You've had this movie that you made, "The Comeback Trail."
[Zach] Yes, sir.
And because of COVID, it keeps, it got pushed to next year
as a lot of movies have.
Yeah.
This is a very big project for you because
you got to work with one of your all-time heroes,
I think a lot of people's all-time hero,
Robert De Niro.
Yeah, Conan, this is how COVID extra effed me up
is that I had one of the biggest breaks of my life,
in that I got cast, as a lead, with Robert De Niro,
in a giant comedy directed and written by George Gallo
who made "Midnight Run," one of my favorites.
Yup, yup.
And I didn't even audition, they offered it to me,
and I was like, "But wait a minute, it's a big part.
Like, I'm on every page."
And they were like, "Yeah, De Niro and George
want you for it."
So I go down there, we shoot it in Albuquerque,
it's literally me and De Niro in every scene, we play--
That's fantastic, yeah.
We play movie producers
who are just the worst movie producers
and then COVID hits and now
it's not coming out until next year.
It'll come out, but I was so excited.
Yeah, I mean, this is just a still from the movie,
but this you in bed with Robert De Niro,
and it's like, it's clear that you guys have, I mean,
there's no way you didn't
get intimately close with this man.
We became very close, and I had to,
I'm not exaggerating that I would,
because I love him so much,
and I would go in my trailer, in the mirror,
I would give myself pep talks.
I would be like, you need to go into the scene,
'cause I'd have scenes where I'm screaming at him
and I'm slapping him across the face.
And I would just give myself a pep talk.
Like, "This is just a normal actor.
This is not the most legendary hero that you have."
[Conan] Right, right.
And so, because I knew that if I was intimidated,
I would suck, so I had to like, every scene,
I would give myself this like mental,
like, you got this.
And that worked out?
Yeah, it was great, you know, he's very shy.
A lot of people don't know this about him,
but you know, when he's not in character,
they call cut and he's kind of like, you know, a quiet guy.
He goes back to his chair and then they go,
"Okay, Bob, we're ready."
And he comes to set and he's kind of quiet,
and then they yell "Action,"
and he goes full, amazing De Niro.
But he's pretty soft-spoken,
but little by little, we became closer,
and I made it to texting status, which was thrilling.
We just texted the other day.
You text now with Robert De Niro?
Oh yes, me and the Bobby D are text buddies.
Sometimes he calls me out of the blue because,
you know, when you get like,
you know when you get no caller ID
and you're like, "I'm not gonna answer that.
Who the hell could that be?" Right.
Now I know that it potentially is Bob De Niro,
so now I always answer it.
Of course, nine times out of 10,
it's a cold caller, but one out of 10 times, Conan,
it's Bob just saying hi.
Do you have a special voice?
'Cause sometimes I pick up the phone
when it says no caller ID, I take a chance,
but I don't use my voice.
[Zach] Yes, yeah, the tough guy voice, it's like,
"Yeah, what? Hello?"
I do a crazy over the top Italian guy
"What you want from me?"
Do you remember that Eddie Murphy bit in, I'm sorry,
I have a horrible Eddie Murphy impression.
But when he, on SNL, when he'd go,
"This is how you answer the door in my neighborhood.
Who is it?"
(Conan laughing)
Not bad. I don't think that was
a terrible Eddie Murphy impression.
Well, I just go with that, that's what I channel
when I answered the no caller ID.
Hello.