Conan O’Brien may not host a late night TV show anymore, but the best jokes find a way to transcend mediums. In a recent appearance on the Conan O’Brien Needs a Friend podcast, Paul Rudd revived the duo’s iconic Mac and Me gag in a stunning commitment to the bit.
In the interview, Rudd spends a good two-and-a-half minutes discussing a new Audible series he’s “working on.” “Adam Scott is in it, and Ken Moreno, who I think you know, and Celia Weston, who I actually did a play with many years ago,” Rudd says. “It’s about this guy named Ken Croft who’s hung his own shingle as being kind of a publicist — a low-rent publicist. And he is kind of really at the end of his rope.”
The setup goes on and on, with Rudd adding incredible detail to the story while Conan listens intently. Eventually, Rudd is ready to share a preview of the podcast — except, of course, the podcast is entirely fake, and the preview is that clip from Mac and Me.
“You can’t do this on a podcast!” Conan exclaims, exasperated and shocked that he was tricked yet again. “It’s a visual joke! It’s an audio medium!”
The two go on to debate whether or not the joke worked in podcast form, but for those who want the full effect, the YouTube clip of the podcast shows the Mac and Me clip in all its glory. Check it out below.
When Conan wrapped up his TBS show back in June, we rounded up his best long-running bits, including the origin of the Mac and Me gag.