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Okay, let's get started.
Hey guys.
Hi Sid.
Welcome to Conan O'Brien Needs a Fan.
Hello.
Thank you so much.
Hey Sid.
How are you?
Hey Matt.
Hey David.
Hi.
Yes.
You can leave.
What the hell was that?
You got Conan O'Brien in the room.
You got the Queen of England in the room and you're talking to the footman.
What are you doing?
Here's what it is.
Okay.
This is the inaugural episode of Matt Gourley Needs a Fan.
Oh!
Nice.
Look at you.
You've got a James Bond poster and a cat back there.
You are.
You're goddamn right.
Wow.
This is great.
Listen, I am very secure in my fame and I will allow.
Matt Gurley to have one fan, and that can be you Sid, as long as you remain in Budapest and never leave.
I can never meet him?
You can never meet him.
Oh, man.
That I will not allow.
You meeting a fan, I won't have it.
All right.
No, well, I'll come to Pasadena and I'll find you.
How about that?
Sounds like you already know where he lives.
Sounds ominous.
Well, tell us a little bit about yourself.
We already know that you do you listen to this podcast at all, or you only listen to Matt Gourley products.
Well, here's the thing.
First of all, I listen to this podcast religiously.
There you go.
I'm like Trump.
I'm like Trump.
You really need to blow a lot of hot air my way and then I come around.
All right, okay.
You're like him in a lot of ways.
I'm a lot like him.
It's true.
I bloviate.
I have insane hair.
I spent a lot of time in Florida.
But anyway, so go ahead.
Tell us the story.
You listen to this.
I like how this is starting.
You listen to the Conan O'Brien podcast all the time.
Go ahead.
Yeah, and I re-listen to episodes as well.
I find certain ones that sort of comfort me a lot.
I'm a big fan of the podcast, but I have to be honest Conan, it was your podcast that made me a fan of you.
I mean, it was Matt's podcast.
It was.
Oh, wait a minute.
I'm sorry.
This is episode one.
We'll see how it goes.
Yeah.
But what I'm saying is it was you didn't know about me at all.
And then you started listening to my podcast.
Well, I knew your name.
I knew your face.
I saw your little walk-on cameo in the office and stuff.
You saw no reason to pursue.
I heard your name and I saw your face and I was out.
I love that he knows me from my cameo on The Office.
That's fantastic.
Listen, here's my attitude about all of this.
You wanna know the fucked up thing about that?
I thought you were Craig Kilbourne.
Yeah.
Oh, wow.
There's a name I haven't heard in a while.
I know, yeah.
Listen, I said, this is good for me.
You're like a loofah for my ego.
You're scrubbing away at it, removing all the dead layers.
So I welcome this.
Yes.
You know, I have too many people on the street saying, I want to do you do me now.
Oh, we walk around with you.
Have you ever heard?
No, I've never heard that.
This is in my mind.
But I've heard you say that.
I say it.
Yeah, I say it to myself.
No, but Sid... He walks around with earbuds on.
Yeah.
It's just a recording of me on a loop.
Sid, I am fine.
I like that you... Here's my...
Here's how I feel.
I'm kind of like a drug dealer in that as long as I get you on heroin, I don't care how you came to like it.
So when people say to me oh, I only knew you from your failed line of designer jeans in 1996, I'm like I don't care as long as I got you in the door.
But now I feel like I have to apologize because I'm responsible for getting you hooked on this heroin.
You know what I mean?
Yeah, because you were a Gourley fan, right?
You listened to Gourley's podcast.
Which one?
Yeah, okay, so Matt, genuinely, I am a bit starstruck talking to you.
Oh, come on.
No, I'm liking this.
This is good.
This makes me so uncomfortable.
You're so sweet.
I understand that, but I do have to say it.
But you and I had a brief interaction on Twitter, actually back when it was Twitter a few years ago, where I said that you were more like instrumental in forming my comedic voice than anyone else.
And that's through me listening to the James Bonding podcast.
Oh, my God.
From from day one over and over.
Actually, I've relistened to the entire run, I think maybe six or seven times.
Wow.
And it was when you were talking to Matt Myra about working with Conan that I was like oh shit, Gorley's got another podcast.
Let me check the Conan thing.
Oh yeah.
He's got another podcast with ugly face from the office cameo.
I believe I said Craig Kilborn.
Yeah, weird name, ugly face from the cameo.
Well, I'm going to Sid.
You are uh, i honor your love of gorley.
He's very talented, very funny, and this is all.
Uh, a great day in my life occurred when i met this this gentleman.
And so no no seriously i i'm i'm, this is all not going to irritate me.
It's not going to irritate me at all.
Yeah, you seem fine.
I'm, I'm going to get over this.
I'm going to put the knife away.
Speaking of heroin, I'd like just a little taste right now.
I want to disassociate from my emotions at the moment.
No, but that's great.
I'm glad, but let's...
We'll go back to Gourley, but I want to find out a little bit about you, okay?
Because part of the whole reason for this podcast, where I talk to people around the world, is to find out what they're up to, and then we can return to the great Matt Gourley.
Tell us about yourself.
What do you do?
Are you native to Budapest?
Tell us about yourself.
Matt, is it OK if I answer that question?
Yes, I will allow it.
But you've got 20 seconds.
Then we get back to me.
Well, okay, so I'm not native to Budapest.
Good pronunciation, by the way, Conan.
I am originally Indian.
You know, I have such an ugly face, I have a lot of time to get pronunciations right.
Because no one invites me out, but go ahead.
I don't want it to be on the record that I find you ugly because I don't.
I find you to be a very attractive man, so let's just get that out there.
Yeah, so I'm originally Indian.
I left there when I was very young, when I was eight.
And I was basically raised in Central Eastern Europe.
I lived in Prague for a couple of years.
And for the last 25 years, I've been here in Budapest.
So I'm essentially a local here, but I don't present as such, obviously.
Yeah.
Do people in Budapest think that you are a tourist often?
You know, when I was a teenager, they thought I was a member of the Roma population.
And so they would kind of get a little bit nervous that I was going to, you know, steal something from them or behave in an unsavory way or whatever.
Did you live in America because of your accent?
Are you asking because of the accent?
Yeah.
There's an American school here and that's where I went to school.
Oh, wow.
But I mean, the fact that you picked up that accent.
So you've been in the United States.
You spent a lot of time here?
No, you went to an American school.
There's like an American international school here in Budapest.
That's where I went to school.
Wow.
That's very impressive that you would.
I mean honestly, I feel like if I was just talking to you on the phone, I'd feel like you were from Rhine, New York.
Yeah, yeah.
You know, it's just, it's incredible that you, a school can provide that.
Yeah, did movies and James Bond movies have anything to do with that?
I know they're English, but...
Well, it's weird.
It was more cartoons, actually, because when I left India, it was a lot of cartoons, but you know, the Bugs Bunnies and the Cartoon Networks of the world.
But obviously, when I speak to my family, I still speak with an Indian accent, so I code switch.
But that happens.
I go back to Boston.
I haven't lived in Boston since 1981.
But, I mean, I haven't really been... That's not true.
1985.
But...
But when I drift back to Boston, I find certain things coming out.
I'm much more abrasive.
Intolerant.
The Bill Burr in you comes out.
Yeah, suddenly.
Little short quips and short breaths.
I'm an insane driver suddenly.
So that can happen.
What do you do for a profession?
What is your?
What's bread on my table?
So I'm the head of marketing for a cheese company, which is run by my childhood friend.
So he's the CEO.
It's like a family run company.
So I'm their head of marketing.
On the side, I also dabble in stand up.
But yeah, but obviously that doesn't pay anything.
Well, I don't know.
I mean, it might.
Is there a thriving stand up scene in Budapest?
You know, it's not bad.
It's pretty good.
But I guess the market for it is kind of limited because you have a couple of filters.
You have number one people who are interested in comedy, which in a former Soviet country is also questionable.
There's people interested in comedy, people who are interested in comedy who speak English, people interested in comedy who speak English who actually want to go to a basement bar on a weekday.
So there's a few levels.
But, you know, we draw a crowd.
There's a few very talented people that I admire a lot.
And, yeah, it's pretty good.
It's an up-and-coming scene.
It's been active for, I guess, at most, maybe 15 years.
Why don't you do me a favor?
It'd be a nice thing to give a shout-out to some of your favorite comedians that you see in the Budapest scene.
And your favorite cheese.
We want a pairing of best comic with best cheese.
But seriously, just quickly name a few people so that maybe some of our listeners, someone out there, might hear about this and then we might discover somebody.
Oh, trust me.
I'm going to tell him about it.
All right.
So shout out to- Add yourself as well, Sid, your full name too, so people can come see you.
Yeah.
What's your full name?
Hey, Sid Murthy.
Thank you very much.
Okay.
There was no applause.
It's very easy to spell, obviously.
Please, please settle down.
Please.
I'll edit some in.
Yeah.
Thanks, Carly.
All right.
So shout out to Rom, obviously, who's a big Conan fan.
Kitty, Albert.
Hey, let's put the light on Rom.
No, we don't have time for that.
What is Rom's full name?
Rom can call in.
What's Rom's full name?
He would prefer to remain anonymous.
Oh, he'll go far.
He hires a publicist.
All right, here's what we're going to do.
I'd like to be anonymous.
What?
What are you talking about?
What's your name?
This is unimportant.
Can we have a photograph of your face?
No.
I want you in a film.
I won't do it.
I might be seen.
It's actually a little bit relevant because he's an outspoken Iranian.
Not not in Iran.
So if he if he's seen as talking shit about the government, then he can be called back.
And, you know, does he wear a disguise when he performs like the unknown comic?
No, the disguise that he wears is remaining in relative anonymity in a pretty small comedy scene.
It's so funny.
I asked for a shout out.
And by the way, we hear from fans in Tehran.
We have fans in Tehran.
And a shout out to them because I know they've been going through a difficult time.
I'm talking about the people of Tehran.
There's a lot of young people out there and some of them are listening to this podcast.
And I think it's relevant to say that we've been hearing from them.
And it's so funny that you're saying that.
So there are people in Iran who are listening to this podcast.
And I say, let's give a big shout out.
Let's put the spotlight on one of your friends who you think is really talented.
And you mentioned a guy who's in hiding.
And am I right?
So he can he has to like fight a certain amount of success.
He can't be too good because if he becomes known, then he's in danger.
So he has to be like a mediocre comic to stay alive.
Trust me, I'm familiar with this process.
Yeah.
That explains a lot.
There aren't a lot of people out to get me, but there are some.
That's why I've kept it at kind of B minus celebrity status.
Okay.
It's very comforting to me.
He's been given the tonight show, but don't worry, he'll be off very soon.
You know what?
It's been a long enough time that I can really laugh at it.
And no, I can't.
Sid, now I'm coming after you.
Bring it on, man.
Yeah.
Oh, wow.
Okay.
I can't wait to jump out of a mailbox in Budapest and attack you.
It'll just be with like a wet stuffed animal that I hit you with.
So the cheese business, you're doing that.
I'm going to take a wild stab and say, I don't think you take that business very seriously.
I don't think it's your passion.
Well, how can you?
How can you take cheese seriously?
Who does take cheese seriously?
Like, apart from Jordan Schlansky.
My father-in-law and Jordan Schlansky.
They would take cheese very seriously, yes.
But there are people out there.
Jake, if you're listening, I'm after you too.
But there are people that take cheese very seriously.
I mean, you can pick any object and there's someone in the world who takes it very seriously.
So there are people.
Is it a profitable cheese concern?
Is it doing well?
It is.
It's doing very well.
It's thriving.
We sell a lot of cheese in the Middle East, actually.
So the company is owned by a Lebanese family here in Hungary.
What a melting pot this is.
Oh, yeah.
Yeah.
Of course, an Irish guy sweeps up afterwards.
You've got everyone working for you.
So, and the cheese is good.
You're backing the cheese.
How many kinds of cheese do you make?
And we also invent new kinds of cheese as well.
Really?
What's a new kind of cheese?
I thought there were just the cheeses that exist that are always on a plate when you go to a nice party and they put out the cheese course.
And there they are.
There's the blue cheese.
There's the soft cheeses, the breeze.
Yeah, but there's the cheddar there's uh, but are there really that many kinds of cheese?
There are countless types of cheese.
I mean like if an accident happens with, like your milk and acid levels then boom, that's a new type of cheese.
So, like you just sort of improvise, but um It's, you know different, like consumption methods or whatever.
Could you theoretically invent like a Conan cheese?
Yeah.
Could you make a cheese?
Or he's going to want to make it about you.
It's going to be a Matt Goral cheese.
But I think cheese is much more appropriate for you.
Okay, that's good, that's good.
Do you make rods up the ass?
Like a stiff rod up the ass?
Because then we could name that after Matt new new astiff rod.
We call it the Gorley, but it's signature, it's signature, I'll take it.
And it's made of a fine ash.
Okay alright alright, it's.
Their quality is superb.
I worked with the designer and I approved this stiff rod at the ass.
It's you looking slightly uncomfortable, but also you're a little pleased.
You're having a low level of erotic high.
Yeah, maybe you can make a cone and cheese and we could maybe profit together from this venture.
Well, okay, good.
Because this is kind of what I do.
So every year...
So here in Hungary our most popular, profitable whatever you want to call it type of cheese is halloumi, which is like a Mediterranean type of cheese which is really popular in the Middle East as well.
Uh, and, and every year we introduce two new flavored halloumi, um, products.
Uh, this year we did a tandoori one and um Tomato and basil, kind of basic ones, but we like to go for more and more.
I guess shocking, surprising flavor combinations.
Well, I am shocking and surprising, I think.
Well, that's really true.
And I don't know.
I'm getting a lot of citrus energy from you.
Oh.
Yeah, I'm very acidic.
I also have me with any medication and the medication will be less effective.
There you go.
And I mean, that's just part of my personality.
It's there though.
What's that?
Well, orange, orange hair.
Orange hair.
Vitamin C, C for Conan.
This is very good, Matt.
And there's a reason you love Matt.
I don't get it yet, but I'm going to listen to this podcast he's got.
Please don't.
I'm going to.
Please do not.
I think an orange flavored cheese, and maybe we add some other things that are very Conan-y.
Yeah.
If it could look like it has some kind of spotting or freckling, that would.
My arms are just riddled with.
That would be maybe like rose petal.
Rose petal or, yeah, some kind of bacteria.
Just add a little salmonella in there.
Or just some Lucky Charms.
Could you put some Lucky Charms in there?
Oh, the marshmallows from Lucky Charms.
I mean, we can think.
How about Fruit Pebbles, right?
That's your go-to?
I like a Fruity Pebble.
I wouldn't say it's my go-to.
It is what they're going to find coming out of my mouth when I'm found dead.
Yeah. in a hotel room.
You have to have it removed from your house.
Yeah, exactly.
I did.
We had a whole box of it.
A crate.
And I said, get this away from me.
And then I accidentally bought you more and you would have thought I like brought him a gun.
Yeah.
Get that away from me.
Depressed guy with a gun.
Well, I think that's a possibility.
Maybe we could get into business together.
Yeah, let's do that.
You can have whatever cut you want because I'm salaried, so I don't get a cut of anything.
Whoa.
Okay.
I'd like you to see a little something.
And also, I think, to be fair, we should cut Matt Gorley in as well.
Oh.
Seriously.
Great.
I'm in.
Okay, let's do this.
You brought me Sid.
You were the entryway. to the much harsher and of course much sought after Conan drug.
So yeah, I think that Matt should also participate in the profits.
Yeah, okay, so we'll do this.
We'll do the code and cheese, which is with orange and salmonella.
Done.
Very good.
Can't wait for the ads for this.
There'll be no return customers.
A wave of strange salmonella deaths.
In the cheese-loving, experimental cheese-loving community.
All right, well, Sid, you've been terrific.
It's been really nice to get to know you.
You've been really terrific.
Yeah, I've been really terrific.
And you've reawakened my love of Matt Gourley, which has been dormant for a very long time.
Has it ever even?
Well, I'm saying it goes back to before I even met you.
Okay.
It's like Ali's comment once every 80 years or whatever it is.
But Sid, very cool to meet you and best of luck to you and maybe we'll cross paths someday.
That would be really fun.
Hey, I'd love to have you here in Hungary.
You know what?
It gets a bad rap in the media.
All you hear about is how horrible the government is, which it is.
And it's relevant that we're recording this now, in June, which is Pride Month, where the rights of queer people are being stamped on every day.
But you know what?
There are good, solid people that don't get spoken about, and they're lumped in with all the horrible people.
And I think that Hungary deserves a shot.
Hungary deserves your presence in it.
And I think that you'll find a lot to love over here.
Well, I think that's true of so many countries where the leadership sends you one signal.
But there are lots of good people there.
Lots of good people there.
And that's a good point that you make.
And so my shout out to Hungary and to all the people there.
And-
I just love getting to talk to people sensitive funny smart, creative people from all over the world who represent what's possible.
So thanks for reaching out to us.
Thank you for doing what you do, Conan.
I think you've added more positivity in the world than you really realize.
Your episode in Haiti in particular, and in Ghana as well, were very moving for me.
And I think that you shed a light on the goodness of humanity in ways that will only become clear in a few decades.
So your impact is felt.
But I'll still be alive.
Yeah, because they'll rot up your ass.
You owe me for that.
You know what saved you?
The rod up your ass.
Your left ventricle collapsed, but the circulation kept moving.
All right.
Hey, Sid, thanks for those kind words.
And maybe we'll see you soon.
Take care, man.
Absolutely.
Hey, would it be all right if I took a picture?
Is that okay?
Yeah, let's do it.
So let's just do a screenshot.
Fuck it.
Thank you guys so much.
Really appreciate this.
And say hi to your friend who's a comedian, but not too loudly.
All right, take care.
Kind of whisper it.
Thank you for everything, Matt.
Conan O'Brien needs a fan.
With Conan O'Brien, Sonam Ovsessian, and Matt Gourley.
Produced by me, Matt Gourley.
Executive produced by Adam Sachs, Jeff Ross, and Nick Liao.
Incidental music by Jimmy Vivino.
Take it away, Jimmy.
Supervising producer, Aaron Blair.
Associate talent producer, Jennifer Samples.
Associate producers, Sean Doherty and Lisa Byrne.
Engineering by Eduardo Perez.
Get three free months of SiriusXM when you sign up at SiriusXM.com slash Conan.
Please rate, review and subscribe to.
Conan O'Brien Needs a Fan wherever fine podcasts are downloaded.
