Hi, my name is Mary Bronstein and I feel destined about being Conan O'Brien's friend.
Fall is here, hear the yell.
Back to school, ring the bell.
Brand new shoes, walkin' blues.
Climb the fence, books and pens.
I can tell that we are gonna be friends.
Hey, Conan O'Brien here and I'm sitting with Matt and Sona, and this is a special episode of Conan O'Brien Needs a Friend.
Today I'm welcoming Mary Bronstein, the director of a film that I'm in, which is a strange thing to say, because that's something I didn't expect from my kooky career.
But Mary Bronstein has made, I think, a really terrific film and it stars Rose Byrne and it's called If I Had Legs I'd Kick You.
I'm in the movie as well, and so is A$AP Rocky.
There's a lot of just brain twisters here.
Yeah.
Because America has been saying how come Conan O'Brien and AAP Rocky haven't been in a film together yet?
Well, guess what?
Problem solved.
Yeah.
We're in a film together.
The new bogey in Bacall.
We are.
Yeah.
If all of our movies were just together now, we're like Hope and Crosby.
But it's it was a wonderful experience.
The movie's out now and it's in New York and it's in Los Angeles.
And and I think it will start appearing in other areas soon after that.
And I'm just very happy.
Just very happy for her.
Well, thank you.
This is exciting for you.
I'm in some intense scenes with Rose Byrne, who is, I think, one of the great actors on the planet right now.
I really do.
She can do anything.
I love her so much.
Well, get in line, buddy.
Okay.
I didn't mean to be that aggressive.
I know.
We both can like her.
Okay.
It's all right.
Just not as much as me.
I like her more.
So this is a chat with the director, Mary Bronstein, who is such an impressive force.
And she made this whole world spring from her mind.
And it was just an honor to get to work with her.
So we'll be talking to her today.
Thank you.
Please welcome Mary Bronstein.
Did you manifest this whole relationship?
Yes, I did.
You did, actually.
There's a whole story here.
Oh, yeah.
We're gonna get into it.
Let me initiate.
Anyone who doesn't know what's going on here.
Mary Bronstein, very talented screenwriter director auteur, has made a movie.
I did.
Called If I Had Legs, I'd Kick You.
This is not your first movie, but you made this film and it stars Rose Byrne and I'm in there too improbably.
We'll get to that glitch in your career.
But the response has been fantastic and stunning, and the movie's coming out soon.
Working with you has been a joy and a great journey.
I don't get to say journey often, but it really has been a journey.
And I'm just so delighted you're here.
Really.
I am.
This is like a Twilight Zone moment for me.
You know, I'm staying in this hotel on the Sunset Strip.
Across the street is the Viper Room and the whiskey.
I go into my hotel room.
On the coffee table in the hotel room is a magazine with Rose on the cover of it, with me inside of it talking in the magazine.
Not talking in the magazine.
Yeah.
Quoted.
Quoted in the magazine.
That's a proper way to say it.
But soon, talking magazines are coming.
I just invented that copyright.
And tablet.
That's called a tablet.
I'm sorry.
That's called a tablet as a talking magazine.
I have to interject in this very important moment.
So you're painting a great story and then, of course.
And then.
Sona ruined it.
I'm going to take it back.
I'm going to grab it back.
And then I'm here.
And I have been a fan of yours since, you know, day one.
Day one of your original show.
September 13th, 1993.
And I'm freshly 14 years old.
Freshly.
And we actually had like an encounter, didn't we?
Over a fax machine.
Yeah.
Steamy.
Yes.
As one does.
The best romantic scenes take place over a fax machine.
In the early 90s, that's what you did.
Yes, I... You were a young fan of the show and you were a real fan.
Oh, I can... Yeah, we can get into that if you want, but I can... Yes, I was a real fan.
And so I had a school project and where it was like pick a career that you want to have and then interview a person in the career.
And because this will tell you everything about me and my personality, I said well, I want to be in show business.
I'm an interview con and I'm Ryan.
And what I did was I figured out.
I did some sleuthing, some early 90s sleuthing, which is hard to do.
No internet.
No internet.
And there was a little booklet that they used to sell in the drama book shop in New York City called Ross Reports Television.
Do you know what I'm talking about?
No.
And in it, it had every television show and the contact information.
It was for actors to use to submit to television shows.
Sure.
So that's how I got the phone number to the office of the show.
And I called and I spoke to some woman and I told her what I wanted to do.
And she goes.
I can't promise that he's going to do it, but here's the fax number.
Fax the questions.
And I live in a suburb and here literally, I don't have a fax machine in my house.
So I literally walked down to the gas station and I walked down to the gas station with my papers.
I love this portrait of another time.
I finished churning my butter.
I did, I did.
Then I walked down to the gas station.
I sewed my own outfit and I put it on.
And I walked down to the gas station and I faxed it.
And then I was like, but wait a minute, how am I gonna know if it faxes back?
So then every, literally for the next week, every probably like two hours, I called the gas station.
Did I get a fax?
Did I get a fax?
And one day they said, yes, you did.
And I go and you answered my questions, man.
Yeah, yeah.
And you revealed some things.
Like I know that you took tap dancing lessons when you were a kid, because you put that in the questions.
I wrote my essay.
The teacher gave me an A, but also didn't kind of believe it, I think.
Yeah.
A little bit.
A little bit.
But that happened.
And also that says a lot about me personally.
My middle name is Tenacity.
And it says a lot about you.
Your middle name is Mench.
And that is.
And also time on his hands.
My other middle name.
Look, I don't know.
I'm just going to fax some gas stations.
And it was in your handwriting.
You filled it out with your handwriting.
You didn't bother to type it.
My handwriting is like typing.
Do you still have that fax?
I do, and I should have brought it.
That's okay.
But I didn't.
I don't want people to see that I do little smiley faces.
I dot my I's with smiley faces.
And then a heart when I say goodbye.
But it was a beautiful thing.
And it was something that really it was like oh, people in show business, you can, it's not inaccessible.
That was my first, that was, I grew up, my parents were teachers.
I grew up in a suburb.
I grew up like I didn't know anyone who was in show business or anyone that was even making an artist.
The fact that you could make a living as an artist, that was, I didn't know about that.
That's exactly my same experience with growing up.
And I've said this a million times.
Never saw anyone famous.
Nope.
I felt like I was as far from show business.
I didn't think it was something that I could ever do.
Absolutely.
It was, you know, saying, oh, yeah, I'll live on Mars.
I mean, it was... Absolutely.
It feels that far away.
Yeah.
It feels that far away.
And so...
You know, it's funny because I want to now tell the story of how I come into this whole picture.
Yes, please do.
Which is one day I was going down to a place that's near my house to get some stuff for lunch.
My phone rings and it's Adam Sandler.
So I rushed to a fax machine.
No, I pick it up and he's like hey buddy, is it okay if I give like one of the Safdie brothers your phone number?
Josh Safdie.
Josh Safdie.
Is it okay if I give Josh Safdie? from A24.
Someone wants you in a film, an A24 film.
Some lady.
Some lady.
And I said, what?
And he said, do you want to just look at the script?
And I said, I guess so.
I mean, yeah, I guess so.
And he went, that's right, buddy.
Like, are you stupid?
824, Safdie, script.
Lady that you don't know.
Yeah, lady that I don't know.
Who claims she has a letter from you.
And so I read the script and I...
Again, I don't pretend to know this is not my world.
I can't say that enough.
But I read the script and I immediately thought there is a.
This is a very original voice.
This is a very original story and there's great tone control.
There's just, there's a tone to this movie that just comes off the page.
And again, I'm saying this as someone who doesn't read scripts professionally.
I don't know of that world, but I know what I like.
And so you and I had a meeting.
Yep.
And I took the meeting just to try and maybe talk you out of having me.
That was the meeting.
Yeah.
You kept saying, I love the script.
I want to do it.
I don't, I can't do it.
I've never acted.
I don't think I can do it.
Yeah.
I don't, I do want to do it, but I can't do it.
That was the whole, that was the whole meeting.
Yeah.
It's like Faye Dunaway in Chinatown.
You kept slapping me.
I don't want to do it.
I got to do it.
My sister, my mother, my sister, my brother.
One hundred percent.
And so it was one of those moments.
And so I said to you, well, I think you can do it.
And then you said that you were in a place in your life where you were doing like a radical yes.
Yes.
I was saying yes to things that scared me.
That scared you.
And you said, so that's the place that I'm going to say yes from.
And then you said well, but if I you said, you made me promise you that if you sucked that I would fire you and that we could still be friends.
Yeah.
It's not too late for that.
It is.
It literally is too late.
That's why you're here?
It literally is too late.
And she does feel that way, but it's too late.
I could go back to the editing room, but if you see the movie, it'd be very bizarre if I edited you out.
You could just funny if you just cut from Rose Byrne talking to me and it's just a bag of golf balls.
Who has a crude face painted on it.
Therapist here.
So... No, but you're fabulous.
You showed up and you did it and you worked hard and you're fabulous and accept it.
Take the compliment.
Accept it.
I killed it.
Yes, you did.
I think...
What was funny is I did make you promise.
I said, I don't want to be the guy that ruins your great... I think this thing is terrific.
Then Rose signs on, Rose Byrne, and I'm like, oh my God.
I've never seen Rose Byrne be anything but fantastic.
She's one of the best that we have.
One of the best working actors we have today.
And this was such a different... chance for her, just a role for her.
And I, but when you said Rose Byrne is going to be your scene partner, I had two instincts.
The repressed Irish Catholic boy in me was like.
I love her so much, you know.
Maybe she'll smile at me.
Your tongue like rolled out like a... I know, just I... Who doesn't?
If you've got a pulse, you have a crush on Rose Byrne.
I have a crush on her.
I do too.
I'm obsessed with her.
Yeah, and so I...
I was delighted, but also, oh my God, I don't want to, I can't let Rose burn down.
I don't want to be.
And then we had this, I got to tell you this.
Yeah.
You will probably remember it.
We meet, the three of us are going to meet.
Yeah.
You call a meeting and you say, okay, I happen to be in New York.
I'm always in LA, but I happen to be in New York.
Yeah.
So we all meet at this Midtown hotel.
I said we got to all meet in person.
Yeah.
Yeah.
So we meet and Rose doesn't disappoint.
She shows up.
I mean, she just, you know, she was on the subway.
She comes in.
She takes the subway.
She's such a, you know, I'm in my mind thinking, she'll come here in a white carriage.
You know, like I'm just such a besotted fool.
She's a princess.
But not me.
You weren't worried about how I got there?
I don't give a shit how you get there.
You're tough.
This is what... Anyway, I go on with this.
No, no, no.
And so the three of us are there, and then Rose really quickly starts to You're like oh, I'm really excited and this is going to be great.
And Rose looks at me and she goes, Conan, so... what acting have you done?
And she did that.
And I said, well, I haven't really done anything.
I mean, I've been in sketches.
And she went, uh-huh.
Yeah, not sketches.
And she's doing it in this.
She is so funny.
She's so funny and so sweet.
And she's very sweet.
She wasn't doing this from, but she's doing this from like a kid sister.
Yeah.
Giving Conan a hard time.
It was like, hi, Conan.
Like, what's up?
And I was like, well, I haven't really been in any movies, Rose.
But you can't call her on it because she's doing it in such a sweet way.
And she's doing it in such a sweet way.
And then she said, uh-huh.
And she said, well, but you must have been in something like in high school.
Were you in plays?
And I went, I wasn't really in plays.
No.
And she's like, huh.
And she looked at me.
And then she looked at you.
She was like.
Like, what are you doing with your movie, Mary, that I'm in?
And then she said, well, you probably took acting classes.
And I said, she kept going and kept going.
And I was like, oh, my God.
And I was sitting there like this is.
And then you know, in those cartoons when someone shrinks because they've been humiliated, I kept getting smaller and smaller.
And then I'm sitting on top of a crouton like it's a massive pillow.
I'm just I'm like, hey, I'm going to do my best.
I'm like this tiny little person.
I'm just swilling drinks.
Yeah.
Just trying to.
It's a morning meeting and you are pounding vodka back.
Double fisting it.
I was like, what is going on?
And then Rose looked at me and winked.
Yeah.
And I was like, OK, but also, why are you doing that?
Yeah.
But she was doing that.
She was doing that to tell you, you gotta work.
You're gonna work.
Which is my modus operandi anyway.
I do not, I've never in my life said, check this out.
But I wish someone had filmed that meeting because- It's so funny.
First of all, I was just watching it. as if it was a scene and loving it on that level.
But then, as the person who casted both of you and knowing that your scenes are exclusively only with each other, I'm dying a lot.
Because then in my mind I'm like oh, after this meeting, Rose is going to come to me and be like he never even took an acting class.
What's going on here?
But she didn't.
She came up to me after the meeting and was like, he's so great.
I'm so excited.
I can't wait.
But blood was coming out her eyes when she said it.
Are you okay, Rose?
I lost a couple years off my life on that one.
But guess what?
I was right.
I don't want to give spoilers on the movie.
This is not a spoiler.
You play her therapist.
Yeah, yeah.
So the rest of the meeting was us all talking about therapy, which we all have our stories.
Well, then I decided you came out here to L.A.
Yes, I did.
Right to this studio in Larchmont.
I announced to you.
You said, I'm coming and we're going to work.
I didn't ask.
And so you and I would meet out on this little terrace.
For four hours a day for one week.
Really?
Four hours a day.
And we would go over and you would drill me on who is this guy?
What's his deal?
And you had me- Drill you.
And all of the things that I have to admit-
As a novice, I would be suspicious of.
It was a boot camp.
I have to know what kind of shoes this guy likes or what his backstory is.
You do.
But you did it and I could see the value of it.
And by the time my assistant, David Hopping, came with me.
I was looking for him.
He's on the room.
No, no, he's banished.
David.
He's being punished.
I love David.
David's great.
Come on.
But David, he's out in the hallway.
I'm jealous.
David came with me and we went to New York for the shooting.
For the shoot, yeah.
And it was, my scenes with Rose are in the smallest office.
It's a real office.
Real office.
It might even be a real therapist's office.
It was.
It was a real therapist suite that I took over.
Why don't you use that guy?
No, I completely redid it in my imagination, what I wanted it to be, which is that there's different kinds of therapists.
We've all been in therapy.
We've all been in therapy, right?
We all admit it.
After I got this job.
You and Eduardo are looking at each other.
No, Sona.
No, I don't.
No, you don't need to be in therapy.
I do need.
No, you do not.
I don't.
You are Zorba the Greek.
You do not need therapy.
Not everybody needs it.
But in New York, you throw a pebble, the person's been in therapy.
Everybody's in therapy.
And so I've been, you know, I've had good therapists.
I've had bad therapists.
I've had every kind of therapist in between.
And they all, what fascinates me is that therapists have different kinds of offices.
And I can know when I walk into the office, I'm like, Either I'm like, okay, this is going to work.
I like this.
Or I'm like, I got to get the fuck out of here.
This guy.
Oh, can I swear?
No.
This airs on PBS tomorrow.
I just went blue.
I just worked blue a little bit.
This is being introed by Elmo.
Why did I ask that?
I'm such a dork.
Anyway, so I'm going to say it again.
I go, I got to get the fuck out of here.
And then it's because some therapists take a lot of care in every inch of the room having a meaning or a purpose in a therapeutic sense.
You know, like I'm going to pick this color for the wall because it's calming.
I'm going to put these knickknacks here because they might elicit something, but they don't give anything away about me.
And then some therapists you go in.
There's like a picture of them with, like their mom and dog and like that's too much.
And then there's a therapist that rose plays, who she's hanging on for the last, the last thread.
She just went in.
She was like this is the room.
Okay, i'll rent it.
The furniture that came with the room yeah, it's fine.
And he's also.
I i don't clean up my garbage.
Come in yeah, Welcome.
And and you guys are two very different types of therapists.
And so, you know, it was a real room.
Yeah.
Very tiny.
And if you remember, the way that I like to direct or the way that I like to run a set, is that I don't like to be down the hall on a monitor.
When I can be, I like to be in the room.
And that's because for the rest of time, I will see the performance on a screen.
It's my only chance.
I set up the shot.
I'm not just going in and sitting there.
I set up the shot myself.
I know what the framing is in my mind, but I watch it live like a play.
And it's the greatest pleasure for me.
And then I watch it back, and then we decide if we're going to do it again.
But watching you guys, you know, I'd be sitting in the little corner.
It was a very tiny room.
And watching you guys... sometimes I would forget that this was my movie.
And I would just be like, I'm watching a play.
Your chemistry, and you guys were both so in it, and the work we did, was I correct or incorrect?
You were 100% correct.
Because you had all that's in there.
Well, the other thing – okay, I'll admit to this which is I've done a lot of scary things in my career, terrifying things, and I keep doing terrifying things.
And I mean physically terrifying things and then just things where I feel like, oh my God, I could really get – my career could be shattered here if this doesn't go well.
Yeah.
And this –
So I'm used to doing scary things, but there was a moment where it's just Rose and I looking at each other and we have this intense scene to do.
Yes.
And then you say, action, and my heart is pounding in my chest, which is not me.
I don't... That's not... But...
For the first take, when we're really doing the movie, and I'm aware there's a whole crew here.
There's cameras.
This is very intimate.
That's Rose and action.
I could feel.
You know when you can feel your circulatory system.
There's nowhere to hide in that moment.
Yeah, and all my normal tricks of oh, I can riff, I can come up with a funny distraction.
And then I have to say the secret weapon in that situation is Rose Byrne, because I would see her go from zero to 95.
And I mean I described this to one reporter.
But she can just pull her own heart out and rip it in half in front of you.
And then you would yell, cut, and she'd say, whoo, hey, cut. can I get a sandwich?
You know, and I don't, I don't know.
I'm not, I, I just said, I don't know that we're the same species.
I don't know how you do that.
A hundred percent.
And I also remember the and when people watch the movie, they'll know exactly what scene I'm going to talk, I'm talking about, but I don't want to give it away.
There's a, there's a very intense scene, very intense, where she is literally and I don't know, and this is this.
Is you, this is you doing technical acting?
I don't know how you did this.
She's literally screaming in your face.
Yeah.
One inch from your face.
Yeah.
And it's very intense.
And I remember that when I called cut on that she just started hysterically laughing and she couldn't stop.
And she like fell off the couch and was like crying, laughing.
And it was a release.
And you were sitting there and you didn't know what was happening.
I knew what was happening, but you were just like, like, did her brain just break?
Like, did you just break Rose Byrne?
But when you're doing intense work like that Look the two, and this is also in the movie, it's baked into the idea of the movie where you're talking about tone in a very calculated way is that is like when something, when the universe is like piling everything onto you and it's like the universe is doing everything to work against you.
And something really bad is happening.
But then also like you get all the red lights and then also like your pencil breaks.
And it's just like too much.
You can laugh or you can cry.
Those are the two ways that your body physically deals with that.
And in this movie, I try to do both.
I do both of those things.
But Rose is so the type of actor she can get a laugh on the heels of a cry.
Yes, where I'm cutting it because I know that I'm cutting from her crying and I know what's the next thing and it's a laugh.
And I think what is gonna surprise people the most that are fans of yours is that your character is devoid of humor.
Yeah.
Well, you know, it's funny.
There's a lot of, and again, I don't want to give too much away.
But you get laughs because it's so extreme.
Well, the other thing is that I realized early on, I did not like this character I'm playing.
And I used to tell you, I don't like this guy.
What did I say?
Do you remember?
Shut up and do it.
You said, I'll put peanut butter on your lips.
I said, where's Greg Kinnear?
Yeah, exactly.
I gotta get him.
Get me Kinnear.
No, I said you have to love him.
Yep.
Because he's you.
Yeah, yeah.
But also you have to release the fact that people in the theater might not like him.
Yeah.
Because there's some people in life that you don't like.
And there's some people in a movie that you don't like, and we can't be scared of that.
Well, this is the other thing that fascinates me.
I realized early on, especially when, I mean, multiply this by a thousand once you cast Rose.
Yeah, yeah.
Once Rose Byrne is in the film and I realize my relationship with that character, it's contrary to every instinct I have in my body as Conan.
100%.
I am a people pleaser.
This will shock you Matt, but I do very much want.
I very much want.
A lot of my career has been trying to put people at ease and make them okay and make everyone okay.
Yeah.
And...
I'm not letting you do that.
Yeah, for better or worse.
And in this role, I had to do the opposite.
And when it's Rose, who was probably, you know, one of the people in show business that I would most want to please, you've made it a thousand times harder.
Impossible.
And I'm locked in this little room and I realized, oh, I see what this is.
That helped me a lot was to know...
Um, any instinct I have, I need to go the other way.
Almost you know the George Costanza like yeah, exactly.
Yeah.
I'm going to say the opposite, do the opposite of what I would normally do.
But yeah.
And it's, it, it's also it, it, and also for me, it was so magical to see you transform that way.
Cause, like I like we talked about the beginning.
I've I've been watching you on screen for for over 30 years.
Um, I know that thing that you're talking about, and it's what made me a fan.
And so then it's like this thing I don't know what that says about me that then I wanted to take you and strip all of that off.
Yeah, yeah.
So that then you're left with something.
It's so raw what you're doing.
Yeah.
And it's such a trust.
You trusted me.
Yeah, of course.
In a way that I'm always going to be grateful for, because that is your go-to, what you're talking about.
And I'm saying you're not allowed to do any of that.
Yeah, yeah.
And you did it so fantastically.
That means that it's also part of you.
And it's also why I would be disbarred as a therapist.
Because you said, can't we just take, can't my character just say, let's go for a walk?
Yeah.
Can't I just say, go take a nap and I'll babysit?
And I'm like, no, you can't.
Yeah, yeah.
I mean every instinct if I was a therapist and would be to completely cross the line and say well, this sounds rough.
Okay, here's what we're going to do.
I mean, nothing creepy, but this is what we're going to do.
I'm renting you a hotel room.
I'm getting you a hotel room.
You get some sleep.
I'll look after your kid.
I'm going to go out and get you some tacos.
And I'm going to bring them to you.
I need a therapist like that.
I need a therapist like that.
Are you okay now?
How about get you more sleep?
That's okay.
I'll stand outside the door and guard you.
And the husband is like, what is this therapist?
Yeah, what's this guy?
What's he up to?
Why is he renting your hotel rooms?
So now we get to the really the part where it's getting really surreal to me, because I cannot stress enough that movie-making film, it's never been on my agenda.
And also it is not...
It's the opposite of the kind of art or show business that I'm involved in.
Mine is very much we make this.
It's immediate.
For almost three decades it was let's.
We'll have an idea at three o'clock in the afternoon that we really like, and we'll do it at five, and it will air that night.
I'm so jealous of that.
I'm so jealous of that.
Well, there's a yin and yang.
And the only experience I had with this long wait was The Simpsons, where I'd come up with an idea, I'd work on it with all the other writers, we'd make it as good as we could, and then a year would go by.
Is that true?
I never thought about that.
It's close to a year.
I mean, sometimes it's less, but...
I think for some of my episodes it was much to the point where you almost forgot what this was all about.
And then it would come out.
I never thought about that.
Yeah.
Because it's animation.
And so this is very different.
And so what happened was we went through this intense experience.
We made this.
I'm then released.
Then I'm doing all the stuff that I do and whatever.
Very much me focused and in my world.
And then I'm hearing from you occasionally that editing and and then I just I got to the point where this had completely drifted away from me.
Yeah.
And then it starts to get back, creep back in in this very nice way, which is I'm hearing really nice things.
You're very happy.
And the one thing I always said is all I want for you is for you to make the movie you want to make.
And you called me up one day and said, we locked it.
It's the movie I wanted to make.
I remember that day.
And I said, who is this?
You said, who is this again?
Yeah.
No, I remember that day.
You were the person I wanted to call and say that to because you said that to me.
From my brain to the page to the screen, I made no creative concessions.
Wow.
But not because it's easy to do that, because you fight and you fight, and you fight and you fight, and then, and you and you can't not give up.
And filmmaking is like the longest con that there is because because of how long it takes to do.
And then you have to wait for it to come out.
And I was so impatient and and the fighting never stops.
Right.
And I don't mean fighting, like people are trying to not let you do it, but just that if you have an idea and you know that the idea is correct, someone else might have a different opinion about it.
But I don't want that opinion.
It's mine.
This is mine.
And so I would fight.
And, you know, A24, I have to say, we're such wonderful partners because I won every fight.
And sometimes the fights are like almost like you have to like.
I announced this movie shall have no score.
The score is sound design.
It's only sound design.
Well, that's then it's like, well, you can't do that.
You have to have a score.
No, I don't.
And then that, you know, that, that. it doesn't have a score.
And it's correct for the movie.
It's not that... Then my next movie might have a score.
I don't know.
But for this movie, it doesn't.
And it doesn't stop.
And then and then alongside you, the form of it feels loose like that.
If you feel it through the television, when you're watching it, it feels loose and it feels immediate.
Right.
And it feel it's ephemeral.
So like, say, I mean, probably to you, you want to die.
But like, if you have an idea, you do the skit or the piece and it and it like bombs.
Yep.
It's over, and then you're on to the next thing.
You're doing another show the next day.
You're doing another piece after the next commercial break, whatever.
And there's an immediacy to that that I think is so magical, that for me that's broadcast television.
And that's the magic of broadcast television.
I'm 46 years old, so you just drop.
That was a mic drop.
I was riveted.
You just couldn't believe it, what I said.
Aren't you the professional in the room?
I said I'm 46 years old, and he freaked the fuck out.
He thought 26.
No, because he's uncomfortable with middle-aged women, and I understand now.
Famously.
Very famously.
He's always awkward around me.
I just dropped my pen.
Sometimes a pipe is just a pipe.
You know what?
I'll let it go.
I want to get to something you said that I think is worth talking about.
You said...
And again don't want to give away too much about the movie, but you said there's a lot of.
There've been many women going crazy movies, but none of them by women.
All of them have been made by men.
And that was important to you.
And I do think that you can feel the difference in the film that it's your point of view and it's devoid.
And look, many men have made many good films about this, but it has to be different than a woman doing it.
I don't take anything away from any of those films.
All those films are inside my body and my DNA.
And they come out through my work somehow.
But one time I heard Denzel Washington say something that I really it stuck with me because the interviewer said to him well, why is it so important to you?
I forget even what the movie he was promoting, but why is it so important to you that the filmmakers and the whatever are also black?
And he said, it's not about color.
It's not about race.
It's about culture.
He's like.
I know what it feels like and smells like to have a hot comb go through my hair on a Sunday morning.
Okay.
I don't know what that is.
Right.
And it's the same way that a man doesn't know what it's like to be socialized in a society as a girl and grow up and to be a woman.
Mm-hmm.
They just don't.
Like, I don't know what it's like to be a man.
And it's fine.
I can write a movie about a man.
A man can write a movie about a woman.
I can write a movie about a black person.
Black person can't write a... It doesn't matter.
But it's that thing of it's culture.
It's experience.
It's just baked in.
And so I think it's 2025 and it's still radical for people to tell their own stories, which is wild to me, filmmaking is a male-dominated field.
And that's just the way it is.
And so my whole thing is like, it doesn't have to be the way it is.
Why is it the way it is?
I'm going to radically... All I care about is creating characters...
Female characters that are full human beings that are on the screen, and we know those women.
We have encountered those women in different ways.
Sometimes we are those women.
They might scare us.
None of that's bad.
It's all great, because the thing about movies is that you are in a theater and you are asked to get into somebody else's point of view, into somebody else's life, whether it's whether, like you, brought up Chinatown or like some of my favorite movies like Bonnie and Clyde, movies that you immerse yourself in like The Shining, like you forget yourself.
That's the idea of a movie.
That's the magic of movies.
You forget yourself, you forget your life, and then you open the door.
Best thing is if you see a movie in the daytime and you open the door and you forget it's daytime and the sun hits you in the face.
That's magical.
That's movies.
That means that you forgot.
You were transported.
Yes.
Yes.
And if you're, people are scared.
People are scared of of of being asked to get into somebody else's mind or point of view that they're not familiar with.
You know, and for me, I just in a radical way, I just want to push that as far as it goes.
You know, I'm not a provocateur provocateur provocateur.
I'm not one.
I'm wearing a... You're so not one, you can't even say it.
Provocateur.
Provocateur.
Now I'm just going to keep saying it.
I am no provocateur.
Provocateur.
Because it's such a pretentious word to say because you have to say it with an accent.
I hate that.
I'm wearing a John Waters t-shirt.
He is one.
Yeah.
He is one.
But he is a huge influence on my work because he's just like, you know what?
I have an idea.
I'm going to put it on film.
You like it, you don't like it.
It doesn't matter.
I also just want to point out that to people that are just listening, there's a lot of humor in the movie.
Oh, yeah.
And I don't want to give anything away, but you pitched me one thing that I thought I don't see how this is going to work.
And it involves like a puppet.
Oh, yeah.
And I thought... Oh, there's puppets in this movie.
Nice.
Oh, there's puppets.
It's so over the top.
Yeah, yeah.
And the comedy is really dark, which is my favorite kind.
Yes, gallows humor.
It's gallows humor, but there's a puppet scene.
And I thought, there's...
This I'm reading the script.
But you said you laughed out loud when you read it in the script.
Yeah, no, I thought it was really funny.
But I also thought, I don't see how this is going to work.
And then it's it's one of my favorite things.
It's really ridiculous.
Because do you know why?
If you're going to use puppets in a movie, you you you do it like my whole thing.
I don't.
There's no way that, I'm not tricking anybody into thinking that it's not a puppet.
Right.
Right?
Right.
I can say without giving anything away, it involves a hamster.
Mm-hmm.
And also, I'm a puppet.
You're not a puppet.
Well, yes, you are.
You are my puppet.
And I was the puppet master.
You were going to watch it, and there's like a cardboard corner going, whoa, okay, Rose.
I call her Rose.
Okay, Rose.
That's another thing you kept saying, cut.
Cut, that's not her name.
How are you, Rose Byrne?
Cut.
Cut.
Rose Byrne from Movies and Television.
How are you?
Hello, famed Rose Byrne.
I'm your therapist.
Cut!
Conan, all right.
No, with the puppets, it's like, I don't care.
It's like the Muppet Show.
Yep. is a big influence on me.
You know, I don't watch The Muppet Show now.
As an adult, it lives inside my DNA.
It's part of my DNA.
All these things are, yeah.
And it's like, you see strings on The Muppet Show.
You see strings.
You see sometimes, you see, it doesn't matter, because you're watching a puppet and no one's trying to pretend that you're not right.
And there's something radical about that.
And there's something so, it's visceral.
It's visceral.
Oh.
I'll tell you, one of the most shocking things I've seen in my life is, in my New York existence, being asked to do something on Sesame Street and going over to Queens or Brooklyn, wherever they were.
Please tell me the story.
I'm living for this.
I go in and they're like okay Conan, we're going to shoot this thing and Elmo's there and you're going to be here.
And I'm just looking around because it's where they shoot everything.
And it's limited space because it's a very urban warehouse or studio.
And so I look up and they have lashed Snuffleupagus to the ceiling.
And it's, you know, you got to keep him somewhere.
He's not.
They lashed him to the ceiling and it looks exactly like the guard that Hannibal Lecter flayed and puts up skins and hangs out.
And you're shocked, and you're an adult, and you're so shocked, I'm an adult.
I was in my 30s.
I looked up and I went sweet Christ.
No, and he's inanimate.
His eyes have rolled back in his head and he's lashed to the ceiling.
And Something the genius of the Muppets is when they're animated.
You believe, you talk to them.
Horrifying.
Did he have to be on the ceiling?
Because I guess they didn't.
They were just like, hoist him up.
We got to clear this space.
It's a 90 pound, 170 pound costume.
So yeah.
And then when they were done with me, they lashed me to the ceiling.
No.
That's the end of that bit.
But anyway.
Oh, I know Amy.
Because she's my best friend.
She's the best.
We'll see.
Well, you know what, Conan?
I'm very competitive with Amy.
She was like, I'm her best friend.
And I'm like, well, I don't know.
You could work it.
You could work it.
I'm buying you a car.
Oh, my God.
I'm going to get you land upstate.
Two desks.
Rye, New York.
A lot of land.
Very needy.
Rye, New York.
I have family that lives there.
Let's pick somewhere more exciting where I haven't been.
Bermuda.
And I'm driving a car there that you bought me because you shipped it there?
I shipped it there at my own expense.
Oh.
And what does my house look like?
It's made of $100,000 bills.
And do I have to work?
You never have to work again.
But you do have to show up for your foot massage, done by a professional foot masseuse whose name's Guillermo.
Oh.
Listen, I've got this all figured out.
I'm your new best friend.
Do you see my face right now?
I'm a little bit, you know what?
I'm tempted.
Yeah.
But I don't think you can pull it off.
I can't.
I think you're just talking.
I think you're selling me some snake oil over here.
Pen drop moment.
But what I was going to say was that she took a puppetry class in college.
You know as one does to spend our parents' money very wisely.
Sure.
And the culmination of the class is that they were going to go see the Sesame Street.
And I said, guess what?
I'm going to pretend to be in the class.
I'm going on this trip.
And I did.
I showed up and I stayed.
You lied to the Sesame Street gang.
I was sneaking.
I was just saying I want the professor to see me.
I'd be so excited.
And I went in there and I saw, here's what I saw, my friend.
I saw Big Bird's legs not attached to his body.
Horrifying.
It's a ghoul's paradise in there.
And they were fixing them.
They were fixing them and putting, refelting them or whatever it was.
And they were on a table, like a surgeon's table.
And they were attached to no body.
And I couldn't ask a question.
But in my mind, I was like, where's the rest of Big Bird?
In a wheelchair.
Yeah.
He had no legs, man.
That's where I came up.
And then I came up with the title for this movie.
Yeah, exactly.
If I had legs.
I brought it back.
You brought it around.
You made it work.
Never go to the Sesame Street set.
I'm just telling you, it's horrifying.
You need to hide that stuff.
The two old men up in the balcony who criticized the show.
That's me.
Yeah, guess what?
I saw their genitals nailed to a wall.
There's no reason for that.
You took it a little far.
You did.
That's what I do.
My name is Johnny Too Far.
No, they don't have titles.
That's not cool.
You know what?
I want to get to the happiest part of this whole thing is that I'm going to New York next week.
I'm going to do Colbert's show.
Yeah.
And I get to throw to a clip.
Oh, wow.
Guess who picks the clip?
Yep.
I'm picking that clip, baby.
Well.
So what's crazy to me is I've spent a whole career making fun of the idea of throwing to a clip.
You have to set it up.
And now I'm going to throw to a real clip.
I never thought of that before.
And my whole life has been, what's a good bit about throwing to a clip?
Never throw to a clip.
Mackin' me.
Yeah, all my work with Mr. Paul Rudd has been.
Yeah, top that.
No, and so.
What if I'm mackin' me you, but it's not mackin' me, it's something else.
Yeah.
Now I got to think about, but I have to think of my career.
Yeah, exactly.
You do.
Fortunately, I do not have to think about my career anymore.
A24 wouldn't like that if I did that.
Yeah, yeah.
They would say, what happened?
We're not releasing this film.
No, and it was just Don Knotts.
Yeah.
I...
Going to a conversation we had off mic about Mr. Don Knotts, one of the greats of all time.
When are we not talking about Don Knotts?
So what are you going to do?
You thought about it?
I'm going to throw to a club.
He's going to say, do you want to say something about this?
Set it up?
Yeah, I have to know which clip it is.
I'm not going to tell you.
That's the tricky part.
No, I'm gonna tell you.
I'm gonna tell you.
I'm gonna tell you.
But it's just so funny to me to be, I'm here to promote.
So, all right, well, Conan's movie opens.
Yeah, you gotta accept it, man.
Blah, blah, blah.
You're a movie star.
Oh, I'm going for it.
You're a movie star now.
But I am very, you know, I have two strong feelings about this whole endeavor, which is I am just so happy that for Rose Byrne, because she is being noticed in a big way.
Hiding in plain sight.
Hiding in plain sight, which is what you said to me about Rose.
I'm gonna cast this person who everyone loves, who's amazing and she needs, now it's her time.
You nailed it.
And I'm thrilled for you because you have been, you are incredibly tenacious.
There were many hurdles, many obstacles.
You had to overcome a lot.
You got this made and you're a very, very impressive person.
And I'm thrilled to be your second best.
Second best friend.
Second best friend.
The movie is If I Had Legs, I'd Kick You.
And when is the premiere date?
When does this happen?
So it comes out in New York and L.A. on October 10th and then all other major cities on the 17th.
And then after that.
And I'm going to like a premiere next week.
Oh, you're going to premiere at the New York Film Festival.
I bought a feather boa for this.
Oh, wow.
Oh, that's an interesting choice.
What do you mean interesting?
It's what all the actresses do.
You know what?
Actresses.
Actresses.
But you know what?
We can gender bend.
It's fine.
It's all, you know, it's okay.
I've been gender bending for a long time.
No one's quite sure what I am.
Bending.
You're just bending.
Okay.
Mary Bronstein.
Thank you.
Go, go, go.
Never stop.
Do your thing.
Thank you.
And I'm really proud of you.
I'm your avuncular pal.
You know what?
You are.
I really am.
And you always tell me that you're proud of me and I appreciate it.
Yeah.
I really do.
Yeah.
Because you know what?
I'm proud of you.
I can't handle.
Accept it.
Accept it.
Okay.
I accept it.
I just threw it up.
Podcast over.
Pen drop.
Pen drop.
Yeah!
Conan O'Brien Needs a Friend with Conan O'Brien, Sonam Ovsessian, and Matt Gourley.
Produced by me, Matt Gourley.
Executive produced by Adam Sachs, Jeff Ross, and Nick Liao.
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 Batista, 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 And if you haven't already, please subscribe to.
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