It will only be a few years before Jay Leno steps out of the spotlight on The Tonight Show and leaves the reins to Conan O’Brien. The day can’t come soon enough. Last night, the part of the public that’s asleep before Conan makes it to the NBC airwaves got a chance to see the genius at work, as he hosted the Emmy Awards. Though I didn’t watch the show, I can safely say that one of the highlights was Conan’s opening montage. He stumbles into the plots of Lost, The Office, House, 24, and Dateline’s “To Catch a Predator” series. It’s smart, funny, and time-appropriate, something you don’t always see in the opening monologues of awards shows. The whole thing is reminiscent of the opening to the 2003 MTV Movie Awards, featuring Justin Timberlake and Sean William Scott.
And, of course, one can never link to a video that features Conan without bringing up the Walker, Texas Ranger clips. You can see two of them here, and the perhaps the ultimate online video clip ever here. Apologies for these two links, as they aren’t YouTube videos and may take a while to load and/or have questionable page content.