Conan O'Brien

The writer who didn't want to be on camera

Conan O'Brien sat in Lorne Michaels' office in 1993 with a résumé that included only comedy writing. He had no prior experience in front of the spotlight, and his look (a six-foot-plus guy with an impossible red pompadour) didn't fit the standards of American television at the time. But Michaels saw something in his writing for Saturday Night Live that the rest of the industry overlooked.

Before moving in front of the cameras, he worked in the writers’ room of The Simpsons during its golden era. He wrote episodes such as Marge vs. the Monorail, a milestone that defined the show’s absurd humor in the early 1990s. That talent for building surreal situations is what he tried to bring to his first late-night show.

His early days on Late Night were an absolute disaster. Critics tore him apart during the first few months, and audiences didn’t get his jokes about masturbating bears or time travel. NBC kept renewing his contract week by week because they had no better replacement.

Nobody was betting a dime on him.

But young audiences connected with that chaotic, self-deprecating energy that set him apart from the elegance of Jay Leno or the cynicism of David Letterman. By 1996, the show had become a cult product that brought in millions for the network. The key was turning his own insecurity into the engine of his comedy.

The 2010 Mutiny

O’Brien’s career is defined by a contract dispute that changed the rules of the television business forever. In 2009, he inherited The Tonight Show, the crown jewel of American television, after years of waiting. But NBC’s management was disastrous, and Jay Leno reclaimed his slot just seven months after handing it over.

It was a televised professional suicide.

O'Brien refused to move his show to midnight to accommodate Leno and chose to leave with a severance package of 45 million dollars. The exit deal barred him from appearing on television or giving interviews for months. So he decided to organize a national live stage tour titled The Legally Prohibited from Being Funny on Television Tour.

That crisis in 2010 turned him into a martyr of alternative comedy. While traditional networks were losing relevance, his fan base grew online thanks to viral clips and a community that saw him as the victim of an outdated corporate system. In 2010, he signed with the cable network TBS to host Conan, a show with a smaller budget but total freedom to experiment.

The business of audio and the final journey

Linear television stopped being his priority long before his colleagues realized it. In 2018, he launched the podcast Conan O’Brien Needs a Friend under his own production company, Team Coco. What started as a side project to chat with friends ended up becoming one of the most profitable audio platforms in the advertising market.

And then came the definitive format change.

In 2021, he ended his daily television talk show after 28 years on the air. He didn't retire; he moved his production to the Max platform to focus on travel specials and long-form interviews. His style evolved toward sharp cultural observation, where he is always the clumsy foreigner who doesn't understand local customs.

In 2024, he premiered the documentary series Conan O’Brien Must Go, filmed in countries such as Norway, Thailand, and Argentina. The focus of these episodes drops traditional monologues to concentrate on raw interaction with complete strangers. He no longer needs a desk or a band to drive the pace of the story.

In 2022, he sold his production company, Team Coco, to SiriusXM for close to 150 million dollars.