Unless you’ve been living in a cave, you know what’s going on with Coco, aka Conan O’Brien. Unceremoniously canned from his dream gig on The Tonight Show, his exit contract stipulated that he wasn’t allowed to be back on the airwaves until September. The late-night-talk-show-hosting equivalent of a non-compete clause.
Through it all, Coco [how'd he get that name anyway?] has been completely up-front about it. Always the first to make fun of himself ["I'm freakishly tall!"], his tweets and sound bytes have kept him relevant and entertaining while managing to deflect snide comments to the network that done him so wrong [NBC].
I suppose he had no choice. It’s not like he could deny what happened to him in front of millions of people, or pretend it wasn’t embarrassing. Besides, we wouldn’t want it any other way. Coco is a case study in how to mine comedy from what was probably a personal tragedy.
Since he’s forbidden from the airwaves for a few months yet, he just launched a national tour with the catchy name "The Not Allowed to Be Funny on Television Until September Tour." Gathering from the reviews, the premiere in Oregon was a smash.
I’m not surprised. One of the pillars of the Coco brand has always been self-deprecation. It’s a credit that he has stayed true to it. I hope, and expect, that when his newly-announced TBS talk show debuts in the fall, his commitment to his Brand Essence and the fact that he knows his audience so well, will pay off.
Go, Coco!