look at the sky and not said, september 11th blue, because that's the way it was that day. >> tonight my exclusive with conan o'brien, a rare interview with a late night legend. >> nothing more comically than me without my clothes on. >> his life and loafs. he tells all. >> sorry any of this going to get if the papers? >> conan o'brien as you never have seen him before. >> we're go to the spa together. it was your idea. >> here doesn't hold back. >> that's the dumbest thing

anyone has said to me. >> how many times has he been proper flee love. >> i am giving you the answers that will make it all okay. don't screw with this. >> this is piers morgan tonight. . >> conan o'brien is tall and talented and irish and perhaps the funniest man with red hair on the planet. she an ordained minster and the fourth funniest episodes of all time. you are a man of many talents. >> yes, i am. thank you so much for noticing. you didn't even scratch the surface. i have a high fal cetto and i sing like an angel. i'm hairless on my body. there is many things aerodynamic. >> what is the genuinely weirdest thing about you. >> that's a good one.

the weirdest thing about me that nobody knows. i can be amusing at times. it seems to have escaped people's notice. >> you haven't done a lot of interviews. i have been trueing to lure you for 18 months. a desperate attempt to lure you in. >> i don't do a lot because think about it. i'm on television constantly. since 1993, i'm on tv for a chunk of time every day. i'm not look for more ways to be on television. no one in america seems to want me to be on more. if anything, i am trying to pull it back. i couldn't resist this. you have this beautiful lucite desk. it's like a classy airport lounge. it's beautiful. i'm thrilled to be here. >> i am thrilled you are here. i'm a huge fan. take me back to the first moment you me somebody laugh. do you remember? >> it was about four years ago.

i remember it very well. it was my wife. we had been married for seven years. i don't remember the exact moment. my mother claims as an infant, i mashed up food in my high chair and was throwing it around and laughing and it was making my mother laugh and her brother, my uncle said don't laugh. it's going to make him think he's a comedian or something and it caught on. i think it always starts with the family. i'm from a large irish-catholic family and trying to make my dad laugh or brothers laugh at the table when we were having -- >> where do you come in the pecking order of the kids? >> we are not sure. we are always finding new ones. we walk into the bathroom. i'm liam. i don't think we have med. >> there six of us. i am third from the top. i have two older brothers and two younger sisters and a

younger brother. >> what do they make of being related to the coco phenomenon? >> my brother luke looks a lot like me. we are only about a year apart and he lives in boston. many times he will be walking and he told me he was walking to a store to buy some embarrassing product. he probably doesn't want me to mention it. he has a rash on his as that is chronic. i'm sorry. i think you asked me what was his ailment. people sometimes follow him and will follow him into a store and he will have to turn and say no, i'm not him. i'm the smarter -- he is actually the smart one in the family. luke is a genius. >> you have a close family. >> still close. i talk to someone in my family

every day. what's great is they don't care that i'm on television. they don't care. we all make fun of each other and they are very happy. in your country i think it's take the piss out of someone. they love to do that. >> it's not a very common thing in american psyche to take the piss as we call it. sarcasm is not a massively advanced part of the american humor. >> in the different parts -- dending on where you are from. in boston it's a strong thing. they love to take you down a peg the second you show up back in town. it's something about that place. that's what i love about boston. this is a true story. i showed up once a couple of months ago and i learned it at logan airport. there was a cab line and they take a cab to my parents's house. headed to the cab line long before i get a chance to get to

the back, this guy sees me coming and he is the guy that runs the cab line. he's like hey, back of the line, tv star. i said i was headed to the back. yeah, you are like the rest of us, pal. that's where i was headed. they don't give you the chance. they need to take you down a notch. >> when you were young. >> younger. >> my apologies. >> i'm 26. >> even in third grade you did a charlie chaplain impression. you said i need learn that. i love that line. >> i had this very -- television in those days is different from tv now. in the 1970s, there is only a couple of channels and the uhf stations, channel 38 and 56, all the programming is showing old movies. that's what i watched. i grew up on old movies.

my parents wouldn't let me. >> was it that kind of thing? >> i was watching old gangster movies. angels with dirty faces. that move that's entertainment came out and showing you what entertainment is. i thought like an idiot that in the 1970s thought that was what entertainers needed to have to other than. you have to be like donald o'connor and you have to sing and dance and move and do it all. i marched up to my parents and i said i need to know how to tap dance. they thought all kinds of things, but they said okay. let's call his bluff and found me this really old african-american gentlemen named stanley brown who had been bill bo jangles robinson and live and worked out of this studio and

taught all these people how to dance. i was the only white kid there. not only that, but i was tiny we bright orange hair. all these beautiful women are learning jazz and tap and i would march in with my box of shiny shoes. hi, everybody, let's get started. let's do it! he would work with me. my parents, god bless them, they were great that way. my dad is a microbiologists and a scientist and my mom is a lawyer. >> very they regretted helping you get into show business? >> i think no. i'm sure they have since. >> is there a moment in particular, my mother when it's going great it's fantastic, but when things don't and you are high profile and you get hammered, others hate that. >> mothers don't like it, but my parents the second i was paying my own rent they didn't care what i did anymore. that's just true.

the minute i think if i -- when i paid that first rent check of my own after i got out of college and i moved out and paid my own rent, by the way, should know, i'm a hired assassin. we don't care. kill who you need to kill. >> was part of the allure being famous when you look back to that time? >> i have to say that and this this is true of a lot of comedians. i defy anyone to deny this. for most of us it's getting girls to notice us. it really is. it's still probably on some level. very happily married with two kids, but there is something initially in the early days you notice. you go through the checklist of what i have that might interest a girl. i would go through the list. i'm not a good athlete and my

skin and the hair is silly. the name is weird. they would laugh. then they would hang around a little bit. if i'm going to be honest, it was just to get girls. not even get them, but to get them to look in my direction. i'm taking it down to a much more basic level. >> you moved to l.a. after harvard. this is one of the classic commencement speeches. >> that was the fourth greatest. you have ranked the commencement speeches?

in the abstract. >> where was your agony? >> insecurity. a feeling that i don't deserve to be where i am. for example, i think when i went to -- i worked very hard in high school. that's the dirty secret about me. i was not -- i was always a hardworking student and wanted to go to a good school and worked hard to go to a good school. when i got there, i had the fears a lot of people have. i don't belong here. these others know a lot more and i'm the fake and the phony. that is the common denominator that you see with a lot of people. they are artists or performers. they don't think. >> you still see it? >> today. i wasn't sure they would let me in here. there is a constant -- >> there is a pressure to be

funny that. must be a very particular thing. >> it's funny, it's odd or ironic, whatever you want to call t but my desire getting into comedy was a very beautiful accident. i worked very hard at everything. i tried really hard. comedy was something they stumbled into in college. i wanted to be a performer and then thought this is never going to happen. i'm from brooklyn, massachusetts. we don't know anybody in show business. i'm not going to be in show business. this is ridiculous. i became a really good student and accidentally stumbled into the magazine and it was like falling off a log and discovering what it was i was meant to do. i never valued being funny, but i thought it's something i do with my friends. suddenly i saw it had a cache in

the real world. they think i'm funny and want to put me in charge. a lot of that changed my outlook on what i could do for a living. >> you are at harvard and making people laugh and everything is going great. after the break, it all goes horribly wrong. i didn't want to mention it first. >> i was a girl. i was a boy. now i'm a girl. mid grade dark roast rest fresh full tank brain freeze cake donettes rolling hot dogs g of ice anti-freeze wash and dry diesel self-serve fix a flat jumper cables 5% cashback signup for 5% cashback at gas stations through september. it pays to discover.

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>> i took a lot of criticism. ani will be honest with you. it hurt likeou would not believe. i want this for a reason. i didn't have a lot of success. i got a lot of failure. i was good and i was bad. i can criticize. >> you wrote this incredible commencement speech for the year 2000. i want to tell the story of what happened to you after you left harvard. it was a wonderful life template that anyone who is considering the life after college. you see kids after graduating and got a three-week start to

the cable show and terrible dump. i bought an old car and the car that isuzu. >> they only manufacture because they thought technically it's not a car. >> it was a hair brush more than a car. terrible car. >> you go to work on a show for a year. you must be thinking i'm a harvard graduate on the show, life is beautiful. >> i would love to pretend that's what i thought. anyone who knows me will never think we are in good shape now. i have never been that. i got that job and as i said in the speech, my writing partner and i lost that job. a lot of series of misvnchls and highs and lows. >> the wilson's house of suede and leather and you are say thing there thinking how about a

harvard graduate end up here? >> i had those thoughts and los angeles is a very -- you don't have a job in los angeles, there is something about it that's more profoundly depressing than maybe not having a job other places. >> they are all-around you, success stories. the whole machinery is geared to achievement and success, not failure. when it's great, it's the best place to be in the world, when it's wrong, it's the most lonely place on earth. >> on this town, when you are walking on a sidewalk, you are perceived as a failure. >> if you walk you are perceived as a failure. >> you can walk on three blocks in the town and people will pass you who know you and say that's too bad what happened to conan. it's not like new york or any other city. that was a very -- there is lots of intense despair. >> you then get a big break.

"saturday night live." >> i believe this gentlemen has something to say. >> i completed your course. i never deamed i could be this handsome. thanks. >> you're handsome. give that man a round of applause! >> and after a year and a half, they read your sketches and give you a two-week tryout and that turns into two seasons and you think i made it. i'm an snl superstar and you get so cocky, you think i'm getting my own show. it's going good and that will be groundbreaking and resurrect the career of tv bat man adam west. >> sounds like a foolproof plan. >> it was going to be a comedy with a studio audience that changes the rules and here's what happened. when will pilot aired, it was the second lowest rated television show of all time. it tied with a test pattern in nova scotia.

>> it's true, but i have seen. test pattern and it's funny. >> huh this terrible disaster and then you get a break and then a little above yourself and another disaster. what is going through your mind? >> i'm irish. we think that the worst is ten minutes away or five minutes away. there is part of me that was half expecting that. i think you constantly think it's over. i had that feeling of well, i guess it's over about 35 times in my career. one was five minutes ago. >> is it the kind of career, it strikes me as odd that it's the comedy that attracts a lot of neurotic insecure people. like the worst thing they should be going in for. that pressure to make people laugh is like nothing like it. when a joke doesn't work and there is a terrible reaction, it feels awful.

i can feel my body starting to compress. i don't know how you do this. >> first of all, i never experienced what you are talking about. every joke worked. there is 35,000 of them and they have all gone brilliantly. what's interesting is for me i am one of the people that comedy is the release. comedy is although it's scarey and difficult, i find more agony in other things. if someone asked me to make them a sandwich, i would have more fear resolving around making that sandwich and insecurity more than doing comedy. it's the escape. >> sorry there an art to comedy? people said you have an incredible instinct for what will be funny. it's what makes you laugh or your instinct is what makes an audience laugh. >> i don't think about -- i try

to think what i would like. what i would personally find funny, i don't know how to do it the other way. you make adjustments and you learn this kind of thing probably wouldn't work for these reasons. to me there is a very strong comedy and music that are close together. musicians are fascinated with comedy and comedians want to be musicians. myself included. there is something about having an ear for it. people like having a comedy ear. they have a sixth sense about what might work. they go with that rather than trying to extrapolate what the audience will like. >> your comedy took you to the host of a new late night show, the biggest break of your career. that's on september 13th, 1993. i was really, really happy. it's a seize the moment and put my best foot forward. that was when the most respect

and widely read television critics wrote in the "washington post," it's a living collage of habits and giggles his and has dark beady eyes like a rabbit and he's a switch on the guest that won't read and the host who should never have come. let that become the late, late show and may the host return to when he came. there is more, but it gets mean. you get buried by the number one critic. >> that was the nice part. >> when you read that, what did you feel? >> i think a weird elation. i always respond inappropriately. at the time it's devastating -- who can read that and not be devastated. i never thought of my eyes the same way again. they are beady. >> they are quite beady-like. >> i am having them completely

redone soon. they are going to be twice the size. it's a rare operation you can get and i will talk about it later. i remembered at the time there was criticism and you think about it, replacing david letterman at the height of his abilities. i said it was like the greatest baseball players ever. ted williams departing the field. >> you have to me about replacing the tv ledge end. >> ted williams leaving the field and everybody going crazy and cheering and saying don't worry. his replacement is here. chip whitly! a guy like me running in. don't worry about ted williams. i will catch it! striking out right away. you can imagine the reaction. i never in my heart had ill will towards people. if i had not been myself and

watched conan o'brien debut, i would have been horrified as well. >> what are you did that day, you would land the holy grail of comedy, "the tonight show." then you would have another down moment. >> oh, yeah. in a way i say i'm going to go on to have and i wrote that thinking not really. >> let's take a break. i want to hang on to the big moment. whatever you call it. >> you can get hit by a softball? i don't get softball, but the ball is not soft at all. >> this is a seinfeld routine. that was great. that was observational comedy. you should do ten minutes on this. this is fun. in communities across the country.

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. >> forgive me for making this all about me, but that's what i do. i was delighted by everything that happened except you losing

your job. >> i will tell you and this is honest. the only consolation i took during that period is that you were happy. >> i refer to that period as the golden age of television really. >> the period when i lost the tonight show. the brief week and a half period for you is the golden age of broadcasting? >> that's right. >> cbs's late show with david letterman and all laughing around them, but it's no secret. the moment you got "the tonight show" is the holy grail in comedy. when you got it, is that how you felt? given all that happened to you before, did you feel this is it? i have my 2o-year plan worked out? >> probably on some level you think this is going to be fantastic and another level where they announc it and it

was the strange and clearly absurd plan that was announced five years ahead of time. stalin's grain production plan. that is not how television works. in retrospect now, you realize it's a strange thing to have this weird hand over. >> i think that cutoff point, the racing is pretty good. did you think this would be tricky, whatever happened this would be an odd thing. the guy leaving is not leaving as a failure. he is leaving because he has to contracturally. >> well, the thing i say there, they don't know "the tonight show" host is left. that was not the reason for any of them going. i think the conset cent and the network, no one was expecting that change.

that was the motivation. let's move on to the next generation. was that the greatest moment in your career? >> obviously in retrospect, they never feel like it really did happen. it took five years and was there for a few months and there was a plan and it seems so silly, i am happier now. this seems like a greater achievement for me. this is a greater show they want to do and i'm doing it with things i love. for me, this feels like more of an achievement. >> this is where i get the ka taft officeries.

you can put it in and you always bounce back as something better throughout. the patent has always been -- boom. >> you know, someone said to me and i think it was my dad said if you read a biography, we love history. if you read a biography of a great historical figure, if you cut to the middle of the book, there is a lot of trouble. like churchill. there is a lot of disappointment and not that i'm a great figure, but in a good career, there should be a lot of challenges. i would honestly not change anything that happened. it's been fascinating and it brought me to where i am now. >> what are did your parents say when it ended? >> they don't follow the news. they think i am still hosting. they think i am doing a lovely job. they are very confused.

>> do you feel more free and liberated? >> they let me do whatever i want. we are partners on this and it's a fantastic opportunity to -- first of all they encourage us to travel. we had been to new york and traveled twice in one year. they have been amazing partners in helping us build a new kind of talk show. and an incredible social network presence and we are able to have this show that is a very funny show, but a show that is having a dialogue with our audience. we're talking to the audience and they can talk back with the social network and effect what happens on the show. in that way it's really thrilling. creatively the last two years.

>> let's take another break and talk about your greatest hitss a talk show host. no more rising from the ashes. pure glory. >> let's get to that. [ male announcer ] citi turns 200 this year.

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>> it's really amazing. >> i sneak into the room and you went to harvard and you should know that. >> past part of sneak. >> look at me. i'm conan o'brien. phone in the show. by god, i got a couple of words for you.

you better get your as togs! >> greatest hits from the late show. when you look back over, you have done thousands of interviews and thousands of monologues. you have five minutes left to live and you can relive any moment from any of the shows. >> what would you go for? >> which guess would i go for? >> to define and you any particular reason. >> okay. >> i did a silly remote once where we found a group of baseball players that play baseball in late 19th century rules. i put on the mustache and spoke in that turn of the century baseball. it was so me. i always said whenever i go, don't even give a eulogy.

show that piece. it only lasts a few minutes. it's me with the big mustache and acting like a complete as. that's my first thing to do. it was in my wheel house, so to speak. very philly, but also had these magical moments in it. i would say roll that. >> if that was any lower, i would have to dig to find the apple. why not dig a trench? then the ball would be as low as you wish it to be. that was no strike.

you regret it, see? what is that? >> who are the ones who see they are coming back. your eyes light up because this will be great. >> tom hanks is one of the great guests of all time. he gets the whole package and is a massive superstar who is as funny as any comedian that i have known. people like that don't exist anymore. >> generically what was the night? >> you are awful. we don't even invite you. they pulled out and piers is sitting there. >> did you one recently.

let's have a look at this. >> a large family to me, but this is just the tip of the iceberg. we have a photo of a family gathering of the romneys. absolutely incredible. when you get together, there is a global tacky shortage. >> there is a panic worldwide. >> how comedically rich is this campaign been to you? >> it's funny because our show doesn't focus on politics as much as the other shows who do it brilliantly. we touch on it when it works for us. sometimes my show can be irrelevant to the news. we also do that and sometimes people tune in when they want to escape what's happening in the news. we have the ability sometimes to just create our own comeic world and live off of it.

obviously it's something that is a serious of humor. you figure it out and it got much better for us when it was obama versus romney. it got so complicate and you have so many angles going, once it was obama versus romney, it doesn't matter if you are on the left and the right, if we can coming to and mock jersey shore, we brought this country together. >> of course you met your wife on a comedy show. >> yes. i met her when i was working on the late night show and i went out in the field to shoot a remote and went to an advertising agency and she was one of the ad execs. >> we will talk about your wife when we come back. the comedic rock. i want to know who makes who laugh most and when you laugh in

bed and whether she laughs at you in bed. >> i'm feeling very badly. you know why i sell tools? tools are uncomplicated.

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springfield's only choice. throw up your hands and raise your voice. . >> sorry, mom, the mob is broken. >> monorail ♪ >> doh! >> the classic mob versus the monorail. the fourth best of all time. he is not even in the top three. >> enraged.

no. i'm just -- the simpsons for me is a gift that keeps giving. i am always clear that i didn't create that show. that was up and running in a massive success when they let me step on board. for a few seasons. just before i took over the late night show. i loved it. i loved it and what's nice is the episodes are out and bouncing around and i can be anywhere in the world. people will occasionally bring up one of the episodes i worked on. they have this beautiful gift they keep giving. >> let's talk love and romance and marriage. >> which one? >> let's start with love. how many times have you been proper low in love in your life. >> i'm married so there is one answer to that. one. >> sorry that a diplomatic life.

>> my wife, liza. >> you never had your heartbroken before that? >> it wasn't a woman. it was a cat. it was a cat that betrayed me. we don't want to talk about the animals. yeah, i would say i will go with my answer. my wife. my beautiful wife. >> when did you realize? >> my only true love. >> did you realize he was the? >> instantly. these are the answers ha make it all okay. don't screw with this. instantly. i knew right away. actually i did know very quickly. it was being shot for television. somewhere in the vault at nbc, there is footage of me literally falling for my wife on camera. >> what was it about her? >> to be crass, she is

incredibly beautiful. that was the first attention getter. that works occasionally. i'm a guy. ladies, a little trick for you. when you are really beautiful, that can work sometimes. what was nice is that we talked on the phone for a while. that was our relationship. because i'm impotent. is any of this going to get in the papers do you think? it won't get out. we did talk on the phone for a while. she is very intelligent and funny and a really good person. the nice thing is that that was the basis of the relationship. so i just knew. you a romantic man? >> i'm going to say i have deep, deep down underlayers and layers of repression and ham and layers of carbohydrates, there is a

romantic guy down there, yes. but man is that covered up. it's a slim jim of romance with massive insulation layers of insecurity and self loathing wrapped around it. >> how would you like to be remembered? >> that guy was well-endowed. massive. he was a freak show. i saw him in a men's room. that was scary. honestly i would -- if anyone remembers me at all for any amount of time, i would like to be thought of as someone who i do try i think sincerely to be nice to people and try to make them laugh. i think mostly it comes from a good place. that would be nice. if not that, the hair. i would like to be known for and then the endowed thing would be great if we could slip that in.

>> you make people laugh, you are well-endowned and you have great hair. not a bad thing. >> you verified it as a journalist. those three are all true. you would know and you have seen me. we often go to the spa together. it was your idea. to go to the spa. >> this is uncomfortable. >> it's a spach. it's a creepy room he has. >> you are not going to get the plug. you want to read it? >> watch this. where is my camera? watch conan week nights at 11:00 eastern and 10:00 p.m. central on tbs. miss it and you're a fool. we will take a break. when we come back, madeleine albright will be here. she will make cookies.

angela merkel is up next. you talk to real people. they have done real things. what was this? >> i loved it. >> nice talking to you. but plenty of companies do that. so we make something else. we help make life a little easier, more convenient, more rewarding, more entertaining. year after year. it's the reason why we don't have customers. we have members. american express. welcome in.

how did i get here? dumb luck? or good decisions? ones i've made. ones we've all made. about marriage. children. money. about tomorrow. here's to good decisions. who matters most to you says the most about you. massmutual is owned by our policyholders so they matter most to us. massmutual. we'll help you get there. mom: ready t♪ go to work? ♪ ♪ ♪ every mom needs a little helper.

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