Zach Galifianakis Returns Again

Summary

Podcast Summary: Conan O’Brien Needs A Friend

Episode: Zach Galifianakis Returns
Date: May 4, 2026
Host: Conan O’Brien, with Sona Movsesian
Guest: Zach Galifianakis

---

Episode Overview

In this highly anticipated return, comedian and actor Zach Galifianakis joins Conan O'Brien and Sona Movsesian for a freewheeling, playfully confrontational, and ultimately heartfelt conversation. The episode explores friendship, the surrealities of fame, the value of humility, and the role of comedy in a volatile world. Tangents abound—from stories of humiliating early jobs to the perils of technology—while Zach’s new TV projects and Conan’s penchant for banter keep the tone lively and unpredictable.

---

Key Themes & Discussion Points

1. Workplace Favors and Playful Grievances

[02:05–06:30]

• Conan complains that Sona asks for too many favors, sparking an improvised routine about indebtedness and professional boundaries.
• The running joke evolves into a broader conversation about the favors Conan does for his team and how rarely he asks for help.
• Zach chimes in, noting Conan is generous with everyone, not just Sona.

Notable Quote:

"What if I get you a doormat and instead of saying welcome, it's just my face because you walk all over it all the time anyway."
— Conan O'Brien [02:33]

2. Zach’s Entrance & Early Days with Conan

[06:30–08:59]

• Conan observes Zach’s famously unflappable persona, confessing mild resentment at Zach's unaffected response to his presence.
• The duo reminisce about Galifianakis's early appearances on Conan's late-night show and the blossoming of his career.
• Conan, half-sincere/half-mocking, credits himself for "giving Zach his sizzle," while Zach counters with self-deprecating wit.

Notable Quote:

"What would you like one to do when you enter the room? Jump up? No, it seems insincere."
— Zach Galifianakis [07:11]

3. The Impact of Sudden Fame

[08:59–14:00]

• Conan shares admiration for how little fame has changed Zach, emphasizing his groundedness.
• Zach offers honest insight about the discomfort and disorientation of sudden notoriety, especially post-Hangover.
• The conversation touches on the absurdities of fame, including Galifianakis impersonators and the disconnect between real life and media expectations.

Notable Quotes:

"No one ever asked me any questions until I was in a movie with a monkey."
— Zach Galifianakis [10:50]
"It just magnifies things. So if you're insecure, you will become more insecure. If you tend to be angry, you'll become a rageaholic."
— Conan O’Brien [13:23]

4. Humbling Early Jobs & Staying Grounded

[14:00–20:00]

• Zach details his time as a busboy at a mafia-connected strip club in NYC, including surreal incidents and his lack of comic showmanship in those roles.
• The group riffs on the awkward realities of strip club environments and the disconnect between fantasy and mundane work.
• Conan and Zach agree that "real jobs" keep you humble and shape one’s approach to comedy.

Notable Moment:

Zach shares a story about his roommate losing $1,000 at the mafia-owned club and equating it to "worse than Bosnia." [17:11]

5. Comedy in Show Business & the Evolution of SNL

[21:08–24:04]

• Zach reflects on his brief, humbling stint as a writer at Saturday Night Live, including bombing at a table read and receiving unexpected kindness from Tina Fey.
• Conan contrasts SNL’s competitive environment with the more collaborative, open nature of late-night shows.
• Both discuss how the comedy scene and relationships have shifted over the years.

Notable Quote:

"I remember I wrote a sketch and ... you could only hear the air conditioner in the room."
— Zach Galifianakis [22:06]

6. Comedy Ethos and Political Satire

[31:32–37:54]

• The talk pivots to the responsibilities of comedians, especially when interviewing politicians or powerful figures.
• The pair dissect Zach’s legendary "Between Two Ferns" interviews, including Obama and Clinton, and contrast sincere satire with sycophantic entertainment.
• Discussion emerges around the “math of comedy," the necessity of “punching up” rather than “punching down,” and why right-wing comedy often falls flat.

Notable Quotes:

"You are to challenge. You are to make uncomfortable. You're not to sit there and fake laugh."
— Zach Galifianakis [32:36]
"If you laugh at yourself, it humanizes you ... when you refuse ... that's not projecting strength, it's projecting weakness."
— Conan O'Brien [34:58]

7. Zach’s New Projects: Gardening and ‘The Audacity’

[39:05–44:53]

• Conan praises Zach’s new AMC show The Audacity and, more extensively, his unique gardening show, This Is A Gardening Show.
• Zach describes his passion for gardening on Vancouver Island, framing it as an antidote to technological burnout and an essential human practice.
• He’s motivated by both environmental concerns (“64 harvests left”) and the personal, meditative power of growing food.

Notable Quotes:

"I have a hundred little pumpkin seedlings in my greenhouse right now that when I get back ... I'll put in the ground."
— Zach Galifianakis [40:07]
"Our food ... we don't have a relationship with food. A lot of us don't."
— Zach Galifianakis [41:32]

8. Technology, AI, and Human Connection

[44:53–53:54]

• The conversation develops into a critique of tech, over-communication, and social media addiction.
• Both comedians express skepticism of AI and concern over its impact on humanity and wisdom.
• They dissect the absurd way social media undermines actual connection and mental health, and reminisce on the creative power of boredom.

Notable Exchange:

"We're in a time of over-communication."
— Zach Galifianakis [51:53]
"I remember when I was ... so bored when I was a kid. And that's when my mind started to do weird things. And that's how I make my living now."
— Conan O'Brien [52:59]

9. Camaraderie, Banter, and Wrapping Up

[54:28–56:26]

• The trio slip back into friendly ribbing about future travel plans, particularly Conan and Zach possibly visiting Greece.
• Zach offers practical, heartfelt advice and support, reiterating the value of real connection and simple pleasures in life.

10. Return to Workplace Favors & Armenian Heritage

[57:45–65:45]

• The episode closes as it began, circling back to the Sona/Conan favors dynamic, including a comedic brainstorm for jokes Sona can use at an Armenian Heritage Gala.
• The group jokes about Conan’s honorary Armenian status, Armenian wordplay, and the challenges of writing material for community events.
• They wrap with expressions of affection (as “bits”) and mutual appreciation.

Notable Quotes:

"You know what? I don't resent these favors for you. I like doing it. ... And also, is there some truth in it? Probably."
— Conan O'Brien [59:44]
"You make him cool."
— Zach Galifianakis to Sona [58:56]

---

Additional Memorable Moments

• "Crummer" Discussion: Zach educates the group on the tool used to clean crumbs from tables at fancy restaurants. [15:46]
• Between Two Ferns/Obama: They dissect both the comedic technique and political impact of presidential interviews. [32:00–34:30]
• Brick Device for Phones: Conan shares his use of a “Brick” to limit phone distractions. [51:27]
• Running Joke: Zach and Conan threaten to eat the “veal” of Silicon Valley, poking fun at tech workers’ sedentary lifestyles. [50:51–51:00]

---

Selected Quotes with Timestamps

• Conan on Showbiz Favors:

  "Do you see me and just see a doormat? Is that what you see?" [02:32]

• Zach on Sudden Fame:

  "No one ever asked me any questions until I was in a movie with a monkey." [10:50]

• Conan on Success Magnifying Traits:

  "It's a magnifying lens. ... If you're insecure, you will become more insecure." [13:23]

• Zach on Comedy’s Job:

  "You are to challenge. You are to make uncomfortable. You're not to sit there and fake laugh. That is not the job of the court jester." [32:36]

• Conan on Political Comedy:

  "Everyone wins ... If you laugh at yourself, it humanizes you." [34:53]

• Zach on Gardening:

  "It's a medicine to be in the garden. Yeah, it's healthy." [43:17]

• Conan on Tech Overload:

  "We're in a time of over communication. ... My brother's, like, texting me over Christmas: Got those paper towels you asked for. I don't need you to text me that you got them." [52:01]

• Sona, Receiving Material Help:

  "You can't offer to do something and then say you're doing me a favor." [62:03]

---

Important Segments — Quick Reference

• Workplace banter & favors: [02:05–06:30]
• Zach’s intro and early days with Conan: [06:30–08:59]
• Handling fame, Between Two Ferns: [08:59–14:00 & 31:32–37:54]
• SNL & table read anecdote: [21:08–24:04]
• Philosophy on comedy & power: [32:20–35:08]
• Gardening show & philosophies: [39:05–44:53]
• Tech/social media critique: [44:53–53:54]
• Armenian Gala joke brainstorm: [61:16–65:45]

---

Episode Tone & Style

• Richly playful — Even while discussing serious topics like mental health, technology, and political satire, the tone remains irreverent.
• Candid & reflective — Both Conan and Zach share honest insights about uncertainties, insecurities, and the costs of their profession.
• Improvisational banter — Quick-witted and looping, with running jokes and self-aware meta-humor.

---

Conclusion

This episode stands out for its blend of rapid-fire comedy, sincere reflection, and the easy chemistry between Zach Galifianakis and Conan O'Brien. Listeners are treated to stories of struggle, philosophical musings on technology and fame, and a vivid look at how comedians process the world—and why gardening might be the best antidote to stardom.

---

For fans of comedy, reflection, and the delightfully absurd, this is a must-listen episode.

Transcript

[Narrator/Advertiser]

If you're looking for new ways to get ahead, then you're our kind of person. We're Udemy and we help learners like you upskill in AI productivity, leadership and management and more. Learn at your own pace from real world experts. You can also prep for certifications that show employers what you know upskill for the career you [e-mail] now back to your regularly scheduled listening. At Strayer University, we help students like you go from is it possible? To anything is possible by offering access to up to 10 no cost gen Ed courses so you can reach your goals affordably and fast. Visit Strayer Edu to learn more. No cost Gen Ed is provided by

[Conan O'Brien]

Strayer University affiliate sofia.

[Narrator/Advertiser]

Eligibility rules apply.

[Sona Movsesian]

Connect with us for details.

[Conan O'Brien]

Strayer University is certified to operate in

[Narrator/Advertiser]

Virginia by Chev and has many campuses,

[Conan O'Brien]

including at 2121 15th Street north in Arlington, Virginia.

[Zach Galifianakis]

Hi, my name is Zach Galifianakis and I feel Zach Galifianakis, about being Conan o' Brien's friend. I have to say, I feel up Zach Galifianakis.

[Conan O'Brien]

You don't, you don't seem up.

[Sona Movsesian]

Fall is here Hear the yell back

[Zach Galifianakis]

to school Ring the bell Brand new

[Sona Movsesian]

shoes Walk and lose Climb the fence Books and pens I can tell that

[Conan O'Brien]

we are gonna be friends

[Sona Movsesian]

I can tell that we are gonna be friends.

[Conan O'Brien]

Hey there and welcome to Conan o' Brien Needs a Friend, joined by Sonam Obsession. Hi and wow. Let's pump it up a little bit. Hi. I wish you were a voice on Siri and you were just like, hey, hi. Bleh. Yeah, no one would. There'd be no follow ups for Siri. What else can I help you with? Forget it. Siri and David hopping. You're a cheery chat.

[Zach Galifianakis]

Hello.

[Conan O'Brien]

Good to see you.

[Zach Galifianakis]

You too.

[Conan O'Brien]

Sona. You asked me to do a lot of favors and I want to talk about this. What? Yeah, you do. You asked me to do a lot of favors. It's can you do this for me? Can you do that for me? You know, it's Armenian this week and it's Armenian that week. Can you do a thing for me? And it's sometimes I want you to know that it's a little much. You take advantage. Can you do a blurb from my book? Can you also write an intro, then an outro? I mean, what's going on? Do you see me and just see a doormat? Is that what you see?

[Zach Galifianakis]

Oh my God.

[Conan O'Brien]

What if I get you a doormat and instead of saying welcome, it's just my face because you walk all over it all the time anyway.

[Sona Movsesian]

That's so unfair. I'm so mad. I hate asking you for favors.

[Conan O'Brien]

I know. Well, you don't hate it that much. I'm sorry. I'm. How could you hate it that much?

[Sona Movsesian]

Cackling so hard like a bird, saying,

[Conan O'Brien]

I hate building a mess.

[Sona Movsesian]

How many times do I tell you? Conan agreed to do something for me,

[Conan O'Brien]

like, hey, guess what? I'm an owl saying, I hate hooting.

[Sona Movsesian]

Hoo, hoo, hoo, hoo, hoo, hoo. I sure hate it. Hoo, hoo, hoo, hoo.

[Conan O'Brien]

23 hours later.

[Sona Movsesian]

Hoo, hoo.

[Conan O'Brien]

I sure hate it.

[Sona Movsesian]

Hoo hoo. Oh, my God.

[Conan O'Brien]

I mean, that's my impression. If you were an owl and asking a favor was hooting, you'd be hooting a lot.

[Sona Movsesian]

Yeah, no, it's good. It's good for you to explain it. I hate asking you for favors. There are so many things people ask me to ask you that I speak specifically.

[Conan O'Brien]

Say you filter stuff out. Yeah. How could there be more?

[Sona Movsesian]

What are you talking about? Do you know how much stuff. First of all, it's your fault because you made me. You put me on this podcast. People know who I am now. I'm attached to you for the rest of your life until you die.

[Conan O'Brien]

And so, please, that's not for months.

[Sona Movsesian]

Oh, come on. But it's. It comes with, I'm sorry. You did it. It's. It's your. It's you. It's your fault.

[Conan O'Brien]

Your speech champion.

[Sona Movsesian]

Oh, come on.

[Conan O'Brien]

Listen.

[Sona Movsesian]

Come on.

[Conan O'Brien]

I. Listen. I don't begrudge you anything.

[Sona Movsesian]

Yes, you do.

[Conan O'Brien]

I do. Of course I do. I just made it the whole front of the show.

[Sona Movsesian]

Yes, it's a lot.

[Conan O'Brien]

And, David, do I do a lot of favors for people?

[Zach Galifianakis]

You do a lot of favors for everybody, not just Sona.

[Sona Movsesian]

Yeah, what the fuck, David? I'm just. I don't ask for that many.

[Zach Galifianakis]

Do you do favors for every. You do favors? Raise your hand if Donan's ever done a favor for you.

[Sona Movsesian]

Yeah, I.

[Conan O'Brien]

The only. I actually never asked for. When your Aquaman figurine got stolen from your apartment, you asked me to put up posters, and I did. I never. Then when your iron man got stolen, I put up posters for that. That's right. He offered. Then when your several hundred of your other figurines were stolen, you asked me to call the police for you, and I did. That's right.

[Zach Galifianakis]

It was very nice.

[Conan O'Brien]

I was just saying I never asked for favors, but I know that you would help Me out. The only favor I've ever asked you for is when you were in my short film and you did it, and it was. So don't say you never asked me. But that was. But in 25 years, I've asked you for one thing. Can I ask you to be in a mov. You made. That's a big favor.

[Sona Movsesian]

When you.

[Conan O'Brien]

I'm just saying. You can't start by saying I never asked for favors. Except for that one time when you did me a huge favor. Trying to help you in your argument with Sona. Why are you attacking me? Because when I see you, I just see red. Yeah, you're like a. I'm a. I'm a bull, and you're a giant red blankie that's flopping around in the wind. You do a lot of favors for everybody and very. I don't know that you've ever asked any of us for a favor. You know, Baskin Robbins, I famously, I think, had 38 flavors. I think I do more than 38.

[Sona Movsesian]

That's our whole job. Our whole job was doing stuff for you. That's our whole job.

[Zach Galifianakis]

You get paid for that.

[Sona Movsesian]

I know, baby.

[Zach Galifianakis]

I got you your lunch today.

[Conan O'Brien]

I ordered you a leave.

[Zach Galifianakis]

Can we talk about that?

[Sona Movsesian]

Yeah.

[Conan O'Brien]

Yeah. Hey, if people know out there that I occasionally take a leave, I don't

[Zach Galifianakis]

know what you like to keep secret.

[Conan O'Brien]

No, that's a secret.

[Sona Movsesian]

I think we've all.

[Conan O'Brien]

No one must know of my Aleve. You know, I. That's why I always. When I throw out my Aleve bottles, I always. I always try to throw them out in someone else's trash can because no one can know that I occasionally have some muscle stiffness.

[Sona Movsesian]

I don't have time for this bit. I'm angry right now. I'm so mad right now.

[Conan O'Brien]

You're. Are you really mad?

[Sona Movsesian]

Are you done with the Alief thing right now? Because I want to address this accusation.

[Conan O'Brien]

You leave it for now. Home run. Okay, wait a minute. There's too much to unpack here, as the kids say these days. I hate that saying, but my wife uses it all the time. We. And sometimes she says it while we're unpacking on a trip. And then I think, okay, whatever. Anyway, let's revisit this later on in the show and get to our next guest.

[Sona Movsesian]

Okay.

[Conan O'Brien]

My guest today is a very funny actor and comedian who starred in the Hangover movies. Now you can see him in the new AMC series the Audacity. And he has a new gardening show called this is a gardening Show. How does he come up with these names? He's truly one of the funniest people I know. Zach Galifianakis.

[Zach Galifianakis]

Welcome.

[Conan O'Brien]

When I walk into a room, I'm used to people. I mean, even pretty big stars are like, whoa, it's him. You know? And then I walked in today, and you. Your heart beats, like, one beat every two hours. You were just sitting there, totally unimpressed that Conan o' Brien had walked into the room.

[Zach Galifianakis]

What would you like one to do when you enter the room? Jump up? No, it seems insincere.

[Conan O'Brien]

Whoa, look at that guy.

[Zach Galifianakis]

What up, brah? So good to see you. Hey, brah.

[Conan O'Brien]

Dude.

[Zach Galifianakis]

Yes.

[Conan O'Brien]

Yes.

[Zach Galifianakis]

That's the real me.

[Conan O'Brien]

Well, I mean, we go way back.

[Zach Galifianakis]

I've known you for many years in a showbiz way.

[Conan O'Brien]

Early, early days. You used to come on my show, and you were always hilarious. And don't look at your watch.

[Sona Movsesian]

Oh, Jesus.

[Conan O'Brien]

What the fuck was that?

[Zach Galifianakis]

Time is moving slow. That's so rude. We can cut this short.

[Conan O'Brien]

I was trying to compliment him about how funny he was. And this is before America had Zach Galifianakis fever. This is back when they had Conan fever and I lent some of my fever to Zach Galifianakis. And then America had the very contagious Zach Galifianakis fever.

[Zach Galifianakis]

Yeah, I like to call it sizzle. I still have a sizzle.

[Conan O'Brien]

You sizzled and sizzled all the way. Sizzle through the late 90s, 2000s.

[Zach Galifianakis]

Did you guys get my sizzle reel? I sent it over.

[Conan O'Brien]

We got your sazzle reel.

[Zach Galifianakis]

It's past tense.

[Conan O'Brien]

The past tense of sizzle. You sazzled back in the day. I used to sazzle in the early 2000s. No one sazzled like you. You're not this. But I adore you. I think you're a wonderful fellow. One of my favorite comedy pieces of work is your work on Between Two Ferns. I think it's absolutely hysterical. Thank you. And endures. And I resent you for that.

[Zach Galifianakis]

Why are you resentful? It does seem. I know you joke about it, but I do think there's a tinge.

[Conan O'Brien]

Oh, it's all real.

[Zach Galifianakis]

Yeah. I do think there is a tangent.

[Conan O'Brien]

I resent you terribly because you are very funny, and you are, but.

[Zach Galifianakis]

But also. Is it my height? Is that what you. Is that what you wish you were more like me about?

[Conan O'Brien]

I do. I wish I was closer to the.

[Zach Galifianakis]

Is my size of my head? Is that what you wish you had? Parking meter head, Parking meter body. Whatever this is. You get what you're upset about people

[Conan O'Brien]

try and put time in your head so that they can keep their car there a little longer. So what happens?

[Zach Galifianakis]

You wish you had a seven syllable last name. I do. No.

[Conan O'Brien]

You are very funny. You're one of the funniest people I know. And yet you seem grounded and I don't know how to do that. I mean, this guy, he is of the earth. He seems like he's got it all together. He seems like he emotionally wants for nothing. That doesn't seem fair. I mean, yeah, I get some chops.

[Sona Movsesian]

Oh my God.

[Conan O'Brien]

But I'm constantly wracked with these roiling seeds.

[Zach Galifianakis]

Does every podcast turn into like a one man show? Like the light should shift.

[Conan O'Brien]

We don't need you to talk during this part. In fact, you don't have to be here for this. You're just here to get it started and then I do the rest. Have you listened to the podcast? It's pretty much me yammering and yammering.

[Zach Galifianakis]

I mean, really, it is. You're really taking the floor here. Yeah, I am, but I appreciate all that stuff. I, I don't know if it's true or not, but I, I, I. Grounded is a good is an interesting word.

[Conan O'Brien]

I'll be serious for a second and then we'll go back to my one man show. You are hilariously funny. And then very. I'm hard pressed to think of anybody who's been less altered by success. You just seem like if all of it went away tomorrow, you'd be very happy and contained doing whatever you're doing. And I love that about you.

[Zach Galifianakis]

I think that second part is correct. I think I feel I am one of these people that feels very fortunate to be working. But the first part about having success or whatever, being known, that threw me for a, that really messed me up. Not in a woe is me, but I just, no one ever asked me any questions until I was in a movie with a monkey.

[Conan O'Brien]

Yeah.

[Zach Galifianakis]

So I just, I found that to be odd. That switch.

[Conan O'Brien]

Yep.

[Zach Galifianakis]

And I was older and I think I just. The BS of this, this business or whatever is, it's always been laughable too. I'm from a small town. I think I have a chip on my shoulder when I moved here and I don't know, I think that's kind of healthy. But it affected me for a while and I feel kind of embarrassed by it, actually.

[Conan O'Brien]

But yeah, I remember it at the height of hangover mania, I went to some event someplace and there were a bunch of. It might have been like on Hollywood Boulevard. Or I had to go into some event, and there were all these people outside the venue. There was, like, a spider man and there was a Superman, whatever, a Batman. And there was a guy who. I thought it was you for a second. And I thought, oh, there's Zack. I'll say hi. And then I realized it's not you. It's a Zach Galifianakis impersonator with a fake baby and a Baby Bjorn.

[Zach Galifianakis]

These do come true, don't they?

[Conan O'Brien]

From the. Yeah, from the movie. And it's. So I had a moment.

[Zach Galifianakis]

I had an idea that you thought maybe that was me in the outfit from the movie. But can I tell you something?

[Conan O'Brien]

I didn't clock the outfit right away. I just saw out of the corner of my. And by the way, you were known to promote that movie very hard, but. And all the sequels. But no, I just had a moment of thinking, because I know you. I know that that would have bummed you out to your core.

[Zach Galifianakis]

That would have. Yeah, yeah. But what. You know, what's interesting is as a. I wanted to do this experiment once, and I had the wardrobe. This was many years after we did the Hangover movies. I had the wardrobe sent to me because I was in Vegas and I wanted it to look like how pathetic it was that the actor got into his outfit and was trying to get recognized. And I did it, but no one came up. It was so embarrassing. No one did it. The experiment failed. But, yeah, the Hangover was big. That was a big change. Right.

[Conan O'Brien]

But I do think it's good for people to hear from you that. Because. And we talk about this a lot on the pod, but are you too

[Zach Galifianakis]

busy to say podcast?

[Conan O'Brien]

I am, yeah.

[Zach Galifianakis]

You should do a doc about that.

[Conan O'Brien]

I don't have the tie to do it. I'm fascinated by this idea that there's a lot of envy surrounding this crazy, weird business and people thinking, oh, my God, all your dreams would come true. And what I found is that it's a magnifying lens. It just magnifies things. So if you're insecure, you will become more insecure. If you tend to be angry, you'll become a rageaholic. If you are someone who's capable of feeling gratitude and appreciate the people around you, those things can be enhanced. But I do think there's a, you know, maybe.

[Zach Galifianakis]

So that's a good way of looking at it. Yeah. But I was angry about it, to be honest. I was intimidated by it because I thought, as a comedian, to not be able to observe. Cause you had Too many distractions of trying to hide or whatever. It intimidated me, and I got weirded out by it. But now that I'm old, like, none of it matters. And it. You know, who cares? But it was a change. It was a change.

[Conan O'Brien]

Yeah. I've always tried to picture you. Cause I know that your success didn't happen right away. And I knew you for a bunch of years where you'd come on our show and be really funny, but the whole thing hadn't quite gelled or clicked yet. And then.

[Zach Galifianakis]

And I was this busboy at a strip joint TILL I was 28.

[Conan O'Brien]

Yes. I was gonna get to that. Yeah, you were. You were. I was. And I try to picture you in these real jobs, in these. I hope so.

[Zach Galifianakis]

With my briefcase. Yeah.

[Conan O'Brien]

I do think that's a real job.

[Zach Galifianakis]

Going to work, honey. No, but I had to wear, like, a cummerbund. It was like a fancy.

[Conan O'Brien]

And it was a strip joint.

[Zach Galifianakis]

Yeah. On Park. You were in New York, probably at this time. It was called Stringfellows.

[Conan O'Brien]

Yes.

[Zach Galifianakis]

So I worked.

[Conan O'Brien]

I had a table there.

[Zach Galifianakis]

Yeah. I never saw you come in, thank goodness.

[Conan O'Brien]

No, I. Yeah, it was.

[Zach Galifianakis]

It was. And the guy that I moved to New York, New York with, who we went to college together, he was the cashier at the strip joint. And he ended up being Jimmy Fallon's head writer. 80 miles. If you know 80 miles, that's where

[Conan O'Brien]

all the best head writers come from.

[Sona Movsesian]

That's cool.

[Zach Galifianakis]

And then weird.

[Conan O'Brien]

Well, I'm curious because I'm trying to picture you in a situation where you have the comedy mind that you have, but you're doing a job like that. You're, you know, you're working at a strip club. You were a busboy.

[Zach Galifianakis]

Bus boy. Bus boy.

[Conan O'Brien]

Bus boy.

[Zach Galifianakis]

Bus boy.

[Conan O'Brien]

So you're wearing a cummerbund, and it had a crummer.

[Zach Galifianakis]

Do you know what a crummer is?

[Conan O'Brien]

No.

[Zach Galifianakis]

It's a little metal stick that you take out of your pocket and you get the crumbs off the table.

[Conan O'Brien]

Oh, yeah.

[Zach Galifianakis]

For Wilt Chamberlain.

[Conan O'Brien]

If Wilt Chamberlain had gone.

[Zach Galifianakis]

I think it. I think he came in a lot.

[Conan O'Brien]

Maybe it was another 7 foot 2 legend. His name was Wilt Chamberlain and he was 7ft 2 inches tall. But it wasn't that Wilt Chamberlain.

[Zach Galifianakis]

Yeah. This guy was an accountant.

[Conan O'Brien]

Yeah. And a very good one. So were you funny at that job? And I bring it up because I know that when I did jobs that weren't comedy related early on, I was deadly serious to the point where when they found out later on, oh, I just got a job writing. I'm leaving. They said, there's no way you're a comedy writer. Because I was just dead serious. Never made a joke, just did my work.

[Zach Galifianakis]

That makes sense.

[Conan O'Brien]

I think it comes with maybe being depressed. I don't know. What was your situation? The strippers

[Zach Galifianakis]

were not nice to me at all. I was really intimidated. And the men that went in there were not the men that I would want to hang out with anyway. So it was a weird situation. I don't remember trying to be funny. I'm sure with the others, with Miles that was working there. I'll tell a story. I think I've told this story. Hopefully not here before, but it's a fractured media.

[Conan O'Brien]

No one's heard it. Go ahead.

[Zach Galifianakis]

And no one will. But Miles and I. Miles and I were getting ready for work. There was a snowstorm in New York. It was a blizzard, I'll never forget. And it was in the mid-90s. And I'm putting my cumberbud on. Miles had just lost $1,000 from the register. It's Mafia owned, or it was, I think. And so he was so worried he had to go in and face the music. He'd lost his. Lost it. He wouldn't have taken it. He lost it. So I'm putting my cummerbund on, and as I'm looking over, I lived in his closet. And I look up and Miles is tying his shoe. And he says to himself, didn't want me to hear it, knowing he had to go face the music. This is worse than Bosnia. Bosnia was going on at the time.

[Conan O'Brien]

Yeah.

[Zach Galifianakis]

And that's what he compared. And I'll never forget how dramatic.

[Sona Movsesian]

He's not wrong.

[Conan O'Brien]

He's not wrong that owing Stringfellows 1000 doll is worse than anything that happened in Boston.

[Zach Galifianakis]

Well, if you know that the Mafia may have. And then what happened? I think what happened. We go to work and the feds came in. They closed it down that day. And that was it.

[Conan O'Brien]

A mysterious tipped call came in.

[Zach Galifianakis]

Yes. From a busboy. Yeah.

[Sona Movsesian]

That's friendship.

[Zach Galifianakis]

Yeah. But no, I was. I was very serious at that job, I think. Yeah.

[Conan O'Brien]

We shot a bit once in Houston at like 2 in the morning at a strip club.

[Zach Galifianakis]

We'll be right back with the World's Worst Bragger.

[Conan O'Brien]

Yeah, we were there to shoot some piece. And so I'm there. I think we were just trying to figure out, because my show in Houston at the time, this is like 1995, 96. Aired at like 3 in the morning. So I went to places at 3 in the morning to figure out if I could see anybody watching our show and who's up and watching TV at 3 in the morning. And that it ended up being very funny. I went to a bus station, I went to an emergency room, and I went to a strip club. And you walk in and you see these beautiful naked women. And, you know, just my. My head turned into a jukebox cartoon where all the cherries come up. It's like, ding, ding, ding, ding, ding, ding, ding. And coins came out my mouth. I was like, like all the cartoon stuff, like steam coming out of ears. I'm like, I can't believe it. Within 15 minutes, we had a problem with the camera. And we're trying to figure it out. And this completely naked, beautiful woman, who would have been my fantasy of every way of 16 completely naked, not wearing a stitch of clothing, comes up and starts to talk to me. And I'm like, I'm sorry, can you just give us some room? I gotta. We got an issue with this camera.

[Zach Galifianakis]

And I kind of. You mean, who, me and you and your ball?

[Conan O'Brien]

No, no, me and I am not that polite. To my ball. To my ball.

[Zach Galifianakis]

I imagine you were there by yourself and you said, can you give us some room?

[Conan O'Brien]

Yeah. Pardon me, testicles. No, I have a very different relationship with my testicles. But no, I remember being kind of irritated. Like, can't she step back? We're trying to fix this lens. And I was realizing that, oh, my God, you get inured, you get used to this right away. Like, you're in there for 10 minutes and suddenly it's like, come on, naked, gorgeous woman. Can you give me a break? We need to get this shot.

[Zach Galifianakis]

And behind the scene, there's nothing. Like the women are talking about how much they hate the men that they have to, like, they, you know, so it's not. It's not thrilling backstage. It's a whole different scene. So that's weird.

[Conan O'Brien]

Cause strippers love me. They just love me.

[Sona Movsesian]

Oh. Huh.

[Conan O'Brien]

Yeah.

[Sona Movsesian]

What?

[Conan O'Brien]

I just. I think I'm the one guy that when I go into strip club, they're just like, wow, I love him.

[Sona Movsesian]

Conan.

[Zach Galifianakis]

Conan. When is the last time you've been in a strip club?

[Conan O'Brien]

1969.

[Zach Galifianakis]

Right.

[Conan O'Brien]

I was six years old.

[Zach Galifianakis]

Right. I was conceived at one. We won't go further into that story. You know what? I didn't know.

[Conan O'Brien]

Why did I not know that you were at Saturday Night Live? You worked at Saturday Night Live for a very.

[Zach Galifianakis]

That two week. Don't they Do a two week trial thing. Sometimes they do.

[Conan O'Brien]

I hear, I don't know. That's not how I came in. But I remember thinking that we were on a two week trial. My writing partner, Greg Daniels and I thinking that was a two week trial. But then later on, someone said, no, you weren't a two week trial, but you were a two week trial.

[Zach Galifianakis]

I honestly, when I got there, I thought I was. I thought I got hired as a cast member, honestly, because I had already auditioned twice, right. And I was told, you're gonna go and be a feature person. And I said, great. And I got there and they said, no, you're actually gonna write. Which either way, it didn't matter to me. I was just so thrilled that I had that opportunity. It was a tough two weeks. Yeah, because the table reads. I think even if you're, you know, no people there, the table reads can be kind of brutal. I just remember I wrote a sketch and it was. You could only hear the air conditioner in the room.

[Conan O'Brien]

Yeah.

[Zach Galifianakis]

I mean, I've been like that on stage, you know, so I'm kind of used to it. But there it was just. And I remember for some reason, I was sitting next to Tina Fay, and I just remember her patting my shoulder in a very calm. Not even. Not in a sarcastic way. It was really calming. And I'll never forget that. It was. Actually meant a lot to me, but it was rough, but I was thrilled to be there. But you don't know what you're doing when you get there. Right.

[Conan O'Brien]

It takes a second to figure it out. And it's not so many shows I've worked on since. And I obviously loved my time at SNL and was so formative for me, but I've very much liked working in late night all those years because it felt like we were all working together a little more, you know, there's so much show to fill. There's. For years it was, you know, five hours a week. You've got to fill. There's no elbowing for room or real estate. Do you know what I mean? There's just. If someone has a good idea, everyone's like, oh, my God, that's great, let's do it. No one's. Well, that's a really funny idea. But I'm not gonna laugh because. And that's so snl definitely much more competitive.

[Zach Galifianakis]

I don't know if it's like that as much anymore.

[Conan O'Brien]

Might not be, because when I went

[Zach Galifianakis]

back to host, I noticed, oh, it seemed much more loose and friendlier. Not that it wasn't friendly in the beginning when I was there for writing, but yeah, it was an honor to do it. I didn't have any bad feelings about it. Except for the tumbleweeds going across the writer's room.

[Conan O'Brien]

Yeah. And that feeling of when you put a sketch in if it's not working at read through, you can see everybody flipping to see how many pages this is.

[Zach Galifianakis]

So you'll have that moment. I'm not supposed to do that. I do that all the time at table. I know. I'm always like, do I have any more parts to this? Scanning for my name.

[Narrator/Advertiser]

Who are you celebrating this Mother's Day? Shop Etsy for special gifts made for every kind of mom. Whether you're looking for a handmade planter for a plant mom, an additional adorable custom collar for a pet mom, or a personalized gift to commemorate a mom's first Mother's Day, it's all on Etsy. Celebrate all moms with unexpected gifts on Etsy. Celebrate being human.

[Sona Movsesian]

Hi, I'm Angie Hicks, co founder of angie.

[Narrator/Advertiser]

When you use Angie for your home

[Sona Movsesian]

projects, you know all your jobs will be done well.

[Narrator/Advertiser]

Roof repair, done well. Kitchen sink, sink install, done well. Deck upgrades, done well.

[Sona Movsesian]

Electrical upgrades, done well. Angie's been connecting homeowners with skilled pros for nearly 30 years. So we know the difference between done and done well. Angie, the one you trust to find the ones you trust. Find a pro for your [e-mail].

[Zach Galifianakis]

close your eyes. Listen to Monday.com feel the sensation of an AI work platform so flexible and intuitive it feels like it was built just for you. Now open your eyes, go to Monday.com, start for free, and finally breathe. You're bringing in something that popped in my head, and I don't know if you and I have ever talked about this connection, and maybe he doesn't want us to, but Tommy Blocha wrote on Conan, right?

[Conan O'Brien]

Yeah, Tommy T. One of my favorite writers of all time. Yeah.

[Zach Galifianakis]

I think he happens to be the funniest person I think I've ever met. Like, he's the that funny. And I knew that he left your show to go right for professional wrestling, right?

[Conan O'Brien]

Yes. He worked with us back in the 90s, and I knew him through Andy Richter from Chicago. Probably from Chicago. And he brought. And for a while, Tommy didn't say anything and he was super quiet. And I just thought, well, I wonder if this guy's going to work out. I don't know. And then he revealed himself in the writer's room and on paper to be the funniest guy. I gave him a shout out on Stern once. Cause I was on Stern and Stern was kind of talking to me about, so you must just hire like Harvard Lampoon guys. And I said, no, he was like a army guy. Yeah. I said, one of the funniest guys I've ever. One of the funniest writers I've ever known. I don't think went to college.

[Zach Galifianakis]

Are you talking about Tommy?

[Conan O'Brien]

And I was talking about Tommy and he said, who is that? And I said, tommy Blacha. So he really brilliantly funny guy.

[Zach Galifianakis]

He's on a level that I. The same level I would put you on, which is this. We used to do this bit back and forth to each other where it was just really just the dumbest person, right? Cause Tommy's really good at dumb. And it would be like, what about drinking coffee or something? It was always the most obvious. And it always followed with or something.

[Conan O'Brien]

Yeah, or something.

[Zach Galifianakis]

So one night, Tommy's had to spend the night at my house and we were both working together. We had to get up early the next morning for work. And he's in the next room over and it's seven in the morning. I'm up, but I'm just kind of basically waking up. And I hear Tommy say under his breath as he's waking up, what am I awake or something? And I fell in love with him.

[Conan O'Brien]

I fell in love with him and

[Zach Galifianakis]

I used to beg. Like he would make me laugh so hard, like I didn't want to leave him.

[Conan O'Brien]

It was so he. This is one of my proudest happy moments.

[Zach Galifianakis]

He.

[Conan O'Brien]

For I would do all these riffs in the writer's room. That outrageous over the top where I would almost play this over the top host who's incredibly abusive. And I would come into a room and someone would start to talk and I would say, play. Yeah. But I remember at a time I was on this jag of saying, like, why don't you go have a big tall glass of shut up juice? And it was just a really stupid, childish put down that I was doing. And I would do it whenever someone was taking a swig of something. I'd be like, a little more. Just after they had pitched something, I'd be like, oh, a little more shut up juice. Huh? Wet the whistle with some. And they. Tommy left. Cause he was gonna go write for professional wrestling. And he told me, hey, you gotta tune in. I wrote this for the Rock. He's taunting one of his opponents and he tells him, why don't you go have a tall glass of Shut Up Juice? And I was so thrilled. And I watched it, and sure enough, the Rock was like, hey, I'll tell you something. And he's got like my. And he's like, maybe you should just go have a long, two glass, tall glass of Shut Up Juice. And then they cut to people in the arena, and they're, like, holding their heads. The Rock got him. And then I think the following week, someone had a sign that said, shut Up Juice. And I was in heaven. That's a payoff. No one knew. I didn't care if anyone knew that was me or not. And then those are the kind of things that make me super happy. And so, Tommy, one of the funniest.

[Zach Galifianakis]

Such a funny guy.

[Conan O'Brien]

I'm curious, like you and these other jobs. It's interesting to me, that. Which I totally understand. You're not being the Zach Galifianakis that people would know. You're just grimly doing your job and trying to do it well, which would describe probably you. And, I mean, I know that you were a nanny for a while doing.

[Zach Galifianakis]

I was a house cleaner.

[Conan O'Brien]

House cleaner.

[Zach Galifianakis]

Cleaned apartments in New York for a couple years. Yeah, I was pretty, you know, I'm pretty quiet, I think. And then the comedy scene kind of maybe broke me out of my shyness. I think somewhat, as I performed more, I got a little bit more comfortable with that stuff. But, yeah, those jobs will humble you. I mean, I moved to New York wanting not my. I didn't want my parents to have to, like, send me anything. Right. And they never did. And I was pretty independent. But my father, he would send me things in the mail. I'm like, oh, go run to the mailbox. Oh, God, I hope this is food. I hope this is food. And I'd open it, and it was always irregular underwear. And just open it in the post office.

[Conan O'Brien]

It was light.

[Zach Galifianakis]

I mean, maybe he was sitting there with potato chips, but it was always irregular.

[Conan O'Brien]

Valuable was wrapped in it, you know, I don't know.

[Sona Movsesian]

Irregular underwear.

[Zach Galifianakis]

Yeah, it's cheap.

[Conan O'Brien]

My dad was cheap. Cheap. I also think there's something to. I used to think about this a lot. When people get to know me and know my rhythm, this will be a little easier. And I think that would be very true of you. I mean, I always thought you would come on our show back in the day and people didn't know you, and you'd sit at a piano and you would tell these great jokes, but you never winked. You never, you know, shot them a Look like you never ingratiated yourself with the crowd. You just completely went in and they had to accept you as you were. And I think you have to do that for a while in order to have people meet you halfway.

[Zach Galifianakis]

I think that's a. I think you're right. I also think comedically, I should say only I've always thought it's more interesting if you're just doing a stand up bit like that to have kind of a disdain for the audience. You know, I never was like, hi, I'm gonna tell us like that friendly. All right, let's tell stuff. See, stand ups come out. Like, what's up, Miami? God, that's a lot of videos.

[Conan O'Brien]

You don't want to know how Miami's doing. Miami has no concern or interest in you.

[Zach Galifianakis]

I respect the audience, but the relation. Now, performers have a real relationship with the audience via social media. That, that too, I've never participated in. I don't. That's a weird. I don't know how to do that.

[Conan O'Brien]

Yeah, you have something that I'm not too familiar with called dignity.

[Zach Galifianakis]

I could tell you a lot of stories that would go against that.

[Conan O'Brien]

Well, I mean, we've talked about it. I won't go into it, but I do think that was particularly helpful to you when you did your famous Between Two Ferns interview with Obama, because you're the only person that gave him. I mean, you know, I know that this in any way was just you doing your comedy, but you were so rude as that person. And it's hilarious because I don't think anyone's talked to certainly a sitting president or even in this time, no one's talked.

[Zach Galifianakis]

Well, all the podcasters that have had the president on now, they don't do their court gesture. They don't do it. They just. They suck up to him.

[Conan O'Brien]

Yeah, yeah.

[Zach Galifianakis]

So the comedians that have had. That are podcasters that have had Trump on, they're not doing their job.

[Conan O'Brien]

Yeah, yeah, they're.

[Zach Galifianakis]

That's not the job of a comedian. You are to challenge. You are to make uncomfortable. You're not to sit there and fake laugh. That is not the job of the court jester.

[Conan O'Brien]

Yeah.

[Zach Galifianakis]

Period. So there is a difference. People were actually somebody yesterday was talking to me about that, about, you know, political influence through comedy and all that stuff. I'm more interested in the comedy first.

[Conan O'Brien]

Me too.

[Zach Galifianakis]

You know.

[Conan O'Brien]

Yeah, yeah.

[Zach Galifianakis]

No, I mean, whatever their, Whatever their motive is, fine. But you. But. But the comedy has to come first. I remember when I interviewed Hillary Clinton and I could tell she didn't want to be there. And I totally get that. I get it. But before we had set that whole thing up, they. They wrote back, well, you can't bring up those emails. And I go, well, we don't have to do the interview. I totally. That's fine. We won't do it. When you tell powerful people, no, it's crazy. They were like, okay, we'll do it. Well, you can ask, because it's not that important to me to do it the way they want to do it. You have to. If you're gonna come in a comedy, you gotta do the way we want to do it.

[Conan O'Brien]

Also, I see this all the time, and I've seen it for years and years and years and years. People not understanding that if they go to the supposedly vulnerable place and have a sense of humor about it, it is magical for them. People see they have a sense of humor. They see that they can take a joke. I mean, no one walked away from your interview with Obama and thought, wow, you really showed him. He got to be hilarious. He sat there and entered your world of being intentionally ignorant about who he is, what he does, cutting him off, being insanely rude, and gave it back to you in equal measure. And you looked at it and you said, this is a great piece of comedy. And I know it reflects well back on the president. And our current president would do well to understand that. To understand that, you know, if he let himself be the butt of the joke, it's impossible. It's humanizing. I know it is impossible.

[Zach Galifianakis]

You wouldn't do it with him.

[Conan O'Brien]

It wouldn't work.

[Zach Galifianakis]

No, it wouldn't work.

[Conan O'Brien]

I'm just saying in an alternate universe, if we're talking about a different human being, they would see that there's this misconception that, oh, the media just wants to go after conservatives, and they don't understand that everyone benefits when they laugh at themselves.

[Zach Galifianakis]

That's right.

[Conan O'Brien]

Period.

[Zach Galifianakis]

Yes.

[Conan O'Brien]

Everyone wins. Yes. If you laugh at yourself, it humanizes you. And, like, pheromones are released and humans think, that's a good human who. And when you refuse to let that happen, that's not projecting strength, it's projecting weakness.

[Zach Galifianakis]

I agree 100%. There's also the math of comedy to me sometimes where the punching down that the right seems to do something. And I don't want to get political here, but that's not as funny to me as taking on the powerful. Like, the math of it doesn't work for me, like, to take on some marginalized people, make fun of that. Listen, I'm all for humor. I can defend it, but that mathematically. So that's why you don't see a lot of comedy that comes out of the, like, the right. I mean, the right. You just. It's hard to do. I don't. I'm not saying suggest that. You cannot. It's just difficult to do because of the dynamics.

[Conan O'Brien]

Yeah, yeah.

[Zach Galifianakis]

Greg Gutfeld, what a hilarious guy.

[Conan O'Brien]

You got him. I. I don't know if they'll show up to work again. I always love imagining these people being completely unhinged by a comment on a podcast or, you know, someone did a sketch about them on SNL and they're just completely unhinged. I'm sure they can no longer go.

[Zach Galifianakis]

That's all for clicks, though. You know what I mean? It's.

[Conan O'Brien]

It's fake. Well, that's boring. The whole.

[Zach Galifianakis]

The whole Everyone commenting on everything. Yeah.

[Conan O'Brien]

And everyone has to wait. Did Sabrina Carpenter just slightly misspeak at a performance at Coachella? Or can we make that into something? Yes, we can. And then she'll apologize. And I think she's a fantastic performer. She makes a lot of people happy. I actually don't think she did anything wrong. She couldn't hear what the person in the audience was saying. There was no harm, no foul here, but people got a 24 hour news cycle out of it. And it's just.

[Zach Galifianakis]

I mean, it's stupid strange. You know, the other thought of that too is it's interesting. People from the right or whatever you want to say, they're always like, shut up, Entertainers. You're just entertainers. And I kind of get that because I'm from the south and, you know, but I always think, yeah, but you guys say that to us entertainers, but you elect the entertainers.

[Sona Movsesian]

Yeah.

[Zach Galifianakis]

Clint Eastwood, Donald Trump, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Fred Thompson, Gopher from the Love Boat. I mean, I could go on.

[Conan O'Brien]

His name's Fred Grandy.

[Zach Galifianakis]

I could go on and on. Sonny Bono. I mean, it goes on and on. So it's always interesting to me that they point that out, but then they fall. Then they're the ones that hire or elect the entertainers.

[Conan O'Brien]

Yeah.

[Zach Galifianakis]

I think even more so than the other side. So I don't know. It's very, very odd, all of it. But it was a good run.

[Sona Movsesian]

Oh, no.

[Zach Galifianakis]

Oh, we're wrapping it up.

[Sona Movsesian]

Are we calling it.

[Conan O'Brien]

We're calling it. Well, 250 is a good time to call it, you know.

[Zach Galifianakis]

Oh, yes, 250. 200. I don't feel any. Is Anybody celebrating?

[Conan O'Brien]

I think they're going. They're gonna. Well, there's plans to build giant monuments. I think the triumphal arch was going to be for the 250th, I think.

[Sona Movsesian]

Okay, good.

[Conan O'Brien]

We just got to get that thing built.

[Zach Galifianakis]

This is going to sound controversial and I don't want to. When Trump did that Jesus thing, I was the turning point for me. I was like, I kind of like him.

[Sona Movsesian]

Oh, like him?

[Conan O'Brien]

Yeah.

[Sona Movsesian]

Oh, you okay?

[Zach Galifianakis]

What do you think? Am I off?

[Sona Movsesian]

No, he wasn't. Jesus. He was a doctor.

[Conan O'Brien]

Well, he. Yeah, his excuse was I was a doctor who wears a robe and a red sash and has like a halo light behind us.

[Sona Movsesian]

He was a Red crosswalker.

[Conan O'Brien]

Oh, man. He's a very good nightclub comic. You know what? I. I was watching your gardening show and I want to mention this. Cause it's called this is a Gardening show and one of the. Like that title. Yeah, he was up all night thinking of that title.

[Zach Galifianakis]

And actually we spent about 400 titles back and forth.

[Conan O'Brien]

Oh, really?

[Zach Galifianakis]

Between two farms. I mean, it was like, you know, all these play on words. It was so. So then the producer emails me and goes, the first thing you say is, this is a gardening show.

[Conan O'Brien]

Yeah.

[Zach Galifianakis]

Why don't we just call it. I said, okay, but yeah, that's how we get to the title.

[Conan O'Brien]

Well, you know what I love, because I've known for years that you hang out on Vancouver island and then to get to see you in your habitat is very cool. I mean, first of all, it's beautiful. But getting to see you, I knew that you were a very sort of an outdoorsy guy. I didn't know specifically how important gardening was to you. The show is really funny. And you get to be you, obviously. Cause you are you. And there's no fixing that now. But the. But just getting to see you in that world, I totally get it. You like to get up in the morning and tend to plants.

[Zach Galifianakis]

I love it. It's strange how much. I mean, I've always been a hobby. It's been my hobby, I guess, for 20 plus years. But now that I have some space, I've been building a garden and I just do. I mean, I have a hundred little pumpkin seedlings in my greenhouse right now that when I get back to Canada, I'll put in the ground and that'll probably produce 200 pumpkins for the year. That kind of stuff. I can't tell you how much I love it. It's a feeling that I feel like as humans, it's part of us, but we got away from it.

[Conan O'Brien]

Yeah.

[Zach Galifianakis]

Because technology and convenience has overtaken everything we're pushing. Buttons is soulless. There's nothing there for me. And I wanted to do this show for several reasons. One, when you watch documentaries about where we are, climate wise, you hear there's 64 harvests left. Okay, maybe that's not true. But what if it is?

[Conan O'Brien]

Right?

[Zach Galifianakis]

These are scientists that are saying this, 64 harvests left. So I see some people acting like, oh, my God, what are we going to do? What are we going to do? And then I see some people don't care. So I don't know. I'm just going to go with what my gut feeling is, which is maybe kids need to know this stuff.

[Conan O'Brien]

Yeah, yeah.

[Zach Galifianakis]

Wait till the Russians shoot down the satellites. Motherfucker. It's just a quote from the South. I heard recently that. I was like, yeah, I believe you. I actually believe that. That one I believe and think about that. Yeah, right. So all of the. I feel like the safety might not be there for the next generation. So I'm. And this is not an altruistic thing I'm trying to say, it's just a practical thing. Our food, even if nothing happens, even, let's say, everything stays normal. Well, our food and where we get it and what we know about it is we don't have a relationship with food. A lot of us don't.

[Conan O'Brien]

Right, Right. You think about it, birth, death, food and where it's coming from. We're primal parts of our existence for so long. I mean, they're just printed into our DNA as we evolve. And then within the last few generations, we've completely removed ourselves from it. And I'm going to be completely honest with you. Like, I know nothing about gardening. I know nothing about where my food comes from. I say to David, I want to get that. And you were like, all right. And you get it, and it comes and I shove it in my face really quickly and with great hate and. But it's same thing about death. Like, we're not. We're not. People used to live and die in their home, and people used to be there for it, and now everything's kind of farmed out. So, yeah, it's.

[Zach Galifianakis]

But it's a medicine, too. It's not just. It's just not.

[Conan O'Brien]

It's not altruistic. You do it for yourself.

[Zach Galifianakis]

Yes, absolutely. I mean, look, I'm a little chubby guy, but I love eating fresh vegetables and fruits out of the garden. It's like. It's It's a high for me, it just is. So there's a. There's many elements to it, but I'm saying it's a medicine to be in the garden. Yeah, it's healthy to be.

[Conan O'Brien]

It's also, when you talk about. You've spoken about this for a while and you mentioned it today, the kind of allergic reaction you have to the bullshittery of show business. And in some of it, there's obviously great parts of it, and then there's parts of it which can actually feel like a toxin.

[Zach Galifianakis]

It's poison and honey.

[Conan O'Brien]

Yeah, I felt this. I got a chance. Danny Harrison, George's son, invited me to come see George's home, Friar Park. And I went. And so much of it are George Harrison's were his gardens where he grew things. And I've seen footage of him in various documentaries just tending to his gardens and tending to his sunflowers and tending to the things he was growing. And I thought, oh. And you know, he. Danny said, yeah, he told him once, you know, Jenny said, oh, let's go into town. Let's leave Friar park and go into town. And his father said, why would we do that? Why would we go out there? It's insane out there. If you look at all the footage of his life in the 60s and 70s, it was screaming and madness. This was the antidote.

[Zach Galifianakis]

Interesting.

[Conan O'Brien]

And I think you've experienced being in the nose cone of the rocket, and there are people who are making a living pretending to be you, hanging outside of Planet Hollywood that, you know, that's. And like, we gotta get us a Zach Galifianakis for the party. I got one. I got one too. Well, bring them both, you know, so it's such a nice antidote to find those places where you can grow apples.

[Zach Galifianakis]

Well, I also think it's possible in the cities. I mean, when you guys all leave today, I want you to pay attention to how much concrete is around you versus greenery. Just think about it. It's crazy. It's really crazy. I mean, I think humans biggest mistake was fighting nature instead of working. We're gonna conquer it. Well, no, you're not. No, you're not. It's gonna win, and it looks like it's definitely gonna win. So you have to respect it and honor it. If there's a God that made all this stuff, why not respect it? And the other, the things that this God has made, that's coming from someone that has no idea if there's a God or not. But if there is, why is it the simplest thing to respect the earth and the humans and the animals on it. Other than that, what is there? Yeah, I mean this where humans are going with AI. I mean, I guess I don't know if I'm old fashioned or maybe it's because I'm 56 now, but I think this whole AI thing and I don't mean for medicine, it's got a lot of great things. Otherwise though, I think it's another like biblical. In the biblical term, biting the apple again. I just am very afraid of it. The dudes that are designing it, there's a real problem because these dudes, how do I say it? They have math minds. They have math minds. You know what I mean? They have math minds and that's good. But there's very little wisdom coming out of that pocket of the world. Almost none. And we're just running, all of us are running in that direction. The media loves AI. The media loves social media because it causes more this. Yeah, I love when cnn they'll have a reporter on but they'll do a report on social media and how bad it is for someone. And then after the report Jake Tapper gets on and go follow me on Twitter. It's asinine. Have you no self reflection? Well, even how we communicate through text, there's not a sarcastic font. Right. And people are not good enough writers to do it through text. As a comedian to get back. LOL is really diminishing returns. So I think the way we have let robots do this for us has also made us a little bit off. I just do. I worry about the lack of human connection with that stuff and maybe it just is not as needed as we think it is. I don't know. I mean, I really don't know. But this world, this tech stuff has always, I've always thought about, I've always worried about it especially when social media came about and MySpace and all this. When it was done, you could do it anonymously. That's a weird start for anything. So the weirdos running this thing and good weirdos, I don't mean they're all bad weirdos. We need to something something. There needs to be a guardrail. And I think politically nothing changes in the state states until they regulate the Internet.

[Conan O'Brien]

Yeah, I do think not.

[Zach Galifianakis]

So we can sit here and talk. Good luck. It could work for both sides, right? It just depends on who's going to control it, the, the messaging. But you're. I see how people scroll on planes. I'm like, that's how people get Their new we're screwed.

[Conan O'Brien]

Yeah. I do think that if you look at the history of huge technological advances, including like the printing press, you know, and how that revolutionized things in the early days, it's rough going when people are handed a brand new superpower and we are at the beginning of this. And I do think if we survive it, there will be guardrails, there will be people that say, oh no, you can't have a kid, can't have a tablet. We've figured it out. They can't have it till they're 14 and that's a law, you know, or you can't.

[Zach Galifianakis]

It's like how a city, like a city can be built and there's like, like crap in the streets. The sewage is all wrong. And then as it ages, they fix the problem.

[Conan O'Brien]

No, we're at the okay corral phase where drunks are punching each other through the swinging doors of the bar and landing in the mud. People are shooting their guns in the air, going knee haw. That's where we are.

[Zach Galifianakis]

But you think it's going to need a regulation to get to there. Do you think the government.

[Conan O'Brien]

Yeah, yeah, I think it's. And I think it's going.

[Zach Galifianakis]

They're not going to do it.

[Conan O'Brien]

But you know what it does, it comes through just this hard experience. And humans do. If they put their hand on the stove enough times, they learn not to. We need a rule about putting our hands on the stove.

[Zach Galifianakis]

I hope you're right.

[Conan O'Brien]

There's an addiction.

[Zach Galifianakis]

There's an addiction. There's an addiction thing here too. That we have it. That's the other thing, is the addiction part. And that addiction is designed. Listen, you read the, read the. Have you read the Facebook whistleblower book?

[Conan O'Brien]

No, did not.

[Zach Galifianakis]

You need her. It's unreal. I read it twice. It's fascinating. So they know that they're making it addictive. So that's the problem, I think maybe with the comparing it to the old technology. Sure, you're right. I think the printing press, of course it changed the world. Technology is what changes humans the most. Political correctness, for example, has always been in comedy. For the last 30 years, it just has. The difference is the technology. The audience talks back now. And comedians, you gotta be okay with it. That's the only thing that's changed. Not political correct. That did not for sure. It happened many, many years ago. But what really changed is if someone comes and sees you live and they don't like it and you've said something, they're going to either videotape it or get it. So it's weird. It's all very strange. But then I see people on their computers all the time and they never do anything else. My mind goes, well, when the end of the world comes, they're the veal.

[Conan O'Brien]

Well, you know what? It's soft.

[Zach Galifianakis]

Soft meat.

[Conan O'Brien]

It's a soft meat, so we might need them.

[Zach Galifianakis]

No, we're gonna eat all the fields up in Silicon Valley. We're coming to eat you, babies.

[Conan O'Brien]

The way you describe it, we're gonna eat very well. I mean, I want this to happen sooner rather than later. Just you and I.

[Zach Galifianakis]

But also, we're humans. We're animals, Right. Like, we need to move and think and talk and blah, blah, blah. This is. It's too much.

[Conan O'Brien]

Yeah.

[Zach Galifianakis]

It's making people nuts. It just is. Well, I think it's making people mentally do. I think it's making people mental.

[Conan O'Brien]

I mean, I do things now where I like Brick, my phone. Well, there actually is a device called the Brick where you can turn off a bunch of apps so that in order to go turn them back on, it's called the Brick. And I use that all the time now.

[Zach Galifianakis]

Do you have email on your phone?

[Conan O'Brien]

I do.

[Zach Galifianakis]

Take it off.

[Conan O'Brien]

It's too late.

[Zach Galifianakis]

Oh, no, you can take it off. No, I never. I can't imagine having an email on my phone. It's so, like. That's asinine to me.

[Conan O'Brien]

What about. And you're including text, too? No, text.

[Zach Galifianakis]

If I knew how to get rid of text, I would. I don't know how to get rid of it. We're in a time of over communication. Right. So my brother.

[Conan O'Brien]

He says on a podcast.

[Zach Galifianakis]

My brother. Well, exactly. But my brother's, like, texting me over Christmas. Got those paper towels you asked for. I don't need you to text me that you got them. I don't need that update. It's insanity.

[Conan O'Brien]

You know, I've nast too, is that someone will text you, like, how's it going? And if you don't text them, it's the person who maybe 20 minutes went by, and they're like, what the fuck? You alive? You're like, I was. It was three in the morning. What's going on? Because they're so used to getting an immediate dopamine hit.

[Zach Galifianakis]

Yes.

[Conan O'Brien]

That they forget they're talking to someone who isn't walking around looking at their phone all the time.

[Zach Galifianakis]

I see.

[Conan O'Brien]

So I get a lot of my texts are, did you die? Or something? And it's like, well, no, I Mean,

[Zach Galifianakis]

I see teenagers on planes and the mental illness that they're doing with their faces. Like, changing it for three hours staring at a phone. You know, you're supposed to be bored. You're supposed to be. It's good for the brain.

[Conan O'Brien]

Well, it's actually. And really good. I remember saying this when my kids were little. We gotta keep the boring parts. Because I remember when I was. I would get so bored when I was a kid. And that's when my. You know, we weren't allowed to watch TV if there was school the next day, which meant most of the week we had none of this technology. And that's when my mind started to do weird things. And that's how I make my living now. So you gotta.

[Zach Galifianakis]

God, I thought this was gonna turn into a masturbation story.

[Sona Movsesian]

I think we all did.

[Conan O'Brien]

That's what it.

[Zach Galifianakis]

Just get the air out of the room. The story's not done.

[Conan O'Brien]

That's what I was. You cut me off.

[Zach Galifianakis]

You're right. I wish somebody had.

[Sona Movsesian]

Yeah.

[Conan O'Brien]

That is what I was getting to my mind.

[Zach Galifianakis]

Started doing weird.

[Conan O'Brien]

Yeah.

[Zach Galifianakis]

And my hand.

[Conan O'Brien]

Yeah.

[Sona Movsesian]

Come on.

[Conan O'Brien]

And then I said, and that's how I make my living.

[Zach Galifianakis]

And then I became a writer.

[Conan O'Brien]

I became a professional masturbator at the circus.

[Sona Movsesian]

Yes.

[Zach Galifianakis]

Yeah. What you say to me? No, nothing.

[Conan O'Brien]

You just accuse me of murder.

[Zach Galifianakis]

No, no. I was going to say, is there a comp. Is there. I don't know. Never mind. I don't want it to be in the.

[Sona Movsesian]

Is there a masturbator at the like.

[Zach Galifianakis]

No. Is there. Is there masturbation competitions?

[Sona Movsesian]

I bet there is.

[Conan O'Brien]

I hope so.

[Zach Galifianakis]

Eduardo.

[Sona Movsesian]

I bet there is.

[Conan O'Brien]

I'm not looking this one up. No, he just meant Eduardo.

[Zach Galifianakis]

Yeah.

[Conan O'Brien]

He didn't even know you had a computer theater.

[Zach Galifianakis]

What's going on this week?

[Conan O'Brien]

Let's just say Eduardo is very skilled. It is so lovely to talk to you. And you. You really are a remarkable individual. I wish we could all be more like you and I. Really.

[Zach Galifianakis]

So you got my text?

[Conan O'Brien]

I did. I just read exactly what you wrote.

[Zach Galifianakis]

Thank you very much.

[Conan O'Brien]

I read exactly what you texted.

[Zach Galifianakis]

That in there.

[Conan O'Brien]

And a great lover.

[Sona Movsesian]

What the fuck is this?

[Conan O'Brien]

You misspelled lover.

[Zach Galifianakis]

Yeah.

[Conan O'Brien]

Two V's.

[Zach Galifianakis]

Always.

[Conan O'Brien]

I love. I've been. I checked out. This is a gardening show. I really like it. I especially love when you incorporate kids in it and you're talking to them. You're so.

[Zach Galifianakis]

It's the easiest thing.

[Conan O'Brien]

I know. It'd be so funny doing it. So fun to do it. And also, you're in a series, the Audacity, which is getting raves. So congrats to you. That's on amc. And you. I mean, anytime you're in town, you want to come by and talk about anything. Tomorrow's not good for me.

[Zach Galifianakis]

Okay. The next day. No, I'm in Saturday.

[Conan O'Brien]

Starting in six years from now is what I meant.

[Zach Galifianakis]

Did you end up going to Greece for your.

[Conan O'Brien]

No, we haven't gone to Greece yet for the travel show. But I do want to go there.

[Zach Galifianakis]

It's the best.

[Conan O'Brien]

Would you go with me? If I went, I would pay for half of it.

[Zach Galifianakis]

Love to go, but I might take my gardening show there.

[Conan O'Brien]

Okay.

[Zach Galifianakis]

Next time. But if you do go, please call me because I can point you in. Like, I have first cousins that are still there, so I can point. They can.

[Conan O'Brien]

You should check out the Parthenon. You know, thanks a lot.

[Zach Galifianakis]

No, they were going to take you to the Hard Rock in Athens,

[Conan O'Brien]

and I just.

[Zach Galifianakis]

I hope there's not a Hard Rock Cafe in Athens.

[Conan O'Brien]

You know, there is. They're better.

[Zach Galifianakis]

I don't think.

[Conan O'Brien]

No, the Greek has to be.

[Zach Galifianakis]

The Greeks are not. They're not. They're not capitalists that way.

[Conan O'Brien]

Good.

[Zach Galifianakis]

They're not good. They actually. During the European Union, they got really real. They got really hurt.

[Conan O'Brien]

Yeah.

[Zach Galifianakis]

By Northern Europe.

[Conan O'Brien]

I've never been to Greece in my life, and I would love to go there.

[Zach Galifianakis]

That's the best. They know how to live. They know how to live.

[Conan O'Brien]

And so do you.

[Zach Galifianakis]

That's right.

[Conan O'Brien]

And so do you. Zach Galifianakis. Thank you for being here. I treasure you. I really do. Those aren't cheap. Could you put it back?

[Zach Galifianakis]

No, I'll put. There's a.

[Conan O'Brien]

So you just grab one of our.

[Zach Galifianakis]

By the way, I was asking the.

[Conan O'Brien]

Clean.

[Zach Galifianakis]

There's a comment box here, right?

[Conan O'Brien]

We took it down just for you. Okay, well, put it back.

[Zach Galifianakis]

The minute you're gone, I'll take it to Twitter.

[Narrator/Advertiser]

Looking for a gift to make Mom's Day. Shop Etsy for all her favorites, like personalized jewelry and accessories or even custom stained glass artwork she'll truly love. We can't count the ways your mom means the world to you, but you can count on Etsy to help you find a gift that will make her feel seen. Celebrate the heart of the family with Mother's Day gifts on Etsy. Celebrate being human. Why have we asked our contractor we found on Angie.com to be our kid's legal guardian? Because he took such good care when redoing our basement that we knew we could trust him to care for our kids, all eight of them, should something happen to us.

[Conan O'Brien]

Are you my dad now?

[Zach Galifianakis]

No, sorry. I do basements, connecting homeowners with skilled

[Conan O'Brien]

pros for over 30 years. Angie, the one you trust to find

[Zach Galifianakis]

the ones you trust.

[Conan O'Brien]

Find pros for all your home [e-mail]. Okay, look, there's some bad blood out here. We have to take care of this. Yes, I brought up, Sona, that I do a lot of favors for you. I mean, I do a lot of favors for everybody, but you, you get more than your share.

[Sona Movsesian]

Oh, my God.

[Conan O'Brien]

Let's revisit this topic. Okay.

[Zach Galifianakis]

Ugh.

[Sona Movsesian]

Okay.

[Conan O'Brien]

Sona, you know I love you, I adore you, you're the best. But you're. You're just this bloodsucker. Oh, my God, it's draining me dry.

[Sona Movsesian]

You are awful. You're awful. You're awful.

[Conan O'Brien]

Are we getting content or not?

[Sona Movsesian]

We are, but you know what? Every clueless gamer. Do you take that game home with you?

[Conan O'Brien]

Oh, I would say no, actually. Maybe only like, half the time. Yeah, 85%.

[Sona Movsesian]

85% of the time. When you do a clueless gamer for a cool game, you get the game. How is he a favor? You get some benefit out of it. That's not direct. That's what I'm saying. We all get a lot of fun stuff from this job.

[Conan O'Brien]

All I'm going to say is he

[Zach Galifianakis]

does a lot of favors for you,

[Conan O'Brien]

but you do the greatest.

[Zach Galifianakis]

But you.

[Conan O'Brien]

But you. But you. But you do the greatest favor for him.

[Zach Galifianakis]

You make him cool.

[Conan O'Brien]

Oh, that's the greatest favor you're doing?

[Zach Galifianakis]

I don't know.

[Sona Movsesian]

Am I doing that?

[Zach Galifianakis]

You do.

[Conan O'Brien]

You do. Yeah, I think. No, people do get excited. You're a cool person. And you. Me?

[Zach Galifianakis]

Yes.

[Conan O'Brien]

I guess I'm cool. And that I pop Aleve every now and then. I always drink a lot of water with it. You gotta make sure you flush out the system. And that's a recommendation that's on the bottle. But.

[Sona Movsesian]

Wow.

[Conan O'Brien]

No, but I mean, between my Aleve use and your coolness factor, I think we make a good duo.

[Sona Movsesian]

I don't think they're favors. I think you are paying me back.

[Conan O'Brien]

What? Oh, yeah.

[Sona Movsesian]

For all the.

[Conan O'Brien]

So that means I don't have to pay you financially?

[Sona Movsesian]

No, you should still do that. But I also. I. I don't know, for something.

[Conan O'Brien]

You know what? I don't resent these favors for you. I like doing it. And I will say, look, I needed a segment, so I came out swinging.

[Sona Movsesian]

Yes.

[Conan O'Brien]

And it worked because you got really mad. And also, is there some truth in it? Probably, because in most of my bits, there's a little bit of truth. This is my nightmare, and I do a lot of favors for people.

[Zach Galifianakis]

You do.

[Conan O'Brien]

We have to do a favor for Sona today, for instance, at the end of this. Oh, is that true? Yeah. What's happening today? We have to.

[Zach Galifianakis]

I don't want to rattle.

[Conan O'Brien]

No, no, we get to. That's right. We get to do a favor for some. You know that I like doing things for the Armenian community. You know, I like doing that.

[Sona Movsesian]

They're the ones. You took me to Armenia in 2015.

[Conan O'Brien]

I tried to leave you there. You know, that was the plan. The plan was to leave you there. And then I was like, shut the door. Shut the door. And the pilot shut the. You didn't shut the door fast enough. And you squirted into the plane, and you were like, we're headed back. But the plan was to leave you there.

[Sona Movsesian]

Well, thank you for doing that. But you shone a light on my beautiful homeland, and since then, you've been kind of an honorary Armenian. They're very excited.

[Conan O'Brien]

You know what I will say, Armenian people always very happy to see me.

[Sona Movsesian]

Yes.

[Conan O'Brien]

And they say. And I say, inch Pasek. And then they say, la Vem. And we have, like, a nice thing going.

[Sona Movsesian]

Yeah.

[Conan O'Brien]

So that's always nice.

[Sona Movsesian]

Yeah.

[Conan O'Brien]

I meet a lot of them in steam rooms. I don't know what that's all about. Several times I've been in a sauna or a steam room, and the naked men in there have been Armenian, and we have a nice chat about Armenia.

[Sona Movsesian]

Oh. Oh, that's nice. Yeah, that's a nice. See, that's the thing. If you hadn't taken me to Armenia, I don't think you would have been getting as many asks. And I filter a lot, but there are some that I.

[Conan O'Brien]

And we're doing one today, which is important.

[Sona Movsesian]

We're doing one today, and it's because

[Conan O'Brien]

it's an important event. What is it?

[Sona Movsesian]

It's the Armenian Heritage Walk Gala in Philadelphia, and I'm emceeing it.

[Conan O'Brien]

And how do you emcee a gala? Oh, you're going to.

[Sona Movsesian]

I'm going to Philadelphia.

[Conan O'Brien]

Oh, I see. There's a benefit, and you're going to be up there saying, all right, our next auction item, or that kind of thing.

[Sona Movsesian]

No, no. It's going to be like honoring people who help them do it. It's this. It's this permanent installation by the Philadelphia Museum.

[Conan O'Brien]

You have jokes written. I'M not you. I don't.

[Sona Movsesian]

I don't.

[Conan O'Brien]

We know that, but I mean, what about.

[Sona Movsesian]

The bar is really low, but you

[Conan O'Brien]

got to have some material. You can't. You can't MC a gala and not have material.

[Sona Movsesian]

That's true.

[Conan O'Brien]

What kind of jokes do they like? I haven't.

[Narrator/Advertiser]

I haven't written anything yet.

[Conan O'Brien]

When is it? Soon, Right? It's like really soon. Okay. You have to write material. Maybe I would help you another favor, but let's.

[Sona Movsesian]

You can't offer to do something and then say you're doing me a favor.

[Conan O'Brien]

I can say yes to things and then resent them, because that is my true hobby that you are. I say yes to stuff and then I resent it. You know, we got to think of some jokes, you know, about.

[Sona Movsesian]

I have some.

[Conan O'Brien]

Like, what about pomegranates and what is it about?

[Sona Movsesian]

I don't want to tell you. I'm nervous.

[Conan O'Brien]

Let's hear it.

[Sona Movsesian]

I think. Well, one of the honorees. No, this is stupid.

[Conan O'Brien]

Come on. Yes. No, we know. We have to now.

[Zach Galifianakis]

This is Judgment Free Zones.

[Conan O'Brien]

We have to.

[Sona Movsesian]

One of the honorees is an Armenian man who's an astronaut. And so I'm going to say, you know, within the last six months, we've had one of the greatest moments in space when Katy Perry went up for 10 minutes.

[Conan O'Brien]

That's a good joke.

[Sona Movsesian]

It's a misdirect.

[Conan O'Brien]

That's a good joke.

[Sona Movsesian]

It's a misdirection. That's a good job because everyone's gonna think I'm talking about.

[Conan O'Brien]

Are you explaining to me how a misdirect works?

[Sona Movsesian]

Yes. This is what comedy is. Conan o'. Brien.

[Conan O'Brien]

No, but you know what? I think that's a funny joke.

[Sona Movsesian]

Okay.

[Conan O'Brien]

You know what's another good joke? Ian is added to every Armenian name, right?

[Sona Movsesian]

Yeah.

[Conan O'Brien]

So you could say there's some other great celebrities who are Armenian. Katy Perryan, you know, Tom Cruiseian, John Travoltian.

[Sona Movsesian]

Yeah. Okay.

[Conan O'Brien]

You know what I mean?

[Zach Galifianakis]

Yeah.

[Conan O'Brien]

I mean, this is a good Sabrina Carpenter, Ian. I mean, you know, you could go into that whole thing, okay. And you could list a whole bunch of celebrities, real names, before they shorten them. You know what I'm saying?

[Sona Movsesian]

Yeah. Okay. I like that.

[Conan O'Brien]

Conan o'. Brien, not so good.

[Sona Movsesian]

It didn't roll off the tongue. And also, there's already a lot going

[Conan O'Brien]

on with your jokes about some of the other. They're true. Famous like Dr. Kovorkian.

[Zach Galifianakis]

Armenian.

[Sona Movsesian]

Well, there's six honorees. Well, I'm coming up with bits for each one.

[Conan O'Brien]

Hey, I'm going to kill it at this Armenian gala, even more than your previous host, Dr. Kavork.

[Sona Movsesian]

Oh, God.

[Zach Galifianakis]

Right?

[Sona Movsesian]

God, yeah, Conan.

[Conan O'Brien]

That's a good joke. He killed people.

[Sona Movsesian]

I know, I know.

[Conan O'Brien]

Yeah, he's the pride of the Armenian people.

[Sona Movsesian]

Don't say that.

[Conan O'Brien]

Did he drive around in a van and do it? I forget how he did it.

[Sona Movsesian]

You know what? Nowadays, euthanasia is not looked at as poorly as it was before. He was a.

[Conan O'Brien]

Well, his name was Dr. Death and he drove around in a van. But, yeah, you're right.

[Sona Movsesian]

He was a pioneer.

[Conan O'Brien]

No, ending people's lives is all cool now.

[Sona Movsesian]

They wanted to end them. They were all. Weren't they all terminally ill. All right,

[Conan O'Brien]

you're taking us down a dark road. I'm gonna kill it up here. I'm gonna be Armenian host who kills it the fastest since Dr. Kavorkian. That's funny. That's a good joke.

[Sona Movsesian]

Oh, God.

[Conan O'Brien]

And then you say, by the way, other, you know, famous. And then it's Dr. Perry. You know what I mean? You know, the singer Sia.

[Zach Galifianakis]

Sia. C.N.

[Conan O'Brien]

is a good one. I mean, we're coming up with good material right here. You're gonna kill at this thing.

[Sona Movsesian]

I know.

[Conan O'Brien]

Oh, I could come out as a character.

[Sona Movsesian]

What?

[Conan O'Brien]

Yes, I could be a character. I could come out, like, as an old Armenian lady, and then, you know, and I do a character.

[Sona Movsesian]

Oh, that won't be offensive at all. No, let me hear your old Armenian lady.

[Conan O'Brien]

Oh, hello. It's nice to be here. I dried the apricots and flattened them, and now we're eating them.

[Sona Movsesian]

I knew it was going to be

[Conan O'Brien]

whatever and it would kill.

[Sona Movsesian]

Yeah.

[Conan O'Brien]

And guess what? I'm going to fly out. I'm going to write this material, and I'm going to do this on the. On the gala, and then I. I'm really going to resent you and say it was a failure. Those who are given much are expected to give much. And it's clear that I've been gifted with some divine powers. And so I must spend my time on this earth doing favors for Sonam of Sestian. I think that's the rule here. But you know I love you. You know I care about you.

[Sona Movsesian]

Do you?

[Conan O'Brien]

Is a bit. I do.

[Sona Movsesian]

Oh, that's nice. Well, thank you. I love you, too, as a bit.

[Conan O'Brien]

Love you a bit. Bye.

[Producer/Announcer]

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 Leow. Theme song by the White Stripes. Incidental music by Jimmy Vivino. Take it away, Jimmy. Our supervising producer is Aaron 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]

And Doug, there's nowhere I wouldn't go to help someone customize and save on car insurance with Liberty Music. Even if it means sitting front row at a comedy show.

[Sona Movsesian]

Hey everyone, check out this guy and his bird. What is this your first date?

[Zach Galifianakis]

Oh no.

[Conan O'Brien]

We help people customize and save on car insurance with Liberty Mutual together. We're married. Me to a human, him to a bird. Yeah, the bird looks out of your league. Anyways, get a [e-mail] or with your local agent.

[Zach Galifianakis]

Liberty Liberty. Liberty Liberty.

[Narrator/Advertiser]

Why have we asked our contractor we found on Angie.com to be our kids legal guardian? Because he took such good care when redoing our basement that we knew we could trust him to care for our kids.

[Zach Galifianakis]

Kids we only met a month ago.

[Conan O'Brien]

Angie, the one you trust.

[Zach Galifianakis]

Define the ones you trust.

[Conan O'Brien]

Find pros for all your home projects at Angie Combination.