https://archives.uwp.edu/files/original/fce51526f1813de23cf5c487ecb01247.pdf c8c5a6f9ffe23fa356b1494f8af648ef Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource University of Wisconsin - Parkside Ranger News Description An account of the resource Student newspaper of UW-Parkside Text A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text. Issue Volume 22, issue 23 Headline Used for newspapers, the Headline element describes the main article of the issue. Ranger Exclusive: Interview with NBC Late Night's Conan O'Brien Series Number The series number of the original collection. UWPAC124 Ranger News Text Any textual data included in the document Ranger Exclusive: Interview.with NBC Late Night's Conan O'Brien by Ioe Kene Managing Editor During Spring Break, our managing editor, Joe KImel travelled with Parkside'. Theatre Deparhnent to New York City. While there, he interviewed the new host of NBCs Late Night--<:onan O'Brien. The Ranger is pleased to present their conversation in this exclusive interview. -Steven Moore Several weeks before the thealre grou p left for New York, I began calling Conan O'Brien's people to try to arrange this interview, without holding out too much hope for success. Yet after about two dozen back-and- forth phone calls, some as late as the day of the show, I arranged the meeting. Everyone we had the pleasure of dealing with, from the ticket people to the show's creative producer to Conan himself proved to be terrifically accommodating, friendly, and professional. On Wednesday, March 16, 1994, the day of the interview, four members of our group and I arrived at NBC Studios in Rockefeller Center in Manhattan at 4:15 p.m, Late Night usually tapes from about 5:00 to 6:00 p.m. and then is broadcast in our area at 11:35 p.m. on NBC's ChannelS ou t of Chicago or at 12:05 a.m. on Channel 4 in Milwaukee. Upon arrival, we were taken in a special group of "tape reserves" to be seated before the regular crowd. Tape reserves, we found out, were special guests of the show and, when we were seated, We found our seats were masking taped with "Kane" Written across it. We kind of felt like big shots as we were placed in the front row. After a brief explanation of the logistical procedures from the announcer, the band entered. the studio and played two or three songs in a rocking rhythm & blues vein. The band is led by a former member of Bruce Springsteen's E Street Band, drummer Max Weinberg. The remainder of the show's warm- up happened when Conan was introduced. He literally leapt onto the stage, microphone in hand. He ran up into the audience as the band launched into a blistering version of Elvis Presley's "(Hunk 0' Hunk 0') Burnin' Love" with Conan on the vocal. He pulled a woman from the audience into the aisle to dance with her while belting out the song. The audience was clapping along and whooping it up when he waved. his arm. and everything suddenly stopped dead. The audience broke into hysterics as he looked sheepishly at the woman and said, "I'm terribly sorry ... I" m very sorry. This is a talk show ... .1 just heard my name and I sort of lost it..." He ad-Jibbed jokes with the audience for a while then said the show woulc be starting in a few minutes-"Y have to go backstage and put on some underwear." He ran down the aisle and leapt over the guest couch. The band played him off and the show began after that song. Conan O'Brien is, in his own words, "the only Irish-American talk show host-c-on NBC-at this lime of night." A little over six months ago, the 6' 4" host stepped into some mighty big shoes as David Letterman left Late Night and took his show to CBS. O'Brien, unknown to most of America when he took over the reins, was however a heavy- hitter with a diverse background in the world of comedy writing, as he delineates in the conversation below. The show is noted for its wacky, off-beat sense of humor and for booking some of the best cutting-edge alternative rock bands. On the two nights we were there, for instance, the bands were the Lemonheads and Green Day. As O'Brien settles into the job, he has begun to carve ou t his own comic territory and develop a burgeoning following, especially among college students, as evidenced by the fact that CNN Entertainment was there on St. Patrick's Day to interview our Parkside students about the show. That piece will be broadcast on CNN at a later date. After the show, we were brought backstage and we waited ou tside the dressing room for Conan to change. The assistant knocked on the door of his spare IOxIO dressing room and announced us. Conan was just lacing up his shoes as 1 entered. He greeted us wearing a T-shirt and jeans as he offered a seat to me and Tom Newman, who ran the video camera. During the interview after the Wednesday taping, I found Conan to be relaxed, funny, accommodating, completely forthcoming and quite down-to- earth. Kane: First of all, happy St. Patrick's Day, from one Irishman to another. O'Brien: Oh, thank you. Thank you very much. Kane: Now, to get started, you are a Harvard graduate, right? O'Brien: Yeah, I graduated in 1985. I don't talk about that a lot. (laughs) Kane: Why not? O'Brien: Because I don't think I'm representative of Harvard people. I spent a lot of my lime there doing comedy-more than I should've, more than studying. That's when I started gelling into writing. They had a lrumor magazine called the Lampoon ... Kane: The Hartard Lampoon? O'Brien: Yeah, and I just lived there. That was my life. And I started emceeing concerts at school and things like that. I remember that because I was on the lJimpoon I just started gelling gigs. Kane: Oh, you did stand-up, then? O'Brien: Yeah, I did some stand- up. Y'know, the kind where come out, you tell some jokes and you introduce different singing groups. That's sort of where I got started. Kane: Someone on your staff told us that you got invited to the White House tomorrow. What's that deal? O'Brien: Yeah! Yeah, I'm going .. .1 think the Irish prime minister is in town and Clinton apparently watches the show and likes it. And he though!...! guess he's invited some Irish people just to sit around the White House and fool the Irish prime minister into thinking that Irish people are always hanging around. So... that's a trip ... Kane: (laughs) Yeah, absolutely. O'Brien: I mean, I hope I don't spill something or ....Actually, I started to come down with a cold today and I thought-what if I'm talking to the President and I make him sick. Y'know, I pictured Secret Service people pouncing on me. But I'm looking forward to that....But, that's weird ...it's a strange thing .. .I've never done anything like that. Kane: So you're going down to Washington right after the show? O'Brien: Yeah, after the show tomorrow. We're gonna do the show a little early. Kane: Yeah, we're bringing down abou tIS or 20 people from our university to see you tomorrow ... O'Brien: Oh great! Cool. That's great. Kane: And now that I've been here today and seen how it's done, I can sort of lead the tour .. .I'm an experienced ... O'Brien: (laughs) You can tell 'em, "Ah, I remember the old days .. .I remember how they ueed to do the show." Kane: 24 hours ago ... O'Brien: Right. Kane: Now, on the set , on the continued on next page Max Weinberg makes successful transition from concert hall to television band leader I was also had the opportunity to speak with the leader of the Late Night band, Max Weinberg. After spending about 15 years as the drummer for Bruce Springsteen's E Street Band, weinberg now leads the jumpin' band for Conan O'Brien. And jumpin' it is. The Max Weinberg Seven is horn dominant and features a saxophone, a trumpet, a trombone, as well as an organ, guitar, bass, and, of course, drums. When I asked him what, in particular, he was trying to do with new band, he replied that they like to "keep it swingin' -not rockin'. That's why we're different from other late night bands." My take is that they have the best of both worlds. The band warmed up the show both nights with a wide variety of outstanding, uptempo rhythm & blues jump tunes; I don't think they know any slow ones. This band really cooks and it features extensive brass soloing. Weinberg himself is friendly and outgoing and his band is a perfect mesh with the cool, late evening time slot. Ranger Rnus · march 31, 1 ggt CONAN, cant. from page 1 back wall, you have a lot of pictures of old comedians ...I'm not exactly sure; you can only see a few of them on television ... O'Brien: We have, I think, Jack Paar, is up there ...old talk show hosts, early broadcasters. We have Ernie Kovacs ... Kane: Yeah, Ernie Kovacs I saw. Did I see Steve Allen up there? O'Brien. Steve Allen's up there. Kane: Now, did you pick those? O'Brien: Yeah, I thought it'd be kind of neat to just put up people from TV. I'm kind of a TV buff, and a lot of the people who work on the show are into TV. [One of the curators of New York's Museum a/Television and Radio Broadcasting confirms this, saying that O'Brien has been a frequenter of the museum.] And we try to play around with 1V and we just thought It'd be kind of funny to hang up these pictures in the background. Kane: I myself see a lot of Steve Allen's influence in the work you do now. Do you find him to be an influence? O'Brien: No, I wasn't aware of Steve Allen, but you're certainly influenced by a bunch of different people. You can't help but be influence by Letterman- who I think was influenced by Steve Allen. I think also I was influenced by SCTV ... Kane: Oh, absolutely. Now you're what-about 30 years old? O'Brien: I'm 30, yeah. Y'know there was some stuff that I grew up with as a kid (gigantic sneeze), and you see some of those elements. I think our show bOITOWS ...Y'know, sometimes you'll see something that' s sort of like Saturday Night Live, and sometimes you'll see something that's kind of like SCTV, and sometimes you'll see elements of couple of years and then I worked on The Simpsons, which of course is very visual. And I think that's what we're trying to bring to the show. Probably It's a lot more visual than it is verbal, a lot of the time. Kane: You think so? O'Brien: Yeah, I think ...it relies on a lot of footage stuff and things like, "Let's take a look at that clip ..." and there's the stuff with the moving lips [refers to a recurring bit that places the still picture of a famous per50n- President Clinton, Jack Nicholson, etc. on a screen and then superimposes a writer's lips onto it, much like the old Clutch Cargo cartoons, so Conan can interview the "person,"] Kane: Yeah, that goes over well, people love that. And a particular favorite of mine is "In the Year 2000." I think that is inspired; that's incredibly funny. O'Brien: Oh, "In the Year 2000." That's funny, that's something that Robert Smigel, who's my creative producer, and I... years ago we did that on a stage show in Chicago. And that's how we ended the show. We were at the Victory Garden Theater ...and it's so weird that we were doing it in this little, tiny theater in Chicago and now we're, doing it on a nationally broadcast show (laughs). Kane: Just listing your career here, you worked for the Harvard Lampoon, then Not Necessarily the News, then Saturday Night Live, then The Simpsons, and now you have your own TV show. I mean, you've been just skyrocketing to the top. Is it overwhelming? O'Brien: Yeah. I'd be lying if I said it wasn't. This is what I wanted to do. It happened own thing." I think maybe he thought it was possible that "this guy'll take over and just do my kind of stuff." Kane: He said that you had cut your own niche here and that you're doing high quality humor and doing it consistently. I mean, he gave you a lot of praise and he seemed very sincere. [LeHerman's actual quote was: "(T)he more [watched the show, the more I realized you guys do an incredible amount of comedy ... that is very high level, and the volume and the quality of the stuff just knocks me out, and I think you've done a great job to carve out a wonderful identity for yourselves .... ] O'Brien: That was, I think, the nicest...next to my premiere night, that was the happiest night that I had doing the show. Because a lot of people here work very hard and .. .it's tough, because there's this late night war and if s easy to get lost in the shuffle. And we're on pretty late at night and it' s nice when people say they've been checking it ou t and they see how much detail we put into it and how much work we put into it. Kane: Weill sure. O'Brien: And we try to follow up on things like "krunk" [an invented swear word which can be substituted for ever dirty word you've ever heard-as a noun, an adjective, or a verb, as in "krunkin'''] and and we try to develop little strands and then pick up on them later on. So you get a real rush when fans of the show ...when you get the sense that people are out there ...and they pay attention to the little things and they say, "That little thing is great when you do it." Kane: Well, you must be doing something right-you've got fans like David Letterman and President Clinton ... O'Brien: (laughs) He shouldn't be watching TV! That guy should be working. Kane: Well you have to do something before you go to bed. O'Brien: Right. (laughs) Kane: Have you completely severed your ties with The Simpsons? O'Brien: Yeah, pretty much ... Kane: Because I still see your name on the credits occasionally ... O'Brien: Well my name is still on the show, because the shows that come out now ...it takes a long time for a Simpsons episode to be develaped-c-just the technology of doing it. So the ones that come out now are ones that I actually was in the room working on and contributing jokes to over a year ago. Kane: Oh, so is that what it means to bea producer? ...because you're listed on the credits often as that. O'Brien: Yeah, well I was a supervising producer, and that's a vague term but basically I would write episodes and help other people with their episodes and try to fine tune them. IYs a very collaborative atmosphere. IYs a very creative job. Sometimes people say, -oi, you were a supervising producer- that must mean that you went over the books and made sure there was enough money allocated for paint." And I have to say no, no, that not quite it. Kane: OK, before we get Conan accepts his gift from the University. it that are like Green Acres or something. I believe in mixing all that stuff up and taking from just good, funny TV shows that you liked when you were a kid. Kane: Exactly. And a lot of that 1V influence maybe comes for the work that you did on The Simpsons ... ? O'Brien: Yeah. Well, I worked for a bunch ·ofTV shows. I worked for Not Necessarily the News, which was a cable show and a very visual show. And that was actually good training because it was a show that used footage in a way that was very silly. And it was a very visual show. My job there-I used to try to think of a lot of sight gags and that was good training in visual comedy. And I worked then at Saturday Night Live for a earlier than I thought it would it would happen. Certainly, y'kncw, I'm kind of aware that OK, y'know, I've got some rough edges because I'm pretty new at this, but what I hope always comes across and what I think does come across is that we really believe in what we're doing here and we don't have an attitude about it. We just try things. And I think it was really nice when David Letterman came on the show and he just...he was very sincere, because he was talking to us before the show too, and I wasn't sure he was going to say anything on the air about it, and I was happy when he did. But there's a guy who really appreciated us ...He's checked out the show and he said, y'know, "you guys are really doing your Conan poses moments before his trip to the White House. Pictured clockwise are: Joe Kane, Conan O'Brien, Heather Schmitz, Jessica Perugini. wrapped up here, I brought these sweatshirts from the University. O'Brien: Oh, cool! Oh, great! That' s terrific. Kane: We brought one for you, and one for Andy [Richter, Conan's sidekick], and one for Max Weinberg [Late Night's band leader]. O'Brien: Oh, that's great! Let's get a shot of this, here. [Here Conan psused for a picture holding up the Parkside sweatshirt] That's really nice. Thank you very much. Kane: Well, it's a gift from the University and from us, so... if you can pass' em along to the guys ... O'Brien: That' s great...and this is fabric that breathes, too. I'll certainly do that. Did you have a preference about which one Andy gets, or Max? Kane: Doesn't matter, doesn't matter ...whatever you guys like ... O'Brien: Because I wouldn't want to insult anyone ... Kane: No, not at all. And thank you for your time. O'Brien: That's great. Listen, thank you very much. I'm sorry ... they've got me slated to do a million things bu t it was nice to talk to you and ... Kane: Y'know, if you, uhf need someone to tag along to the White House ...I'd be happy to... O'Brien: (laughs) Actually, [need two guys (laughs) ... But y'know, if s nice to talk to you and if s really nice to meet with people who appreciate what we're doing ...y'know, it's cool, it's upIifting. Kane: Well, no problem. We like your show-and we think you're smart and funny-and just keep doing what you're doing. O'Brien: Alright, we will. Thank you very much. It was good to see you ...and happy St. Patrick's Day! I , l • ( I The next night, most of the rest of our theatre grou p attended the St. Patrick's Day edition of the show-in part, featuring a band of abou t 20 ventriloquists singing old Irish folksongs-the Irish Ventriloquist Dummy Choir. Many of the students were seen on camera in the audience. After the taping we were escorted, along with four students from Villa Nova, backstage to the green room to wait for the arrival of CNN's Jill Brooke. While waiting, we helped ourselves to the refreshments. Unexpectedly, Conan swept into the room in full tuxedo, graciously posing for pictures and signing autographs moments before he was taken by helicopter to New York's La Guardia airport for his flight to the White House. At least one of our female students contemplated asking him if he needed a date for the evening. When Brooke arrived with her camera crew, we were reseated in the studio as she interviewed us about the growing national support among college students for Conan and the show. It was, perhaps, our less than 15 minutes of fame, but we enjoyed the brief spotlight. And it gave the actors in our group a chance to ply their wares on national television. After our interview, we split up to enjoy exciting Manhattan in a dozen different ways. I! I , I I' I STUDENTS WITH DISABILITIES April 6, 1994 12 noon Cart 129 Please feel free to bring your lunch or snack For more information, contact: Renee Sartin- Kirby, Coordinator of Disability SeNices. WLLC 0175 - 595-2610 1 I] Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource The Ranger News, Volume 22, issue 23, March 31, 1994 Description An account of the resource Student newspaper of the University of Wisconsin-Parkside, Kenosha, Wis. Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1994-03-31 Subject The topic of the resource College student newspapers and periodicals| Student publications| University of Wisconsin-Parkside--Newspapers Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource Newspaper Language A language of the resource English Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant Kenosha, Wisconsin Type The nature or genre of the resource Text Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available University of Wisconsin-Parkside Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource The Board of Regents of the University Wisconsin System conan o'brien parkside student government association (PSGA)