Zach Braff

27:30You're saying it all with your faces. Well, those ads are so funny because we shoot them on a cul-de-sac in Santa Clarita. And first it was just one. It was the Super Bowl ad last year. We did a West Side Story spoof. Right. And it had such an insane reaction. And it was like, I think, the number one or two ad of views-wise. And so they just kept coming back to us. And the funny thing is, the whole concept is that we live next door to each other in this cul-de-sac. So this cul-de-sac of people, we're like, we've shot like seven ads there now. And they're like, they're just like, they've like unionized all the houses.

28:09I love that. They've gotten super savvy. Oh, as they should, of course. But I mean, they like, so there's been so many of them. And that one, the one you liked was just an idea. The guy behind it, who's the Don Draper of all, is a very talented, funny man named Brian Klugman. And at that moment, we had shot a different ad. And he said, I have a funny idea, but if we have enough time at the end of this spot, let's just bang it out real quick as a proof of concept. Right. And we did that. We shot it in one, not the one you saw, but we shot it in one take. And they sent it off to T-Mobile. And they were like, yes, that's the Christmas campaign.

28:44We actually came back to make it look better and put fake snow on the ground. But it had been sort of just a little spec thing that was an afterthought. Well, that's how the good things happen. Yeah. so many so many of the best like hits in rock and roll where this will be a b-side let's just i don't even like this one and then it becomes satisfaction right you know but uh having a kind of relationship like that with someone uh in this business and having everybody be able to read it instantly like oh great it's it's those two they're they're together again it's authentic i think people know when things aren't authentic and that is most certainly authentic i mean we're we're we are best friends we talk every day we it's funny because his his wife is also um is one of my best girlfriend we female friends and so we're on this text chain the three of us it's like a throuple um well now it's getting kinky well friends with zero benefits uh but um but anyway they're they're my best friends and so it's it's uh it's uh it's real and it's all have you ever been gotten has donald ever given you signal enough already my wife and i need to go see we'd like to go to this movie without you no no they let me i think you're not picking up No, they have plenty of time for their sexual relations.

29:53I'm not like to leave me on FaceTime in the corner of the room while you guys hook up. Well, I only bring it up because I have that relationship with a couple of people. Or I insist that I'm in the background on FaceTime all the time. I enjoy it. It's erotic. I love them. We do everything together. It's fun. uh so i'm trying to think of the chronology because as scrubs ended completely when you do garden state no no i wasn't i was very young it was it was the um it was i think after the second or third season of scrubs because i i um my my second my first hiatus from scrubs i was in a production of the of twelfth night at the delacorte shakespeare in the park in new york which had always been a dream of mine and then i remember while being there writing natalie portman a letter because she was my first choice.

30:43I didn't ever think she'd say yes, but she was like the archetype of who I picture. Sure, yeah. And I knew that she had done the seagull there. So I thought, oh, this will be a good angle. I'm sitting in the same dressing room where she once sat and I'll write her a very personal note saying, please consider the script. And then she said yes over that season two. So it may have been after season two or three, I forgot. But we shot in 2003, whatever that was. I mean, first of all, getting Natalie Portman and this is your directorial debut. Yeah, and I'm young, very young. Very young, and I remember at the time it being, you know, you're stepping out of your comfort zone to say, like, I'm on this successful sitcom.

31:23Everyone knows me as this guy, as this character, but I am going to make this movie. Yeah, and it's something that's very vulnerable, saying, like, hey, here are the things I've dealt with here. I mean, it's very, it was, I had so much chutzpah But when I think back, I didn't know what I didn't know. You know what I mean? Yeah. But that's another gift too. It is. Is to be, I mean, were I to get in a time machine now knowing everything I know and someone said, okay, it's 1993. What you're going to do is I'd say no. That's fucking crazy. Yeah. No. And that's going to be painful and awful. And I'm going to get knocked around and no.

32:01Yeah. I'm just going to stay right here in this armchair. Yeah. Because it's great not to know. Yeah, I didn't know anything. It's a superpower. It's a superpower. That's a great way to put it. And so, and amazing things happened. I mean, it became, you know, no one wanted to fund it at first. No one knew, you know, it was a sort of different kind of screenplay where the third act should go. The character just go off on a quest for a piece of jewelry we've never heard about. Right, right. It didn't really follow. I was being a little bit brave with structure. And so it was hard to find someone to make it.

32:35And then I did. And then we had a really meaningful Sundance sale. And then it went on to become really successful. How terrifying. It all worked out so well, but how terrified. Just knowing you, how scared were you? I always try to delineate. I've never been in this film business. I've always been in a, let's get in there. Think of a couple of ideas. Okay, these seem pretty good. Let's get out there and do it. Da-da-da-da-da-da. Bang. Crowd seemed to like it. Let's go. What's the next one? or a crowd didn't like it. Well, we'll get them tomorrow. Yeah. And this idea that you're putting that much time and so much of yourself into something and you're so young and then it's all, it's coming out.

33:16Yeah. It's coming out. How scary must it be? It was terrifying. But I feel the same way now. I have a new movie coming out. It's so, you're so vulnerable. But what else can you do? I mean, I think when you choose this career, it's like, what else are you going to do? You have to do it. You have to make stuff and go, okay, here world. But in the spirit of not knowing what I didn't know, I had never put myself out there. Scrubs, I was hiding behind the great Bill Lawrence. I just did what he said to do and improv some jokes and it worked. But he was the face of it, in Hollywood at least. Garden State was the first time saying, hey world, these are some of my thoughts and feelings.

33:56Love them or hate them. So that's terrifying. Yeah, you said, hey, now you're going to listen to me, see? no you say hey please maybe look at this no but I remember at the time you doing a lot of interviews you're saying yeah you're all gonna listen to me see and you had a big cigar no I you're thinking of somebody else I'm thinking of guys and dolls you're thinking of whenever they do like old like movies parodies like I had a pound you let's talk about a good person because I watched this last night and you did an amazing job and you have you wrote this you directed it I don't want to give away too much, but it is a heavy movie in places, but it has to be.

34:37I mean, you're talking about the main character, who's played by Florence Pugh, goes through this incredible, very intense situation early in the film that reverberates throughout the rest of the movie. But, I mean, the cast, Morgan Freeman? Yeah. I mean - He's pretty extraordinary. I just was, how do you get Morgan Freeman to do your movie? Well, I'll start with that. I had made a studio sort of heist film. It was a remake of Going in Style with him, Michael Keaton and Alan Arkin. And so we had a relationship. But I never thought he was even a possibility because this was a little tiny budget indie and Morgan doesn't usually do those.

35:22So I wrote the movie for Florence. we were in a relationship and I just think she's the most incredible young actress on the planet I was I was and am in awe of her and and I was dealing with a lot of grief so which I can talk about more if you want but but I'll just circle back to Morgan I wrote this piece it was about I wanted to mix the story of grief with humor because I don't want anything that's too maudlin I mean yes there's a lot of drama in the film but there's a lot of humor as well yes there is yeah Yeah. And and so it was real. It became real. And I said, I'm just going to start with.

35:59And there was a character of a senior citizen who I wanted to be some great acting legend. And I thought, well, why don't I? This is crazy. He's never going to do it because we can't afford to pay him the Morgan Freeman amount of money. But I do know him and I know he likes me. So let me try. And I remember Florence, we were in my my den and my phone rang. And the times Morgan and I have communicated it's never been over a phone call it's always been very curt texts but my phone rang and she held it up and it said morgan freeman oh wow and uh i grabbed it i was like she's like answer it answer it and i picked it up and he said i see myself on every page of the script oh wow it's fantastic and that's when uh my life changed again and he said um he goes i don't normally do uh this but meaning attach myself to a movie that wasn't even really fully set up yet but I'm with you.

36:52And then, of course, we were on our way to being made. It's so crazy because, I mean, that's an amazing story in and of itself, but also Morgan Freeman has the most, next to like James Earl Jones, the most iconic voice. Yeah. And especially voice over voice. Yeah, he used to be my voicemail message because he lost a... When we were making Going in Style, he lost a bet to me and my prize was that he was my outgoing, What was the message? It was like, hello, this is Morgan Freeman. Zach can't come to the phone. Oh, that's fantastic. Oh, my God.

37:32Zach can't come to the phone. He's with Andy Dufresne. I guess I just miss my friend. I miss my friend. Because hope is a thing that you have to hang on to. It would be great if it just kept going and going and going. The penguin must sit on the eggs. Wait, we're doing that now?

37:58He does have the most beautiful voice. Oh my God. Well, I mean, he's fantastic. And I mean, God, Florence Pugh is incandescent. She's next level. Yeah. And you - And also there's Molly Shannon as well. Molly Shannon playing the mom is terrific. You know, what I like is I'm drawn to stories where everybody's vulnerable. I think we all have our own stuff. Not me. Except you. Really? Yep. That doesn't at all check with what we know of you. I think you have a skewed view. But anyway. All right. Is there, you know, because I'm thinking, again, I'm trying to put myself in your place, which is impossible.

38:47But if I say cut and then I have to go up and give Morgan Freeman a note, you know what I mean? It feels like it would be you. Yes, you are. You are. You have earned the right. You're a proven director and you've you're the writer director of this film and you've you've earned the right. but still it's Morgan Freeman. And you must flash back to, I remembered when I was working at Chili's. With Morgan Freeman. With Morgan Freeman, but it was his Chili's. He was the manager. It's funny you say that. Well, first of all, Morgan really only would prefer to do one take of every single thing. Oh, wow.

39:28But as a director, that's usually impossible because, you know, there's multiple, Morgan Freeman is truly almost always perfect. but you know there's there's an there's a background person that crossed in the wrong spot or the camera was out of focus so you often are in the position as a filmmaker of saying okay that was an awesome take one we're gonna go again and then you would hear wow oh my god wow and then i'd be like morgan you were awesome um we can do better with the camera and also can we change those blinds and can you not cross when when that you know you're directing the movie like you normally do So, but, but part of it is like, he's, he's very, um, he teases like that.

40:07He's very, um, he's like, but that's his, that's his vibe. But I mean, a little bit of it is like, let's keep moving, but he knows I'm going to do more than one take. And in terms of the directing thing, I would say the best analogy I can use with someone like him or someone like Florence Pugh, you're not teaching or telling them how to act. Right. You're having a, it's, it's analogous to a conductor who has a genius first violinist. I can't play the violin like that person can, but I can say, I need to hear the bassoons a little more. So at that section, can you quiet down? Do you know what I mean?

40:39Yeah. So I'm not going to him and being like, bro, what are you doing? Morgan. Jesus, Morgan. What the hell was that? I'm going to him and engaging in a conversation going, do you think that maybe in this scene it should be more X because later we're going to do Y? Right. And then more often than not, he's like, that's good. Let's do that. Let's do that. So if I had gone up to him and said, hey, Morgan, it's called acting. That would have been horrible. Let's give it a try, shall we? That wouldn't have worked. Shortest directing career ever. Conor O 'Brien was a movie director for, it says here, eight seconds.

41:20For one take, yeah. For one take. You wouldn't even have gotten the wow. Oh, no. Oh, I know what would have happened. suddenly he's not there and people are packing up equipment i also think as an actor um obviously not of that stature but as an actor myself i want direction whether you're whether you're a super famous uh director or it's your first film i want you this is your thing i want to be steered please steer me you know what i mean right i i mean i find it all fascinating because it's not my world and i'm so impressed by it because i know how much work goes into it the times I've had any glimpse at all of movie making.

41:58I just think, oh my God. I know people want to visit and then they come visit and they're like, this is so fucking boring. Right. They're adjusting that light for six hours. Anytime anyone comes to visit a set for the first time, they're like, I can't believe how slow and boring this is. Well, because I think your average person, and I'll include myself, when you go to a movie set, especially if you're younger, you think that if you're going to see a movie like 48 hours, is you're going to see, you know, you're going to see Nick Nolte and Eddie Murphy in a car firing guns, smashing through things and saying funny things.

42:31No, you're not going to see that at all. You're going to see someone opening a door. Okay, let's try it again. Different angle. Nope, fix that light. Yeah. That's what you're going to see. Can someone oil the hinge? Why did we go with brass hinges? You know, let's take 20 and change the hinges out. Yeah, let's throw those hinges out. the new hinges are squeaky we need to oil the new hinges he's really someone should do a a blooper reel where it's all that stuff well you know what's incredibly boring have you ever seen living in oblivion no no i haven't that's a great movie uh that and it's an older movie it's i think in the 90s uh i mean not that older but um it's a great spoof of of making an indie movie and I highly recommend it.

43:17Who's in it? Well, Peter Dinklage is one of his first films, right? And Catherine Keener. Maybe I have saw it a long time ago. A lot of the 90s for me is - What's clever is that when they're doing the, when it's all the behind the scenes, which is the chunk of the movie, it's black and white. But when they call action, they pop into the camera and now it's in color. So it's kind of like a backstage in front of the curtain kind of thing. You know what I mean? like you're kind of getting both viewpoints right so it's a lot of fun and and and it so accurately spoofs the struggle to try and and and and make an indie movie on a on a budget and on a schedule well if that's a good person and i can't imagine what went into making it uh just like emotionally and also just a sheer hard work it was really it was really i'm but i'm really proud of it and i hope people go check it out um it's a struggle to get people to go to the theaters these days so here's my my blatant ask to go check it out in the theaters um it's it's it's beautifully shot by an amazing cinematographer and and um and i and i really do believe they both give pretty outstanding performances yeah they do you know that because you saw it i yeah i do know that and uh and also if it helps i'm putting a brand new microwave oven uh still in the box under one of the seats in one of the theaters this thing retails for like 160 i didn't say it was a good microwave.

44:42So when you're in the theater, make sure to look under your seat. Yeah. Just briefly, but don't keep your eye on the screen. And how are you right now? Are you now that this process is done? You're in a good place? I am in a good place. I'm I'm I have a lot of fun stuff happening. I directed an episode of Bill's new show Shrinking, which I'm which I'm really proud of. I think it's a really good show. And and releasing this movie, which has been my baby for so long. It was ready to be released at the end of last year, but Florence had two other big movies come out, and so we decided to hold it for the spring.

45:15So, you know, holding something you're proud of that you want to share with the world back for so long, now it's finally coming out, so it's really exciting. Yeah, that's the thing that I say. I can't, you know, I'm in the, we think of it, it's gone. But what about The Simpsons? I mean, there's an excuse. Oh, that was different. You knew you had written a funny joke, and you had to wait, like, how long to see it? Yes, I know, I know. That was a different experience, but that was so long ago. I mean, Simpsons fans will come up to me and talk to me as if I just finished working on the episode that I worked on that they liked.

45:47And I have to explain to them, because they're so young that I'm, you know. They think you wrote it like recently. Or else they don't really, they just think, oh, so, you know, they're quoting lines from things. And I'll think, I don't know what you're talking about. You know, it's like telling a, whatever, over a Confederate soldier who's like 98. You remember that in that first battle? I'm like, no, I don't. I don't remember. It was so long ago. I should have said Union. I know. I was really confused about your choice of a Confederate soldier. I was like, what you're going to remind them of.

46:18Can I just say, I just like the cap they had. That cap was a good cap. Yeah, the Union guys had those too. Yeah, I mean. No, they were blue. I like a gray cap. Okay, okay. A blue cap is too striking. I just like the world where you're going and chatting up old Confederate soldiers. Yeah, what? I want to see that podcast. stories to tell it sounds like a podcast to me let's do a much better guest than me i think uh they'll they'll talk to me about this but i do remember back then the time between thinking of the idea for an episode and seeing it could be a year it could be more than a year because it was animation and so crazy about animation and and it's it really is analogous here because i've had to wait so long we completed it and we had to wait so long to finally share it and it's it's made me think of you in animation like wow we're all so proud of that episode it's going to be a year for anyone to see it right right well it's uh there's so many people that never and i see them all the time because i mean here we make our podcast in larchmont and in la there are all these cafes and i'm always see is people working on their screenplay yeah that's what people came out here to do is to write their screenplay and i was sitting yesterday with uh two of the guys i I work with Mike and Matt, and they were just, I think there were four people around me working on screenplays.

47:36And I think it's just to, it's such a gift to get something made because so many things aren't made. Yeah, it's the most insane obstacle course to get anything made. I mean, even with Morgan Freeman and Florence Pugh starring, it's not like, you know, everyone's going to make it. I mean, you have to find the right person who wants to make it. Yeah, you also want to make someone, you want to find someone who's going to honor the vision. They're going to let you make it how you want to make it. Exactly. And not say, we have an idea. They're buddy cops. Yeah. That is not what I wrote. Yeah. I wrote a story about loss and, you know, crossing generations and how people, nope.

48:15There's another, there's another great thing you'll love. I don't know if you ever watched, there was a spoof of the pilot making process called the TV set with David Duchovny. Did anybody ever see that? Oh, I think I did see that. I highly recommend that too. You'll love that. But there's a funny moment in that where Duchovny plays the showrunner and it's his idea and they're finally making this thing. And Sigourney Weaver plays the head of the studio. And she comes to him and she goes, look, we want to talk to you about the suicide thing with your brother in the story. And he goes, that was the whole impetus for the script.

48:48I mean, the reason I wrote the script was my brother's suicide. And that started the whole story and it's kind of the whole foundation upon which this is built. And there's a long pause and she goes, but what if it wasn't?

49:09Well, Zach Braff, congratulations on a good person and on an excellent career. Thank you. And thank you for being so supportive of me. Through all the years, you've always been a cheerleader of mine and I really genuinely appreciate that. Well, I mean, since the first time I saw you, I thought this guy's really funny and you have such a great energy and spirit. Thank you. And I'm proud of what you've, I'm proud. I always, it's so funny, but because I'm older than so many of the people that I interview, including Patrick Stewart.

49:44As they get younger, I get older. No, but I do, when super young people came on my late night show and I liked them, and then they go on to challenge themselves and do cool things. I always take a little bit of like, oh, good for you as if you were my son. Well, you can say that and you can say proud because you knew me right when I was wide-eyed and beginning. I'm your orthodox father. This is the weirdest version of Star Wars.

50:16This is the way. This is the way. What a twist. You didn't see that coming. Luke, I'm your Orthodox father. I'm your Orthodox father. We have to get a blow torch in the kitchen. Someone make bacon.

50:34Someone write that up, come on. Hey Zach, thank you so much for doing this. That was great. Thank you.

50:45I heard some disturbing news today and I'd like to investigate. Let me explain. I'll do a little background first. Mr. Gorley, Matt Gorley, as you may know him, or just Matt, obviously does a terrific job here at the show and constantly crafting the program and making it sound perfect. I think we've covered it. Yep, we're done. Oh, no, no, no. No, no, there's more to cover. Matt is also a bit of a slut when it comes to podcasts. That's true. He's always out there. I mean, I would think being on Conan O 'Brien Needs a Friend would be enough. I mean, this is a big deal. But no, he is always off working on hundreds and hundreds of other podcasts.

51:35I'm the Wilt Chamberlain of podcasters. Yes, you are. Yes, you are. You cannot be sated. You keep going and you're always out to conquer another podcast that you meet in a club late at night. and then bring back to your creepy 1970s house with extra high doorways. But anyway, enough. I wish I could refute you on any of this. But recently, Matt was telling us all in the studio, because we hang around sometimes, we're friends off mic, and just pretend the advertisers like it. They do? They want friendship in order to advertise? They just like it. They want people to buy into this as a real family, like the royal family.

52:23But we all know deep down what's happening behind the scenes. Anyway, so Matt was telling us he had a new idea for a podcast called Mall Walkin', where he walks around a mall and maybe he has a special guest with him and just walks around a mall and sees what happened. So I think, well, interesting idea. And again, confused that he needs, I mean, the man has a child and a wife and he's working with Conan O 'Brien. Why does he need this? But that's his choice, not mine. And then yesterday I was working with Sona. You were helping me out with something. Yeah. And we were working on a project together and you just happened to mention that you were a guest on Mall Walking.

53:06Yeah, I was. With Matt Gourley and that things went a little off the rails. And now I turn it over to you two. Well, I mean, it wasn't - I asked to be on Mall Walk-In. And I was happy, happy to have you. We do this show with my friend Mark McConville, and we went to the mall, which is called The Shops at Santa Anita. Right. And we did what we always do. We walk in with three handheld mics, although we only had two wireless receivers, so I was tethered to Mark with a 20-foot cable. Wait a minute. Wait a minute. But not the whole time. No, because we had a malfunction. So there was a malfunction.

53:42So, because I would think the whole idea of doing a podcast called Mall Walk-In is that you want to be not too obtrusive. Right. You want to sort of fly under the radar, and yet you are lashed to your friend with a cable? Yes. Yeah. Because of what was the malfunction? The wireless receiver on one of the mics wasn't working. Right, right. Okay. Yeah, and it could not have been a longer cable. I just want to make sure. There's no way you can't notice this extremely long cable, and they're standing right next to each other, so it's dragging on the floor. You didn't coil it up? Why didn't you coil it up?

54:17Well, we did, but we got to spread out at times where he's going to the Lids store and I want to check out Hot Topic, you know? But you can't. You can't have a long cord between the two of you in a busy mall. We did. Okay. We clotheslined some people. All right. So, Sona, you're part of this. I am. And tell us what's happening. So we started off, I had clothes to return at Old Navy. Which we did on Mike. You returned clothes on Mike. How am I not listening to this podcast? This is fantastic. We just walk the entire second floor, store to store. We're talking about what we see, you know, and then we're talking about the candy dispensers.

55:00I mean, it's really riveting stuff. And then we get to the end of the second floor and someone stopped us. The security guard stopped us. We haven't been to the first floor yet. So halfway through. Yes. So you're halfway through this show. You've returned some clothes. Yes. And you've looked in lids. Got a seized candy chocolate thing. Oh, that's right. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I made Matt pay for it. Can't forget that. Well, I expensed it to the mall walking. Yeah. Okay. Which has an offshore account. Game of the Bahamas. I know that this is all ways for you to launder cash. It is a front. So you're doing all that.

55:40And then you get to the end of the second floor of the mall and you're approached by a security guard. And why don't you take it here, man? Well, he was the sweetest man. Yes. And he seemed also kind of reluctant. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah. And then Sona kind of took over. As she does. Yeah. And thank God, because she was brilliant and she was really kind, but also very matter of fact, basically said, what would your supervisor say to this? Let's speak to them. so out comes his boss who then recognized Sona yeah oh yeah yeah so he's like you look familiar and then you know I mean usually it's because they watch you so I was like oh I work for Conan O 'Brien and he goes yeah you know I'm team Coco for life and so we were like I love this guy yeah but then we were like so can we record and he's like no yeah no absolutely not wow yeah it didn't help us he's team Coco for life I love team Coco I love Conan can you help us out a little bit No, I cannot.

56:39Then we asked to go above his head, and they walked us back to the management office. Yes. And by the way, your cable is still unspooling this whole time. 900 feet of cable. And by the way, old women on walkers are tumbling left and right. You just keep hearing in the background, Oh, my Lord. Clunk, shatter. Yeah, we went to the office of the mall, which was pretty cool. Okay, so you went into the, yeah, I mean this is, again, if you're going to check out anything at the mall, I think the administrative office would be the place. This podcast opens doors. Yeah. So you're in there, and are you still recording?

57:20Yes, and then technically they asked us to stop, but we kept recording. Well, the old trick is to say we've stopped but not stop. Right, and we did do that. And we spoke to two very nice women, and they said, we can't let you record today, but here's our business card. you can email and get permission, which I did. Never heard from him. Pinged him back. Heard from a new lady. She said, can you please describe the podcast? I did. Never heard from her again. Got ghosted. So what we need you to do, and I'm glad you brought this up, is call out shops at Santa Anita and say, free Sona and Matt and Mark.

57:59You know what I'm going to do? I'm going to quote a really good guy. he's a security guard at shop in Santa Anita and say I can't help you out come on come on the three of us want to go back for part two I'm channeling the guy's team Coco and I gotta go with team Coco I can't help you out yeah Conan imagine if you had the Godfather without the Godfather part two we have not even been on the first floor of this mall it's exactly the same you're right yeah well first of all Godfather alone I think people would still regard as one of the greatest movies of all time. As they would this episode of the podcast.

58:38Yes. But if you say without The Godfather Part 2 you don't have The Godfather no you still have The Godfather and everyone's very happy. So that analogy doesn't hold. Well they end each episode sitting on the massage chairs and we didn't even get to do that. So I think that that alone requires us to go back there. It's a loose tooth. I really need to check out the food court too. That's important. You can't go to a mall without looking at the food court. Okay. I love you guys. I work with you all the time. We're a team. So yes, I will help you. This is Conan O 'Brien. And this message goes out to Shops at Santa Anita.

59:16Thank you. I'm asking you, please, to let Matt Gourley and Sona Movsassian come back. And Mark McConville. And Mark who? Mark McConville. No, I'm not going to vouch for him. I don't know him. He's good. but he's better than me. No, he might be great. I just don't know the guy. I can't vouch for him. Okay. You have to get him in on your own. Oh, shit. So Shops at Santa Anita, I wanted you to please, please allow Matt Gourley, Sonam Ossessian, Mark Mugubba,

59:55to come and record an episode of Mall Walking. It's - Mall Walk-In. Mall Walk-In. I'm sorry. You don't say the G at the end. It's got an apostrophe. Thank you, Sona. Okay, thank you, Sona. That's a wonderful part of my pitch. And we'll make all the difference in this plea. And I just ask that you consider this. This is great promotion for Shops at Santa Anita. And third part of the Mark McGovern. They're going to do a great job with McGovern. Sona Masa. Can I get you saying a few different other malls so we could just plug that in and use that for it. Okay, go ahead. South Coast Plaza. Hey, South Coast Plaza, do me a favor.

1:00:39The Americana at Brand. Hey, Americana at Brand, Conan O 'Brien here, and I need your help. Sherman Oaks Galleria. Hey, Sherman Oaks Galleria, I know I was banned in 1988, but please hear me out and listen to this important message. And finally, the Citadel Outlet Mall. Hey, Citadel Outlet Mall, Conan O 'Brien here. And I've got a special request that may turn out nicely for all of us. Yeah. You know what I'll say? You should make it very clear to these people that this is advertising. That's what I'm saying. Yeah. Did you mention that? No, but I didn't. If I had time to mentally prepare, I would have kicked in.

1:01:24But, like, you know, who's going to the mall anymore, right? We're doing them a favor. Okay, well, first of all, don't say who's going to the mall anymore. That's not going to get you back into the shops at Santa Anita. I'm saying, dear Santa Anita, people will listen to this podcast and flock to the mall. It's true. I wrote that in the email. Maybe that's why I haven't heard back because then they knew they couldn't take me seriously. Well, listen, I do hope you get back in there. Do you really? I do. Do you care? Yeah. Okay, that's good. I don't care a lot. Okay. I barely care. but I do care no I'm thinking about it and I'm registering you know when the sun gets really low on the horizon at the end of the day and there's still just a little bit of like a little bit of glow yeah that's how much caring I have that's a little bit that's fine it's still there I'll take it it registers yeah and you know we'll see and if this doesn't work maybe I gotta show up at the mall if you guys you know and then you can't just say one thing bring a mop because when people see Conan O 'Brien in a mall, there's gonna be shit on the floor.

1:02:33Oh. Yeah. You're proud of that? No. And this is a selling point for Santa Anita? You want them to shit all over the mall? I'm telling you what I want. I'm telling you what happens when I get recognized on the street. Okay. I have been responsible for more public defecation than anybody in the history of the medium. Well, I went to a restaurant with you in Santa Anita, and it's notorious for having a long wait and they saw you and still made us wait 45 minutes for a table. You know why? Why? They were busy shitting.

1:03:09Well, good luck you guys. Thank you boss. Thank you. Conan O 'Brien needs a friend. With Conan O 'Brien, Sonam of Sessian, and Matt Gourley. Produced by me, Matt Gourley. Executive produced by Adam Sachs, Joanna Solitaroff, and Jeff Ross at Team Coco and Colin Anderson and Cody Fisher at Earwolf. 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 by Eduardo Perez. Additional production support by Mars Melnick. Talent booking by Paula Davis, Gina Batista, and Britt Kahn.

1:03:50You 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 323-451-2821 and leave a message. It too could be featured on a future episode. And if you haven't already, please subscribe to Conan O 'Brien Needs a Friend on Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, or wherever fine podcasts are downloaded.

1:04:18This has been a Team Coco production in association with Earwolf. ξ