Conan O’Brien and Adam Sandler first met while they were both working at Saturday Night Live in 1990, and the two took an immediate liking to one another. Decades later, O’Brien moved into Sandler’s Los Angeles neighborhood, which has been a blast for at least one of them. As they’ve each explained on multiple occasions, Sandler really enjoys playing practical jokes on O’Brien. Sometimes he even brings his daughters along for the ride.
One of Sandler’s favorite gags is to yell O’Brien’s name out in front of his house whenever he passes by, be it on foot, while riding a bike, or as he’s driving through the neighborhood. According to O’Brien, there was a time when a celebrity bus tour happened to catch Sandler in the act, screaming like a madman in the street. It’s become such a common occurrence, in fact, that Sandler’s kids expect him to do it every time they’re in the area. During a 2024 episode of Conan O’Brien Needs a Friend, Sandler basically confirmed that it’s become sort of a tradition at this point.
The pranks don’t end there, though. Sandler also gets a kick out of ringing O’Brien’s doorbell without any advanced notice and waiting for O’Brien to invite him in. This might be in the middle of a football game O’Brien’s trying to watch, which O’Brien will graciously ask Sandler to join him for.
That’s when Sandler will pull what he calls a “hit and run”: Within a few minutes, he’ll say, “I gotta go. You don’t want me here,” and leave.
Because O’Brien and Sandler’s kids went to the same school, these gags have extended to parent-teacher conferences as well. One night, when a teacher was asking for a volunteer to come in every Thursday to help out, Sandler yelled, “You should do that, Conan,” from the back of the room, much to everyone’s amusement. Or, we should say, everyone except O’Brien, who accused Sandler of making a fool out of him afterward. The pair then had a lengthy and hilarious text exchange that O’Brien read in its entirety in the video below.