A Quote by Conan O'Brien

I think the best thing I ever did was, years before I got the 'Late Night' show, when I first got out to Los Angeles to be a television writer, the first thing I did was I signed up to take improvisational classes... And I studied that for years, and I really loved it.
I started on television. I had five years of network television before I ever got up on a stage. The first thing I ever did was in 1967. This guy Bill Keene had a little talk show at noon, and Gary Owens took over for a week. He knew about this dummy bit I used to do, this ventriloquist thing, and I was on 'Keene at Noon.'
'The West Wing' was really important for me for a lot of reasons. It was the first thing I did when I got out to Los Angeles. I'd just finished school, and I was so naive.
Growing up in Seattle, I had the opportunity to take classes since I was 7 years old. I did theatre. I auditioned for film, television, commercials, and built up not just a resume but also some confidence. I learned how to master my craft before arriving in Los Angeles.
What did it mean, the first time, a thinking creature looked deeply into another's eyes? Did it take a hundred thousand years before this happened or it was the first thing they did, transcendingly, the thing that made them higher, made them modern, the gaze that demonstrates we are lonely in our souls?
I did a lot of musicals when I was younger. And then I went to Northwestern University, and I did more musicals. I went on to do more work in Chicago, and then while I was in college, I got flown out to Los Angeles to do a screen test for 'Back to the Future.' When I got to Los Angeles, I was like, 'Hmmm, this is different.'
I got my first job when I moved to Los Angeles. I worked at a coffee shop for five years and it was one of the best experiences I ever had. It was a bunch of actors covering shifts for each other and becoming great friends.
I think most artists start off playing in front of people and are used to doing it before they go out. I kind of did it the opposite. The thing got blown sky high and I'm on TV on "Good Morning America" doing my first performance in front of everybody. I think it was backward and from that, what I got out of it, the end is what I wanted, which was headlining my own tour, having people come because they loved my record and loved my music.
I studied voiceover, and I studied acting and I got my first series and my first agent a week out of high school. And it took me about five years of hit-or-miss auditioning and booking on occasion before I could support myself totally as an actor.
I literally knew nothing when I did that show ["Tony Flanagan"]. It was the first time I signed an autograph, it was the first time I got fan letters, it was the first time people screamed when I came out.
About a year after I moved to Los Angeles, I decided I wanted to be a joke writer for a late night talk show. So I met with a late night joke writer and he told me that I should start by doing stand-up comedy, because that would really hone my sense of humor and joke writing ability. Eventually I took a stand-up class and a few months later I had a seven-minute act.
That was an interesting thing I learned I think the first time I did a late night show or something. It was like, "Oh, this is for the camera and a performance that you're giving to the people at home."
I did a job. I completed my Matric and my Bachelors. I did a marketing job. I worked as a bus hostess. I did a lot of jobs; I struggled a lot. I got out from there. The first thing I did when I got out of Darul Aman was my Matric. Then I did my Bachelors privately; I kept doing it.
I didn't really know what I wanted to do, and then I got this call from a casting director in Los Angeles. She remembered me from something years before, and she called my mom wanting me to audition for this thing.
The first time I got on stage I was 10 years old and I did impressions. I did cartoon characters and I really got the bug for this life when I saw that people were laughing and saw the attention I was getting.
For the first six years of my career I was independent. I got on to a major and did my thing there. I had platinum and gold records and all that.
Comedy and tragedy are so mixed up in life, Gilbert. The only thing that haunts me is that tale of the two who lived together fifty years and hated each other all that time. I can't believe they really did. Somebody has said that 'hate is only love that has missed its way.' I feel sure that under the hatred they really loved each other . . . just as I really loved you all those years I thought I hated you . . . and I think death would show it to them. I'm glad I found out in life.
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