The Valentine’s Day Matchmaker Special

0:02Hello and welcome to a special episode. Conan O 'Brien needs a friend. This is a little different. Today is the day after Valentine's Day. Special day. Did you have a nice Valentine's Day, Sona? I did. Did your husband get you anything nice? Yeah. Okay. He got me a... You're acting very weird. Because I'm... Almost as if we taped this before Valentine's Day. Yeah. And you are completely unable to pretend. Doesn't he usually get you flowers or something? He got me flowers. Uh-huh. And your favorite chocolate. Yeah. Yeah. That's such good chocolate. And then he got me, we ate at a restaurant. Wow.

0:44Compelling story. No one tells it like you. What about you, Matt? Well, you have a nice Valentine's Day? Yeah. Even though we're taping ahead of time, but was it a good Valentine's Day? Yeah. We ate at the top of the Empire State Building and then watched Taken on a blimp. Nice. Okay. Oh, we're making shit up then. No. No. Okay. Well, I went to Paris and I just got back this morning. Oh, really? Yeah, we went to Paris. Did you meet your French character and what did he sound like? Yeah, he was like, Welcome to Paris! Oh my God. Welcome! Happy Valentine's Day to you, America! I can't believe you didn't make it.

1:15They don't do... As an improviser. They don't do Valentine's Day in Paris. Have you ever thought of auditioning for Sarnet Live just doing your French character and just taping a big fake mustache under your nose? Yeah, I should. A big fake mustache? What does a mustache do? It's just your French guy. My French guy doesn't have a mustache. He's clean shaven. Oh, then he's not French. Okay. Listen, it is the day after Valentine's Day, a very special day for many where they are either sad about their lonely Valentine's Day or quite delighted with the romance of that very special time. Or happy with their non-relationship Valentine's Day.

1:57That's the third one I was getting to. I didn't mean to make it sound like there were only two. Oh, no. No, that was just me getting to the big and I think the best one, which is being very happy being just on your own for the time being or forever, whichever you prefer. And either one's okay. We have limited time. Anyway, I should point out this is a 15 hour segment. We have a special guest joining us today. Someone who works on the show, the podcast here at the podcast company.

2:31podcast empire, really, if you will. Oh, awkward. More of a conglomerate. That's like saying Standard Oil is just an oil company. Well, no, it really is an octopus, if you will. What? It takes Teddy Roosevelt has to break it up. But that's not the point. The point is Sam is here. Hi, Sam. How are you? Hi, I'm good. Were you waiting for me to get around to the point of this podcast? Yeah, I've been here a while. Yeah, let's see. We watched you get older as you've been sitting here. Sam, you're quite young, and you've been working here at Conan O 'Brien Needs a Friend for how long? Like two and a half years, I think.

3:02Yeah. You having a good time? Sure. Okay. She's not going to say no. But she meant no. She wasn't very enthusiastic at all. Very much behaving like a prisoner of war making a tape. But anyway, Sam, what is your job title here? I understand you recently got a promotion. I did. I am now the social media producer. Oh, very nice. Very good. Well, you do a terrific job. Thank you. I like working with you and with Ruthie very much. Thank you. You guys are cool. And you seem to tolerate me. Your vibe very much is I will tolerate Conan. Yeah, I feel that.

3:37Okay. Well, anyway, it's a pleasure working with you as well, Sam. Sam, we had you in here because rumor, and you know how people talk in an office, rumors that you are freshly single. I am. And anything you want to say about that as backstory? It was a short one. Well, like I said, you're young. This is what you're supposed to be doing. Just be meeting different people. Hitting it and quitting it. Hell yeah. Oh yeah. Plowing and - Okay, take it easy. Take it easy. Chowing? I don't know. I wasn't going anywhere. That was awful. Plowing and chowing. That's fantastic. Sam, you went through this breakup.

4:13You were newly single. I don't know. I've been married for a long time. And so I don't know anything about the dating apps. Are you on the apps? No. No? Well... Are you thinking of going on an app? Yeah. Yeah. I feel ready. Are you averse to an app or you're ready to do it? No, no. That is how I historically have dated. Okay. And most people, most young people I meet today use dating apps and many of them quite successfully. Oh, yeah. My last two relationships were from the apps. Yeah. Okay. Is there an app that you favor in particular? And this is not a commercial, so you can say whatever you want.

4:49We're not getting paid by anybody. You know, Bumble's a good one. I like that. Hinge is good. Tinder's bad. Stay away from Tinder. Tell me, what is it? I just want to know as kind of a friend, an employer, and kind of a pervy guy, what's the problem with Tinder? It feels very like hit it and quit it kind of. Clow it and chow it. Clow it and chow it. Yeah. Right. It's just a little scary. Bag it. Okay. You're out the door. Bag it. Bag it. Yeah. Like bag it used to mean like, let's get out of here. You know, you shag and then you bag. you know no it sounds like you shag it and then you're murdering it and then you put it in a bag listen listen if that's your thing that's what happens you gotta if you're gonna murder someone you gotta clean up after yourself so so so you like bumble yeah you taking notes here remember if you murder always clean up okay i want to be that psa if you murder i'll be the smoky the bear is to what we hope you don't have to murder but if you do if you do hey keep it clean someone else is going to rent that apartment hey that crawl space might be needed by someone else okay so bumble and i hear a lot of good things about hinge yeah it's a good one how can we help you i want to help you uh i know that you are indifferent to me but i like you i really like that you work at the company and you're bringing your creativity and your social media smarts and and and benefiting us so i want to help you yeah what do you think i could do to help i think you know help me with my prompts okay okay let's do that we can actually bring this profile up on the screens we've kind of done a little we have that kind of technology we do okay oh look at that there i am oh you look great beautiful photos thank you i think i love that i love those photos okay so i'm looking at your bumble date profile and those are really nice pictures thank you uh and i would just like to put in my own comment about sam which is incredibly cool and you seem like you have a very amazing sense of humor and so i think uh yeah that's the cone and seal of approval but let's go through the prompts and tell me how i can help i'm surprised you're not telling her to pick up put a picture up of you i know well if you want to get some clicks what would be the best version of you in her photo not just a selfie but how can we be creative where it's like um maybe you're like deep in the background staring down the camera or something like that so it's just an odd like he's a lurker we could take that now we could take one now you know what would be funny what if sam is pushing me in a wheelchair and like her hobby is taking care of conan o 'brien who's much more infirm than you think he is it just raises a lot of question it would get a first of all you come across as very caring in Her hobby.

7:43It's a hobby. Is there one we could shoot right now? What about I'm bringing you a drink? Like I work for you. Yeah. Oh, that'd be great. Want to do that? Mm-hmm. You're going to help us out here. I could be handing this mug. Oh, yeah, the mug. Yeah. Yeah. And then I'm going to be bringing you a drink. Like I'm your, do I have the headphones on for this? Absolutely. Okay. I don't know. And Blay, you do this away from my microphone, but I think my dulcet tone is still. Here we go. I love your hands ready to accept. There we go. Okay, that is me humbly serving you, Sam. And I look, I'm obsequious.

8:22I'm hoping that I please the almighty Sam. We should choose that as the main photo, I think. Okay, so that's going to go on as a photo. That's very good. And then what's next? You young people, and I'm including everyone in this room who's not me. Okay. What's next, guys? All right, so interests. You want to add some interests? Yeah. Sam, here's some interest. We've got, here are the different categories of interest. We have self-care, sports, creativity, going out, staying in, film and TV. There's a lot of them. There's a lot. Can I quickly say something? I worry that if there's too much stuff in the self-care area, it's going to send a signal that, you know, I'm neurotic.

9:00Do you know what I mean? Like I spend a lot of time taking care of myself and thinking about myself. That's why, and this is, I'm a complete novice. This is just me shooting from the hip. Sure. What do you think? I do care about myself, though. You do? But I would say let's just not go crazy on this and check every one. So maybe just sleeping well. No, you could do more. There could be more than one. You can pick as many as you want. I go to therapy. Okay. So do I. Yeah. Clearly, if anyone's listening to the podcast, I haven't been in a while. Sleeping well in therapy. I think those are fine ones.

9:40What if a guy's like, God, I really want a girl who can have a deep chat. Because I feel like Sam's deep. Okay. We could do that. No, no, no. I'm not going to force it. No, but deep chats, this is so preliminary that I would worry that deep chats implies that that's going to be expected on the first date. Oh, okay. Do you know what I mean? That's fine. I'm not saying hit it and quit it on there. No, wait. Guess what? I'm seeing sex positivity, though. Yeah. If I did this, I'd be sex negativity. very sex negative yeah it's the whole thing just freaks me out what a freak show okay uh sports what are your sports uh none all right already you'd be a hit for me yeah oh this one you're gonna kill because you're very i know you're creative thank you um you know i like uh art yes you do and crafts uh making videos that's a big part of my job videos i know you make them for us, but do you do it on your free time?

10:37Yeah, for myself, yeah. But does it ever impinge on what I'm paying you for? Oh my God. Maybe. Maybe I post from here sometimes. Okay, well that's something we have to discuss. Okay. So that's an A-term meeting. Photography? Going out. Let's go to going out. Yeah. Well, everyone goes out, right? I don't go out very often. Do you go to bars? Not really. Do you go cafe hopping? What? Does that mean, what if you go to one cafe and just hop up and down? That's the kind of cafe hopping I do. Monsieur, please, if you can move on. Where's your fake mustache? Is it a callback to Sonner's French impression?

11:14Yes, it is. It's called a callback. So no cafe hopping, no bars, clubs? No. I haven't been to a club in my life. Concerts? You like music? Yeah, you could put concerts. All right. That's fine. Put concerts down. Oh, wait, guys, you can only... We've reached our limit. You've chosen all five. What? You can only have five interests. Are you kidding me? And are you able to enter your own? You have to choose theirs. I think you have to choose theirs. This is a scam. But where do you... Traits, pets, traveling. Oh, these are your most... Oh, wait a minute. So we did this all wrong. I didn't realize you can only put in five.

11:49Yeah. How do you date if you can only say five things about yourself? Well, I think there's... I just leave it blank. I don't put anything in here. Oh, this is Jo, the engineer. I think we should have been talking to her all along. You sound like you know what you're talking about. Jo's very cool. I trust her. Yeah, Jo is super cool. What's the strategy? for putting in nothing. So I just do photos all from the same room. What? Why? What do you mean? Just the same room, just different parts of the room and then a bio and that's it. So the zero effort adds an air of mystery. I think just people ask you more questions about why you're in the same room.

12:26I like what I'm hearing. Maybe we don't check any of these. Take them off. I trust her. Joe why didn't you say anything while we were completely screwing this up you're so chill that you neglected to help us but some people like to put their interest in there and then you just have to answer a lot of questions about like basketball okay even if your interest is cafe hopping cafe hopping that's weird right I don't know I love it I love cafe hopping same photo it describes my life in my 20s was cafe hopping. Okay, we got to move along. We don't have much time for this. All right. So, Joe, do you think we have profile prompts?

13:08And then do you want to add a prompt? Yeah, I would add a prompt. Okay. Now this says pick a profile prompt. It's the perfect opportunity to show a little more of your personality. I'm hoping you... Keep it simple. Guarantee that a non-negotiable... You pick one. Me? Yeah, pick one out. A non-negotiable would be if you're not a Conan fan. No, that's fine. Actually, it would be weird if they were a big Conan fan. But don't you think - Wait, hold it. Why? Because then I would feel like they're trying to date me to get to you. I think that's going to happen already now that we've done this. No, I know.

13:42No, that was always my big thing, was I never was sure what guy's intentions were. Tack is always trying to talk to me and write me and hit me up for various Conan memorabilia. Yeah, sometimes he makes me put a Conan mask on when we go to bed. Oh my God. I'm kidding. I'm kidding. I asked Eliza to wear one. Can you cut that out? See, when I took this job, my wife left me. Eliza, put on that Conan mask. No, no. Listen, no, we won't mention me at all. I mean, I'm in the photo.

14:21What's your My Real Life Superpower is? It has to be clever. How about x-ray vision? It's like a real superpower. She's got one. My favorite real life superfist is I can fly at the speed of light. And if I circle the earth backwards, I can make it go back in time. I always heal and have adamantium bones. Yeah. That's a funny one. Giant adamantium spikes come out of my knuckles. I am Wolverine. Just say nothing. I think it's adamantium. Adamantium. Just say no powers. No superpowers. Okay. We're being told by Joe to knock it out. Take it out. Take it out. Wait, the goal here is celibacy forever, isn't it?

15:06It's just... Isn't the goal here to live and die alone? That's what I thought we were doing. The only hits you're going to get are me, Conan, and Sona. That's what you want to say? No. That's what I have on mine. Yeah, but Joe, come on. I'm serious. How's it working for you? It literally worked. I have a boyfriend. Oh my God. You didn't tell me you had a boyfriend. Everyone's supposed to report this shit to me. Why would people tell you? That's creepy rule number nine in the Conan code book. Oh, well, you're in a bathtub, in an empty bathtub, and it's just, the description says, don't hate me if I, and your answer is just don't.

15:44Can I see? I don't think that's going to work for me. That's very on brand for Joe, though. Yes. But notice how all the photos are in the bathroom. When you said a room, you meant the bathroom. But Joe, you have a very specific thing going on, and I'm worried that it's not Sam's thing. Oh my God. Yeah, that's true. I'm not as cool as Joe. Well, no, you're cool in a different way. You're just cool in a different way. Oh my God. These look like American apparel ads. Yeah, they really do. A lot of people are like, why are these in the bathroom? And then you got to be like, yeah, then you can talk about it.

16:16Because I live in a bathroom. Want to date me? Yeah. Did you ever mention that if you kill someone in the tub, the cleanup is very easy? oh yeah all right let's just move on uh okay sam you got to help us out here what are you seeing here that what makes me feel grounded i'm a real nerd about uh yoga i care i'm a yoga teacher that's cool yeah i like that that is good but but are you cool attracting yoga dudes is that a breed okay i would like to go to yoga with my partner okay okay yeah i'll take anything okay okay i'm a real nerd about yoga i'm oh that's this is good yoga you know what i don't like the exclamation point.

16:52I know. I know, Bley. I know that you love exclamation points. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. Why do you always put exclamation points? Every text from Bley is like, sorry, your dad died. Exclamation point. I will say, I emailed you about something and there was an exclamation point. You said, hey, I'm getting you some, I'm allowing this exclamation point because it's your birthday. And then you send me a follow-up email like two hours later. Here, here's your birthday present. and it was just a bunch of exclamation points in the room. I put a lot of thought into my put-downs. Okay, I like that. I'm real nerd about yoga.

17:28Yes, this is good. So I'm just a real nerd about yoga, period? You tell me. This is your dating profile. I like the teacher part. Okay, thank you. I like the teacher part. That's cool, yoga. I'm a yoga teacher. You could put an emoji instead of a period. Oh, no. Okay, well, I also don't know. That's not Sam's style. Yeah. Okay. We got to keep it Sam. Okay, so here we go. Okay, here we go. Okay, so now the next section is my opening move. Start your chats with an opening move. Okay. So I don't know. This says you're in control. Set your move once and we'll take it from there. We'll add it to your profile and send it to all new chats.

18:02Is that what you want? Oh, no. This is like an auto reply? Yeah. That's crazy. I think this is a nightmare. I think you people live in a hellscape. Yeah. All right. Let's get to the meat of this, which is your bio. Oh, here we go. We want to write a fun and punchy bio. This is what people are going to see. they're going to see your photo and they're going to see your bio so this is important. Okay, well it's cool. You work at a very cool place. It's okay to mention that. Start with that. All right. You work at a really cool place. Yeah. Should I just brag in the whole bio? No, I don't. I think that's fine.

18:31Jo, I shouldn't mention we shouldn't mention anything about her working with her. I wouldn't put stuff about work. Yeah, okay. So it's safe to say there's nothing about Conan in your bio. Oh, yeah. Okay. You don't have your job on your profile? I have my job, yeah. Do you at all feel like you need to disclose that you work here? Yeah, sort of. Sort of like you knew I was working. You knew. No, the next thing. You knew I had been in prison. Oh, the next thing is work. So you're okay. So what's your bio? What do you want them to know about you? God, I don't know. I feel like I'm a very chill and like.

19:05You are the chillest person I've ever met. Really? Yeah. I feel like that's important because I can't have someone with like really intense energy. Why are you working with me then? It's hard. I mean, I come into a room and I'm, I come into a room and there's heat coming off of me and I'm babbling like a chimp on crack. And I always see you in the corner and you're always shaking your head slowly like no grasshopper. No. So that's good. You should say that she's. You could be like, don't be like Conan. Just. Yeah. Oh, don't. Wait, don't mention Conan. But if you do mention Conan, it's don't be like Conan.

19:42That's great. so yeah but like i work for conan i'm looking for someone who's not like conan yeah okay we can do that yeah and i'm looking for someone who's not like conan then how about parentheses keep in mind conan is very kind generous and sensitive but uh his energy sometimes uh is a little tightly coiled i think you gotta you know put something in there so people don't think i'm a monster right we can't have anyone saying i'm a you're a very kind person yeah he's very kind and generous. And then can you put in brackets he made me write that. Yes, thank you. That's what I was looking for.

20:18That's not something a normal person says. So it's important for people to know you did this. Conan made me write that last part. Yeah, say that. Conan made me write that last part. He's crazy. Please help me. I never wanted to do this. I'm in a relationship. It's right W-R-I-T-E. What'd you say to me? Oh, that's embarrassing. Oh, Blay. Oh, Blay. Conan made me write that last part. I just think it's good if it just keeps going with Conan just making you do this. He's here with me now. Yeah. Call the police. He's here with me now. He may come on our first date. On our first date. I'm sorry. Oh, wow.

21:04A lot of pressure. On our first date. He just wrote, come in our first date. Gross. This is a nightmare. Joe, what happened? This is a nightmare profile. That's good. Did you say I'm DTF? No, I said if he does, he's DTF. Okay, for me. Like in my stead. Okay, okay. Okay, how's this? How's this? Your bio. I'm very chill. I work for Conan and I'm looking for someone who's not like Conan. Parentheses. He's a very kind and generous person. Unparentheses. Arrow pointing to that. Conan made me write that last part. He's here with me now. He may come on our first date. I think there needs to be a little bit more Conan.

21:45No? He's very kind. Okay, work. See above. Add a job. Here we go, yeah. When we say just Conan, do you think people will know that's you? Oh, like she works for Conan Gray? I don't think so. That would be great. That would be pretty cool. Okay, oh yeah, that would be cool. He's really cool. This is looking for a relationship. Something casual. don't know yet, marriage or skip? Who puts down marriage? I'll put marriage. I'm serious. Are you ready to get married? Yeah. Are you serious? Maybe this will happen. I'm 31. I'm about to be 31. What's your height? Five feet. Five feet. I like it. Just five.

22:25Perfect. All right. Do you want to answer the rest of these questions? Yeah, do it. All right. Do you work out? Yeah. Active? She is active. She's a yoga instructor. Zodiac sign. Do you think this is important? Oh, yeah. Yeah, you got to do it. Big time. Yeah, I'm a Pisces. I was going to guess Pisces. Oh, okay. Were you? Yeah. You seem like a Pisces. Thank you. That's a compliment. Yeah. I have an undergraduate. Yeah. All right. That's good. Good. Do you drink? Do you drink? Rarely. Okay. Boo. Do you smoke? Do you smoke? Is that a cigarette? I know, yeah. Cannabis is its own cannabis. Oh, okay.

23:01Oh, okay. So, no. How do you use cannabis? Yes. Well, frequently. How frequently? Frequently feels dramatic. they don't have like a yes my god ideal plans for children yeah what do you want you want kids yeah that's nice you'd be a great mom say this i mean this is first date convo well i don't know joe i mean what about this did you get into this with people yeah i think it's better to just say that especially if you don't want kids oh i do yeah it's good it's good if people find you don't want to be telling someone three years in that you never want children if they really want kids That's right.

23:37Yeah, it's got to come up. Okay. All right. So I think we're done. I think we got it here. Should we recap? There's the main photo. There I am serving you your... Oh, no. It's cut off. Yeah, you cut off. Boom. Oh, no. Wait. That's perfect, though, because they got to know. Wait. They can see it behind. They got to know that it's there. Yeah. Oh, that's true. Yeah, they could. Right. They could see it. I'm cut off. I love it. That's so funny. And then, yeah. And then, let's see. Oh, and then just for work, it says, see above. Oh my God. I work for a fraction of a man. I'm very chill. I work for Conan and I'm looking for someone who's not like Conan.

24:14He's a very kind of generous person. Conan made me write that part. He's here with me now. You may come on our first date. Okay. And then your basics, five feet active. You're a Pisces, undergraduate degree, drink rarely, smoke never. You're a woman. You're socially. You didn't do cannabis. What about cannabis? Oh yeah, socially cannabis. And then you want marriage. And here's some other great photos. I'm a real nerd about yoga. I'm a yoga teacher. And it's right before your yoga. And it's you in front of your yoga butt. That's great. All right, there we go. Maybe what we can do is if you have any hits, we can do a second follow-up for this, you know?

24:44I will say, I think it's good that it cuts your face off because it makes you want to tap into it. Yeah. Like I just did. You know, you're like, ooh, who is that? That looks like Conan. Yeah. And it doesn't look enough like me. There it is. There it is. Yeah. There you go. Yeah. All right. I can recenter it so it's more in the thing. Okay, well. You cut out Sam. Conan's in the picture. Yeah. and then suddenly I'm filling out the questions. Six, four. 200 pounds. I think you're going to get some interesting responses. Yeah, we'll see. I will say seriously and I'm going to say it again. Sam's wonderful and you have a very cool aura.

25:22Oh, thank you. As do you, Joe, by the way. I have to say though and Sona, we have, won't you say the women that work here are very cool. Oh, yeah, yeah. I mean, just go through the whole, you know, Tanisha and EB and we've got a squad here that is very impressive. A lot of very strong, very, you know, opinionated. And everyone quite happy to give me shit. Yes. All the time. Yes. I think you do it on purpose. I think you are drawn to women who, because I think. Who loathe me. Who loathe me. Well, I think we're going to get some, and then you should come back and we'll, you know, we'll see what happens.

25:58We'll see what happens, but I'm excited. Thank you. Because I know nothing about dating apps and I think this was the worst thing you could possibly do. So I'm curious to see. What do you mean? What do you mean? Dating app is the, oh, coming here for advice? No, no, no. Meaning coming to, yeah, coming here for advice. This is terrible. This is a terrible decision. You should have gone right to Joe. I know. I know. And so you should probably talk privately to Joe. Yeah, I will. And you guys will straighten a lot of things out. Yeah. Okay. I'm scared. All right, Sam. Best of luck to you and I look forward to the recap.

26:27I look forward to meeting your future partner. I know, my husband. Uh-oh. Or wife. It doesn't matter, man. It's all good. 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, Joanna Solitaroff, and Jeff Ross at Team Coco, and Colin Anderson at Earwolf. Theme song by The White Stripes. Incidental music by Jimmy Vivino. Take it away, Jimmy. me.