Conan O'Brien's Touching Tribute to Garry Shandling

Conan O’Brien opened Thursday night’s show by remembering comedian Garry Shandling, who died earlier in the day at the age of 66.

Related: A Look Back at Garry Shandling’s Influential Career

“I have to tell you, this is a devastating shock to me and to just about everybody I know,” O’Brien said in his monologue. “I’ve had about three hours now to process that Garry is gone, and this just doesn’t seem real, still.” The somber late night host expressed himself very warmly about his dear friend and said that Shandling was “obviously hysterically funny, pretty much all the time.” O’Brien shared that after he had lost his gig as the host of NBC’s The Tonight Show, it was Shandling who helped him get over the career hurdle. “I woke up the next morning, and I had no job, and I had no idea what I was going to do. And I was just shell-shocked. I was a complete zombie,” O’Brien said.

O’Brien talked about how he had taken a family trip to Hawaii after his job was revoked, and how Shandling, who also happened to be there on vacation, helped him to get over the depression. “I was at a real low point. He counseled me, he cheered me up, he told me jokes. He talked to me about philosophy. He talked to me about how there are bigger things in the world and how I was going to be fine,” O’Brien said. But the one thing Conan will remember most was when Garry came up with a bit for him when he was nervous about hosting the Emmys for the first time.

Conan airs weeknights at 11 p.m. on TBS.

See the full tribute below.

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