Conan O’Brien Dishes on All the Oscars Bits That Were Scrapped

While Conan O’Brien’s Oscars host stint earlier this month was arguably a unanimous sweep, there were some jokes that didn’t slide with the Academy.

In a Thursday episode of his podcast Conan O’Brien Needs a Friend, the comedian sat down with his Oscars head writer Mike Sweeney and dished on all the bits that didn’t make the final cut during the ceremony March 2.

One idea for a promo video that was scrapped for example, imagined O’Brien and a 9-foot-tall Oscar statuette as a couple at home.

“We’re fighting about things couples fight about,” O’Brien shared. “At one point I thought, wouldn’t it be great if it’s just on the couch? Let’s lay it on a really big couch and I’ll be vacuuming and say, ‘Could you at least lift your feet? Or could you at least get up and help? Load the dishwasher?’ We wanted to do it and they just said, ‘No, no no, that can’t happen.’”

A member of the Academy even came forward to tell O’Brien, “Oscar can never be horizontal.”

“That blew my mind,” the talk show host added. “Like, wow, this is like the thigh bone of St. Peter. This is a religious icon.”

Lying horizontally is apparently not the only thing an Oscar isn’t allowed to do, with O’Brien’s head writer Mike Sweeney noting that even dressing up the statue with clothes is a huge no-no. “No clothing on Oscar. Oscar is always naked,” Sweeney growled, impersonating the Oscar execs.

O’Brien also revealed that his original opening video for the ceremony was similarly scrapped. It would have seen the comedian insert himself into scenes from all the films nominated like Wicked and Gladiator II.

“It was the idea that, ‘Oh, Conan’s now going to goof on all the movies,’” O’Brien said. “It starts with me and I’m in Wicked and I’m all green, finishing ‘Defying Gravity’ or one of those songs. And I finish it and then you cut to the next thing, which is Gladiator II and ‘clang, clang, clang’ with swords and you see that I’m a gladiator but then you notice that I’m still green. And then you go on to Conclave and you see people voting with their ballots and one of the hands is still green.”

“We loved it,” Sweeney added on the intended opening. “It was hammered out before the fires happened, and even after that we kind of honed it.”

The 2025 Academy Awards instead opened with a tribute of famous film sets across Los Angeles in light of the tragic January fires.