Conan O'Brien: Legally Prohibited From Being Funny on Television Tour

Photo by Troy Holden /via CaliberSF

Conan paid a visit to the Twitter headquarters before the show.

​Friday, April 23, 2010 
Nob Hill Masonic Center

Better than: Watching an hour-long TV talk show with commercial interruptions, celebrities plugging their latest projects, and FCC restrictions.

Nearly three months to the day after his abrupt removal from The Tonight Show, with his next TV run scheduled to begin on TBS in November, Conan O' Brien arrived at the Nob Hill Masonic Center on Friday evening not to hone his stand-up but to reintroduce himself to his never-say-die fans. The result, on this seventh date of a 32-city tour, was variously blistering, sentimental and, for O'Brien, cathartic, but consistently funny in every respect.

O'Brien, 47, sporting a ginger beard and a variety of outfits, including a replica of the lavender leather suit Eddie Murphy wore in Raw (1987), remains subject to an NBC-imposed ban from television, radio and the Internet agreed to as part of his $45 million Tonight Show settlement.

Yet that didn't stop him from ridiculing his old network (though refraining from calling out old nemeses by name), explaining the eight stages of grief fired talk-show hosts endure (stage eight: "Get Your Ass to San Francisco") and reviving classic bits including the Masturbating Bear, the Walker, Texas Ranger lever and a recorded appearance by Triumph the Insult Comic Dog.

For legal reasons, the names were changed - Triumph now refers to himself as "the only dog on the planet who didn't get fucked by Jesse James or Tiger Woods," while the Masturbating Bear was rechristened the Self-Pleasuring Panda - but O'Brien's quirky offbeat humor remained at once refreshing but familiar. Also recognizable, from his final days at NBC, was his penchant for seemingly earnest confessionals, like admitting that he never wants to be out of work again.


O'Brien did not arrive alone: Joining him on stage was sometime sidekick Andy Richter (who argued that trying to claim the Walker, Texas Ranger lever as intellectual property was like trying to copyright the wind), along with Tonight Show writer Deon Cole and a re-formed Max Weinberg 7, minus the E Street Band drummer himself.

Adding to the onstage revelry was musical guest Chris Isaak, who played a surprisingly strong duet of the Elvis Presley classic "That's Alright, Mama" with O'Brien, an accomplished guitarist and competent singer himself. (The luminously pale host also contributed solo renditions of "My Own Show Again," an amusing parody of Willie Nelson's "On the Road Again," and an as-yet-unfinished song about Diff'rent Strokes star Conrad Bain.) But O'Brien's most compelling material were the stories of his hard-knocks upbringing in upper-middle class Brookline, Massachusetts ("We shopped at Whole Foods") and his bitter, oh-so-public divorce from his network of 17 years.

O'Brien twice received raucous standing ovations from the sold-out crowd, even inspiring one generously endowed female patron to toss her panties on stage. (He later wiped his brow with them before admonishing any would-be groupies to volunteer their services for post-show pleasures. Roughly 20 audience members, male and female, sprang to their feet.)

Reinvented for the time being as a stage performer, O'Brien has a warm, sincere presence, when he's not sending up rockabilly classics, crudely (but hilariously) impersonating his former bosses and mocking his most elaborate stage prop, a giant inflatable bat said to have once belonged to Meat Loaf. Friday's show had a casual feel, spontaneous but professionally polished. O'Brien's act is an acquired taste, as fans learned the hard way in January, but on this evening at the Masonic Center, it was clear that Team Coco remains alive and passionate as ever. Friday, April 23, 2010
Nob Hill Masonic Center

Critic's Notebook

By the Way: The opener was Brooklyn-based comedian and musical performer Reggie Watts, who regaled the buzzing crowd with stream-of-consciousness commentary, a cappella performances and even an abbreviated cover of the Family Ties theme song.

Personal Bias: I would happily be a card-carrying Team Coco member, if indeed it were organized enough to have cards. I'm not entirely sure what the point of the grassroots movement might be, now that O'Brien has lost his Tonight Show battle and is headed to TBS, but it's nice knowing it exists.

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