Conan O’Brien Was Joking About Firing Louis C.K. Long Before He Became #MeToo’d
Louis C.K. was one of the most prominent “cancellations” in comedy. A “cancellation” after which he won a Grammy for Best Comedy Album, mind you. An album on which he jokes about the exact sexual misconduct that… ended his career? He says from the stage of a sold-out stadium? The acrobatics of the angered mind that’s read half of the First Amendment are hard to follow.
The stories about him intimidating female comedians into watching him masturbate to completion against their will are the centerpiece of his legacy now, as they well should be. Some of his old jokes themselves, even removed from his penchant for cornering women and exposing himself to them, probably would raise an eyebrow or inspire a thinkpiece themselves. Most comics now would prefer not to have an extended clip of them using the n-word on wax, for example.
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In an old interview with Conan O’Brien, unearthed on the Conan subreddit, they reminisce about a joke that C.K. forced through that received a less-than kind response from the audience. This was a joke that narrowed eyebrows in the early ‘90s, mind you. People were still watching Rob Schneider pretend to be Asian in Mickey-Rooney style buck teeth and loving it back then.
The joke in question was for a segment on the original Conan Late Night called “Actual Items,” where Conan presented completely fabricated (hence, the comedy) advertisements for items. The one C.K. wrote and pushed to air, though there’s unsurprisingly no record of it now? An fake print ad for antique coins that said they were “so old you could buy slaves with them.”
There’s certainly a reflection to be made there about whether the ‘90s audience’s overwhelming boos were because of an enlightened concern over racism in America, or a visceral hate of being reminded of atrocities they committed. Still, it’s a pretty wild pitch in the early days of a show that, by everyone’s knowledge and admission, NBC was doing its best to scuttle in the first place.
Reminded of the joke, and C.K.’s recollection that he could “bully” Conan into getting jokes on air (a dynamic that has aged extra poorly), Conan joked that he “obviously” should have fired C.K.
If he only knew!
