Bradley Cooper and Jimmy Fallon Can't Stop Laughing, Leave Studio Mid-Interview

Bradley Cooper scored a huge win with "A Star Is Born" and one epic fail with his high school story on "The Tonight Show."

The star and director of the critically-acclaimed film, co-starring Lady Gaga, tried to make a point about how some people from his past are surprised by his success, but it turned into such a meandering mess of a tale that both he and Jimmy Fallon were reduced to gales of laughter.

There's usually a rhythm and a sameness to talk show interviews, so it was refreshing and delightful to see this one take convention and throw it out the window ... or perhaps more appropriately out into the hallway, as Cooper and Fallon headed out there at one point, as well.

The whole thing started off logically enough when Cooper asked Fallon if people from his past were ever shocked that he wound up hosting "The Tonight Show." But then he tried to get into his story and it all went wrong from the very start.

"We went around-- I know we don't have time, I'm gonna say it anyway-- Whatevs!" Apparently, "whatevs" is the key word to lose your composure completely, and both men promptly did so. According to Cooper, there were two seconds left in the segment, so he decided that was plenty of time to tell this story properly.

Apparently no amount of time would have allowed for that, though. Instead, they absolutely lost it, laughing uncontrollably in one of those infectiously joyful moments that was so genuine and so entertaining it became the segment.

While Fallon tried to pull it together, Cooper talked about his 20-year high school reunion and how one of his classmates drunkenly asked him, "How'd that happen, Brad?" Basically summing up Cooper's entire career as this inexplicable fluke.

It was a nice enough story, we guess, but man was that delivery rough. And then he tried to end with a meaningful statement that lost Fallon comlpetely. "You never know," Cooper said. And then after Fallon's dumbfounded look, he finished, "How people are going to react."

"That was a great story," Fallon joked, making a note to edit everything out.

By this point the interview was so off the rails that when Cooper said he thought he was wearing the same suit from his last visit there and Fallon said there was a picture out in the hallway, Cooper said, "We should go check."

Well, why not. There was no lighting or cameras, but the guys decided to head out anyway, treating the home audience to an NBC banner with "Please Stand By" on it until they returned.

"A Star Is Born" is in theaters Friday.

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