Bearded & Tschorn: Conan O’Brien not behind his beard (at least on Twitter)
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We wanted to believe it, we really did. After all, it fit right in with Conan O’Brien’s enthusiastic embrace of social media; since posting his first tweet on Feb. 24 (@ConanOBrien), he’s racked up more than 648,000 followers and counting, and his decision to follow just one person (@LovelyButton (a.k.a. Sarah Killen), has turned her life into a kind of Web-based reality show that plays out 140 characters at a time.
So, after a co-worker forwarded the Twitter feed purporting to be that of Conan’s beard (@CoCosBeard, with a listed location of “on Conan’s face,” and bio that reads: “I’m a beard that can type”) it kind of made sense in that quirky Conanesque sort of way.
Not only did it start just a day after O’Brien’s legitimate account, some of the observations felt positively Conanic, like this post from Feb. 28:
This morning Conan had Lucky Charms. I didn’t feel as lucky-probably because he’s making me watch reruns of Jersey Shore. Again.
So Bearded & Tschorn was all over it like a five-o’clock shadow. For a brief moment, we even entertained the notion of “interviewing” the beard (in a tongue-in-hairy-cheek way, of course) for possible grooming tips.
Alas, while O’Brien’s press representatives confirm that he is sporting a beard these days, they deny it’s tweeting from his face -- or anywhere else for that matter.
“We have no knowledge about this cocosbeard Twitter feed,” publicist Leslee Dart said in an e-mail. “[It] has nothing to do with [O’Brien] or his reps.”
We tried to get the face behind the faux feed to come forward, but to no avail. “Unfortunately I don’t think this is the time to reveal myself,” was the response.
We did, at least, get the shadow behind the unshaven to share his/her/their motivation: “Motivation? I like making people laugh. If I can make people laugh with just a beard and a Twitter account, then I’m doing well. Which I am.”
The facial fur phantom has a good point, in less than a month, @CocCosBeard has attracted 8,895 followers, who seem to want the wit and wisdom of the whiskers -- real or fake.
But with the recent announcement that Conan O’Brien will be embarking on a 30-city “The Legally Prohibited From Being Funny on Television Tour”, there’s the very real possibility that O’Brien’s game face won’t include the beard. That fact is apparently not lost on the mystery tweeter who recently tweeted the following query: “So, what should I do if @ConanOBrien shaves me off? Tweet from beard heaven, or stop tweeting?
Our take? If you live by the sword, you need to be be prepared to die by the sword -- or in this case, the razor -- and @CocosBeard should go dormant. And if you get bored and are looking for some comic face time on Twitter, the feed from Jay Leno’s chin could use some punching up.
-- Adam Tschorn
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on the set of “Late Night With Conan O’Brien” sporting a “strike beard” he grew during a two-month hiatus due to the Writers Guild strike. Credit: Dana Edelson / NBC.