Sketches from Late Night with Conan O'Brien

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The following is a list of sketches performed on the late night program Late Night with Conan O'Brien.

Famous sketches

• [Actual Items] - Seemingly a parody of Jay Leno's Headlines segment on The Tonight Show in which Leno finds humorous mistakes in various newspapers. Conan's bit takes regular newspaper ads and stories and adds blatantly fake text, repeatedly insisting "these are real" and "you can't make this stuff up, why would you, that would waste everybody's time." while showing them. This was the first sketch on the first show in September of 1993. For example, an ad depicting a leather living room couch was modified to include a cartoon cow exclaiming, "How's my ass feel you son of a bitch?"

• Assassination - Conan invites a guest who supposedly is privy to an upcoming, well-kept secret, who suffers a simulated death before he can reveal what he knows. For example, shortly before the final episode of Seinfeld, an actor appearing on the show began talking about what the final episode would be about; a few words in, an assassin shoots him in the chest. On another occasion, Conan introduced a man who claimed to be a high-ranking executive with Coca-Cola, who was going to discuss the soda's secret ingredients. As the interview started, the "executive" fell dead after getting hit by shuriken, and a group of ninjas with the Coca-Cola logo on their backs were shown running away from the stage. These sketches haven't appeared on the show for several years.

• Audience Interview - In this bit introduced in mid-2005, Conan says that because he's always interviewing famous celebrities, who endorse their latest movie/album/etc., he rarely gets an opportunity to talk to the audience, which he says he'd like to do. So, for a change of pace, he says he's going to go into the audience, pick out a random member, and ask them some basic question. However, the gag is that the audience member he "randomly" picks is always some random celebrity, who faithfully reveals him/herself when Conan asks what their name is, who always sits on the first seat immediately right of the aisle of the back row in the far righthand section. They also happen to still endorse some product, or even a standard "latest work" as well. Some examples of guests include Ted Danson, Donald Trump, and Fabio.

• Audience Talent - Conan goes into the audience and selects a pre-picked audience member to show their unique talent. But, the person's "talent" is obviously faked. Conan doesn't know who the people are going to be, and the audience doesn't know what their talent is until Conan announces it.

• Awful Ballgame Chanter - Conan intros the bit by telling sports fans when at event to help the team they should try to start short & simple chants that everyone can say, and not be like this guy. Show writer Andy Blitz is then shown in the audience, and claps like a "Let's Go Yankees!" chant, but tells a very long-winded story in the style of a chant that lasts several minutes, occasionally asking the audience to chant along when they have no idea what's coming next.

• Camera catching audience member - As Conan is about to say something, a random member of the audience (rather than a regular sketch performer) is put on screen for a split second. Conan is then put back on screen and reacts to the audience member, rather than the cameraman, asking the person to not steal screen time. Conan then returns to his earlier statement, only to see the audience member highlighted again. The screen focuses on Conan again and he appears to get upset, telling the person to "Knock it off". This back and forth continues a few more times, with the audience member's on screen time getting longer and longer and accompianed with music, sounds, and visual effects. The bit usually ends when Conan threatens to call security, but ends up having the audience member's face prominently featured in his shot, which he is seen lamenting as the shows takes a commercial break.

• Car Chases - Conan explains that television shows' ratings go up when they cut to a car chase in action. He tells the audience that Late Night will begin doing this, however there are no car chases in Manhattan due to traffic congestion. So Late Night stages their own car chases using model houses and toy cars to replicate a car chase. The toy cars are pulled by thin cord as a camera gets a shot that looks like it might be from a helicopter.

The Michael Jackson Coverage - A special version of the Car Chases skit when Michael Jackson was found not guilty of child molestation on June 13 2005. Conan spoofed on him with coverage of him leaving his Neverland Ranch. Jackson was always the last car of the motorcade. He would often tow away a boy scout camp, a Chuck E. Cheese's restaurant or even a playground. Sometimes, he would trade his motorcade car for an ice cream truck and stop at a school full of kids. Sometimes, even Jackson's family would be made fun of, like Tito's "Never Work Ranch." Other celebrities would also cameo, like Billy Joel, who recently crashed his car. This time, "Uptown Girl" was playing with his silver car. It then crashed into a building and caught on fire and blew up.

• Celebrity Secrets - Features celebrities of different genres (musicians, actors, etc.) in a jail cell, smoking a cigarette and downing hard liquor, usually telling some humorous "secret" that we did not know about them previously. For example, one featured Michael Caine saying "I was convinced that the 'MC' in MC Hammer's name stood for Michael Caine. When I found out it didn't I destroyed his career."

• Celebrity Survey - This is where Conan supposedly sent out surveys to celebrities and he reads off their replies. Usually the first two read off are normal and expected. Then the 3rd is funny and often relates to some sort of scandal or movie the celebrity is known for. For example, to the question: "I like to think of my viewers as people who..." Brian Williams wrote "want to be informed," Meredith Viera wrote "want to be my friend," and Tony Danza wrote "have broken both arms and can't change the channel."

One of the many bumpers shown right after the commercials on Late Night

• Conan O'Brien Hates My Homeland - The premise of the skit began when Late Night received many angry letters from viewers in Ukraine after mocking that nation in another recurring skit, New Euro Coins, where the joke was an image on a Ukrainian Euro Coin depicting a man in Eastern European dress with four arms, waving, with the caption on the coin saying "Over 17 years after the Chernobyl Accident". [link] Unaware that his show was even airing in Ukraine, O'Brien reads fast-paced insults of each of the nations of the world in alphabetical order [link] to determine where else the show is being aired without his knowledge. O'Brien insults 5 countries (with a bell ringing between each one) each time the bit airs. A sample insult: "Georgia: It's where Europe and Asia get together to dump their trash." Announcer Joel Godard then tells insulted viewers around the world a real address to send their angry letters.
  An announcer on the Finnish entertainment channel SubTV, which airs the show couple of days after it is aired in USA, asked people to defend Finland before Conan got to insult it, and the viewers in Finland began sending mail before the bit had even gotten to the letter F. Conan responded by officially insulting Finland in the segment. An overwhelming amount of post-cards were sent in that apparently forced Conan to give Finland a formal apology, going as far as having the flag of Finland shown in the background during his speech and slandering the Finns' "hated" neighbor Sweden with a board with the words "Sweden Sucks!" printed over the flag of Sweden. It would seem that this chain of events led to elevated ratings in Finland and subsequently also sparked a special relationship with the viewers in Finland. This later led to Conan realizing that he bears a resemblance to two-term president Tarja Halonen, which eventually led to a short visit to Finland in mid-February 2006.

• Conan on the Aisle - Conan reviews movies currently in cinemas and comments on the good qualities, then he shows an edited scene. An example: When Conan was reviewing Jurassic Park III, he mentioned that the movie had scenes that were disgusting and weird. An edited scene then appeared where the main characters ran and were surprised by a dinosaur which opened its mouth to roar. Edited by Late Night into the dinosaur's mouth was the parents' lost child, who says hello to the parents.

• Conan's Legs - Conan explains how the show is trying to reach out and collect more viewers by taking a page out of the Today Show handbook. He explains that many Americans tune in to the Today Show just to see Katie Couric's legs. He then calls over two stagehands and instructs them to remove the front of his desk, revealing feminine legs. He continues by doing a few camera tricks such as, moving his legs, bouncing a ball, and even shaving them. In actuality, a green screen is present and a woman offstage is being recorded live as Conan is onstage.

• Conan Sings a Lullaby - Conan explains that many viewers are new parents trying to get their baby to sleep and he will help them, so he begins with a nice lullaby, then takes advantage of a baby's lack of understanding of language and mentions things adults would find horrible in a soothing way. After a while, Conan figures that his main audience is getting bored, so after telling the parents to turn the baby away from the TV, he starts showing humorous pieces of footage. With the baby now asleep, Conan tells the parents to go have sex. The show's musical guests occasionally take part in this skit as well. The final skit of the first episode featured Conan singing a lullaby (with no jokes in the lyrics, but planted audience members crying instead) and was joined by the late Tony Randall, one of the guests on the show.

• Desk Drive - Originally done with sidekick Andy, Conan now invites an audience member to ride his desk around outside with him. He actually is in front of a green screen and he holds a steering wheel. The greenscreen displays scenes of the road and the out doors. Usually they get into humorous situations on the road. For example as they went through a rural area animals "humped" or attempted to mate with him. Green-colored objects are also used to encorporate violence into the bit (such as putting green circles on to show that they've been shot).

• Fake Celebrity Interviews - This sketch relies heavily on the low-budget filming method Syncro-Vox. A TV screen is lowered down to the seat where the interviewed would actually sit. On the screen is a still image of a celebrity, with live video of the mouth of the back stage impersonator superimposed—because of this method, the fake interviews are also called the "Clutch Cargo routine," after the 1959 cartoon, that is the most widely remembered user of Syncro-Vox. Commonly impersonated celebrities are Arnold Schwarzenegger (who almost always mentions his movie Jingle All the Way as if it's a modern-day classic), George W. Bush, Bill Clinton, Martha Stewart, Michael Jackson, Sammy Sosa, Barry Bonds, Rafael Palmeiro, Donald Trump, Saddam Hussein and Mike Tyson. Most of the impressions are done by either Robert Smigel or Brian Stack.

• Fantastic! - This skech sometimes occurs when Conan announces tomorrow's guests. After announcing the first guest, we see a member of the audience who says that the guest is "Fantastic!" right to the camera with a thumbs up. After Conan announces the next guest, the member does the same thing with a word that rhymes with fantasitc or a phrase that ends in tastic (For example: "Wow, Omar Epps? That charismatic scene-stealer is Epps-tastic!") and again with the third. Conan then says he'll also be doing his monologue, and the member almost does his bit, but changes his mind. Then Conan mentions the show's comedy bits, and the member has either already stopped paying attention (by reading a book or newspaper) or he'll be seen torturing himself (by drinking bleach or drilling his teeth). When Conan questions why he likes the guests but thinks everything else is bad, the member will reply with "Not [adjective], [adjective]-tastic!"

• Frankenstein Wastes A Minute of Our Time - This sketch is performed before any celebrities are introduced. Frankenstein's monster (played by writer Brian Stack) appears by one of the doors leading from the main set, acting excited about something, and inviting the cameraman (and the audience, vicariously) to come with him to take a look. He makes a long trek around the backstage area, stopping along the way to wave the cameraman to keep following. Invariably, what he finds is extremely mundane like a spatula, although it is usually near something that is considerably more interesting, and Conan assumes that is the item Frankenstein lead the camera to. Once Frankenstein found Tom Hanks during the sketch, and moved Hanks out of the way to show off a light switch. (Hanks then immediately reentered the frame to join in pointing out the light switch with great enthusiasm.) The joke format is extremely similar to a shaggy dog story. Since NBC owns Universal, the Frankenstein monster looking like the one from the movies and sharing the same logo in the sketch title as Universal's monster is no coincidence; neither is the sketch also appearing shortly after the buy-out.

• Guest Autographs - Conan shows the audience some autographs supposedly from guests on his show (although the fictitious autographs are often from celebrities which have never appeared on the program). The messages left by the celebrity often mock a movie or scandal the celebrity is currently involved in, or may mock O'Brien in some way.

• Hannigan the Traveling Salesman - Played by Brian Stack, a 1950's era door-to-door salesman interrupts the show, often mocking Conan ("Hello, little girl, is your daddy home?") and spouting rapid-fire obsolete patois from the 1950's or earlier, while trying to sell Conan dangerous knockoffs of famous products (like "Hailey's Birish Cream" which contains paint thinner), lame jokes from "Joke-Co" and obscure sexual fetish activities.

• The Hole In The Floor - A hole on the floor in front of Conan's desk that is actually a special effect projected into the scene. Conan throws objects through it and generally hassles the office worker below.

• Holiday Pictures - Conan, Max, and announcer Joel Godard have recently had a party and he displays the ridiculous and fictional events of this party celebrating a recent holiday. Invariably, these events typically include heavy drinking and rather gory violence/homicide on the part of one or the entire cast. Towards the end of the skit they are always joined by a celebrity, played by an actor with a superimposed picture of the celebrity at hand. The celebrity usually ends up getting into a fight with Conan, Joel, or Max, or is seen in uncompromising positions and/or situations, always looking back at the camera, with the exact same look, seeing as the superimposed picture never changes.

• If They Mated - Conan's signature bit features pictures of two famous celebrities (who are usually dating) are shown; the pictures are then combined into a grotesque new picture of what their offspring would look like if they mated. The segment became so successful that it later spawned a book. The last item in the sketch is usually the mating of a person and an object or two objects: the resulting offspring usually ends up being an unaltered photograph of a celebrity. For example, if Saddam Hussein and Osama Bin Laden were to have a child, it would be Steve Bartman.

• In the Year 2000 - The sketch is typically performed after a celebrity guest has been introduced, as the guest participates in the sketch, although during Andy Richter's tenure as Conan's sidekick, he would participate. Its introduction is as follows:
  Conan: "... It's time, once again, to look into the future."
  Andy/Guest: "The future, Conan?"
  Conan: "That's right, [Andy/Guest's name]. Let's look to the future, all the way to the year 2000."
  During an "In the Year 2000" sketch, O'Brien and either Andy or the celebrity, as well as band member Richie "La Bamba" Rosenberg, each wear a futuristic-looking collar and hold a lit flashlight to their face. Between La Bamba's otherworldy wails of "In the year 2000...", O'Brien and Richter/the celebrity guest trade jokes, some based on current events, in the form of humorous predictions. The sketch was invented prior to the actual year 2000, but the show's writers decided to keep the year the same, in a sort of ironic twist. A compilation book of "In The Year 2000" predictions from the show was released in 1999. Quite commonly, the second-to-last prediction involved Conan mocking his guest, while the last prediction involved the guest mocking Conan in return. This sketch actually originated at Happy Happy Good Show a sketch comedy project that Conan O'Brien wrote and performed for in 1988.

• Kids' Drawings - Children have recently visited the Late Night studio for school. They all drew pictures of their field trip. However they are odd and fictional. They most often center on supposed guests on the show, although other themes are common (such as band leader Max Weinberg's various sexual indiscretions).

• Krunk - During the first two seasons of the show, beginning in early 1994, O'Brien encouraged guests to insert the word krunk, a fictional expletive with multiple uses invented by the show's writers that "the censors don't quite know what to do with yet," into their conversations. On April 30, 2004, American Idol judge Randy Jackson used "krunked" during the show, but by then O'Brien had no idea what Jackson was talking about. Krunk is not the same as crunk, a slang term used by Lil' Jon and various other hip hop artists as a synonym for the condition one experiences when under the influence of both marijuanna and alcohol.

• Mark Pender sings - Portly, bald band member Mark Pender sings the same tune (with different lyrics based on current events) while the lyrics are displayed on the screen. He starts off somewhat slow and mellow but ends up going into the audience getting more excited and holding a scream for several seconds, right after proclaiming his love/hate of the subject matter. Conan has to interrupt him to end the bit. He's sung about many subjects including Bennifer & the 2003 New York blackout.

• Mick Ferguson, The Guy Who's Awfully Proud of his Bullet Proof Legs - long-time staff writer Brian McCann, in a mock-Vaudeville dance, sings "Oh I got bulletproof legs, I got bullet proof legs, oh ya can't hurt me cuz I have bullet proof legs! Oh they cost me a fortune but ya don't...." Invariably, a shadowy figure pulls out a gun and shoots him in the chest, which apparently isn't bulletproof. In the second incarnation of it the same man is standing on the screen and Mick implores Conan to get rid of him because he shot him before. Conan has a security guy come out and check the figure over stating that he doesn't have a weapon. Relieved Mick begins his song and dance again, only to have the Security guy pull out a gun and shoot him in the chest. Another incident has the security guard and a search dog guarding Mick. After Conan calms Mick's fears of the security guard by vouching for him, the search dog pulls a gun and shoots Mick in the chest. The camera then switches to Conan who looks in to it and says "We're gonna get to the bottom of this."

• Movie Casting - A new movie is announced, usually based on a real-life event, and Conan has the inside scoop on the movie's casting. We are shown two photos side-by-side of a person or thing who will be portrayed in the movie and the person that will be playing his or her role. The joke is in how similar the two photos are despite how vastly different the two pictured are, with Conan often commenting on how great the casting is. Running rags include President George W. Bush being played by Ralph Wiggum.

• New Characters - Conan tells us that it is time for new additions to be added to Late Night's current characters, such as 'The Masturbating Bear' or the Fed-ex Pope (Brian McCann). New additions are often more ridiculous than ones before, such as the Nudist Who Has No Skeleton or the Screeching Raccoon with a Jet Pack.
• * A related gag also exists where Conan promises that he will not waste the audience's time with zany, random jokes, only to introduce a completely zany, random character. Notable characters from this bit include Castro Rabbit DJ, the Cactus Chef Playing "We Didn't Start the Fire" on the Flute and the Oscillating Air Purifier that Looks Like Slash.

• New College Mascots - New fictional college mascots are introduced and often make fun of the college or its surrounding area.

• New Stamps/State Quarters/Euros - Conan says he has 'connections' and has been given designs for new commemorative stamps, state quarters, or Euros that insult the state or country.

• Old Radio Show Ghost of Artie Kendall - Brian Stack portrays the ghost of an old singer from when the Late Night studio was used for radio. Conan is talking and hears a disembodied voice singing, and a ghost appears next to his desk. The ghost is convinced by Conan and the audience to hear his "silly old songs". He always sings 3 songs, set to the same tune, that have outrageous lyrics. While the subject of the first varies, the 2nd set is always about women (ie "Women shouldn't be allowed to talk/We should seal their lips with strong adhesive caulk") and after Conan's reaction to it, the ghost sings a derogatory song about the Irish. ("Irish people's brains are made of corn/And they all get drunk before they're even born")

• Patterns - Conan shows a series of images and viewers have to figure out the progressive pattern that links them. For instance, "Squirrel, handy man, poorly guarded insane asylum, Tom Green: That's right, these are more and more likely to be missing a nut."

• Pierre Bernard's Recliner of Rage - A comedy bit in which Late Night staffer Pierre Bernard, Jr. sits in a recliner and relates a story that has recently angered him personally. This tale is always a long, drawn-out personal tale delivered in a soft-spoken tone that usually involves some sort of comic-book, sci-fi-related, or similarly esoteric medium. At the end of his complaint he states "Bottom line, America..." as grabs the handle of the recliner and shifts it back into an upright position to lean forward and point furiously at another camera centered on him to give his final geeky demands on the matter. This is inevitably the point at which the audience and Conan break into laughter because Pierre either has difficulty shifting the recliner or has trouble reading the final cue card when he looks at the other camera. The most famous one involved a complaint about the TV show Stargate SG-1, which led to the him getting small cameos on the show.

• Pleasing the Affiliates - Conan attempts to please local affiliates by responding to their fictional requests for positive mention.

• Preparation H Raymond- In this sketch Brian McCann plays a large eared man, named Raymond, parades down the aisles, passing out Preparation H to Conan's audience. While he possesses a common theme song, chorused by the phrase "Raymond's here to help....oooooooohhh...", Raymond's dialogue content is often related to current events (such as the recent "roid" usage by pro baseball atheletes), but is often seen as a random assortment of ideas; all beginning and culminating with the distribution of preparation H.

• SAT Analogy - Conan helps students with their standardized exams by providing satirised SAT analogies based on current events. Although the newest SAT format has dropped analogies, Conan has said that the segment will continue to be aired.

• Satellite TV - Conan shares the extra channels that the large satellite dish fictionally picks up. Some channels are named things like 'Looks Like A Gentile - Sounds Like A Jew' - this particular channel displayed clips of people that looked like a gentile speaking with a stereotypical Jewish voice. Others include a pornography channel featuring "Max on Max" action, in which Max Weinberg made love to a duplicate Max Weinberg; the Potato judge channel, about a ruthless tuber on the judicial bench; and the 'Men Without Hats' channel that featured people in everyday situations singing about it to the Men Without Hats tune "Safety Dance" (One involved a man in an office singing "You can file if you want to/You can leave your friends behind/Because your friends don't file/And if they don't file then they're no friends of mine.")

Clive Clemmons Inappropriate Response Channel - supposedly a new cable TV channel, short skits ending with wildly inappropriate comments are punctuated by British heavy-metal guitarist Clemmons playing a blistering solo and screaming the word "Inappropriate".

• Staring Contest - a famous skit held while Andy Richter still served as O'Brien's sidekick. An homage to the game show Make Me Laugh, Richter (unlike O'Brien) would be subjected to a series of purely physical-comedy skits taking place behind O'Brien, usually insulting and disgusting, which would eventually force Richter to look away. On the last episode Richter served as sidekick, the show subjected O'Brien to the skits instead; this was the only time Richter ever won the staring contest.

• Small Talk Moment - Conan and Max make small talk about something, for instance reality television or college basketball. The result is usually that both Max and Conan end up talking a lot about a single event speaking in rapid succession, going into extreme detail or citing obscure people and events. Once they are done Max stops and says "Wow Conan, talking about (this subject) sure is interesting." for which Conan enthusiastically responds "It sure is, Max!". They then stare at one another in dull fashion as the camera goes back and forth on them.

• The Walker, Texas Ranger Lever - It sprung from NBC's purchase of entertainment company Universal in early 2004, thus forming the media conglomerate NBC Universal. Conan introduced this lever, which allowed him to play a video clip from the television show Walker, Texas Ranger at any time he wanted to, without paying a dime in royalties. The clips from the Chuck Norris series were sometimes taken out of context, other times not. A clip example could be something such as Norris karate-kicking through the windshield of a moving car, and Conan would comment on each clip's absurdity after it aired. In late summer 2004, the bit seemed to have been retired as Chuck Norris walked in and fired a prop gun at Conan. Norris also revealed his own lever and pulled it, playing a clip showing him "beating" Conan up with martial arts in the back of the studio. On March 8, 2005, the lever returned to the show. Notably, the premise of the bit was technically incorrect, since Walker was owned by CBS, Sony Pictures Television, and a few other companies; Walker just ran on NBC Universal-owned USA Network at the time.

One of the last and most popular clips to be shown was one where a young Haley Joel Osment uttered the sentence, "Walker told me I have AIDS." However, it wasn't even used with the lever; it was used as a segment of a "Spring Cleaning" sketch, which was a compilation of short video sketches that weren't used on the show before. Conan didn't want to show the "I have AIDS" clip because he was afraid the audience wouldn't take it very humorously. It turned out to be one of the most well-known scenes Conan used.

The airing of these clips subsequently led to Chuck Norris becoming the focus of an ever-growing trend in which people invent satirical random "Chuck Norris Facts." The "facts" tend to involve absurdly exaggerated claims of Norris' toughness, attitude, virility, and masculinity.

• What in the World? - Conan is shown an extremely magnified portion of a picture. He throws out a wild guess as to what he is looking at, at which point the picture zooms out. Then Conan tries again, although it's not yet evident what the picture is of. It zooms out again, and the picture is now recognizable and seemingly mundane, for instance a celebrity or other normal situation. The final time it zooms out, something unexpected or outrageous that had previously been out of frame is revealed, thus producing comedy. The opening audio cue for this bit is an annoying sounding man saying "What in the world?" which Conan often asks not to have repeated.

• Where's My Kayak? - Conan begins to talk about a mundane news piece or the guest line-up at his desk when he is interrupted by an incorrect man in the audience (played by Brian McCann). The man seemed to have been misinformed and reacts to Conan's calm correctness in disbelief and yells, "There's no reason to live!" and he procedes to run up to the top of the audience area where a blue kayak is waiting, all while yelling "Where's My Kayak?" He gets in the kayak and "paddles" it offscreen and the scene cuts to a shot of a man in kayak falling down an icy mountain. After this, usually another "audience member" rides off in a kayak or the man comes back through the studio doors (sometimes in poor disguises), gets upset again, usually when Conan mentions how stupid the sketch is, and rides to his demise with another means of transportation, accompied with related stock footage, again all while yelling "Where's my [vehicle]?" The sketch usually involves three different "deaths." In addition to the kayak, other means of transportaton have included a train, bike, skateboard, balloons, three bedroom house, and a car.
• *This sketch evolved from a bit done a week or two before NBC broadcast the Torino Olympics where Brian McCann appeared on video as if he was reporting from the Bobsled run in Italy. He starts sliding down the course and Conan tries to tell him the course wasn't finished based on news reports of the time that said Olympic officials were crunched for time to finish some of the venues. McCann says he can't hear because of the noise of the bobsled then he says "What's that?" and there is a quick cut to stock footage of a kayak falling down a snow covered mountain. Then the show cuts back to Conan who has his head in his hands as if embarrassed and the audience is howling in laughter at the absurd scene, especially after McCann's line: "Someone put me in a kayak!". When the next guest comments about the kayak Conan says "You try to find footage of a bobsled crashing that matches. It was the best we could do."

Annual sketches

• The State of the Show Address - An elaborate parody of the President of the United States' annual State of the Union Address delivered in place of the show's opening credits and monologue on the same night the President gives his speech.

• Central Time Zone New Year's Countdown - Aired each New Year's Eve, Late Night is the only show to do a countdown to midnight for the Central Time Zone of the USA. After the monologue, Conan does a fictional list of people who have died that year, starting with a celebrity who has faded into obscurity who many believe has died, to many outlandish and random celebrities who are obviously alive. Each year the Late Night staff creates a skit when the New Year starts. In 2003, the skit was announcer Joel Godard lying down on a table while an Asian man wearing a Speedo lands on top of him at the stroke of midnight. In 2005, giant papier-mâché busts of Chicagoans Jim Belushi and Oprah Winfrey inched slowly towards each other and "French kissed" at the stroke of midnight. The 2004 and 2005 celebrations also had O'Brien joined by a group of costumed revellers representing various Midwestern locales including:

* Abraham Lincoln (Springfield, Illinois)

* A Green Bay Packers "cheesehead" fan

* Dorothy from The Wonderful Wizard of Oz (Kansas)

* Prince (Minneapolis)

* A gaucho from Belize!

• Sweeps Ahoy - Airing during or just after each "sweeps week", they air skits and doctored footage of previous Late Nights on publicity stunts they did to increase their ratings.

• World's Fastest Menorah and Other Holiday Icons - Usually shown for a period of 3-4 days after the annual lighting of the Rockefeller Center Christmas Tree, Conan always mentions that so many people come to New York just to see the tree, usually adding things like "It's just a tree! Big deal!" He then says something like, "Rockfeller Center might have their Christmas Tree, but we here at Late Night have the World's Fastest Menorah!" This summons the menorah, which sits on a platform, flying by the camera lever, pulled by a string by a stagehand. Of course, the platform is not visible in the camera's field of vision. The menorah is accompanied by a quick excerpt of a Jewish song. As the week progresses, Conan introduces other holiday icons, which include a bungee-jumping Baby Jesus (with "Hallelujah"), a rocket-powered fruitcake (accompanied by ZZ Top's "La Grange"), and a Kwanzaa kinara in a pimped out ride.

Monologue digressions

• Awkward Throws to Max Weinberg - Conan usually begins his monologue by saying "We've got a good show tonight, isn't that right Max?" to which Max replies in an intentionally nonchalant tone "Yeah" then usually shrugs.
• "Donald Trump Impression" - Conan's impression of Donald Trump has him tugging on his hair, sucking his cheeks in, and using Trump's catchphrase "You're fired!" and performs Trump's python hand move as the Max Weinberg Seven plays the intro to "For the Love of Money" by the O'Jays. This bit is usually performed any time that Trump is mentioned, whether in the monologue or in interviews or comedy sketches. Conan has performed this bit with Donald Trump himself present in the studio on more than one occasion.
• Eating a Tear - Conan sometimes will say something that will cause him to shed, and then eat, a tear. This is pantomimed by running a finger from his eye down his cheek to his mouth.
• "I'm-a Gonna Go To Hell When I Die" - a rousing gospel-styled song, started on November 12, 2004, that has no lyrics other than its title and is always accompanied by a rhythmic clapping beat. The audience will usually start clapping along, causing Conan to exclaim "Don't clap along to that, that's terrible!" Occasionally, Conan has recycled the tune with a new title/lyric, notably "I Had an Unhappy Childhood and You Have to Pay." Often sung by Conan after the audience finds one of his jokes distasteful. Another variation, sung in a different tune, is "I'll Be Beaten to Death When I Leave Tonight."
• Inappropriate Closeups of Conan's Hair - Conan leaves the screen, crouches down just enough and walks past the camera so that only his red pompadour is visible.
• "Keep cool, my babies!" - Often spoken immediately before his monologue as a response to thunderous applause, Conan will utter this phrase in order to calm his excited audience. "Keep cool, my babies!" is usually accompanied by "The String Dance."
• "The Late Night Cat" - Conan jumps out of the frame and disappears (with a whooshing sound, as in Miscellaneous Pantomiming below) for a few seconds before reappearing extremely close to the camera, out of focus, and hissing at it in a feline manner (replete with "claws" extended). This usually occurs when the studio audience dislikes a joke told in the monologue.
• Making Fun of Awkward Screams by Audience If an audience member screams something at Conan he makes a joke such as: "Thank you, sir" (when it is a woman, joking that men are excited by him, or that the person is a female impersonator) or "It's nice of my dad for coming."
• Making fun of La Bamba - Conan refers to band member Richie "La Bamba" Rosenberg when there is a homosexual or otherwise unsavory reference in the monologue. La Bamba usually reacts by staring back at Conan with a bemused look on his face and/or shaking his head.
• Miscellaneous Pantomiming - Conan will duck in and out of frame, while making a whooshing sound.
• "Nerd Impression" - Whenever nerds are mentioned in Conan's monologue (such in the context of "Star Wars/Lord of the Rings nerds"), he alters his voice to sound like a "nerd" criticizing Conan for that joke. This usually involves pushing his "glasses" to his face, wagging his finger, having his teeth hang out of his mouth, waving an invisible lightsaber, or using sci-fi related quotes, or saying something like "How Dare You" or "I'll get you Conan O'Brien!", and pushing the buttons on an invisible calculator.
• "The String Dance" - Conan mimes attaching strings to his hips and pulls them, shaking his hips back and forth until he "cuts" one of the strings, dropping the attached hip.
• Unusual Audience Reactions - Conan is always amused by, and makes fun of, the unusual reactions of his audience to some of his monologue jokes. The most common reaction is a horrified/angry "booing" melding into "polite laughter and applause," in Conan's words. Another audience reaction is a delayed laughter to the punchline, sometimes sparking Conan's "Delayed reaction always creeps me out" song, in the style of "I'm-a Gonna Go To Hell When I Die."
• Anna Nicole Smith Impression - Conan enjoys making fun of the former Guess? Jeans model and Playboy Playmate, imitating her nonsensical mutterings, drug-influenced wandering, and outbursts. He will wander back and forth in front of the camera, muttering and finally jumps out with the "cat hiss", also seen in the Late Night Cat digression.
• Geraldo Rivera Impression - Whenever there's a news story or any reference to news personality Geraldo Rivera, he places his index finger across his upper lip where a mustache would grow.
• Arnold Schwarzenegger Impression - When a topic comes up about Arnie, Conan will put on a German accent, speak in pseudo-German language, and pretend to eat a giant sausage, while flexing his muscles, and death-staring the audience.
• George W. Bush Impression - Whenever there's a news story or any reference to President George W. Bush, Conan will look away from the camera, as if distracted by a bird, then look straight back at the camera with a confused look on his face, exclaiming "Huh?".

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