Conan O'Brien publicly shames one of his writers for "tweeting stupid things about the state of late night comedy"

Are you "Team Coco" on this one?

Published April 20, 2015 2:48PM (EDT)

Conan O'Brien     (AP/Richard Shotwell)
Conan O'Brien (AP/Richard Shotwell)

Late night comedy has taken a major turn in the last few years. Hashtags are integrated into everything. Lip-sync battling is an actual thing. And if there isn't the possibility of a surprise celebrity cameo lurking around every corner, what's the point.

So, is this turn for the better or for the worse? Mostly worse, if you ask Andrés du Bouchet who, thanks to the very public nature of Twitter, you don't even have to ask anymore. The Conan writer tweet-vented about the embarrassing state of late night comedy last week and hammered the late night machine that has allowed for so-called "Prom King Comedy" to take over the scene.

Many of these tweets du Bouchet later deleted, including:

  • "Comedy in 2015 needs a severe motherfucking shakeup. No celebrities, no parodies, no pranks, no mash-ups or hashtag wars. I’m fat."
  • "and shove your lip-synching up your ass."
  • "Prom King Comedy. That’s what I call all this shit. You’ve let the popular kids appropriate the very art form that helped you deal. Fuck.
  •  "Once again I’m a bonehead for tweeting as a fan of comedy instead of as a guy who earns a living doing it."
  • "Sorry for being a bloviating elitist windbag last night. I know tons of talented people are making the stuff I enjoy shitting all over."

Du Bouchet followed up on this Twitter rampage with a jokey tweet Sunday:

[embedtweet id= 589857047211970560]

One person who wasn't laughing: his boss Conan O'Brien. Not even an hour later, O'Brien stepped in and gave him a public whipping:

[embedtweet id=589867565398253570]

By Colin Gorenstein

Colin Gorenstein is Salon's assistant editor of internet and viral content. Follow @colingorenstein or email cgorenstein@salon.com.

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Comedy Conan Conan O'brien Late Night