Why would Conan O'Brien interrupt his Legally Prohibited from Being Funny on Television Tour last Wednesday for a 48-minute interview with Google? Movieline has no idea, and judging by Coco's confused expression throughout the sit down, the former Tonight Show host had no idea either. Fortunately, Conan used his pit stop to brush up on his open mic skills, roast his moderator (Google's Vice-President of Engineering Vic Gundotra) and direct a few cheap shots at his former employer. Click through for the best of Coco's zingers and full video from the interview.
1. After being played onstage by a Google bagpiper:
"Thanks for playing music usually reserved for a fireman's funeral. That's creating a really nice atmosphere for me right now."
2. After being told not to worry about the meaning of an insider Google phrase:
"You're the most condescending man I've ever met. 'Don't you worry about it. Just relax and let the search engine do the work.'"
3. After the moderator revealed that his "Democratic" method for picking questions from Google employees was by picking the ones he liked best:
"That's not Democratic at all. That's like Stalin saying, 'You guys decide amongst yourselves and then I'll kill all of you.'"
4. After the moderator misread an employee's name as Chirp instead of Chip:
"Why are you running this thing?!"
5. On how his young audience does not even know what the Tonight Show is:
"That's good. I like that. Who even needs to know what a Tonight Show is anymore? [Maniacal laughter and then fake sobs] It hurts so much. It'll get better. Anyway."
5. After being asked to dance for the audience:
"What is this? You guys are so power-mad now at Google. You're such entitled A-holes. 'Hey, Conan's in the area, make him come by. [...] What do you want? You can have one water. We've got a stool for you. Hey, do a dance. Turn around a little bit. Let's see your a**. Hey, you want my job in five years? Maybe I'll give it to you.'"
6. On NBC nearly shutting down his Twitter account:
"I had nowhere else to go so I started on Twitter... I was and am legally prohibited from appearing on television, radio and doing performances on the Internet. So I was just, literally, like a prisoner in a 14th-century cell writing little things on a scrap of paper and throwing them out the window and hoping a peasant would go by and [find them]. So I did that and it exploded overnight."
"At first, I started to hear a little bit of stuff from [NBC] saying, 'We're not sure you should be able to [communicate via Twitter] and then they realized the absurdity of shutting down my Twitter account."
The full interview -- including Conan's impression of Leno (begins at 22:04), Conan's hairy foreplay with a Google employee (begins at 23:24), and Andy Richter's guest appearance (begins at 29:00) -- below.
ยท @Google & YouTube present A Conversation with Conan O'Brien! [YouTube]