had a weird buzz cut.

[Matt Gourley]

I did those braces when I was a kid.

[Conan O'Brien]

Did you really?

[Sona Movsesian]

You did?

[Conan O'Brien]

No. Did you?

[Matt Gourley]

I didn't have braces on my teeth, though.

[Conan O'Brien]

But wait, why did you have braces on your leg?

[Matt Gourley]

I had the pigeon toes. I don't know even if that's the right term.

[Conan O'Brien]

No, they lied to you. That's not what you.

[Sona Movsesian]

Your legs as crooked as question marks. That's what they said in four.

[Matt Gourley]

My dad used to pick me up out of the crib by the bar and swing me upside down.

[Sona Movsesian]

Why?

[Conan O'Brien]

Did you. Sir? Did you have R or something? Did they not.

[Matt Gourley]

I just had.

[Conan O'Brien]

I had. You had no citrus growing up.

[Matt Gourley]

I had feet that turned inward. And now they work too well. And I walk like a duck. Like, my feet turn out too. Too much.

[Conan O'Brien]

Jesus. I didn't realize I was working in a freak show. Oh, my God. I'm sorry. Is that inconsiderate?

[Matt Gourley]

Well, coming from you, it's quite a compliment.

[Conan O'Brien]

That's nice. Sorry, I didn't realize. 6, 4, 190 pounds of muscle is a freak show. I think that's the technical term for Adonis. Let's move on.

[Sona Movsesian]

So we recorded these characters for Big City Greens. And you're right, it's not going to come out for, like, at least, I think, a year and a half.

[Conan O'Brien]

Yeah.

[Matt Gourley]

That long?

[Sona Movsesian]

Like a while.

[Conan O'Brien]

Yeah. Yeah.

[Sona Movsesian]

She said 20, 27, so we can.

[Conan O'Brien]

You're going to be sending this to your kids in law school. You're going to be. You're going to be saying, hey, I'm sending you something in. What used to be FedEx is now called Glip Glorp.

[Sona Movsesian]

Oh, you think the boys are going to law school?

[Conan O'Brien]

Well, I think they're gonna have to. No other lawyer will take it. We gotta go to law school ourselves. Right, Mikey? Right, Charlie? Who says we ain't smart? All right, here we go. I love your boys, you know that?

[Sona Movsesian]

I know.

[Conan O'Brien]

More than life itself.

[Sona Movsesian]

I'm the one who brought it up. So that's on me.

[Conan O'Brien]

My guest today is a legendary filmmaker who's made over, including Grizzly man and Fitzcarraldo. He now has a new book titled the Future of Truth. I am thrilled. I'm in awe of this gentleman, Werner Herzog. Welcome. I want to thank you for being here. And I say that this is my second take as a director. How do you respond when an actor demands multiple takes.

[Werner Herzog]

Oh, I don't care. That's movies. And actually, I do not shoot many takes, even though some of it is very, very complex. I just finished a feature film with the two Mara sisters, Kate Mara and Rooney Mara.

[Conan O'Brien]

They're fantastic. Yeah.

[Werner Herzog]

I mean, it's something you have never seen ever before. After they speak in unison, move in unison, and it is extremely high precision to speak in unison, have the same emotion in unison. And yet I didn't have more than two, three maximum, maybe four takes. Incredible.

[Matt Gourley]

Last time you were here, you were saying you were going to. You started production on this film.

[Werner Herzog]

Yeah, yeah. It has been dormant for a long, long time. And it's. It's wonderful that I finally did it. And it's also related to writing, to my writing. I wrote my memoirs, Every man for Himself and God Against All. And there's a chapter.

[Conan O'Brien]

I like those odds.

[Werner Herzog]

Towards the end of the book, there's a chapter about unfinished business. And I speak about unfinished business, a story that I carried in me that I've encountered, partially encountered myself, with two twin sisters who spoke in unison. And these sisters, they not only speak in unison, they move in unison in the choreography. They fall in love with the same man, they have the same dreams, and they make the same Freudian slip of tongue at the same moment. So the film is called, after one of these slips of tongue. Bucking faster in court.

[Conan O'Brien]

You bucking faster. I'm going to remember that. I want to use that, Eduardo. You bucking faster.

[Werner Herzog]

And the bucking faster, by the way, is Orlando Bloom, who is absolutely wonderful. And they had fallen in love with him. And after they become so insistent, he has to go to court for a restraining order. And the judge allows something that is completely unprecedented in common law in England or Ireland, where actually shot it, to have two persons testify at the same time in the same witness stand.

[Conan O'Brien]

Both sisters in the witness box, and.

[Werner Herzog]

They speak in unison and they shout across that. They get completely excited and panicky and jabbing with their fingers at the plaintiff, the Orlando Bloom. Yeah, Orlando Bloom. And they shout in unison, he's lying. Don't you hear that? He's lying. He's lying under oath. The Bucking Fasted is lying.

[Conan O'Brien]

And they both make the same slip.

[Werner Herzog]

Same slip of tongue. Yeah.

[Conan O'Brien]

When is this going to be out? Can you screen it for us right now in this booth or at least act it out?

[Werner Herzog]

Yeah, I could. I could tell you the story. Act it out.

[Conan O'Brien]

I just did part of it. It was great.

[Werner Herzog]

No, but. But it's still not finished. Yes.

[Conan O'Brien]

Yeah.

[Werner Herzog]

But I have another film that is finished. It's called Ghost Elephants. And Ghost Elephants are shot in Africa and part in the United States at the Smithsonian and in some scientific labs. And this will be shown in Venice Film Festival end of August.

[Conan O'Brien]

Incredible.

[Werner Herzog]

There's a world premiere there. And then Telluride.

[Conan O'Brien]

I just read your latest book. This is a testament to your productivity, which is off the charts. You've written a book called the Future of Truth, which is a bunch of just fascinating essays about what is the nature of truth and where are we headed and in this post strange information age that we live in. But I noticed that at the very end of the book, I'm just looking at the dust jacket as if. I didn't. I don't need to read your bio, but it said something that struck me, which is you've done over 70 documentaries and feature films.

[Werner Herzog]

It's probably more than 80 by now.

[Conan O'Brien]

Since we've been in this room. You ran out and directed seven movies while we were talking. We're in one of them. Yeah, exactly. But, okay, over 80. I'm gonna go with over 80. You should talk to your publisher. I think one of the reasons that I get nourishment from being around you is that you are such an inquisitive person. In your books and in your writings, you can't mention an obscure tribe or place on earth that you haven't been to. You'll say, and I've been there, by the way. I was there to shoot this film, or I was there to do this project. So before this is over, I'd like to have your frequent flyer miles if I could, because you're everywhere. I was fascinated to learn that you don't engage in social media. You don't have a cell phone. And I think you lead a richer life than most people I've encountered. If not everybody.

[Werner Herzog]

Well, it's hard to compare. Each one of us has the privilege of living. To live your life. To live your life. To live your life. We are here only once, so we better do something decent. Do something meaningful. Whatever it is at the end of the day, doesn't really matter. But I have lived with great intensity, with great. How shall I say, Also great dangers, great challenges. And it has been wonderful so far. I can't complain.

[Conan O'Brien]

I don't know how you survive without a cell phone in the modern era.

[Werner Herzog]

Easily. Easily. I enjoy it. I do read. But in fact, I had to get myself a cell phone. Technically, I have one now, because what Happened in Dublin. I was filming at the train station, parked my car at the adjacent train station building, and I couldn't get out of it because it would open only with an application on a cell phone. Yes. You could not pay cash. You could not pay with a credit card. You had to download an app of this parking lot. And then because it would register your license plate, the place where you parked in the duration of your time in parking. So I couldn't get out of it and I was stuck. And for things like that, I do have a cell phone. I will tell you something, but it's always switched off. Sorry. Yeah.

[Conan O'Brien]

No, no. There's a sign of our modern times is we have in my home two young kittens. My wife and I went out and we had heard that, oh, you can get a cat litter box that is self cleaning. So we got it and we unpack it and we. It got very good reviews. We put it in the room with our two kittens and it said to operate this, you need an app on your phone that you need to download. So there's an app on our phone for cat litter. A cat litter box. And it tells us when the cats went to the bathroom, which of the two cats went? Because it knows the two of them separately by their, I guess, weight differential. What they did in there.

[Sona Movsesian]

What?

[Conan O'Brien]

Yes. What they ate. Yeah, what they ate. It analyzes the feces. It tells you what they ate, and then I think it sends the feces. He's back in time. It's insane. And I now have a new rule, which is I will not. I don't want to buy a product that requires me to have an app. I think that's a crime. I think it should be a federal crime to demand that. Oh, I just. This is really nice. I bought these socks. You need to download the app. It tells you if it's on the right foot or the left foot. It tells you what your temperature of your body is. It gives you alerts about how the sock is feeling. It's insane.

[Werner Herzog]

And too much disinformation comes in through it. And people get addicted and they cannot take their eyes off and keep scrolling, scrolling. And of course, everything, everything that comes in via your cell phone or your laptop, emails or whatever, you have to distrust. You have to doubt every single mail asking you for, let's say, your information. Yeah, your information for making a money transfer is probably something fraudulent going on. Every male that you receive, or let's say young girls receive males. From a young, handsome young man, maybe behind it is A predator who is 60 pretending to be a 70 year old.

[Conan O'Brien]

You're looking at me. I didn't. That was an innocent. That was an innocent thing I was doing. Well, this gets us to this book which I very much enjoyed, is called the Future of Truth. Again, I don't know how you're able to make over 80 documentaries films, constantly travel the globe and generate. I think you've generated two books since this new book, which will be coming out soon. But you're talking about truth. What is truth? What are we talking about when we talk about truth and how unattainable it is? And at the same time you make the point that it's the absolute truth of any issue is impossible to determine, but we must strive for it. The striving is the important part.

[Werner Herzog]

Well, nobody knows what truth is. We do not know. And there was a survey among philosophers, 2000 or so of them, and scientists, mathematicians, and trying to get a definition of truth. Nobody could come up with it says no way. There are different schools of thinking, schools that link truth very much with reality and facts. But the question immediately would arise, what is reality? Am I real? Am I just a rumor sitting here? Am I an imposter to try to persuade you it's me. However, it's somehow innate, it's inborn in us that some sort of search for truth that makes us distinct from the, from the cows in the field and in all my work, whoever is an artist, a filmmaker, is always confronted with a question of truth. It's something very, very deeply inherent in us. And I always have struggled with it, always have tried to define it and find a deeper stratum of truth in filmmaking, in writing. And it makes it meaningful, what I do. And yet I do not claim that I am in possession of the truth. However, I have found ways to approximate what we think may be truth. That's something deeply known in us. Because I'm sometimes changing facts. I modify facts, but not for the sake of misleading you or cheating you. I do it for the sake of arriving at a deeper stratum of truth. And I can simply explain it with Michelangelo, who built, who did the sculpture of the Pieta in St. Peter's the Virgin Mary with her son taken from the cross in her lap. When you look at the son, he's a 33 year old man, tormented, and the mother is only 15 or maybe 17. So my question now comes, did Michelangelo try to cheat us or give us fake news? Of course he didn't. He wanted to, by modifying facts, got us into A deeper insight into the very nature of Jesus Christ, the man of Sorrows, and into his mother, the Virgin. So that's the way I think that.

[Conan O'Brien]

He could have depicted Mary being 20, 30, 40 years older in that moment.

[Werner Herzog]

Sure. Yes.

[Conan O'Brien]

And that might have lined up more with chronologically what's happening in that moment, but it would have not arrived, it would not have had the emotional impact, which is truthful, had he not altered their ages.

[Werner Herzog]

Yeah, sure. And of course, would he have shown the Virgin Mary as, let's say, a 55 year old woman? He would have created what I call the accountant's truth. There's such a thing like fact based accountant's truth, which is a term that again, is not completely applicable to these things. But I do believe that he showed us something very, very deep in the emotional context. It's always something that is among all the crazy facts and implausible things. Emotions are always strange enough, are always truthful.

[Conan O'Brien]

Yeah.

[Werner Herzog]

And I describe a case. I made a film called Family Romance llc. In Japan, there's this company that an agency that rents out, rents out friends or family members.

[Conan O'Brien]

I am familiar with this because I've done it, I know I've done it. In Japan you can rent. It's to deal with the problem of loneliness. And you talk about this in the book. You can rent a family.

[Werner Herzog]

Exactly. And the family is fake, but the emotions are truthful and that's a significant thing. Or for example, you have an opera, which I describe in the book, and opera stories, sometimes completely incredible and strange and wild and. And completely exaggerated out of context of any credibility and plausibility. And yet with the power of music, the emotions of the audience, the emotions that we feel are completely truthful.

[Conan O'Brien]

Sona, you and I share many things in common, but one is that we love mysteries, we love true crime. And frankly, I love me some murder.

[Sona Movsesian]

Yeah, I love any crime, really. I love fraud. I love.

[Conan O'Brien]

You do love fraud. You love to commit fraud. You've committed fraud on me many times.

[Sona Movsesian]

That's true.

[Conan O'Brien]

I have to say, when it comes to true crime podcasts, there's one that really delivers. It's called Crime Junkie. And I don't even have to say it's called Crime Junkie. Everyone knows it's Crime Junkie.

[Sona Movsesian]

Yeah.

[Conan O'Brien]

Every week, the queen of true crime, Ashley Flowers, who I love talking to, by the way.

[Sona Movsesian]

Yeah.

[Conan O'Brien]

She dives into a new case, some well known, others you've never heard of, and she tells it with the kind of storytelling that makes you feel like you're Right there with her. Which is terrifying because she's often talking about things where you don't wanna be right there with her.

[Sona Movsesian]

It's true.

[Conan O'Brien]

Yeah. I feel like I'm with you committing this murder, Ashley. But no, it's really great. There are hundreds of episodes of Crime Junkie already waiting for you. New cases covered every Monday. So listen to Crime Junkie wherever you listen to podcasts. Yes. Sona, do you remember when you redid Blay's apartment?

[Sona Movsesian]

Yes.

[Conan O'Brien]

Using Ashley.

[Sona Movsesian]

Yeah.

[Conan O'Brien]

You have some ideas for the office now?

[Sona Movsesian]

Yeah. My first idea was to change your office.

[Conan O'Brien]

Oh.

[Sona Movsesian]

No offense, I don't think it's necessary. So I was thinking cuz my boys visit like a couple times a year. A few times.

[Conan O'Brien]

I love it when. When your guys come over here.

[Sona Movsesian]

Yeah. So I thought we would change your office to like a kids room.

[Conan O'Brien]

Oh.

[Sona Movsesian]

So I guess I have some ideas. I thought I would put in this Pipertin twin tent. Complete bed in the house.

[Conan O'Brien]

Oh, that looks. Actually I would have loved that as a kid.

[Sona Movsesian]

Yeah.

[Conan O'Brien]

So my office. No longer my office. It's more or less a kid's room.

[Sona Movsesian]

Charlie and Mikey's room for Charlie and M. So. And then. But we'll keep your desk in the corner. It's fine.

[Conan O'Brien]

Thank you.

[Sona Movsesian]

And then the next thing I thought was unnecessary was your edit bay.

[Conan O'Brien]

Yeah.

[Sona Movsesian]

Where you edit your.

[Conan O'Brien]

Where we do all the editing for the travel shows.

[Sona Movsesian]

Yeah. Like, is it that necessary? So I thought it would change it into like a meditation yoga room. So we're putting in this TV stand there so that people can just kind of hang out.

[Conan O'Brien]

Because when you do meditation, you want to make sure that the Summer I Turn Pretty is on in the background.

[Sona Movsesian]

Yay. Yeah. Guided meditation. It's very meditative. A cute little couch.

[Conan O'Brien]

Watching television is Sona's form of guided meditation. The stuff is really nice that you've picked out. Ashley has styles that balance timeless appeal and modern trends. They do a very nice job of walking that line.

[Sona Movsesian]

They do.

[Conan O'Brien]

Plus, Ashley provides fast, reliable white glove delivery right to your door. I don't think I've ever had white glove delivery.

[Sona Movsesian]

That's nice.

[Conan O'Brien]

Well, visit your local Ashley store or head to Ashley.com to find your style. This podcast is supported by FX's English Teacher. You love the show, don't you, Sona?

[Sona Movsesian]

I love this show.

[Conan O'Brien]

I haven't checked it out yet, but I hear it's great.

[Sona Movsesian]

It's great.

[Conan O'Brien]

Last year's critically acclaimed series returns to follow Evan, Gwen and Markie as they vie for their students divided Attention. See why Cosmopolitan calls its premiere season a Masterclass of comedy. FX's English teacher. All new Thursdays on FX. All episodes now streaming on Hulu. In the book, you break down the plot of an opera. It's the most insanely implausible. I mean, just breaking down the storylines and how people are posing as other people and fleeing, but then bumping into each other in a cave a thousand miles away, but then marrying each other accidentally, but then having kids who then. I mean, it just. It goes and goes and goes. But you're right. When the music is added and there's a power. I mean, how many times have we broken down the lyrics to a rock and roll song that we love, a rock and roll anthem? And you just look at the lyrics and you think, well, this is ridiculous. But if the band is playing it and you're hearing that recording, you think, this is an elemental truth in our lives. You know that? And we should have sugar poured on us. And we should all have sugar poured on us. That's a rare occasion where I actually read the text, and I think the text holds up, too.

[Werner Herzog]

You see, Colonel Nizzi, opera is a transformation of an entire world into music, and then you achieve it. And as you mentioned, I mean the story, and I'm describing La forza del destino, the force of destiny. It starts with a young lover who is actually an Inca prince entering at night through the window of his beloved. And the father is an aristocrat, has just left and hears some commotion or some noise, returns, corners the intruder who wants to. Who has drawn his pistol because he thinks he's attacked, but he recognizes the father, throws his pistol away to show that he has no bad intention. The pistol hits the ground, discharges and hits the father through the heart and kills him. So that's only the beginning.

[Conan O'Brien]

That's the first action of the play.

[Werner Herzog]

It's just the first.

[Conan O'Brien]

And it's the most reasonable thing that happens in the opera. It just goes and goes and goes.

[Werner Herzog]

Yes, it gets wilder and wilder. And yet. And yet there's a beauty about it. The beauty of the joy of. By the way, the joy of stories, the joy of storytelling. When I modify things, of course, I would let the audience know either the story is so implausible, it cannot. I did a film in Kuwait when everything was set on fire. Before the first Kuwait War, all the oil wells were on fire. And the commentary at the beginning explains that this was shot on a planet in our solar system, meaning we as an audience know it cannot have been shot On Pluto or on Mars or Jupiter. It must have been filmed here. But the world that you see is not recognizable anymore. 60 minutes of images where you cannot recognize our planet anymore. It's not embellishing. It's in a way modifying things in order to enter into a deeper truth, into some sort that elevates.

[Conan O'Brien]

What I took away from the book was we all do this. It's in us. There's something called an Irish fact, which is when the Irish get going on a story, they use Irish facts which are not. No, this is not factually correct. But when a person such as myself, who's 100% genetically Irish and steeped in whatever that is good and bad, is when I'm telling a story, the worst thing that you can do is step in and go, well, no, Conan, stop. Hold on. No, no, no. You spent $18. You said 17. It was 18. And this is going out to you. My beloved wife, Liza, she will hold me to account on some of the facts sometimes. And I'll look at like the facts don't matter in this story. I know that I'm switching things out left and right, but it's a really good story and it is getting to some moment that feels like it's the truth to me.

[Werner Herzog]

More truthful than the sheer facts. Yes, that's the beauty about it. That's the beauty about storytelling, the beauty about invention, the beauty about the invention somehow enters, Enters your heart and enters your dreams, but not your books of the accountant.

[Conan O'Brien]

Yeah, well, I think that's what you're talking about throughout the book is that emotions get us to a truth sometimes that facts cannot deliver. And we live in this world right now where people are constantly contesting, this is a fact. No, that's fake news. What's real? What's not real? We have deepfakes, we have AI. We're constantly debating whose reality are we going to use, which is the real reality. But I do think there are moments where everyone can look at something and the emotion they feel about it delivers the real truth.

[Werner Herzog]

Yeah, but you have to be careful about it, because when you look, for example, at Germany in the late 20s, early 30s, and when Hitler came to power, it was his emotional impact. So you have to be very, very.

[Conan O'Brien]

No, it's not unfail, but it's just.

[Werner Herzog]

Be suspicious, remain suspicious. And you see, I see today 10 year olds who very casually tell me, oh, don't open this here, that's an attempt at fishing or what they call it, and look at it. Yes. And they say, yeah, look at this here and look at that here. Just put it into junk. And they deal with it with great ease.

[Conan O'Brien]

They've grown up with it.

[Werner Herzog]

Younger people, even the generation of, let's say the 20, 30 year old who also grew up with it, don't have this kind of ease and nonchalance about separating things and being suspicious. It's a little bit like with prehistoric men when they were out roaming around and hunting and gathering. They would gather berries and they would gather mushrooms. But I'm sure they were suspicious about things and they would not pick the poisonous mushroom or the poisonous berry. They had a natural acquired suspicion about things. And it was so natural that we can certainly assume that they did not hate nature. They didn't hate nature. They just knew how to navigate. And it's the same thing. You don't have to hate the Internet and the cell phone and whatever is at you in this new media. You just have to maintain a complete level of suspicion. Truth is not like a point somewhere far out in the distance, like a light, something translucent, something which is far out there, which you can never reach. It's more a process of searching for it, approximating and having doubts, going wrong routes and then recalibrating your way. That's what I have done all my life. And knowing that I will never get at the very, very truth. It doesn't matter. It doesn't matter. The search itself.

[Conan O'Brien]

The search is the point.

[Werner Herzog]

The search is the point. Not giving up the search. And could I have the book, because I. The very last chapter.

[Conan O'Brien]

I wish this was your book, but you know what? It's not. The publisher sent a.

[Werner Herzog]

But I have it.

[Conan O'Brien]

You have it. Good. They sent us. I have your copy at home, your paperback. But to have a hardback here on the table, they sent us. I think there's a. This is pornography they sent us. Very good, by the way. Fantastic. There's a picture of Fabio here.

[Werner Herzog]

That is the book, yeah.

[Conan O'Brien]

Oh, this is the. The book.

[Werner Herzog]

The COVID The COVID is correct, but you see the.

[Conan O'Brien]

What did they put here? This is the great degeneration. How institutions decay and economies die.

[Werner Herzog]

Don't. Don't worry about these things. Let them decay. But you see, I just recorded it in a studio and it will be out as an audiobook at the same time with the printed version. And it has a last chapter. The Future of Truth in the future. The chapters are 10 pages, 15 pages or whatever. The very last chapter is only two lines long. The Future of Truth. And it reads, truth has no future, but truth has no past either. But we will not, must not, cannot give up the search for it. End of the book.

[Conan O'Brien]

Yeah. No, it's. The striving is probably what it's ultimately all about. It's interesting because I'm thinking about the way you live your life. We talked earlier about how it must help you that you've kept things simple. You avoid the distractions of social media and a cell phone. You also avoid a lot of the distractions of materialism. True, yeah, you've had great success. But you, unlike many famous directors, you're driving a car that you've owned for maybe 12 years.

[Werner Herzog]

The last one 17 or 18 years.

[Conan O'Brien]

17 or 18 years, yeah. Okay. What kind of car is it?

[Werner Herzog]

A simple Ford Explorer, but the most primitive.

[Conan O'Brien]

I love. That's a great. This is why Ford Explorer is not asking you to do commercials. Ford Explorer. And then you shrug, like, what are you gonna do?

[Werner Herzog]

Yeah, no. Okay. Let's take the name out of it. Let's.

[Conan O'Brien]

No, that's okay. That's okay. It's a simple no, no.

[Werner Herzog]

But I asked for the one with the least amount of digital things in it.

[Conan O'Brien]

Yeah, good.

[Werner Herzog]

No, no sort of phone calls that come in. Google, whatever maps and routing you. And so. And I asked, do you still have a car where I can hand crank my windows? And I said, no, since 12 years, nobody produces it anymore. Then I asked, do you have a car if my electric system somehow fails me, that I can hand crank the windshield wiper in a thunderstorm. And they just laugh, but they got the point. So I just need four wheels, an engine in the steering wheel, and Flintstone had it.

[Conan O'Brien]

Right, so you also. I don't think you own a lot of clothing or shoes. Right. Do you have how many pairs of shoes?

[Werner Herzog]

Basically one pair. But I do have sandals.

[Conan O'Brien]

Someone's hit the big time. Take it easy. You sound like Jesus Christ. I also have sandals. Oh, Jesus. Hitting the big time.

[Werner Herzog]

But, Conan, you will understand, as you have been in the Austrian mountains not long ago, I do have strong, heavy boots for being in rocky terrain. So it's not just one pair of shoes, but basically.

[Conan O'Brien]

But you keep things very simple.

[Werner Herzog]

Yeah, sure. I don't need.

[Conan O'Brien]

Do you have a lot of suits and things like that, or.

[Werner Herzog]

No, no, the jacket, I put it on for you today.

[Conan O'Brien]

This is the jacket that you own? What are you, Johnny Appleseed? Incredible.

[Werner Herzog]

No, I actually own a jacket that's very Bavarian in style and I actually own a suit, but for very formal sort of events where I would dress up to the occasion.

[Conan O'Brien]

I do understand. I didn't used to understand this, but. But you know, when Maria Kondo's books came out and she started talking about you need to clean out your closet, you need to these things weigh on you, that resonated with me that when I have a lot of stuff, it has a psychic weight, which doesn't really make sense, but it feels like it does. And it doesn't mean I'm gonna have less.

[Sona Movsesian]

Oh, oh, God, no. You're learning from it. Oh, no, you're not adjusting.

[Conan O'Brien]

I have 15 homes I've never been to 12 of, but I won't let anyone else stay in them because they're mine. No, but I do understand the principle of it.

[Werner Herzog]

Well. The principle is the observation that we are ruining our environment because of two major reasons, underlying reasons. Number one, we are too many for this planet. We are using 8 or 9 billion, 9,000 million human beings. And the resources of our planet are not sufficient. So we are overdrafting our account here on this planet. And the second thing is consumerism. There are a great amount of human beings on this planet and growing into consumerism. And you see it with emerging countries, they are wildly into consumerism. And that's why I love, for example, the Amish. The Amish who do not want to have electricity, do not want to drive cars, they have horse buggies, they do not have telephones, television or anything like that. And let's say if there's a cataclysmic catastrophe, they are the first survivors because their homestead farmers and they can provide what they need. And Inuit, by the way, would also hunter gatherers would have a real survival if it comes to a cataclysmic catastrophe, which is not too far fetched to think about it. So just in order to understand what's going on, throwing things away is not the right thing. It doesn't feel right. And it doesn't feel right, Conan, because I grew up as a child of the Second World War. I was born in the middle of Second World War. I know what hunger is. I was hungry two and a half years of. And that's my strongest memory, being really hungry. And it pains me. It pains me to see how people are throwing 40% of the food away into the trash. It's not that I want to be ideological or being the prophet of anything. It just pains me, pains me. And it's not right that we are into this amount of consumerism. And it would be very easy to reduce the amount of things that you are throwing away by simply managing Your fridge better. I overlook sometimes something, and, oh, my God, it's gone, and it's moldy, and I throw it away. But it doesn't happen very often. And it's simply because my experience in life was different than your experience in life. Most of the people that I encounter here. Not that you have to adopt my ways of life, but it's healthy to look a little bit about how we are in a culture of consumerism.

[Conan O'Brien]

It has to be a profound influence on you, the way that you were born into that cataclysmic event and then experienced hunger, which is the most primal, really, deprivation you can feel. And I know. I know. I. As one of six kids in a family, I didn't know hunger, but I knew the fear of my brother's taking my food. And so you'll attest to this, Sona. I eat like somebody in a prison yard. I have my arms around my food, and I'm here, you know, living in Los Angeles with, you know, everything at my disposal. And I still eat my food very quickly, and my eyes dart around because I think Neil's gonna get it if I'm not careful. And so these things stick with you.

[Werner Herzog]

Yeah. But what sticks more to me is not that I was hungry. Yeah. It's remembering my mother who could not feed us three boys. And she doesn't have enough food to satisfy the most basic needs.

[Conan O'Brien]

So in a way, you're remembering her pain at not being able to perform.

[Werner Herzog]

Kids get over it easily. It didn't damage me that I was hungry. It made me alert. It made me. Me curious. It made me looking around what is not going right here. My mother, when we were tugging at her skirt and we were kind of wailing, and we are hungry and give us something to eat. And she. I remember that moment. She spins around, completely collected and calm. She says to us, shut up, children. Shut up, boys. If I could cut it out of my ribs, I would cut it out of my ribs, but I can't. And she goes on working in whatever she was doing. And that sticks to me to this.

[Conan O'Brien]

Earn in the air.

[Werner Herzog]

Yeah, of course it does. Yeah.

[Conan O'Brien]

Oh, my God.

[Werner Herzog]

So that's much worse for the parents, for the mother. It's much worse to being incapable of feeding the children than it's for the children themselves. We can take a lot.

[Conan O'Brien]

Yeah. I'm thinking about. You know, your book brings up all these questions, and there's so much to talk about with, obviously, with AI and Deepfakes and how talking about the search for truth, but everything can be manipulated now. And it's only going to. We're just at the beginning. So I'm curious. Are you okay, Werner, with your distinctive voice, your image, living on beyond you? And I mean, it must have. First of all, I'm sure it exists. I'm sure there's. There are Verner. AI generated.

[Werner Herzog]

Yeah. And even before AI, I had at least 30 doppelgangers. And they speak with my voice, they adopt my accent. I mean, fine, let's accept my accent as it is. But they give you advice for difficult situations in your life. They read books to you, they tell you jokes, they do whatever. And I thought, yes, experience of self has changed. And of course, with the Internet in particular, and doppelgangers and fakes of you are rampant out there, and I'm sure there are fake Conans out there.

[Conan O'Brien]

No one wants to do that. Yeah. There's been no takers. They want. They want other Verners. No one wants another Conan.

[Sona Movsesian]

You're making them, and everyone's making them.

[Werner Herzog]

I'm trying to.

[Conan O'Brien]

To sell them, give them away for free.

[Werner Herzog]

No, I can live with it easily. Let. Let them do the battle out there and let them do the dirty fight out. I mean, the doppelgangers.

[Conan O'Brien]

But I'm thinking right now, if I. If I could change the directions in my car to being Verner, I would happily do that. I would. I would happily have Verner telling me to take a left on Crenshaw. You know, I. That would fill me with delight. And. And, you know, if it enabled you to buy another pair of shoes, then everyone wins.

[Werner Herzog]

I should be actually the voice of these systems. They tell you, in 500ft from now, turn left.

[Matt Gourley]

Or get more philosophical, in 500ft, you.

[Werner Herzog]

Just cease to exist. Calmly. Calmly intimidating. Turn left now. Something like that, yeah.

[Conan O'Brien]

Or else you have arrived, or have you. Do any of us really arrive? But we always have a philosophical question.

[Matt Gourley]

We must drive to arrive.

[Conan O'Brien]

Yeah. It's the journey that's important.

[Werner Herzog]

No, it would be great joy if I would pop up with the voice to give you guidance for turning right or left or going for the next 12 miles straight. So no self. The experience of self is a massive change. And of course, AI, I do not want to put it down completely because it has glorious, magnificent possibilities in science, in pharmaceuticals, in transportation, you just name it. But at the same time, it has already en route to take over warfare, directing drones, and I mean, huge swarms of them. And it will be overwhelming the face of warfare of the future. And of course, cheating, pretending Propagandizing. All these things are like a nemesis. It's out there and we have to be. We have to be alert to it. And again, I say when you are curious and when you access different sources very quickly, you might find out this is even invented. I've seen movies, short films, completely created by artificial intelligence, story and acting and everything, and they look completely dead. They are stories, but they have no soul.

[Conan O'Brien]

They don't have the spark.

[Werner Herzog]

It's not only a spark. It's. They are empty and soulless. And, you know, it's the most common, lowest denominator of what is filling billions and billions of informations on the Internet. The common denominator. And nothing beyond this common denominator can be found in these fabrications. And you will immediately identify it. You will find it very quickly. And I have no problem that people are using it like school kids using it as a tool. The same way we used dictionaries or encyclopedias in my time. Or we would use a calculator for calculating multiplication or the square root of something. Fine. But you should understand, what does it mean, a square root of something? What is a mathematical concept behind it? What is a mathematical concept of logarithmic curves and things like that? You have to know that. If you know that, use the calculator. That's fine.

[Conan O'Brien]

It's interesting because when I listen to you, when I speak with you, when I read your work, when I see your films, there's a pattern where things can get quite grim. But then you'll say something that makes me very optimistic. I find that it's a bit of a. It's a wave, you know, which it should be. Cause you can always see both. But I find myself, even in this course of this chat, we've had at times feeling like you're telling me we're all in great danger and it's over, but also feeling optimistic at times that if we strive and if we try to see things as they are, or we make multiple attempts to find a real truth, we'll get there somehow. So I always end up with two ends to the story when I talk to you. A bright one and a darker one, which I think is probably okay.

[Werner Herzog]

Sure, yes. And I love storytelling and I. I love what I do. And of course, when I listen to you. Yes, you're right. And it continues until this very day. I just made a film called Ghost Elephants, a documentary in Namibia and Angola. And what is interesting is that tribal people in the southern part of Africa, Kalahari Sun Bushmen tribesmen, they link the fate of humans to the, the fate of elephants. If these elephants disappear, human beings also will disappear because they are mutually, somehow incorporated in each other's. The soul of elephants lives in you and lives in case of these tribal people, lives in our tribal communities. And it's beautiful to see that. And, and it sounds a little bit as if it were a documentary on wildlife, but you see elephants only for 20 seconds in the film, otherwise you see ghosts, you see the spirits of elephants. And how do you show the spirit of an elephant? And that's a big question. And they show the glory and magnificence of elephants. And at the same time, as you have suggested. Yes. There's this glorious side and the dark side. If we exterminate them, it will probably lead to our own self destruction. And yet of course we don't do it completely. We try to protect them, preserve them, study them, keep them alive.

[Conan O'Brien]

Yeah, that's a great way to look at environmentalism, is do it for ourselves. Not to be noble, but these creatures need to endure so that we can endure.

[Werner Herzog]

Sure. And it's more than just enduring and thrive today as we are around it about and still thriving. I do not want to live in a world without lions, period. I just want to see them around or without elephants.

[Conan O'Brien]

Is there an animal you hate that you're fine if we get rid of it?

[Werner Herzog]

Well, yeah, I'm worried about spiders.

[Conan O'Brien]

I just wanted you to admit. So it's okay to kill this if you're a little listening. Kill a spider?

[Werner Herzog]

Yes, and a spider, a tarantula that didn't sting me or bite me. Almost killed me once. I was in the jungle in the Peruvian.

[Conan O'Brien]

But not a bite. It had a gun.

[Werner Herzog]

No, no, no. We were desperately trying to get a flight, a single engine flight, amphibious flight, far out into a small tributary of the Amazon. And there was one woken up every night. Ah, the plane is there. So it wasn't there. So I went back to sleep. Suddenly at four in the morning, wake up, wake up, get out, get up, the plane is there. So I put on some clothes, put one shoe on the other and there's a sock still in there. And I grab into the shoe and pull it out and it's a tarantula, I mean almost hairy, as big as my fist. And I, and I dropped the tarantula and my heart stopped beating. It literally stopped beating. And I knew it. And I thought to myself, dying from a heart attack is ridiculous. Not because of a tarantula that has not even bitten you, has not Even sitting there and I was looking at the tarantula and tried to listen at my heartbeat, which wasn't there anymore. And then after 20 seconds or 30 seconds, all of a sudden, I was back to life. So I don't like spiders.

[Conan O'Brien]

Do you have an edit of our. My favorite quote of yours from one of the previous podcasts? Was you talking about your favorite or a reality show that intrigued you? And it's. It's burned into my brain, and I hope to burn it into everyone else's. Give it a roll, Eduardo.

[Werner Herzog]

Here comes Honey Boo Boo.

[Conan O'Brien]

That just makes me happy. You enunciating Boo Boo gives me so much joy. Do you still watch Here Comes Honey Boo Boo or have you moved on to Love island now?

[Werner Herzog]

I'm still searching around Honey Boo Boo. Of course. You made something beautiful out of it. I had no idea that it would have such repercussions in your spiritual life.

[Conan O'Brien]

Oh, it's huge. The only reason I get out of bed in the morning is I think. And when I'm down, I think of you saying Honey Boo Boo, and it makes me very happy.

[Werner Herzog]

I had no idea that it was that funny, but I accept it in the Today I enjoy myself because you made it into such a wild thing.

[Conan O'Brien]

Well, a joy to talk to you always, Werner, and I'm in awe of your spirit and your tenacity and your curiosity. These are all great qualities, and we can all. I should get a bracelet. What would Verner do? Because I think you have a terrific outlook on life, and I'd like to be a little more like Werner Herzog. So, Werner, until we meet again. Thank you so much for being here and for honoring us with your presence and your insights.

[Werner Herzog]

I enjoy to be with you on this table. Thanks a lot.

[Conan O'Brien]

Yeah, yeah. And yes, look for. If you want to request that Werner Herzog become directional vocals on your.

[Matt Gourley]

You can actually do that on the Waze. Speaking of app. On the Waze app, you can plug in a few little things. So probably there were enough sound bites from this recording.

[Conan O'Brien]

Turn left.

[Matt Gourley]

And I'm worried about spiders.

[Conan O'Brien]

So look for that soon. All right. Thank you, Werner.

[Werner Herzog]

Thanks.

[Conan O'Brien]

Running a business on a clunky old phone system. Well, I don't know what it's like. Hey, I know what it's like. It's like competing with one hand tied behind your back. That's what it's like. I've had my hand tied behind my back, and I didn't like it. Every time you miss a call, that's money left on the table. Quo works through an app on your phone or computer so you can run your business from anywhere. Quo makes your phone system smarter, logging calls, creating summaries and automating next steps. And yes, their built in voice agent is named Sona. It's not you, Sona.

[Sona Movsesian]

Oh my God. Is it really?

[Conan O'Brien]

No, it's called Sona but it's not.

[Sona Movsesian]

You because oh, that's not me.

[Conan O'Brien]

Then they'd have to pay you a lot of money. But now they don't have to. That makes me laugh. Sona. I'm glad that it's not you because this Sona answers calls, qualifies leads and connects customers even after hours. This is a good Sona. Two Sonas, both indispensable, just a different Sona.

[Sona Movsesian]

I don't know if it's better get started free.

[Conan O'Brien]

Plus get 20% off your first six months at quo.comconan that's Q-U-O.comconan and if you have existing numbers with another service, Quo will port them over at no extra charge. Quo. No missed calls, no missed customers. One of the hardest things about B2B marketing is reaching the right audience. You know what B2B is, don't you?

[Sona Movsesian]

Business to business?

[Conan O'Brien]

You bet it is. It's not some little robot in a Star wars movie. LinkedIn has grown to a network of over 1 billion professionals. And that's where it stands. Apart from the other ad buys. I say this all the time. I hope people are listening. You can target your buyers by job title industry, company role, seniority, skills, company revenue, all the professionals you need to reach in one space. Why be talking to the wrong person?

[Sona Movsesian]

I know. What's the point?

[Conan O'Brien]

That's like like going to a delicatessen and asking for I want a monkey wrench. Yeah, you go to a hardware store for that. I think that's a really good example I just made up.

[Sona Movsesian]

That's a really good one.

[Conan O'Brien]

Stop wasting budget on the wrong audience and start targeting the right professionals. Only on LinkedIn ads. LinkedIn will even give you an extra $250 credit on your next campaign so you can try it yourself. Isn't that cool?

[Sona Movsesian]

Yeah, why not try it?

[Conan O'Brien]

Yeah, play around with 250 bucks. See what you can do. Just go to LinkedIn.com TeamCoco that's LinkedIn.com TeamCoco Terms and conditions apply only on LinkedIn ads. Well, I'd like to discuss not the elephant in the room, but Sona's dog in the room. Okay, Sona, this is a first. I sat down at the Mic, like any professional, ready to go. When in my peripheral vision, I look to my right and I see that Okie, your dog is with you. Okie has been a fixture for a long time. When did you get Okie Special Girl?

[Sona Movsesian]

Well, we were just talking about this. We got her in September 2018, and this podcast premiered November 2018.

[Conan O'Brien]

So Oaky is pretty much the same. Exact same age as the podcast.

[Sona Movsesian]

Yes.

[Matt Gourley]

And the same amount of downloads.

[Sona Movsesian]

Do you guys ever think about what you. Your animals sound like?

[Conan O'Brien]

Yeah, mine are like, oh, oh.

[Matt Gourley]

Mine is feed me. Feed me all day long. Feed me, feed me.

[Sona Movsesian]

I brought. Oh. I. I'm worried she's a little depressed lately because she's been under our bed a lot. She used to, like, roam around, but I think she's just not used to the change of scenery. So she's just been in. Under the bed.

[Conan O'Brien]

Under the bed. There might be, like, half a ham back there.

[Sona Movsesian]

Oh, no, the half ham. We left it there. I forgot. No, she's just. I don't know. I just brought her now.

[Conan O'Brien]

Okie. Let's talk about Okie. Of course, famously, you brought Okie to a restaurant once when you were gonna meet me because you thought, well, I'm eating with Conan. They don't allow dogs at the restaurant. But I'll bring Okie because who's gonna say boo to Conan o'? Brien? So you used. Did you use me?

[Sona Movsesian]

Me? Yes, I did use you. I did. Who is gonna say? I mean, look, it's. It wasn't. It was outdoors. You're making me sound really shitty right now.

[Conan O'Brien]

You used to do this when you would drive me places. You would go, like, 110 miles an hour in a residential zone. And your whole attitude was, what are they gonna do if they pull me over? I'm sitting here with. With the golden child ever.

[Sona Movsesian]

We. We. You know, we don't have to talk about this, but you've been pulled over, and they haven't given you a ticket.

[Conan O'Brien]

You know what they do?

[Sona Movsesian]

What?

[Conan O'Brien]

They pull me over and they say, sir, do you realize.

[Werner Herzog]

Holy.

[Conan O'Brien]

Are you. And I go, well, yes, Officer. I. I just. So much work.

[Werner Herzog]

So prolific.

[Conan O'Brien]

September 13, 1993, up until the present day, every medium you try, a total home run. Officer, please, Officer, do you need a change of pace? I, too. And then they always let me wear their cap.

[Sona Movsesian]

They give me candy and shoot their gun, probably.

[Conan O'Brien]

They let me shoot their gum. They let me shoot their gun. Yeah, it's amazing.

[Sona Movsesian]

Yeah, but you make me sound bad. It was outdoors. We were meeting Outdoors at a restaurant. They probably. There weren't any other dogs there. But I don't think I explicitly asked.

[Conan O'Brien]

Explicitly said no dogs. You walked in holding your dog, sat down opposite me. A woman at the next table went into anaphylactic shock. Cause she was allergic to dogs. She is no longer with us.

[Sona Movsesian]

She died.

[Conan O'Brien]

Yeah. Did she?

[Sona Movsesian]

Oh. But Okie got to sit with her.

[Conan O'Brien]

I said we should use a penknife and make a small opening in her trachea so she can breathe. And you said, on it, chief. And stabbed her to death in the throat.

[Matt Gourley]

I heard about this.

[Conan O'Brien]

Yeah. It was all over the papers. The papers.

[Matt Gourley]

And then you let Okie just go feed from everybody.

[Conan O'Brien]

Everybody's plates.

[Sona Movsesian]

Yeah.

[Conan O'Brien]

And from her wound.

[Sona Movsesian]

But they didn't arrest me because I was with Conan.

[Conan O'Brien]

Yeah. They couldn't. They said, you're. You're technically guilty of murder, but Conan.

[Werner Herzog]

You'Re on the COVID of TV Guide.

[Sona Movsesian]

Three times, Rolling Stone twice.

[Conan O'Brien]

You were one of Us magazine 75 Bachelors in 1995, to quote, keep an eye on.

[Matt Gourley]

Is that real?

[Conan O'Brien]

I don't know. I think that last one's kind of true.

[Sona Movsesian]

Yeah.

[Conan O'Brien]

Yeah.

[Matt Gourley]

Speaking of the early days of this podcast, Okie played kind of a pivotal part because one of the earliest segments we did, and we should recount this story, at least in a nutshell, is the text between you and Conan about Oki. Do you remember this?

[Conan O'Brien]

I don't.

[Matt Gourley]

The Okie shits.

[Sona Movsesian]

Remember, when I text you, I was like, okie, it's classic shit everywhere. And there's throw up, and I gotta stay and clean it up, and then I'll be in.

[Conan O'Brien]

And I read it which way?

[Matt Gourley]

You read it as I'm gonna be late.

[Conan O'Brien]

Okay.

[Matt Gourley]

I shit everyone.

[Sona Movsesian]

Yes.

[Conan O'Brien]

Yes. The dog's name is Okie. And this is a blast in the past. But. And what a blast. But you said, okie shit everywhere. And I read, that's so. Yeah, I'm gonna be late. Okay. I shit everywhere. And I thought, wow, tmi.

[Matt Gourley]

We were talking about this before. The sentiment and the reading of it is like, I'm gonna be late.

[Conan O'Brien]

Pause. Like.

[Matt Gourley]

Like, all right, you got me. I'm late because I.

[Conan O'Brien]

Everywhere.

[Sona Movsesian]

No one asking.

[Conan O'Brien]

Yeah. And I just pictured you firing at the walls. But don't picture it. But then.

[Matt Gourley]

Too late. And every listener is now, too.

[Conan O'Brien]

And then, remember you got that second dog, huh? Yeah. Its name is. I have to be honest with you. And you said. Remember I got these texts. I have to be honest with you.

[Werner Herzog]

Yeah.

[Conan O'Brien]

Was the name of the dog Was, I have to be honest with you, I. Which I thought was. And it was all ran together. I have to be honest with you. I was the name of the dog, which is an Armenian term meaning bright sun come over mountain. And anyway, I was shitting. Yeah. And you said, I have to be honest with you. I humped the leg of a chair for three hours with my eyes rolled back in my head. And I said, what? And you said, yeah, I have to be honest with you. I has an erection that won't go away and has gone for nine hours straight. Remember this?

[Matt Gourley]

Do you remember your dog? To tell the truth, I. To tell the truth, I licked my own butt for a long time.

[Conan O'Brien]

And then remember you got a cat called don't tell anyone. This is just between us. But I remember that. These are all true stories. Is it true? If only. Did you ever think. Think of Fido or Arth or Snoopy?

[Sona Movsesian]

No.

[Conan O'Brien]

Oh, no.

[Sona Movsesian]

Poor oaky Okie. They're using you for comedy fodder.

[Conan O'Brien]

You know what? You can tell Okie knows what's happening because Oki has just sunk his head, her chin down onto your leg and is just in a depressive funk.

[Sona Movsesian]

Yeah.

[Conan O'Brien]

She mocked once again, I can't wait to get back under that bed and nibble that half ham.

[Sona Movsesian]

Oh, my God.

[Conan O'Brien]

Why do you keep ham under the bed? Is that some sort of.

[Sona Movsesian]

I love ham.

[Conan O'Brien]

Okay.

[Sona Movsesian]

Why wouldn't you keep ham under the bed?

[Conan O'Brien]

So you're sleeping and you've got your eye mask on and you just do a reach under and grab a hunk.

[Sona Movsesian]

Pre. Pre. Bedtime ham honk.

[Conan O'Brien]

I love that on the floor.

[Matt Gourley]

Just getting dusty.

[Sona Movsesian]

All covered in collecting a lot of things. It's. It's seasoned, it's getting seasoning. The dust actually makes it taste a little better, though. You guys should try it. Bed ham.

[Conan O'Brien]

Bed ham. Well, I enjoyed this segment. I really did. I'm glad. And I'm glad you brought. I'm going to reach over and give Oki.

[Matt Gourley]

What's the name Oki come from?

[Sona Movsesian]

So when Tack and I were in Japan, we were in Okinawa for our honeymoon for a chunk of it. And then my friend NY reposted her picture on Instagram and said that they were looking for a home for her. So to remember where we were, we called her Oki, which is short for Okinawa.

[Werner Herzog]

Okay.

[Conan O'Brien]

You had a really nice wedding.

[Sona Movsesian]

We had 550 people at that wedding.

[Conan O'Brien]

It was great. It was really fun. That's not a wedding. That's a like convention. Yeah, it was a convention.

[Sona Movsesian]

Yeah, I wish I knew you back then. I would have invited you. It have been crazy. People throw money on the floor. You're dancing on money the whole night. Awesome. And then did you guys hear? Someone in Glendale stole, like, the money from a wedding.

[Conan O'Brien]

What?

[Sona Movsesian]

Yeah.

[Conan O'Brien]

Well, just so everyone knows, Armenian weddings, you throw money in the air.

[Sona Movsesian]

Yes. You throw money in the air. There's money everywhere.

[Conan O'Brien]

It's $1 bills.

[Sona Movsesian]

Well, some of them are like fives.

[Conan O'Brien]

Not at your wedding.

[Sona Movsesian]

How dare you.

[Conan O'Brien]

I was going through. I was looking hard for a fiver. I would take a five. I would have taken a two. They were all singles. I'm sorry. It looked like there was an explosion at the Scores Strip club, but there.

[Sona Movsesian]

Were a lot of ones. And then there's no registry. Usually they. It's just envelopes of cash. And so you put them in a box and some guy came into a hall in Glendale and then literally, like, stole the whole box of money. It must have been like, $100,000.

[Conan O'Brien]

Oh, my God.

[Sona Movsesian]

Crazy. There's video. You see him, like, sauntering.

[Conan O'Brien]

Do we know who he is? Has he been caught? No, but they have him on video.

[Werner Herzog]

Yeah.

[Sona Movsesian]

Yeah, but it's fresh. It's fresh. It's like it just happened.

[Conan O'Brien]

You should have a crime show where nothing's ever solved, but you have that exact optimistic tone. And they never figured it out.

[Sona Movsesian]

Yes, never.

[Matt Gourley]

And they called him the Zodiac.

[Conan O'Brien]

Yeah.

[Sona Movsesian]

And no one figured it out.

[Conan O'Brien]

Anyway, next week, this guy went in the woods and he's just gone. I don't know. Did they find him?

[Sona Movsesian]

I don't know.

[Conan O'Brien]

Isn't it great?

[Sona Movsesian]

Yes. That's a great podcast. I'm gonna do it.

[Conan O'Brien]

Well, listen, I'm gonna wrap this up because I think we've gone on for quite a while, but we had some good laughs. I do love Okie especially. You bought him. I remember. Or you had it made her. I'm sorry, her. Well, you know. Know different pronouns, I suppose. Who knows? You bought Okie a little slash hat. Cuz you love slash and roses.

[Sona Movsesian]

She was a slash for Halloween one year. She had a little leather jacket and.

[Conan O'Brien]

Then a leather hair.

[Sona Movsesian]

Yeah, she had. And we. We just got her groomed, but usually she's like, fluffy and she was slash. Like, it was awesome.

[Conan O'Brien]

Very cool.

[Sona Movsesian]

Yeah.

[Conan O'Brien]

All right, well, peace out.

[Sona Movsesian]

She's the coolest dog in the world.

[Conan O'Brien]

Peace out. And don't say too. No, I was gonna say. I was gonna say slash.

[Sona Movsesian]

Oh, okay.

[Conan O'Brien]

Cool.

[Sona Movsesian]

You could say it.

[Conan O'Brien]

Yeah. Saul Hudson. Love him.

[Sona Movsesian]

Yeah.

[Conan O'Brien]

What a great guy. He's the best good friend to us. We've touched on many subjects. We've roamed. We came up with some amazing dog names. If you want to use them, we will lease them to you. Peace out. Saul, Hudson, Slash Tupac. Saul, Hudson, Slash Tupac and shout out to Sona's other dogs. I swear to God you can't tell anybody but I and this is a complete cone of silence. You can never the word of this but here goes I and you have to swear on your life and your mother's life and your father's life that you will never repeat what I'm about to tell you. I Peace out.

[Matt Gourley]

Conan o' Brien Needs a Friend With Conan o' Brien, Sonam of Session and Matt Gourley Produced by me, Matt Gourley Executive produced by Adam Sachs, Jeff Ross and Nick Leoward Theme song by the White Stripes Incidental music by Jimmy Vivino Take it away, Jimmy. Our supervising producer is Aaron Blair and our Associate Talent Producer is Jennifer Samples, Engineering and mixing by Eduardo Perez and Brendan Burns. Additional production support by Mars Melnick Talent booking by Paula Davis, Gina Bautista and Brit Kahn. You can rate and review this show on Apple Podcasts and you might find your review read on a future episode. Got a question for Conan? Call the Team Coco hotline at 669-587-2847 and leave a message. It too could be featured on a future episode. You can also get three free months of SiriusXM when you sign [e-mail] Conan and if you haven't already, please subscribe to Conan O' Brien needs a Friend. Wherever fine podcasts are downloaded.

[Conan O'Brien]

These days.

[Werner Herzog]

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[Conan O'Brien]

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[Werner Herzog]

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[Conan O'Brien]

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More out of your car. Firestone Complete Auto Care Call or go [e-mail] to book today. Traveling is better with T Mobile with coverage and perks you won't find just anywhere like free inflight WI fi and up to 40% off select hotels. And when you land, you've got unlimited texting and data in over 215 countries and destinations. It's better over here. See how@t mobile.com travel.

[Werner Herzog]

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[Conan O'Brien]

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