Conan Puts on a Show to Remember

He has been known as Consie, The Cone-Zone, Coney, Conando, Big Red and the infamous Coco, and last night I was in the front row at his ‘legally prohibited from being funny on television tour’.

The show was great; it was constantly entertaining and had all the little things that made his late night talk show so original and different from everything else. Let’s face it, when

Conan moved over to the Tonight Show I felt like he was being restricted. He did some memorable things during his time hosting; my personal favorite was from the very first episode where he ran from New York to LA while Cheap Trick’s Surrender played. Yet, most of my favorite moments come from his late night show.

Going into the Mohegan Sun Arena I really didn’t know what to expect. We took our seats in the front row and after the band played we were treated to a movie that filled us in on Conan’s life after he left the Tonight Show.

The movie opened up with a close up shot of Conan’s eyes. The camera pulls back and we see that Conan has grown his hair long, has a full beard and has put on a ton of weight. He is lying in a pile of pizza boxes and empty beer bottles and seems to be in a daze until the phone rings. O’Brien picks up the phone and starts yelling to the person on the other end that there is no Debbie living there.

After that we see O’Brien wondering around his house, jumping on a trampoline, eating a bucket of KFC as he soaks his feet in his pool and other random things that are played with Eric Carmen’s ‘All By Myself’. It was hilarious and a perfect way to start the show and it also made me realize that I have to wait until September to see his new show, it seems so far away.

After the movie O’Brien made his way onto the stage. He opened the show with a great monologue that poked fun at Mohegan Sun, Uncasville and even played off the crowd effortlessly.

During that opening there were two things that were really great. At one point a girl from the crowd yelled out “I’m Pregnant” and Conan, who chuckled at her at first, came back and said “good luck trying to prove anything.” He then turned to the crowd and said “Imagine telling my wife that things got a little crazy in Uncasville.”

He then went on to make fun of the casino and its surroundings. He made fun of the robotic wolfs that Mohegan Sun has on display and how the Casino is in the middle of the woods. He said you can loose a ton of money in Vegas and then forget about it, because there is so much to do. Yet, if you loose a ton of money at Mohegan Sun you are faced with a long drive home through the woods.

We were then treated to Andy Richter. He became a huge part of the show after the opening events and Conan and Andy played off each other well. Richter did do a small skit, where he messed up a little bit, but it was fine he was still funny.

Now, a huge surprise was seeing Triumph the Insult Comic Dog. I thought there was no chance that he would be there, because I thought that NBC owned the rights to that character, but he was there up on the big screen. He of course made fun on Uncasville, while he had a cigar hanging out of his mouth. The other character that I was shocked to see was The Masturbating Bear, he didn’t have his classic music, but he did come out during the final musical number and did his thing.

O’Brien didn’t bring back just classic characters, but he brought back the wheel, which used to be the lever, and when Conan pulls it a Walker, Texas Ranger clip would play. It was a fan favorite from the late night show and it’s still very funny. That was about the last thing he did before he said his goodbyes. O’Brien exited the stage and some people started to pile out, but a camera guy who was in front of me told us to stick around. We stuck around and sure enough O’Brien came back out.

During the encore he performed the song The Weight from the band called The Band. After that they threw out giant yellow balls to the audience and also guitar picks. The camera guy told me to grab one, because they only made a 1000 of the picks. I was able to get one.

The show was great. Conan really catered to the fans and delivered a memorable event.