Martin Short Thinks Conan Looks Like A “Freeze-Dried Prince Harry”

Gentlemen .

It's a rare honor to have you both here .

Uh Thank you , Conan in the same room .

I'll tell you one thing .

It's rare to be here .

It is .

I left out the word honor , but it's just an oversight just before we started recording .

Um , Marty , you , you verbally assaulted me .

No , no , no , no .

I , I said it with love that to me .

When I see you , you look like someone freeze dried .

Prince Harry .

That's all I said .

I uh it's , um you know , my staff looks forward to any time that Marty , I have a staff .

It , it gets , it's very lucrative .

It gets smaller every year .

But um no fans of my show and yes , there are fans of the work that I've done in the past .

Let's not have any mock surprise about that , but they um they have put together a mashup of uh of Marty coming on the show and ripping me apart .

Uh And it is wildly popular .

Oh , yes , it is .

It is wildly popular and it delights uh my writers to the point where the last time when we were wrapping up the late night show , a epic 28 year run .

Thank you .

Uh I'm driving to uh one of the last episodes that Marty's gonna do .

Uh , and he did an extremely funny bit on it and I'm driving to the theater and I looked down and I realized I'm doing something I rarely do , which is wear shorts .

And immediately I thought I'm driving towards the Largo theater and I thought , fuck Marty who's on today , Marty's on today .

And I knew that he would destroy me .

And sure enough you come in and hello , hello , everybody .

And then I see those two eyes dart over and they see my freckled legs there and it began and it began and it was , it was quite a sight .

It was absolutely a terrifying site .

And you couldn't because normally you can't see where the stilts are attached .

But you could , you could that day the shorts revealed way too much .

Oh , and they were short shorts .

1970 Heatherton .

Like you were entertaining the troops .

But uh the writers were so , so happy .

And then of course , you're the line that just , you said it on late night and it uh it's lived forever which is , well , you'll do it better than I , but it was Conan uh whatever you're doing to your face .

I say 20% more and then stop , which is mean in nine different letter .

It's a combo .

I love , it's also done with care .

You're worried about me a little more about 20% more , but I feel like I have to put you down and I've got nothing .

No , no , you don't because you're Steve help .

Uh Well , I don't want to embarrass either of you .

So I won't mention that .

Uh You are just two of my uh absolute comedy heroes .

I'm sure you hear that kind of thing all the time and it bores you .

But one of the pleasures of my life .

And I'm not kidding was when you asked me to do a cameo in your show , your live show at Caesars Palace in Las Vegas .

And I , I was outside my body getting to be , be on a stage with you guys .

It made me so happy , so legitimately sincerely happy he did kill .

I mean , you , we learned a lesson because you showed up with writers , one writer , I can't afford to .

I showed up with my .

That's true .

Yeah , that's true .

Well , I suppose I am .

Um no , II I and uh Matt , he's Matt o'brien , no relation , but I only hire o'brien and uh he um idolizes you both as well and he was just in heaven .

And then there was a but I thought , yeah , come along with me and , and help me tweak a few things since I really wanted it to be better than what I could .

It was , it was inspiring and we've had people show up with , with nothing , no writers and they did way better by the way .

And then I heard you guys later bumped into Letterman and he was like , Conan brought a writer .

No , no , because Dave did it as well .

What was the line you were sitting off stage with Dave ?

And he looked , what was it ?

You were sitting off stage waiting for me to come on .

They look kind of morose .

This sounds like Dave so far .

They edit , by the way .

He had .

No , no , no , no , he had , oh , not at all .

No , an costs money as well .

Everything is in uh no , but um it was fantastic .

It was uh but I remember you were saying that Dave was sort of , he had been off the air for just a little bit and then of course , he always does the thing where he's horrified that he , if I go on stage , it'll just be awful .

And , and I'm like , you're David Letterman , what do you , you know , but he's done it and of course , the place goes nuts and then , and then afterwards he still has a negative feeling about it .

But he , he , yeah , he , but he had only been off a few , I think this was like in June and he'd left six weeks before .

Exactly .

Exactly .

But he is , his personality is always , you know , he came by and which meant a lot to me .

He did a cameo on late night , which was his old studio and he came by and of course , his attitude was , well , they're just gonna hate me .

Well , there's a , you know , there's a , there's an event , how will they know who I am ?

Will you , will you say my name before I come out ?

There's a self-defense mechanism in being overly paranoid and then when you get a little cheer , when you come out and you go , oh , I was wrong .

Yes .

Yes .

I'm familiar with me .

Yes , I think .

And what I think it's kept me out of the big money .

Not having that attitude of just kind of going .

Oh , you don't like me ?

Well , you know , I don't like you either , but good night .

It is a , he does have that attitude .

I'm this insecure shaking one and he says , I don't give a fuck .

Right ?

They're gonna love me .

Well , if they don't guess what if I had dinner with them , I'd be bored .

That's , yeah .

Well , often that was your opening line though .

It was and I didn't know why I didn't play .

Who are you people ?

No one's bathed .

Obviously .

Good night .

Where's my big money ?

Why didn't I get the big money ?

Why don't they like me ?

They don't never hire me again .

I was um , so I got to see your show .

Uh And I was so impressed with how you guys worked it out and even though you both knew the show so well , you had a rehearsal and you were still uh working so hard to make sure that it went perfectly at rehearsal .

And I thought this is , there are no accidents like people that are good , in my opinion there , yes , there is talented , but there is talent .

But then there's just this just mad desire to get it perfectly right and it never goes away .

Well , I always think that that by the way , I'm here too .

Go ahead .

Did you just this chair ?

No , but I'm always amazed , I feel like I should I start raising my hand ?

Ok .

Well , go ahead .

You say something .

I say , II , I think we prepare , I prepare out of fear and also love because when we get a new joke , I , I'm energized the whole show .

I cannot wait to get to this joke .

And often they don't work .

In fact , here's an example because I thought , let me just say when they don't work , I am like either on stage or the wings .

I go hysterical because he's been so excited all day about this .

Go ahead .

I had a joke the other night .

And I thought when I introduced Marty , I thought , oh , this is , this is really going to work , right ?

And then we're going to analyze why it didn't work afterwards .

But I said , and this man , he's , he's done live television , he's been in film and he's done Broadway and truly , he is a master of the toxic workplace environment .

And uh it was just sort of like uh and uh I realized later it's had too many words in it , you know , or it needed to be more of like a casual throwaway in the middle of our toxic .

You had to have just read this story about uh that to you .

No , no , no .

I don't think everyone is following , you know , variety about a toxic workplace environment obviously because you got nothing on the job .

I mean , Conan shorts represent a toxic workplace .

Absolutely .

For the crew .

Oh , we settled out of court .