Highlights
- Late-night talk show hosts avoid naming difficult guests to avoid awkwardness in the future.
- Conan O’Brien revealed Abel Ferrara as his worst guest due to his bizarre on-set behavior.
- O’Brien has had experience handling awkward guests, including Jennifer Garner, and knows how to get interviews back on track.
Late-night talk show hosts over the years have always been very careful to never name-drop anyone who was a difficult guest on their show. After all, it is very feasible that the guest will return in the future to promote a new project and if they were called out as being a difficult interview, there will be nothing but awkwardness on the set.
With the likes of David Letterman, Jay Leno, James Corden, and Conan O’Brien retiring from their late-night shows, more stories have come out over the years about who were the most entertaining guests that were on the show. Guests whose interviews were almost career-ending have been named. Even those who left an impression for being the worst guest have trickled out.
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This is exactly what O’Brien did when he admitted who his worst-ever guest was after his messy departure from NBC and moving to TBS for Conan.
The Worst Guest That Conan O’Brien Had On His Show Was Abel Ferrara
Conan called Abel Ferrara his worst guest for his erratic on-set behavior
When O’Brien finally retired from the late-night circuit in 2021, he had put in 28 years on different talk shows. As such, he was a seasoned professional. O’Brien was also one of the highest-earning late-night show hosts ever.
But just a few years after getting started on Late Night, O’Brien’s ability to control his guests was put to the test when Abel Ferrera came onto the show acting bizarrely. But it was not Ferrara’s behavior that O’Brien called Ferrera his worst guest. It was the fact that Ferrera tried to leave before even coming on Late Night that O’Brien gave the director a label that he was never able to live down.
“He was this wild eccentric,” O’Brien explained. “And he fled during the show before his segment. He ran away, got on the elevator and was out on the street running away and (producer Frank Smiley) gave chase.”
O’Brien went on to say, “He came on camera against his will, came out and (I think) started yelling at me,” after Ferrera was dragged back upstairs by Smiley.
Dax Shepard, who was interviewing O’Brien for his Armchair Expert podcast, asked if Ferrera was “intoxicated.”
“I’m sure,” O’Brien answered. “If not, he should have been.”
It was clear from the interview that not only did Ferrera not want to be there but his behavior was odd. While it worked to entertain the audience, it was not an experience that O’Brien fondly remembers.
“It was like if you ate 15 cloves of garlic, you wouldn’t say that was a great experience but you’d remember it,” O’Brien said.
While it was memorable, O’Brien wondered if Ferrera was acting the way he was because he thought he was a “genius” when it came to his work and he was entitled to act any way he wanted.
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“It’s the tail wagging the dog,” O’Brien stated. “If I’m difficult, I must be a genius.”
O’Brien concluded, “No! Be a genius first, and then if the side effect is you’re difficult, we’ll accept it. Don’t be difficult in the hopes that maybe you’re a genius.”
While Ferrara’s interview on Late Night was clearly one of the most awkward interviews he has done over the years, Ferrera was not the first guest that O’Brien had to control, something that O’Brien was not afraid to do to guests and his audience loved him for it.
Abel Ferrara Has Proven To Be An Erratic Guest During Other Interviews
Conan calling Abel the “worst” wasn’t surprising
In 1995, the year before Ferrara was on O’Brien’s show, he allowed himself to be interviewed while he was cutting his film, The Addiction. While there were moments of clarity from Ferrara, much of the interview bounced around.
As such, there are very few questions asked by the interviewer. Instead, Ferrara says what comes to mind, and more often than not, it is thoughts strung together with no correlation to one another.
“Welcome to New York City,” Ferrara says to the film crew.
“Nine flights above the hustle and bustle. So for all of you tucked away in Europe, far from Bosnia and Herzegovina. Just these walls that… Here. Let me show you something. Here. Just watch. Look at this. Come on. Lean out and look at that building out there. Just lean out. When you’re looking down there, let’s remind you of the good ‘ol days. Let’s rejoice the death of six million.”
At this point, the only thing the film crew said was that they were rolling. This was all a stream of thought from Ferrara.
Ferrara goes on to say, “New York City. A lot of angry kids who are brought up on TV and a culture of ‘buy, buy, buy’ and he ain’t got no ‘dough, dough, dough,’ so they put a gun to your head.”
As scenes from The Addiction are playing on a monitor in front of Ferrara, he brings up that Fossbender’s films were something he thought were inspirational.
“What attracts you to [Fossbender]?” the interviewer asks.
“His ability to make films you know everything about,” Ferrara replied. “The guys, you know… these are films you could sit and watch.”
After quoting scenes from the movie playing on the monitor, the interviewer tries to get Ferrara back on topic.
“Fossbender?” Ferrara asks. “He’s coming at you a mile a minute with ideas. He’s got more ideas in five minutes of his films than Hollywood had in the last two years.”
Out of nowhere, Ferrara begins to blast music in the editing studio and takes out a guitar to play along. Instead, he just sings along and holds the guitar. Ferrara turns the music off and ushers the film crew and interviewer outside. He then tells them, “Welcome to New York” and trips over something in the street. Ferrara then walks off and it is entirely unclear what the point of the interview was at all.
Over the years, Ferrara’s interviews have become clearer. As such, Ferrera appears to be an easier interview than he was in the past. Something fortunate for interviewers today, given how hard he was to keep on track decades ago.
Abel Ferrara Was Not The First Awkward Interview Conan O’Brien Had On His Show
Conan O’Brien has learned how to handle awkward on-screen moments
Most of the guests who came to O’Brien’s show were well-behaved. There was good banter between O’Brien and the guests and the audience was entertained. But when O’Brien’s interviews started to go sideways and get awkward, O’Brien shined getting them back on track.
When Jennifer Garner was on Late Night, she tried to be cute and call O’Brien out for his use of grammar. Without missing a beat, O’Brien shut down Garner’s attempt to make him look stupid.
“You get to do all these neat martial arts techniques that you get to learn,” O’Brien said to Garner. “You also get to learn this great sort of spy techniques on how to hide and how to enter a room if there’s danger. Do you ever get used to that stuff in real life?”
“Well, not so much. We will have a lot of conversations about how to actually hold a gun,” Garner explained. “Do we hold the gun like this? Do we swoop it up? But that I haven’t used so much lately.”
Garner went on to say that there was a writer’s room that they would not let her into because they did not want to let her know what the storyline of Alias was before she received the script. That proved to be a perfect setup for O’Brien’s net question.
“But there was a time when you snuck into the room to see what the…” O’Brien began.
Garner answered, “I sneaked into the room… Snuck isn’t a word, Conan. You went to Harvard and you should know that.”
O’Brien’s expression was one of embarrassment after Garner made her comment. But that was all part of O’Brien plotting his revenge. The next thing audiences saw was a dictionary on O’Brien’s desk.
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Conan O’Brien even managed to make arguably his most awkward interview entertaining.
“I keep a dictionary down here and I just found it,” O’Brien said. “I just want to look at… Oh, what the hell?! Look right here. ‘Snuck: Past and past part of sneak.’”
Garner turned red and O’Brien was vindicated on late-night TV.
This was not the only other time that guests tried to steamroll over O’Brien. But being the ever-consummate professional he was, O’Brien shut down Kari Whurer, Nicole Shurzeneger, Chelsea Handler, and more.
Perhaps this is why O’Brien was able to do as well as he did with Ferrara, who has since had other interviews that left those interviewing him on their toes. All because Ferrara’s behavior was erratic.
Source: NewsFinale
