Marc Maron Returns

0:02Hi, I'm Mark Maran and I feel happy about being Conan O 'Brien's friend. Jesus, said like a true hostage. Said like a true hostage with a gun at his back. Fall is here, hear the yell. Back to school, ring the bell. Brand new shoes, walk and lose. Climb the fence, books and pens. I can tell that we are gonna be friends. Yes, I can tell that we are gonna be friends. Hey there and welcome to Conan O 'Brien Needs a Friend. This is a little bit of a special episode. Let me give you some context. I was in New York City recently. I was at SiriusXM and I was doing some stuff over there and helping out.

0:58Just going over the books mostly. Yeah, I do a lot of accounting there. It's a bad use of Conan O 'Brien because I really don't know accounting very well at all. The company is hemorrhaging money. Very risky. I've cost them a fortune. But I was over at the building and I heard, hey, this gentleman is here, Mark Maron. I just saw him in the lobby. And I had just read that Mark Maron was signing off from his podcast, the one that really started it all. And I said, I want to talk to Mark because we have a lot of history together. and so someone just walked down the hallway and said hey mark and he very graciously said yes and the next thing i know i'm sitting uh in a studio with mark maron and we had a really nice hang so uh this is my chat with mark maron that happened it was kind of a it was a happening if you want to call it that it just was spur of the moment that's podcasting man yeah that's podcasting man that's all right barebacking it you know yeah wait no rod dog yeah yeah Yeah, raw dogging it.

2:05That's right. Just two podcasters raw dogging it. What's the matter? No, you've got it. Keep going. You've got it. No, no, don't. Adam is making these. He's got it right. Are you okay? I'm just disgusted is all. But yeah, fine. I thought he was going to throw up. Don't listen to him. Don't listen to him. Keep going. Anyway, two podcasters having a good time. Of course, Mark Maron, the granddaddy of them all, and me, the little upstart. but it was fun. So my guest today is a comedian whose era-defining podcast WTF Mark Maron is coming to an end after 16 years this fall. I'm excited to chat with him today.

2:45I wonder what he's going to do now. Maybe he's got a Angela Lansbury you know, talk-down show where they go over old episodes of Murder, She Wrote. Yeah. That sounds pretty good to me, actually. I think, can you imagine Mark doing that? Yes. What the fuck?

3:04Mark Maron, welcome.

3:09I got to talk to you about something. Okay. This is happening because I'm here at Sirius XM in New York and look down the hall and I see there's Mark Maron and I bully you into talking to me because I have some things to say to you. Well, I appreciate that. I did feel bullied, but we have a long history. We do. And I thought, well, you know, this is not different than it's ever been. No. So I'll do whatever Conan needs me to do. Yes. You'll do as you are told. Yes, I will. A couple of things. First of all, the other day, it pops up on every screen I have that Marc Maron is saying goodbye to his podcast.

3:44And I thought, Jesus, he invented this. So I need to talk to him about it because. I'm an empty nester now. All you guys have gone on to do great things and you don't need me anymore. Well, you invented this. You were doing a podcast when no one knew what a podcast was. and you were the, you invented it. And I remembered when Barack Obama, a sitting US president went to your house to do your podcast. And I thought you've broken through some barrier. And we had a history before that, which is when I was first doing the late night show at dark times, I mean, I was loving doing it, but we were going to get canceled any minute.

4:25And you, it was, you know, a lot of people, the word was out, don't do that show. It won't be on long. Were they? Not comics. We were all ready. Well, there were plenty of people, including NBC, that were willing to write my death certificate. And you would consistently come on and you would panel. You would just sit with me. And it was always the same pattern. You would come out. And I don't think people, you know, it's not that people knew who you were then. No, they didn't. They didn't. Okay. Most of them still don't. And guess what? They don't know. They didn't know who I was. They were coming to see you late night with Conan O 'Brien, and they weren't sure who this kid was.

4:59But I would say, my next guest, I would say, Mark Maron, and you would come out, and so the crowd doesn't know who you are. You'd sit down, and it was fascinating to me. You would dig a hole. Mark Maron would dig a hole. Crowd not, like, not, they started out neutral. You would dig a hole where they're like, I don't like this. I don't know what he's, who is this man? What is he talking about? And you would comment on how you would dug a hole, which is a rule that, you know, the great artists, I think, break the rules. The classic rule is never tell people this isn't working. I know Freddie Roman once said to me, never admit you're bombing.

5:31Yeah. And so you were out there talking about on my panel, ah, this isn't working. I shouldn't have come. I don't know why I'm here. And telling the audience that, and then I'd hear laughter, more laughter, more laughter, and you would kill. So you always did this thing where you would dig yourself into a hole and then come out of it and shoot out of it like this geyser. It was a rollercoaster ride. That was the architecture of my life. Yes. I would say for the first 30 years, I dug a pretty good hole. Yeah. And then just by cosmic timing and coincidental talent, you know, it worked out. But I was talking about this to somebody recently about doing the appearances on your show.

6:13Yeah. In that, you know, that was the I was talking to Richter because I did his podcast last week. Yeah. And I said that was the pattern that you and I established. But what people don't know is that I was really trying in that first minute. I didn't go out there saying every time that like, oh, good, I'm going to do that thing I do where I alienate the audience completely right when I get out there to try to get them back. I went out there wanting that first joke to work every time. It just did not. And then it became a thing. Yeah. I think I generally come in hot. And, you know, and I always knew that they didn't really know me.

6:49And I always wanted to just the reason I always wanted to do panel with you is because when I watched Letterman coming up as a kid, I always liked it. I liked Richard Lewis and I liked Jay Leno, the guys that did panel to me. It was more interesting. Yes. So very quickly, I tried to get into that relationship with you. And then it happened, you know, I think because we had a good rapport, but also because I was very easy to book on a short notice. Oh, we would, you know, we would get you when Al Roker dropped out. That's right. Paula would call me and be like, look, what are you doing tomorrow?

7:23No, she would say, what are you doing in an hour? And you would come by and it worked. And this is what happened. People started watching the show. Our show started to gradually find itself. And you had been there all along. And then what we said to all comics is, short of it being a Jerry Seinfeld or some iconic comic, you have to come out and you do your set. Yeah. And then maybe you get you come over for some quick panel. Yeah. You didn't do that from the beginning. You only came out really and sat with me. And so comics started to say, I don't want to do a set. I just want to come out and sit there with Conan.

8:01And we'd say, yeah, no, you have to do a set. And it's say, but what about Mark Maron? And I would say, that's different. That's Mark Maron. He and I have a thing. Yeah. We're trying to help Mark. Yeah.

8:15You're doing fine. It was a program and we got, we got federal funding, uh, which is no longer available. But, um, then you go off, you do the podcast. You kind of, I mean, you're the, you're the George Washington figure. What was funny about that though, was like, when I started doing this podcast, my podcast, a lot of the guys I'd known for years, no one knew what a podcast was. So the general idea was, I'm like, I'm going to do this podcast. And I think most people were like, well, that's sad. I guess he's just going to set up a mic in his garage, but at least he's doing something. You know, like the opinion of it was it was not it didn't exist on the media landscape.

8:52People would come out to my house and a lot of them would be like, I don't even know what neighborhood this is. Right. You know, and people would come like I remember Cranston came out early on and he's like, where am I? And I'm like, well, it's going to be fine. John Hamm was on. He's like, oh, Hamm did it. Okay. Like nobody, we were there and the business sort of built up around us. And now it's like, it's, it's like cancer. Rapidly spreading and destroying the organism around it. I think you're right. The cancer analogy is a good one. And I think I'm a fast growing cancer. Which is good. You know, content is good.

9:26You know, malignant content, better. All of us owe you a debt of gratitude because I have found, especially in this stage of my career, I loved all the other stuff I did. And because of you, this forum exists where I can do something that I find incredibly satisfying. Totally. Because I can have these conversations with people that are very different from the world that we were working together in in the early 90s. Was, what does that mean, Mark Barron? Ba-da-ba-ba-ba-da-ba-da-da-da-da-ba-ba-ba-ba. And I know that I've got five minutes. Yeah. And we've got five minutes for you to, for the whole arc to happen.

10:04And I spent an hour and a half on the phone with Frank Smiley. Frank Smiley, shout out to Frank. Saying, yeah, yeah, what else you got? Yeah. Yeah, what else? That's good. Frank Smiley, a single producer who, who still works with me. And he's, I'm going to say this, one of the all-time greats. The greatest. He knows comedy back and forth. And he was such a part of the DNA of the early late night show. What was crazy about it was like the way it worked was, you know, he do he pre produced a segment like, you know, what am I going to talk about? So I get on the phone with him and I just be pacing around my apartment in New York, sweating, you know, telling him ideas, telling him bits that were kind of working.

10:44A lot of times I go on with a funny enough thing that became a bigger thing lately. But I would spend an hour and a half and all I would just rant and just deliver. And then you just hear Frank go, uh, yeah, what else you got? Yeah. And then like, you know, after spending an hour and a half, he goes, all right, I'll put something together. So I didn't even know by the time I got to the show, he'd hand me like, this is what I got. And he transcribed the conversation. I'm like, this is too much. You know, it was all very exciting. Well, he, Frank, early on and to this day has no problem saying, what are you doing to me?

11:18And no, no, that's not right. You know, and he gets worked up, but he's right often. and I'm going to say most 98 % of the time he's right. And when he's wrong, it's spectacular. We used his dad on a bit when I did that talk show on the street. Yes, yeah. His dad, like it was so sad because like Frank was just setting his dad up. It was me on the street. I said, I want to be a talk show host. So we set it up on the street and we're just interviewing people coming by and Frank had brought his dad in and his dad didn't know what he was doing. So his dad goes, what do you want me to do? And Frank says, tell that story that you tell just so I could look bored.

11:54Yeah. So his dad's just doing this story that he's been telling for years. And I'm just sitting there like this. And his dad didn't know what was going on. It was a complete setup. It was pretty funny. I think to this day, huge stars, I'll run into them. And they did the show over the years. And the first thing they say to me is, get up Frank Smiley. Is he still with you? Because he made an impression. Sometimes, I mean, they all give him credit for making him look funny. Him or her make him look funny. but they will invariably say that fucking guy drove me crazy. And he is a guy who to this day, if like, if Seinfeld had been on the show, was going to be on the show, he would have said, what else he got?

12:33You know, like that's Jerry Seinfeld. That's going to kill. You can do better.

12:46I remember one time I was on your show and I was the second guest after Trump. and uh who i by the way early early on knew was a great comic yeah totally great good comedic choice but the funny thing was is i remember it because i was in the hallway i was at 30 rock in my dressing room and frank came in he goes you want to meet trump and i'm like no i'm good yeah yeah yeah and then i took a shot at him when he went out because it was an appearance where for some reason he was playing with a condom no no what happened was he was sitting next to me and we were talking and I just said, this is like he's promoting The Apprentice, I think.

13:22Yeah. And it's an NBC show. So here comes Trump. And I remembered saying to him, so you're a billionaire. How much money do you carry on you at any one time? And he went, I don't know. I don't know. Come on, how much money do you have on your pocket right now? And then I reached over into his blazer pocket and felt something. And he put his hand over my hand really quickly. Like, don't pull that out. We had like a quick tug of war and I pulled it out and it was a condom. And he said, safe sex, everybody. and it was a real moment. And then we go to commercial, I go, okay, Donald Trump, everybody, a reality show host and he'll never go onto anything else after that.

13:59You're always very prescient. Yeah, very prescient. Yeah, and he's mad. He's like, I'm not fucking coming on this show again. Goddamn, you know, and he told my producer, you don't reach into a guy's pocket and stuff like that. But then, you know, literally, I don't know, it was a cut two, three months later. Ladies and gentlemen, Donald Trump. I remember I came out and I said, why is Donald Trump carrying his own condoms? Don't prostitutes usually have them? And then I said, I'll probably end up dead in the East River. Yeah. Yeah. Still could. Actually. Now you'll be. Now I brought it back up and he'll be like, oh yeah.

14:31I remember. Why are we rekindling this? Yeah. Now of all, you know, we're just going to be. Because we want a little heat. We'll be shot by snipers. But yeah, I love our intertwined arc together, going back to 93, all through the years. And then, you know, it's now one of the wonderful things about just lasting or sticking around long enough is that I've had the experience of, oh, at the last minute, Mark Maron will fit in. And then I'm watching you in an amazing movie doing scenes with Robert De Niro. And I'm like, this is the wonderful thing about life. If you take the time to appreciate the wonderful little curly cues that happen and you see people that persevere and stay true to themselves.

15:19And I know that you had years of, I don't think this is working. I don't think anybody's buying into this. Certainly I had moments like that. 50 appearances on your show, I think was the arc of those years. yeah but it was you guys were keeping me afloat i mean it was kind of crazy i just could not but and i know what you're saying and and i think that there is a bit of goodwill for me like it because i i imagine there people aren't always thinking about me but i imagine there was a period there when when my name would come up and be like yeah i uh i hope i hope it works out yeah well i think the nice thing is uh i have a lot of appreciation now it's nice to see you know i guess I'll say this in a shorter way.

16:00Getting older is treated negatively by a lot of people. They don't want to get older. They hate. And I think, not only am I chilling out just a little bit, but when you can see the whole picture or two thirds, I hope, of the picture, it's really great because you can appreciate, you know, we just had Bob Odenkirk on and I was with Bob in the trenches in 1988. Yeah. And we were very lowest, lowest, you know, rung on the totem pole at Sarnet Live. and now, you know, he's beating people up in action movies and I'm like - That's crazy. You know, and I think this is the same thing, which is it's really, I so enjoy watching people that I connected with who I like having these, I mean, you've did it yourself.

16:45You willed it to happen. We all know some luck's involved. I've benefited from crazy amounts of luck, but to just to watch all that happen for you and is a beautiful thing. Well, thank you. And that's why I said, like, I grabbed Mark against his will. I know he's got a lot going on today, but make him talk to me so I can just tell him how much I appreciate you invented this form. You did such a lovely thing for all of us. It's a mitzvah, as the Irish say. I thank you for it. And I thank you for being out there with me in the early days of late night when it was rough sledding. And I knew this is going to be a roller coaster ride, but Mark Maron is going to make it happen.

17:24And you always did. Thank you so much. It means a lot to hear that. And certainly you were definitely part of my, a big part of my life for a lot of years, doing that show three or four times a year. Three or four times a week. Yeah. But it made a big difference. Once again, Mark Maron. Wait, he was on earlier in the show. No, but it was like, I didn't have a lot going on then. I know, and now I just talked to you in the hallway and I said, can I talk to you for just a second? He went, yeah, yeah, yeah. There's a documentary about me. There's also a Broadway show about my life and then I have to go get an international peace prize.

17:57I'm like, okay, I will not stop you. Yeah, they canceled my Mark Twain thing. So I want to - It's going to a ventriloquist next year. I wanted to share this with you, with Bob Odenkirk, because he had a heart attack in Albuquerque, which is where I grew up. And I texted him afterwards, and we actually had lunch when he was out there when he was shooting Better Call Saul. And because he went to the hospital where my dad used to work, but I was texting with him and he said, so he was so funny. I said, glad you're okay. It's scary. It's Marin. And this is after he had the heart attack and he texted back super scary, Mark.

18:35I basically died for a little while and I have to say, I saw nothing. Yeah. But this crew with the, but this great crew with some amazing people kept me going. And then the hospital did a great job with some challenging surgery. I hope you're doing great. I'm feeling good. Take care. And then I said, glad my hometown hospital was there for you. welcome back from the nothing and then he says again this is why he's so fucking funny he goes big time excellent docs and nurses at presbyterian on the ball i'm doing great by the way i saw exactly no light when i was when i repeat no light when i was dead it's the whole heaven thing is a hoax follow the money follow the money that's fantastic it's the best well that's a great i mean people need to hear this we need to get this word out there it's so funny um funny guys are the best funny people are the best especially if you text them oh my god you ever get in a group text with other funny people and you're like i'm not going to be able to keep up with this shit oh are you trying like what can i say that's funny and there's already three texts have gone by and you're like damn it missed my window oh it's and it starts to feel pressure a total pressure yeah i'm on a uh like occasionally i'm in one with the like malaney and kroll yeah dan levy and jeselnik in chelsea peretti i'm like i i just want to be out of this it's too much pressure i'm in one that has all these people in it and i watch all these fireworks go by.

20:04And also their references. They'll be talking about some really incredibly obscure commercial that Telly Savalas was in in 1978 for a mochaccino drink. And they're all doing, they all know exactly all the references. And I feel, my feeling is that it's when a blade is turning very slowly, I can put my hand on the blade and kind of get into the motion of it. but if it's spinning on puree and I put my hand in, I'm going to get chopped to pieces and that's what it looks like and I just watch. Your text gets no ha-has, you know, no explanation points. You know what I've learned? You can put your own ha-ha on your text.

20:43You do that all the time. David, what do I do? What do I do? Tell him. He always laughs to his own text. And I do it on purpose to be a dick but I'll write something to Sona or to you and then I'll write after and then I'll put on my thing ha-ha and you guys are like, you can't fucking do that. No. And then I'll say, yes, I can. And then put a ha ha. What's stopping you? We live through it all.

21:10Laughing your own text, people. Ha ha yourself. You only go around once. Follow the money. There is no light. There's no light. But the thing you're saying about aging is true. And I think what's a great thing for you is that to be able to loosen up and to be able to just have these conversations on your own terms. and be engaged and enjoy people in that way is a great thing about life. And I think so many of us were in such a wheel of not just success, but like being funny, doing a great thing, doing a great show, that you don't have any time for this. And then as you get older, all of a sudden, you give less of a fuck.

21:46Yes. And it's not even on purpose. You just are able to look back at your life and not with regret, but really realizing just how crazy you made yourself for so long. I think about this a lot. My 20s, my 30s, my 40s, and into my 50s. I would say it started to peter out. And then I just started to think. But during those years, I was so intense, so hard on myself, constantly, constantly, working real hard, tunnel vision. Totally. And then, you know, I credit my wife for helping me a lot. And I credit just going through life and meeting really good people. But I thought that I had just found wisdom.

22:39And I was telling this to my mother-in-law, Pam, who's a very smart woman. And I was talking to her and I said, you know, as I get older, I really think I found this wisdom. And she said, your testosterone levels. dropped. That's what happened. And I went, oh. Really? I thought it was humility. I thought it was humility. And that I had, I thought that I had found like the, the true face of like spirituality. And I got into the flow. No, no, no. Testosterone levels plummet in men. And so you're now you have very little testosterone left. Your penis is just, just a little nub now. And, And so you're just - Enjoy your downtime.

23:22Enjoy your life as an asexual being. Yeah, welcome. And whatever it is, I don't think I would have appreciated this format, 20s, 30s, 40s. And I think I'm so lucky that it exists now because I like to have these conversations. I couldn't have them if you hadn't invented this thing. It would not have happened. So I'm very appreciative. Thank you. But for years, I realized the trick in late night is to try and it took me a long time to figure out how do I appear relaxed and casual in a completely insane environment? This is a sane environment. You and I are sitting with each other. We're talking.

24:04There's going to be a weird desk with a microphone. What am I? And also like 80 % of your energy goes into pretending you're not terrified. Yeah. and eventually you you're not afraid anymore and you're like well that's that's done also who ends a conversation and says hey mark it was great catching up with you that was a terrific four and a half minutes we'll take a break you know uh cab calloway's when we get back and i lean over and you say how was that and i went i think you really killed it and um people say what do you guys talk about in the break really not much uh but that's an insane who walks out and addresses a crowd and talks about the day's news.

24:45It's crazy. It's such a kooky thing to do. And the only way to be good at it is to metabolize it as something normal and then start acting like this is all normal. Well, it's a job. One time when I, the first time I did stand up on Letterman and I sat, I didn't even get any desk time, but I did walk over there. And he goes to break and he wins and he goes, you can make that stuff work on the road. I do have to go. I got to go to Tribeca. Yeah, you got to go. And you know what? You've always had to go to Tribeca. Mark Maron, thank you. Thank you. This was lovely. And whatever you do, I'm in your corner.