Conan O’Brien has revealed that he turned down Ray Romano for a writing job, one year before the comedian shot to fame in the sitcom Everybody Loves Raymond.
In a new episode of his podcast, the TV star, 61, explained how Romano, 67, had tried to get a job as a writer on Late Night With Conan O’Brien before landing his breakout role.
“Ray Romano wanted to be a monologue writer for my show,” O’Brien said.
“Great comedian, great joke writer. We didn’t have a slot, but he had a good packet and people knew him, so I met with him.”
During their meeting, O’Brien praised Romano’s talent but had to let him down, telling him that there weren’t any jobs available at that point.
“I just kind of said that your stuff is great but we didn’t have an opening,” he recollected.
“So he goes from that experience to, maybe a year later, getting Everybody Loves Raymond and becoming this monolithic TV star.”
He went on to joke that when he later bumped into Romano, the Emmy winner was still “really bummed” to have missed out on the opportunity to work on the late night show, much to O’Brien’s disbelief.
“I’m like, ‘What are you talking about? Do you realise what we pay monologue writers?’
“Ray, Ray, hello! Ray, you’re Ray Romano. That doesn’t happen if you’re with me writing!”
Romano played the lead role of sports writer Raymond Barone in the CBS sitcom from 1996 to 2005, and received the Emmy for Outstanding Lead Actor in a Comedy Series in 2002.
He went on to voice woolly mammoth Manny in the Ice Age movies and to appear in films including The Irishman and The Big Sick. He recently starred alongside Lisa Kudrow in the Netflix comedy No Good Deed.
O’Brien, meanwhile, is set to host the Academy Awards for the first time next month.
