My Conan Meets a Fan experience - "The Wedding Ringer"
Hi all! I'm Brian Franklin and my Conan Meets a Fan episode went live for early subscribers this week (and will be live to the public roughly 7/9/26)! I thought I’d share my experience with you, with some background on why it was so meaningful to me.
It was my wife and business partner, Nicole, who had the idea for me to submit to try to be a guest for this segment. While the business is unusual - I help people write and rehearse their wedding vows, wedding speeches, and ceremony scripts - I knew it was a long shot, but I filled out the form with no expectations of hearing anything back.
I struggle to keep up with email sometimes, and I almost missed it, but on 5/18, there was the subject: Conan Meets a Fan Submission Follow Up. “We received your submission for Conan Needs a Fan and would love to find out more about you!” with some time slots to choose from.
Are you f’n kidding me???
A few days later, I’m on a screening zoom with producer Aaron Bleyaert - who was the nicest, most inviting and friendly person you’d ever want on the other side of the screen. What was supposed to be 15 minutes wound up over 30. He told me Conan was out of town and it would be roughly 4 weeks before I heard back if this was going to happen or not. I felt pretty good about the interview, but you never know what people will find interesting, or what kinds of personalities they’re looking for. As a listener, I knew it ran the gamut.
About four weeks later - there it was: RECORDING INVITE FOR CONAN NEEDS A FRIEND on 6/22.
As background, I was a child of the 80s. I loved Not Necessarily the News, the Simpsons, and SNL. Before his move to Late Night, I was unknowingly a consumer of his work, but once on the screen, he was very much the representation of everything I loved about comedy: irreverent, risky, intentionally silly, and yet wickedly smart. I was Team Conan all the way.
My dad raised me on a diet of Monty Python, SNL, and Fridays. Perhaps knowing I was raised by comedic wolves, my grandmother - a 4’10, chain-smoking insomniac - introduced me to Richard Pryor and Eddie Murphy at a shockingly young age. Not surprisingly, I grew up a class clown, and while I am not specifically a “Comedy Writer,” it’s been a major part of the work I do in advertising, politics, and now weddings. My wife, Nicole, who is - on a per joke basis - funnier than I am, will never be allowed to forget that the New York Times called me "The Humorist" in their profile of me as a wedding vow writer.
All this to say - having been a huge Conan fan since the 90’s, his podcast only deepened my appreciation for him and his mind. He's a major influence on me. Conan Needs a Friend became our refuge as we spent what felt like months out of every year LA’s soul-grinding traffic. We loved the banter between him and his co-hosts, Sona Movsesian and Matt Gorley - who are, on their own, incredibly funny, endearing characters.
It would have been awesome to meet Conan (or, for that matter, Sona and/or Matt) in a grocery store and have the opportunity to express my long-time appreciation and thanks. Now, Conan was going to interview *me* for 15-20 minutes - a fantasy I had when I was in my 20s and trying to make it as a singer-songwriter.
If you know the show, you know that at any given moment, he might take it anywhere. He might stay on topic, or he might notice something in the background that starts a riff or bit. My wall is filled with guitars, concert posters, and a comedically weird painting of a whale with large breasts being bludgeoned by a guy with a hammer that my 80 year old father made. (The story about this one is a separate thread, but his art, which you can see here, is both incredible and off the rails.) I could easily see Conan asking about any of it - and if we wound up on the whale, it’d be a nice 80th birthday gift to my dad.
As the zoom started, another producer, Sarah - who was every bit as nice and friendly as Aaron - got me prepared. She confirmed a few details, I waited a bit, we did a mic check with Eduardo and Aaron in the studio, and then 10-15 minutes later…. Sarah: “Ok, they’re ready. Have so much fun!”
You’ll see the rest online. I was full of adrenaline and pretty nervous, and I stammered a bit for the first few minutes, but as I calmed down it was exactly that: So. Much. Fun.
One aside: The Norm Moth Joke that Norm MacDonald famously told on Conan (see it here) is my all time favorite joke. I love it because you can change it, riff on it, stretch it out as long as you care to, right up to the point of breaking yourself. Everyone dies at the punchline, and watching their faces as you drop it is just a delicious feeling. The Moth Joke is special to me - as prior to his passing, one of my best friends and I were obsessed with Norm. On what turned out to be our last boy’s trip together, I made him listen to me tell it no less than 30 times. At every bar, whomever we talked to, they wound up getting it. The length grew each time. I was deeply trolling my friend with the deepest of trolling jokes. Norm’s version of it is a masterpiece and will never be equaled in its purity and gall - but like The Aristocrats - it’s a joke that invites expansion and experimentation.
On our recording, out of nowhere, Conan brings up how Norm would bring up jokes from a sears catalog and sell them hard. I couldn’t believe it. My mind was EXPLODING. Me and Conan talking about NORM?!!! I brought up the Moth joke and he talked about that segment - some stuff that I didn’t personally know. It made a special moment even more special.
20 minutes later - it was over. Did that just happen?!? We thought it could be as long as 8 weeks before it went live, and it wound up being two.
Being able to talk about our business with Conan, Sona, and Matt was an incredible gift and so much fun. Trying to spear a new niche in the wedding industry isn’t a cake walk, and Nicole and I have put our heart and soul into it. Moments like these are truly special and treasured. If more business comes out of this, great - but in the meantime, and for the rest of my life, I have the incredible memory of talking to a long time hero of mine. To everyone involved, Conan, Matt, Sona, Eduardo, Lisa, Aaron, & Sarah - I will be forever grateful.
There are no home runs without big swings. It's a motto I repeat a lot because “Big swingers get hits!” raises eyebrows - but none of this would have happened without Nicole’s push. Why did they choose me?
In the parlance of Norm… with Nicole’s encouragement, I left the light on.