Conan O'Brien

A lot of this was who you were, but especially in the early days of late night in the nineties, when we were doing our show, we do a lot of sketches that

would use a kid who would have lines.

And I remember the kids coming up to me, like before the show, we did it at rehearsal.

And then it's time for everyone to get in makeup and the audience is loading in, the band's getting ready, the guests are coming here.

And these little kids would come up to me and they'd say, Mr. O'Brien, you are truly a legendary luminary in the

And I'd look up the hall and I'd see their parents like looking out.

It may break my heart, but they had clearly told their kids, you say this, you go up to him and then he'll have you back.

And it's very clear to me that your mom did an extraordinary job.

At the time, were you enjoying the experience?

Did you like it?

You must have loved being in front of the camera, or were you kind of neutral about it, or even ambivalent?

Well, also, to be fair to you, there probably wasn't a lot of let's explore your character and work on improv on Nanny and the Professor.

Not to put those shows down because it's high art.

But, you know, that's probably how kids felt doing sketches on on our show.

You know, Conan, when are we going to explore my character?

You're not kid.

Say a line and get the hell out of here.

You know, obviously, when you're doing Taxi Driver at that age, how old were you at the time?

12.

12.