Conan O'Brien Needs to Kill

C O N A N O ‘ B R I E N N E E D S T O K I L L

Transcript of Conan's debut murder in the Pacific Northwest

Part one

Starring Conan O’Brien (COB)

Matt Gourley (MG)

Sona Movsesian (SM)

Landon B. Voeller (LBV)

FX: JAUNTY GUITAR JANGLE

LBV: Hi, my name is Landon B. Voeller.

FX: JAUNTY GUITAR JANGLE CONTINUES

LBW: And I feel . . .

FX: DRUM THUMP, THUMP, THUMP

LBW: . . . GOD, NO! (a volley of hopeless shrieks and sobs) So so so . . . fucking terrified about being Conan O’Bri . . . )

FX: DRUM THUMP, THUMP, THUMP

LBW: . . .en’s . . . first murder victim. (Howls of despair)

FX: MUSICAL INTRO

A few seconds of dead air is punctuated by a humourless gulp. Then, a second. Gulps of both sexes.

COB: Hey there. Welcome to Conan O’Brien needs . . . Matt, I was waiting for your cutesy little giggle before I start to speak. today?. . . What’s the matter-cat got your tongue?

MG: Uh, well it’s just a little hard to relax when your boss is pointing an old-timey revolver at you?

COB: (Chuckling) well that is a point. It’s a fine revolver, and it works quite well, as I have already demonstrated today. (GIGGLES) And Sona? You’re awfully quiet. Shoplifted your tongue, perhaps? Heh! Do Mikey and Charlie have it-

SM: Thoo thook thit! Thy Thongue! Thoo thut thit thraight thout thof thy thouth, thoo thucker!

COB: Oh, please. I took a part of your tongue! You still have quite a stump there with which to talk and taste and love . . .

SM: Thh-eww!

COB: Heh, even with two-thirds of her tongue missing, Sona still finds a way to be . . . utterly disgusted by my turns of phrase!

MG: Jesus . . .

COB: . . . won’t help you now, hipster boy. Shut the fuck up. Okay, that’s enough preamble, on with the show. And it’s a special show today, which comes to you from the semi-wilderness of the Pacific Northwest! Isn’t that right, Gourley?

MG: Can you point that thing away from me? I guess so, but I’ve kinda lost track of time in the last few hours I’ve spent bundled up in the back of this fucking rental van.

COB: Well I’d thank you to refer to “this fucking rental van” by its correct appellation - the Deathmobile - if you will? Kinda proud of the name.

MG: Jesus, Conan . . .

COB: Uh I’m just going to put you on mute, if I can work out how. Not really a tech-head, as my son will tell you. Oh, that’s it I think. Matt! Sona! Attempt to yell and struggle, please!

SM: BROKEN CRIES

MG: DESPAIRING MOANS

COB: Perfect! As I was saying, today is a special show. With a very special guest. Those of you who enjoy my foolishness will know that alongside my twenty-eight years of Late Night, writing at SNL and the Simpsons, I have a number of hobbies. Pastimes, if you will. Playing guitar. History. Wrestling my son! Daydreaming about spending a year living in London, walking its cobbled streets, admiring its splendid architecture, soaking in its history. Calling everyone guv’nor or Miss.

But above all, is murder. Thinking about it, watching True Crime, listening to podcasts . . . contemplating it, of course. But until today—and Sona, you’ll attest to this

SM: (Strangled yelp/thwelp?)

COB: —Contemplation was as far as I took this particular obsession. But I’ve been waking up to an empty nest for a while now. I have no children to annoy, and Liza is always out and about. So I guess my . . . interest in slaying my fellow man . . . has managed to mutate from a sideways obsession, to a full-on compulsion!

And the guest I picked up about an hour ago, hitchhiking his way from Portland to Tacoma, was just the perfect target.

He’s not a fine gentleman. Far as I can tell, his entire get up was put together from discarded clothing spilled in a puddle, outside a LL Bean outlet store in Seattle back in Obama’s second term.

He didn’t start at SNL.

He hasn’t got a Netflix special coming out. Nor a book, podcast, or anything really.

He is a rudderless drifter, with, as far as I can tell, no one to care about his whereabouts until his next rent payment’s due.

And, as of ten minutes ago, when I bundled him into the back of a ’84 GMC Vandura I bought for cash in LA several hours ago, he’s ready to be a’murdered! Landon B. Voeller, welcome֫.

JANGLE

COB: uh, let me check just check I pronounced your name right . . . it’s Voller, right, not Veiler, or Whaler . . .

LBV: MOANS INCOHERENTLY

COB: Oh, c’mon, I barely caught you with the anvil to the temple!

MG: Conan, he’s really injured, really scared. We all are! Stop this! It’s madness . . . are you even recording?

COB: Yup, I terrorised Eduardo into rigging the Vandura out with a basic podcasting get up.

MG: Oh, Eduardo!

COB: Y’now, we should probably refer to him as Dead-uardo now, thanks to my trusty revolver! I say probably because I’m not entirely sure whether he bled out after I blasted him in the heart.

SM: Thonan! The thuck? Thooh thod!

COB: Thooh thod? Thee thi thow thum? (Giggles)

SM: Thod!

COB: Thod . . . Oh, you meant God. Well, guess I’m kinda him now. Always knew I had it in me. I was one of six, growing up, so there’s a fair chance that one of us would rise to be the big guy. And being the tallest – I’m 6’4 – I was always that bit closer to God. Who I actually am!

MG: Conan, arghhh!

COB: Anyway: the podcast. As I was saying, before Sona’s thee thigh thow thuminess got me all thot and thothered . . . Landon, you do have a rather nasty – thought I would say – not life-threatening gaping wound to your left temple. But, I gotta say – and I don’t want to get into the weeds on this – (WHISPERS) though that’s where you may end the day, in a patch of weeds on the side of the highway, am I right – hitchhiking through the Pacific Northwest, without any kind of weapon? That’s a, uh, pretty risky move!

LBV: Just take me to Tacoma, please. Or a hospital. God, is this real . . . is it one of your zany remotes?

COB: It kind of is, now you mention it! Normally I’d get Mike Sweeney to write something like this, but this is all my own work. And I’ve never actually struck anyone to the temple with any weighty instrument, so to do it with a Tom and Jerry-style anvil is quite something!

MG: (Temporarily enthusiastic) Where’d you get it, Conan? It’s a pretty sweet anvil.

COB: Just down at the hardware store?

MG: Oh, cool. Easy to forget they have a real world, non-cartoon-violence background.

COB: Yeah. But I see why they were the de rigueur bludgeoning object of the golden age of cartoons: they’re heavy as hell, have a cool name, and fit snugly in the assailant’s hand.

LBV: And they really fucking hurt when whipped against one’s head!

COB: See! Even the victim sings the mighty anvil’s praises.

LBV: I wasn’t really praising . . .

COB: Anyway, Landon. You’re here to serve a purpose – being murdered live on air-

MG: It’s not “on air,” it’s a podcast . . .

COB: It’s being recorded live so that our listeners can listen to me draining Landon here’s lifeforce out at their leisure!

MG: Hmm I’m not sure that’s accurate-

LBV: Shut the fuck up Gourley!

SM: Thut up, Thatt!

COB: (LAUGHING) you know, I’m beginning to like this soon-to-be-callously-murdered guy!

PART TWO OUT SOON!

Amateurish parody not in any way related to TeamCoco, though is probably how Conan would like to spend a spare Tuesday.