Old School. Biblically Independent.
By Andrew Sanford | TV | June 6, 2023
Your relatives will have your best interests at heart if you’re lucky. My aunts and uncles have done a lot for me in my life. Now, they’re just people I avoid on Facebook. They mean well, and they care about me, and none of them have ever tried to get me removed from a high-paying job. That is not the case with Conan O’Brien.
When Conan was hired to host Late Night in 1993, his Uncle Ned thought it was the wrong move. He called Conan and told him as much. In his mind, Conan should be getting into law. It would be one thing if his concern ended there. Instead, Ned called the then-president of the network, Bob Wright!
We know that the pleas of Conan’s uncle fell on deaf ears. Instead, we received almost thirty years of Conan behind a late-night desk. Still, it’s fun to think about what Conan would have looked like as a lawyer. Part of me likes to believe that he would have still found a way to use the Masturbating Bear or Max Weinberg in the courtroom.
Instead of headlines about a tall, redheaded late-night host, there would have been stories of a similar-looking lawyer who can’t stop trying to get laughs. Eventually, he would have found a way back in front of the camera, even if it was as an analyst. There’s also a significant chance that he still would have wound up with a podcast! Still, and this may sound crazy, I think Conan made the right choice by not listening to his uncle.
If only Ned would have tried to make NBC get rid of Leno next.
