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    Lionizing Mark Twain, Conan O’Brien Subtly Skewers Trump

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    In accepting the Mark Twain Prize for American Humor, the comedian mounted a bristling political attack artfully disguised as a tribute.Conan O’Brien faced a thorny question when accepting the Mark Twain Prize for American Humor on Sunday night.In the headlining speech for the most-high-profile event at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts since President Trump purged Democrats from its board, cashiered its leaders and made himself chairman, how political should he be? Considering artists like Lin-Manuel Miranda and Issa Rae have said they are boycotting the Kennedy Center in protest, should he even show up?Triumph the Insult Comic Dog, the puppet voiced by Robert Smigel, who was on the original writing staff of “Late Night With Conan O’Brien,” captured the dilemma of his position when he welcomed the audience in a gravelly voice: “Thank you for coming and shame on you for being here.”The assignment was especially tricky for O’Brien, because unlike past recipients like Jon Stewart or Dave Chappelle, his comedy has always steered clear of ideological fervor. But moving out of his comfort zone, O’Brien delivered what amounted to a bristling attack on the current administration artfully disguised as a tribute to Mark Twain.“Twain was suspicious of populism, jingoism, imperialism, the money-obsessed mania of the Gilded Age and any expression of mindless American might or self-importance,” O’Brien said, steadily, soberly. “Above all, Twain was a patriot in the best sense of the word. He loved America, but knew it was deeply flawed. Twain wrote: ‘Patriotism is supporting your country all of the time and your government when it deserves it.’”O’Brien’s speech, which along with the rest of the show, will air on Netflix on May 4, followed a murderers’ row of comedians — who put on the best Twain Awards in recent memory. Among those gushing about O’Brien were father figures (David Letterman), peers (Adam Sandler, Will Ferrell, Stephen Colbert) and his comedic children (Nikki Glaser, Kumail Nanjiani, John Mulaney).We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Conan O’Brien to Host the Oscars Next Year, Too

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      Mr. O’Brien received high marks for his work as the emcee of the 97th Oscar telecast this month. It was his first time hosting the show.Conan O’Brien will reprise his Oscar hosting duties next year, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences said Monday morning, in one of the earliest renewals for an Oscar host.The news comes after Mr. O’Brien received high marks for his work as the emcee of the 97th Oscar telecast, which delivered a five-year ratings high for ABC this month. It was his first time hosting the show.“The only reason I’m hosting the Oscars next year is that I want to hear Adrien Brody finish his speech,” Mr. O’Brien said in a statement, referring to Mr. Brody’s five-minute oration after winning the Oscar for best actor.The show’s producers, Jeff Ross and Mike Sweeney, will also return for a second year. And the ceremony’s executive producers Raj Kapoor and Katy Mullan, will be back for a third consecutive year. The ceremony will be held on March 15, 2026.The job of hosting the Oscar telecast is often a thorny one. The comedian Chevy Chase called it “the most thankless job in the world.” The hosts rarely get credit when things go right — and are often held responsible when things go wrong.In the past few years, the academy has tried to shore up the assignment early, though it didn’t announce its most recent hosts until the November before the March telecast. Jimmy Kimmel signed on for his fourth and final turn in November 2023, and Mr. O’Brien was named in November 2024.“Conan was the perfect host — skillfully guiding us through the evening with humor, warmth and reverence,” Bill Kramer, the academy’s chief executive, and Janet Yang, the group’s president, said in a statement. More

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      Zoe Saldaña Makes Apology After Winning Oscar for ‘Emilia Pérez’

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      The Spanish-language musical from Netflix saw its grand hopes fizzle after derisive social media posts from its star resurfaced.Just six weeks ago “Emilia Pérez” got 13 Oscar nominations, more than any other film this year. Its lead actress, Karla Sofía Gascón, made history by becoming the first openly trans actor to be nominated and the film, a musical about a Mexican cartel boss, was seen as a real contender to win the Academy Award for best picture.It did not work out that way.Collapsing under the weight of award-season scandal after derogatory comments resurfaced that Gascón had posted years ago on social media, “Emilia Pérez” wound up winning just two Oscars: for best supporting actress and best original song (“El Mal”).Its travails became a punchline during the opening monologue from the evening’s host, Conan O’Brien. “Little fact for you: ‘Anora’ uses the F-word 479 times,” he said. “That’s three more than the record set by Karla Sofia Gascón’s publicist.”And even when its winners were supposed to be getting feted, they faced some of the only pointed questions of the night. Inside the press room, Cristina Ibañez, a journalist for a Mexican publication, confronted Zoe Saldaña, who won for best supporting actress, telling her bluntly that “Emilia Pérez” was “really hurtful for us Mexicans.” (The film, by the French writer-director Jacques Audiard, drew criticism in Mexico for its depiction of the country and the fact that few Mexicans were involved in the production.)“First of all, I am very, very sorry that you and so many Mexicans felt offended,” Saldaña said. “That was never our intention. We came from a place of love, and I will stand by that.”“I’m also always open to sit down with all of my Mexican brothers and sisters and with love and respect, have a great conversation on how ‘Emilia’ could have been done better,” she added later.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Oscars 2025’s Best and Worst Moments: Speeches, Performances and More

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      There was plenty to take in, including a “Wicked” opener, Conan O’Brien gags, and memorable speeches both good and bad. And people watching on Hulu saw almost all of it.Most Gravity Defying Opener: ‘Wicked’When it was announced that Ariana Grande and Cynthia Erivo would perform at the Oscars, it was assumed they would sing something from “Wicked,” the film for which they were both nominated. They did, of course. It would be silly to pass up that opportunity. But the women also paid tribute to previous cinematic versions of Oz, showing how Hollywood had imagined L. Frank Baum’s world through the years.Grande emerged first, wearing a sparkling red gown, channeling Judy Garland to sing “Over the Rainbow” from “The Wizard of Oz.” She then ceded the stage to Erivo, who performed “Home,” Dorothy’s ballad from “The Wiz,” famously sung onscreen by Diana Ross. And, yes, then they closed with “Defying Gravity,” the signature song from “Wicked,” with Erivo bringing everything home with her shiver-inducing war cry. (Later, we returned to Oz to honor Quincy Jones when Queen Latifah performed a rousing rendition of “Ease on Down the Road.”) — Esther ZuckermanSean Baker joined rarefied company with his Oscar haul.Philip Cheung for The New York TimesMost Dominant Night: Sean BakerThe “Anora” director has hovered around the outer edges of the Academy’s sensibility with his previous films “The Florida Project,” which earned Willem Dafoe a supporting-actor nomination, and “Red Rocket,” which had some Oscar buzz but was ultimately snubbed. Now Baker appears to have hit a sweet spot: He earned four separate Oscars tonight — in the editing, directing, original-screenplay and best-picture categories — which tied the record set by Walt Disney. Don’t expect Baker’s R-rated films to get the same amusement-park treatment, though. — Kyle BuchananConan O’Brien, hosting for the first time, injected some silliness into the proceedings. Philip Cheung for The New York TimesBest Host for the Moment: Conan O’BrienGoing into the night, O’Brien was at least as nervous as he was excited. But from the filmed opening — in which he fished around in Demi Moore’s back, in a spoof of “The Substance” — to his monologue, O’Brien seemed to have a joyful glint, even (or maybe especially) when he was razzing the industry. (The sandworm from “Dune” earned its residuals.)We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Trump and Politics Were Largely Absent From the Oscars

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      Washington was an entire country away.At the Academy Awards on Sunday, there were relatively few references to politics. The most direct commentary on President Trump and the upheaval in the capital was an oblique reference by the host of the telecast, Conan O’Brien.“You know, ‘Anora’ is having a good night,” Mr. O’Brien said, referring to the Oscar-winning film about a sex worker’s short-lived romance with the son of a Russian oligarch. One of the movie’s emotional high points is when its working-class protagonist, played by Mikey Madison, dresses down the powerful family.“I guess Americans are excited to see somebody finally stand up to a powerful Russian,” Mr. O’Brien said.The comment was the closest he got to uttering the name of Mr. Trump, whose administration has been dealing with the fallout from his public blowup in the Oval Office with President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine. The dispute involved Mr. Trump scolding Mr. Zelensky for his harsh words for President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia.Aside from alluding to the country’s “divisive politics,” Mr. O’Brien also kept Washington at arm’s length during his opening monologue, in which he kept the focus on Hollywood.Daryl Hannah was more direct as she presented the best editing category. “Slava Ukraine,” she said, before moving on to the award at hand.In accepting the award for best supporting actress, Zoe Saldaña hinted at the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown. “I am a proud child of immigrant parents with dreams and dignity and hardworking hands,” she said.The most political moment of the telecast, by far, was the award for best documentary feature, which went to “No Other Land,” an exploration of the Israeli demolitions of Palestinian homes in the southern West Bank.During his acceptance speech, Basel Adra, a Palestinian activist and one of the filmmakers, called “on the world to take serious actions to stop the injustice and to stop the ethnic cleansing of Palestinian people.”Yuval Abraham, an Israeli journalist who directed the film with Adra, said he believed there was a political solution to the conflict that includes national rights “for both of our people.” “And I have to say, as I am here, the foreign policy in this country is helping to block this path,” he said.The Oscars were the latest awards ceremony this year to largely steer clear from politics. Presenters and winners at the Golden Globes avoided the subject, while a few artists alluded to politics onstage during the Grammys.A reference to the president during the Oscars was perhaps most likely in the best actor category, in which Sebastian Stan was nominated for his portrayal of Mr. Trump in “The Apprentice.” Instead, the award went to Adrien Brody for “The Brutalist.” More

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      How to Watch the Oscars 2025: Date, Time and Streaming

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      Conan O’Brien will host the annual awards, which will be available to watch live on a streaming service for the first time.It seems like a lifetime ago that Sean Baker’s screwball comedy “Anora” first emerged as the favorite in the best picture race (no one was yet even thinking about holding space for “Wicked”).But we’re now right back where we started in the fall with both math and our Projectionist columnist, Kyle Buchanan, predicting that “Anora” will emerge triumphant. It’s by no means a sure thing — last weekend’s big Screen Actors Guild Awards winner, the papal thriller “Conclave,” could play spoiler.In the acting races, Demi Moore appears to be the one to beat after notching another win at the SAGs (though Buchanan says not to count out Fernanda Torres, who delivers a tour de force performance in the quiet Brazilian drama “I’m Still Here”).But could Adrien Brody, who plays a Jewish architect who survives the Holocaust in “The Brutalist,” be in for an upset from the 29-year-old Timothée Chalamet, who has embarked on a decidedly unconventional — and very online — Oscar campaign for his lead role in the Bob Dylan biopic “A Complete Unknown”?Here’s everything you need to know.What time does the show start and where can I watch?This year’s show is again one for the early birds: The ceremony is set to begin at 7 p.m. Eastern, 4 p.m. Pacific, at the Dolby Theater in Los Angeles.On TV, ABC is the official broadcaster. Online, you can watch the show live on the ABC app, which is free to download, or at abc.com, though you’ll need to sign in using the credentials from your cable provider. There are also a number of live TV streaming services that offer access to ABC, including Hulu + Live TV, YouTube TV, AT&T TV and FuboTV, which all require subscriptions.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Conan O’Brien on his Oscars Hosting Gig

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      Conan O’Brien is not a cynic — at least not when it comes to the Oscars, which he is hosting for the first time on Sunday. The Emmy-winning comedian, podcaster, traveler and movie buff is genuinely excited — “I get to do this!” he enthused — but also thoroughly worried.“It’s the thing I wake up and think about at night: What’s the best way to tackle this? How? In a way that makes me creatively happy?” he said.Since he accepted the job late last year, O’Brien, 61, has had an emotionally taxing few months. In December, his parents, who were in their 90s, died three days apart, in his childhood home in Massachusetts. Not long after the double funeral, just as he was settling back in Los Angeles to work on the Oscars, the fires started there, and his home was evacuated. When his wife called to ask what to save, his only thought was of a 1980 letter from the author and essayist E.B. White. O’Brien had written to him, as a teenage fan, “and he wrote me back a really sweet letter,” O’Brien said. “So I said, just grab that. And if the rest goes, it goes.”He is still living in a hotel, where he has hung the letter on a wall, he said in a video interview from his office on Monday. The conversation was discursive — pensive and funny. Though he hosted the Emmys twice (most recently in 2006), he has never attended the Oscars. “This was the only way I could get invited,” he joked.His preparation has included bringing in 10 of his own writers to work with Oscar-night stalwarts, running jokes by the crew, and dropping in at clubs in Los Angeles to try out material. “I started seriously writing comedy around the time I was 18,” he said, “and it’s what I think about all the time.” Yet even for him, there is no formula. “It’s frustrating, but it’s not math. You can’t prove it. The only way to find out is to try it on people.”“This was the only way I could get invited,” O’Brien joked about his hosting duties.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Conan O’Brien’s Parents Die 3 Days Apart

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      Thomas O’Brien, an epidemiologist, and Ruth O’Brien, a lawyer, juggled successful careers with raising six children, including the comedy star.The parents of Conan O’Brien, the longtime late-night television host and a star in the comedy world, died this week within days of one another.Thomas Francis O’Brien, 95, an epidemiologist, and Ruth Reardon O’Brien, 92, a lawyer who made strides for women in the legal field, both died at their home in Brookline, Mass., according to the Bell O’Dea Funeral Home. Dr. O’Brien died on Monday, and Ms. O’Brien, died on Thursday.Happy families are not exactly a common topic in comedy. The parents of Conan O’Brien, 61, were not only celebrated in their respective fields but by the most well-known of their six children.Conan O’Brien credited his father with introducing him to comedy and described him in an interview this week in The Boston Globe as “the funniest guy in the room.” He added that his father had a “voracious appetite for ideas and people and the crazy variety and irony of life.”Ruth R. O’BrienThomas F. O’Brien, M.D.Bell O’Dea Funeral HomeThomas O’Brien spent most of his career at what is now Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston, where he was the first director of the infectious diseases division, and was on faculty at Harvard Medical School. He also was a co-founder of the Collaborating Centre for Surveillance of Antimicrobial Resistance for the World Health Organization. He became known for his work around antibiotic-resistant bacteria.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Conan O’Brien Doesn’t Matter

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      After hosting talk shows for nearly three decades, Conan O’Brien has come to believe that longevity is overrated. The first time he made this point to me was in April at a restaurant in New York, when he proposed that all statues and monuments should be made with durable soap that dissolves in seven years. One month later, in his office in Los Angeles, down the hall from his podcast studio, he went further, declaring himself anti-graveyard.Asked if this means he wants to be cremated, O’Brien responded: “I want to be left in a ditch and found by a jogger.” Taking up space in a cemetery seems selfish to him. “I say this in a positive way,” he added, leaning forward and shifting to a less jokey tone. “We don’t matter.”Since leaving late-night television in 2021, Conan O’Brien, 61, has become more reflective about life (and death), given to philosophical flights of fancy that he compulsively alternates with comic tangents. O’Brien famously champions the intersection between smart and stupid, but in conversation, what stands out is how quickly he moves between light and heavy. In one of several interviews, I asked him if he was happier now than when he was on television and his response was to question happiness itself. “At best it’s a fleeting moment after a rainstorm when the sun’s coming out,” he said. “Being contented comes in little moments, here and there.”The only thing trickier than being a late-night talk show host is being a former one. Some relapse (Jon Stewart). A few vanish (Johnny Carson, Craig Kilborn). Most enter a more modest era (David Letterman, Jay Leno). Since he started writing for “Saturday Night Live” in the 1980s, Conan O’Brien has built one of the most consequential careers in comedy. And while his late-night tenure is beloved by comedy nerds, helping define a sensibility for a generation of comedians like Bill Hader, Eric André and Nikki Glaser, his postshow work may turn out to be more impressive.It helps that his brand of joyfully goofy absurdity ages well. Stewart may have repeatedly beaten him out for Emmys during the George W. Bush years, but jokes about the Iraq War have a shorter shelf life than the masturbating bear, a recurring character on O’Brien’s late-night show that is exactly what it sounds like. His reputation has grown as new generations have discovered his work online.The other reason O’Brien has done well since leaving “Conan,” his final late-night show (after “Late Night” and “The Tonight Show”), is that he’s always been excited by and open to experimentation. “I enjoyed playing with that form,” he said of the talk show. “The stuff I’m really interested in, there’s so many opportunities to do it now. ‘Hot Ones’ is proof.”We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More