June 13, 2019 • 47 mins
Chelsea is joined live in Dallas by Connie Britton where they have a hilarious conversation about their friendship, drugs, Connie’s TV Husbands and Chelsea’s trip abroad with her dog, Chunk.
Credits:
Host: Chelsea Handler
Guests: Dr. Dan Siegel & Brandon Marlo
Executive Producer: Conal Byrne
Producers: Sophie Lichterman, Jack O’Brien
Writers: Jamie Loftus, Anna Hossnieh & Sophie Lichterman
Consulting Producers: Nick Stumpf, Miles Gray, & Anna Hossnieh
This episode was Engineered, Mixed & Edited by: Danl Goodman
Music by: Kingsbury
Order: "Life Will Be the Death of Me"
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hi, I'm Chelsea Handler. Welcome to Life Will Be the
Death of Me, a production of I Heart Radio. Thank You, Dallas.
That's a very very warm welcome. I know it's gonna
be one of those nights because it always is in Dallas.
(00:22):
It's always one of those nights. And that's why I
always come back here when I go on tour. I Um,
I haven't been on tour in a really long time,
and I didn't feel like standing up while I was
doing it, so and I didn't want to go on
tour until I had something to say. And so this
(00:46):
is me with something to say. I wrote a new book.
It's called Life Will Be the Death of Me, and um,
I'm gonna read the first chapter of the book to
set the tone for everybody about where I was in
my life when I wrote this. The book is dedicated
to my future husband, whoever he is. If you're here,
(01:11):
if you're a straight man here tonight by yourself. There
are no straight men here by themselves, no fucking way,
And if they are, they're seventy. The chapter is called
(01:31):
where have I Been All my life? I don't remember
the actor and I don't remember the movie, but I
remember it was five o'clock in the afternoon, and I
had just taken a couple of hits off of my
vape pen. I needed to load my picks account, which
held pre released movies that I was expected to screen
before a star of one of the movies was a
guest on my Netflix talk show. I was sitting on
(01:52):
one of my overpriced Shaise lounges, the kind that celebrities
and Russians purchased for their bedrooms, when I found myself
once again unable to convert the TV that descends from
the ceiling from Apple TV two picks rich people have
descending to smart television's. The idea is that they descend
silently and gracefully from the ceiling, But because I am
(02:16):
nouveau che rich, mine sounds more like a helicopter is
fucking landing. I'd like to blame my inability to change
the mode of my television picks on the fact that
I was stoned, but that would be a lie. I'd
be even less capable if I were sober. I called
my assistant Brandon at his house to tell him to
(02:37):
tell my other assistant, Tanner, who was downstairs in my house,
to come upstairs and help me with the television. I
hung up the phone. I looked down at the table
and saw the vait pen. How many more hits of
marijuana am I gonna need to take to get through
this movie? I knew things that hit a new low
(03:00):
or high, depending on how you looked at the situation.
I picked up the iPad that controls the TV along
with everything else in my house, from the window shades
to the exterior lights in my backyard to my pulse
probably and tried to pretend that I was troubleshooting so
that Tanner would think I had at least tried to
figure it out on my own, as if that had
(03:20):
ever happened before. How did I become so useless? And
how many assistants did I actually have? The answer is
to Brandon and Tanner. Brandon is gay and has an
incredible attention to detail. Tanner is straight, and before he
met me, he thought the Four Seasons was a weather pattern.
(03:42):
Before I met Tanner, I thought Venma was an online
liquor store. I didn't want to watch another stupid movie
that I didn't care about, and I really didn't want
to interview another action star blow viating about his motivation
for playing a half man, half mur made. I didn't care,
and I wasn't doing anyone any favors by pretending that
(04:05):
I did. Did I ever care? The answer is yes.
There was a time when all of this mattered to me.
There was a time when being famous and having this
kind of success and money and having a TV show
was what drove me to want more and more and more.
And now I found myself exhausted and ashamed by the
meaninglessness of it all. I remember coming home a couple
(04:26):
of weeks before the two thousand and sixteen election on
a windy fall night, which for Los Angeles is rare.
Anytime there's weather in Los Angeles, even rain, it's exciting.
The constant sunshine can start to grade on your nerves.
I went up to my bedroom, I opened up my
sliding glass doors, I grabbed my vapen, and I turned
on some Neil Young and I lay on my bed
(04:48):
in the dark, watching the wind blow my bedroom drapes around,
hearing the ruffling of the leaves, and watching that lanterns
that hang from my backyard trees swinging into each other,
thinking if there's an electrical fire, I hope the dogs
will at least bark to wake me up. But overall,
my thought was, this is fucking awesome. This is exactly
(05:09):
what I hoped adulthood would be like. No kids, no husband,
no responsibilities, just a TV show on Netflix and whatever
else I felt like doing whenever I felt like doing it.
Not trapped, not stock, not dependent on a single person,
(05:29):
but myself, free to be you and me. I couldn't
believe how lucky my life had turned out, how many
of my dreams had come true, and also my good
fortune in being alive during this time in history, the
year we were going to elect our first female president
that didn't happen. I suppose I could blame my state
(05:52):
of mind on the election of Donald Trump, so I
will I have the Trump family and their horrifying personalities
and was disgusting veneers to thank for my midlife crisis,
along with more than half the population of the world.
I couldn't grasp how in this day and age we
(06:13):
elected a man who insulted everybody he's insulted and done
everything he's done since. The contrast in decency between Barack
Obama and Donald Trump was too much for me to bear.
It was like electing snooky to the Senate. Now people
were seriously talking about Dwayne the Rock Johnson for president.
(06:36):
How on earth did we get there? Although, if I'm
being honest, at that point, I would have taken an
actual rock. I kept hearing the word elitists, you know,
like that everyone in California, New York lives in a bubble,
that the election of this lunatic was a result of
all of us not knowing anything about the rest of
the country. And that didn't bring true for me because
(06:58):
I had traveled all over the country doing stand up
for so many years. I've been to every major city
in some minor cities multiple times. I wasn't an elitist.
My father was a used car dealer. I didn't have
a trust fund or wealthy parents. We weren't even allowed
to answer the phone growing up, because more often than
not it would be a bill collector. Had four hundred
dollars when I drove across the country alone to move
(07:20):
to Los Angeles and then was broke for seven years,
living paycheck to paycheck while simultaneously getting fired from every
waitressing job I ever had. I worked for everything I
ever have and never even went to college. How could
I be an elitist without ever going to college. And then, oh,
wait a minute, I remember. I grew up wanting to
(07:41):
get as far away from my life and my parents
as possible. I had created a life in which there
was a zero tolerance policy for any discomfort. I could
handle physical discomfort, like dental work or elective surgery to
make my thigh smaller, but not any discomfort related to
not having money. Sure, I was just graping by on
those cross country trips in the beginning of my stand
(08:03):
up career, barely making enough money from small comedy clubs
to cover my hotel room for the week. But after
a few years I was making more money. And then
the clubs turned into theaters, and then arenas, and then
private planes and Schureford cars, and sometimes I'd be in
a city for less than twenty four hours and then
onto the next city. So here I was, again not
taking into account the optics, or for that matter, the
(08:23):
reality of my own entitlement. I had become exactly what
I always wanted to be, an elitist. I did live
in a bubble inside a bigger bubble, which was inside
an even bigger bubble. That's three bubbles, two assistants to
cleaning ladies who are basically more like my nanny's a driver,
(08:46):
a pool guy, a landscape or a florists because I
need flowers all the time. A houseman. What's a houseman,
you asked, Someone who walks the dog and polishes the
outdoor furniture, And oh, who somebody who cleans up the
dog ship because he can't do that even basically he's
an outdoor butler. When was the last time I cleaned
up dogship? Probably the last time I flew coach. I
(09:11):
hated having these thoughts. I hated it because in the
process something clicked for me, and I realized that I
had made a career of overhydrating people with honesty, yet
I was being dishonest with myself. And now that I
was aware of this situation, I would have to do
something about it, because I couldn't just carry on the
way I'd been carrying on, just coasting and cashing checks
(09:33):
for essentially being a loudmouth. So I took another hit
of my vape. What I really wanted to do is
watch the news. Even though the news was giving me diarrhea.
The whole administration was giving me diarrhea. I'm probably hurtpies too,
For all I know, my outrage was high. I had
(09:54):
spent the year after the election being sucked into the
vortex of news cycles that accompanied Donald Trump's sent seeing
my subsequent mental hernia. The news was like a high
speed merry go round that never slowed down long enough
to figure out when it was safe to hop on
or off. So, like everything else in my life thus far,
I hopped on and I stayed on. I had spent
the better part of my day in a wormhole googling
(10:15):
pictures of young Robert Mueller because I was developing strong
sexual feelings toward him, as well as his investigation. In
an interesting plot twist, it turns out Bob Muller is
even hotter in his early seventies than he was when
(10:37):
he was in the Marines. I was more attracted to
present day Bob Muller than I would have had I
been alive during nam The guy fucking kills me. I mean,
who is hotter than Bob Mueller? Daniel day lewis playing
Bob Mueller? Maybe, I mean potentially, but he's gonna have
to stop with his shoe cobbling to fill him. Another
(10:59):
movie Daniel day Lewis and his shoe cobbling. It's like,
no one's talking about your shoes, buddy, Okay, just sucking act.
But Mueller was the only hope I had that Donald Trump,
in that terrible vampire family he spawned, would end up
in prison. The investigation into Donald Trump and he's conspiring
(11:26):
with Russia and all the other crimes. I'm sure he'll
be indicted for It made me realize what real men
look like. They look like Bob Mueller, a seventy four
year old with a six pack, possibly an eight pack
underneath his shirt. When he walks, you can see it.
He's ripped. Keeping your ship together is what that's called.
(11:48):
Everybody a prosecutor, a marine, and the director of the FBI.
How on earth is any woman worth her salt meant
to control herself around him and not sit directly on
his face. Very few seven year old men have a
head of hair like that. And if anyone knows their
(12:08):
way around seven year old men, it's me. They're my
core demographic, the thickness, the salt and pepper. It's one
thing after another with that Patriot. My best friend Mary
and I have spent many a night deliberating about what
(12:29):
he drinks when he gets home after a long day.
Was it a Scotch on the rocks or a Scotch
neat one ice cube? Mary would say it would be
a McCallen. People who use one ice cube usually annoy me,
but this was different. I knew that Bob Muller knew
better than I did, and if he wanted to use
one ice cube, then he was trying to accomplish something
(12:52):
different with his libation. I'd be willing to switch over
to scotch or whiskey, or even use one ice cube
for the rest of my life if the reward meant
seeing Donald Trump dragged out of the White House topless, handcuffed,
while his hairpiece detached from the tape on his head,
(13:15):
and and then flew around like a cyclone landing in
the rose garden. I'm not embarrassed by my feelings about
Robert Mueller or for Robert Mueller. I'm surprised, maybe, but
I'm not embarrassed. I am legitimately attracted to him and
everything he stands for. I respect the ship out of him,
and I suspect there will be a lot of people
(13:35):
naming their baby boys Bob after this whole ship show
is over. Who would have thought Bob would finally take off?
Imagining Bob Bobby sitting in his boxers and a little
boy's Hayning undershirt with short sleeves while drinking a McCallan
on the rock, probably in a leather club chair, maybe
(14:01):
me feel like Bob Muller and I had a lot
more in common than anyone who would have guessed, even me.
I imagine us playing Clue together deep in the Catskills,
learning entirely new strategies to a game I thought I
had already intellectually mastered. I understand Bob Muller is married
and unavailable, so I would like to go on the
record and say I respect that, while also remaining deeply
(14:24):
attracted to him. It wouldn't matter if he was interested
in me or not. I don't need people to like
me in order for me to like them. That's a
new thing I'm toying with, and I like it. It's fun.
Through the months of thick fog and despair after the election,
he was the one bright spot. He also represented a
seminal moment for me personally. I had finally found the
(14:45):
first Republican. I could see myself being penetrated by back
to my midlife crisis. There's a line I'd written down
from Victor Frankel's memoir Surviving the High. It's about surviving
the Holocaust. It's called man search for Meeting. It was
a line that stopped me cold when I read it.
It said, it did not really matter what we expected
(15:08):
from life, but rather what life expected from us. I
had never thought about what life expected from me. I
had only thought about what I expected from life. That
was a book put her down her It was a
look up at the sky and wonder, where the funk
have I been all my life? Moment? How lost was
I if that question had never occurred to me? And
(15:28):
it hadn't ever occurred to me. I had to read
it to think it. What a fucking dummy I was
rewarding myself over and over again with homes and cars
and vacations and gross extravagance. I justified all of it
because I worked for everything I had. I came from nothing.
I told myself for years that was my story. Work hard,
fight hard, don't give up. You can do anything you deserve.
(15:48):
This the idea that I came from nothing is a joke.
My parents were disappointing, like with their personalities, but I
always felt loved by lots of people. I never went hungry,
I never struggled. I was white, pretty Jewish, and had
(16:09):
a ton of misplaced self confidence. So life got easier
the more focused I became. I got to Hollywood, and
I was rewarded for all of that behavior. My life
was a bubble, that's exactly what it had become, a big,
vapid bubble. And what were my ties to being famous?
What were my ties to being a celebrity? Wealth and
fame existed as a couple in my mind they went together.
(16:31):
Did that mean I could still have one without the other?
And if so, which one would I choose? And is
this my whole identity? Is this my whole life? It
can't be. Do I get to fall in love again
with a man? No, a man can't help you with this.
You got yourself here, So the question is what are
you gonna do with yourself now? What is my enough?
(16:52):
I never had to care about the state of the
world before the world was a vague thought and a
whimsical fancy that was for the adults. I thought that
by traveling to so many different countries these I was
doing my due diligence. That by edifying myself with other
cultures and sharing my experiences on camera on my show,
I was somehow making a worthy contribution to society. America
(17:12):
wasn't a problem. There was no problem. We had elected
a black president and we were about to elect a woman.
Racism and feminism were fights again. It didn't happen, sweeties,
who maybe we're not talking about the same thing. Racism
and feminism were fights we had already won. America was
(17:35):
being handled by people smarter and more skilled in politics,
and they took care of this stuff so that people
like me could live the American dream and remained blissfully
ill informed. I had spent my adulthood on a cigarette
boat going a hundred miles per hour, and now I
felt like I had somehow become a ruined on one
of those terrible all inclusive carnival cruise ships. Time speeds
(17:57):
up as it goes by. Someone explained to me that
there is a mathematical reason for this. As you age,
each year becomes a smaller percentage of the life you
have already lived. I'm forty two, as I write this.
So one year now represents a small percentage of my
forty two years, about two point three eight. But when
I was eight, one year was a really long time.
(18:18):
It was an eighth of my life. And that is
why summer lasted for about four years when you were
a kid. And this may be why I now feel
an urgency to know more, to do more, and to
be more. Don't get me wrong, I don't believe life
is too short. I believe life is too long. It's exhausting.
(18:39):
I don't fear dying. I want people to know that
if I die early, it's not some tragedy. If I
die to night, it's not I'd be relieved. I'm wiped
out and I've had a great adventure. I have two
hundred and fifty thousand dollars set aside for my funeral
because I want everyone to have one big fucking party
in my honor. I want to have a great funeral,
(19:02):
filled with dancing and little people and mushrooms and then
little people on mushrooms. I wanted to be a celebration
for all the people who love me and for all
the people who are happy to see me go. But
in the meantime between now and then. This is my
attempt at taking stock of how I got here, where
(19:22):
I've been, and where exactly it is that I'm going.
What exactly is it that I might bring to the
table to answer the question that Victor Frankel forced me
to ask myself. Do I have the conviction to examine
myself unflinchingly, to reveal the good, the bad, the ugly,
the beautiful the answers. Yes, I have a lot to
be embarrassed about, and I intend to advertise it. I'm
(19:46):
sick of my voice, of my ambition, of my entitlement.
I'm sick of not knowing more, and I'm embarrassed it
took me this along to figure it out. Life has
been too easy. I've gotten almost everything I've ever wanted,
and I'm forty two. Something smells fishy. M After all
is said and done, I'd like to be cremated and
have my ashes scattered over Bob Muller's grave or inside it,
(20:19):
or his inside mine, or inside of me, or in
one of Daniel dy Lewis's clogs. Thank you, Thanks guys. Okay,
we're gonna take a quick break and we'll be right back.
(20:43):
I'm gonna bring out somebody that you're all gonna love
very much. And she's a very good friend of mine,
and she was nice enough to fly out here to
interview me for uh for tonight, and uh you might
know her. Please welcome Connie Britton. Wait where do you want? Okay? Hi,
(21:23):
Hi Dallas? Yeah, good good. Let's tell everybody how we met? Okay?
Was it on my TV show? Um? We we met? Uh? No,
you thought we met on your TV show. We did
not meet on your TV show. We met in an airport.
You accosted me. You were dating Ted Harbor, remember Ted
(21:44):
Harbor from previous books. That was one of my first
older boyfriends. That was the twenty when twenty years between
my age and their age was acceptable. When when I
was in my twenties and thirties, I date fifty year old.
Now that I'm forty four, I'm not dating a fucking
sixty four year old, do you know what I mean?
So the margin has to like shrink, So I mean
(22:06):
I'm open minded. Then that's why I'm single. So yes,
I'm it's working. It's working out great for you think
working wonderfully. No, but you were a fan of Friday
Night Lights. I know I'm so happy to be back
in Texas. I love y'all. And you accostomed me in
(22:27):
the airport and and somehow we ended up with each
other's numbers. And I don't know if you remember this,
And I wanted to start by saying, I'm so fucking
proud of you. This book is number one. I'm like
two different New York Times bestseller lists. I'm so proud
(22:50):
of you because this book is like nothing else you've
ever done, It's nothing else you've ever written, and it
is a reflection of who you've become. And I say
that as we're talking about when we met, because when
we met, this is Chelsea's like, bless your heart. I
was out of control and then we we like texted
each other, and then you invited me to some birthday
party that you had on you were having on some
(23:12):
island in like in like a club where it's like
going to be a club like twenty four hours a day.
And I was in the middle of working on something
I don't know what, and I couldn't go, and you
were so mad at me, so I tossed. She was
so pissed. She was seven anger, anger, like just sucking
agitation but also also like somehow that I couldn't go.
(23:34):
It was like I was abandoning her. You don't do
that anymore. No, No, now you're so healthy. I'm a
lot healthier than I was. Yeah, but you don't realize
when you're in those states, when you're just kind of
going and you're just like, you know, my my career
when it started in in this town, you just go
a million miers per hour. You know, you never can
take a break either, and it becomes an addiction, and
(23:55):
then all of a sudden, you're just out. You're not
even paying attention to what's happening, and your life just
kind of passes you by. So it was good to
have a wake up call because when I hear stories
like this, I cringe. I'm like, oh god, I was
so fucking annoying. No, but you weren't. You were still
you always have had this heart. But now you're letting
us really see it, and you're letting yourself really see it.
And I'm really proud of you, and I um, i'd
(24:17):
like to thank Dan for that. Dan's my psychiatrist. I
I have, I have uh, really irrational feelings for Dan.
I really want Dan badly. Like you want Robert Mueller,
I want Dan. Yeah, I get it, I get it.
(24:38):
Dan was the first psychiatrist that I ever went to
that I wasn't attracted to. And that's why I stuck
with it, because I knew that if it wasn't if
it's a sexual thing, you're with girls were so screwed up,
you know, you A dentist can be borderline good looking,
and all of a sudden, you're like, you know, just
because he has some control over you. If you ever,
(24:59):
like anybody, anytime I've been put under by an anesthesiologist,
you're just like, oh my god, Like you're immediately attracted
to them, just because they're like, they have your life
in your hands, you know, in their hands. I know
that's so. Yeah. I love I love being drugged. What
what are wead? What's happening? Um? Connie doesn't like drugs.
(25:22):
Just so you know, I gave her a hit of weed.
I'm into cannabis now. Yeah, she's into cannabis. Now is it?
It's not legal here right? Okay? And it will be,
it will be at some point. It's gonna be legal everywhere.
But um, I'm coming out with my own cannabis line.
At the end of the summer, and because it's helped me,
(25:45):
It's helped me so much, especially with like you know,
just relaxing, calming, slimming down. Cannabis was my gateway drug
to like meditation and all that ship. But because that's
how that goes, you always start with drugs before you
met it tate healthy first. I have to calm down
for long enough to metadate. So yeah, I need some weed. Um.
(26:06):
We went over. We were over at our friend Charlie's
Theron's house one night, and so we're there and I
had my weed pen, a sample of my weed pen.
I said, Connie, here, try it, and She's like, I
never really smoke. I was like, then don't. I don't
want the drama, you know what I mean, if you're
gonna like I was like that place. Wait. Also, it
(26:28):
was a dinner party where all these people were supposed
to show up and and like we were the only
two people who came. So it ended up being and
it was like this beautiful dinner party for like three
or three women, three of us, two of him were
real stoned. I was stoned, but I'm always a little
bit stoned. So you were stoned and then we moved
(26:49):
to the living room and some other people came over,
so it was Rita Aura, the musician, and carl tell
Avine came over. So She's on the couch lying behind me,
and I'm talking chit chatting, and I don't even notice,
and I just went to go sit back. I'm like,
who's that. They're like, Connie, She's been sleeping for like
two hours. And then and then three weeks later, I
(27:11):
get it in text from car tel Avine saying, Hey,
I'm having a party at my house, a housewarming or whatever.
It is her birthday. I thought it was too I
got there, it was a housewarm inte. I'm like, why
the fund did I go to this? I was like,
I thought this is an important night. I mean, so
she said, hey, I have I'm having a housewarming party.
Will you invite Connie and Charlie's And I was like, yeah, yeah,
(27:34):
I will. And then I invited you and You're like, oh,
that's so sweet. I don't even know cards all Avine,
and I was like, well, she met you the other
night while you were asleep on the couch, and I
must have made a great impression because she invited me
to her not birthday party. So whatever, I'm a great sleeper.
(27:56):
If you could make a good impression while you're sleeping,
I think that's solid. Feel pretty good about it. You
used to You used to be more of a sleeper too.
That was another thing. Two years ago at your birthday party,
you basically announced everybody who was still at your birthday party, Okay, guys,
I'm going to bed. You know it was. It was
as awkward as that sounds like. It was not any
(28:19):
less awkward than that. It was literally like I looked
at Brandon, I'm like, Okay, should we go. We're gonna go.
I'm gonna go. Yeah, that's that's yeah. I'd like to
do a French exit. But it's hard to do that
at your own house. Yeah, you know what I mean.
It's hard to just like yeah, anyway anyway. So but
(28:39):
now here you are, you're in Texas. I'm in Texas.
Which the other thing. The other thing about Chelsea is
she's had a crush on well, you've had a crush
on a couple of my teeth. The thing, the reason
I'm friends with Connie is because she works with men
that I would like to get penetrated by. Kyle Chandler.
Obviously it's ridiculous, and obviously had a huge crush on him,
(29:03):
and then he did the other show after you, and
then I was like, oh my god, like I have
a real obsession with him. So I had to stop
watching him because it was unhealthy because he's married and
doesn't want anything to do with me. I tried to
get him on my show to interview me. I mean
to interview him on my old show, and Connie would
try and be at our liaison, but then you know,
he's like, I'm not gonna do it. He's like, tell
(29:26):
that that's real sweet. She could come out what you
offered to, like go meet him, like in a tepee
or something, which he said, did she come down and
do the the interview? And where does he live in Austin?
In Austin And I was like, yeah, I'll go to Austin.
We could do it in the woods. Yeah, And he's like,
tell that crazy bitch. I don't want her to interview me.
(29:49):
And then she worked with Eric Banna because and that's
another one of mine. Although did you guys all see
Dirty John and how many people? Although in Dirty John,
I wasn't as in to him as I've been time. Yeah,
well it's hard to get into a sociopath. Yeah, well
you did a good job. I'm an actress. It's gone acting. Yes, yes, Okay,
(30:12):
well this sounds like a good time to take a break.
Tell the story about Chunk on the plane. Oh well, Chunk.
Chunk was my old dog. Yeah, Chunk was. He was
such a stud I'm gonna cry in the book too,
by the way, just saying, um, he Chunk was great. Chunk.
(30:32):
It was like my family dog. He was my first dog.
He made me a mother, and I wasn't a great mother, um,
which is why I'm glad I didn't ever have children,
because you know, that would be a disaster. And so
I think I also am like people should thank me
for that too, Like I don't get enough recognition. I
feel like, you know, not contributing to like putting out
another one of me. I think it's a responsible decision making. Um,
(30:56):
but Chunk and I I was a really good mom
until I took Chunk, you my ORCA. I brought him
to Spain because I thought he would deserve to trip overseas.
And and when I before, I had never taken on
an international flight, so it was like twelve or fourteen
hours totally with a layover in Germany, and we were
going to see my family and my family and I
we all get along, but we're a little bit like
(31:17):
my brother is married to this Russian and she's kind
of a buzz kill, and um, she's very Russian, you know,
like she's very overprotective. She doesn't she's superstitious. It's all
like she thinks everyone who's gay is has been molested.
It's like it's hard to deal with her, you know.
She's always like Chelsea when you get the boyfriends and
I'm like, what are you have you been listening to
anything I've ever said that is not going to complete me?
(31:42):
And so she has three boys with my brother and
they're all horrified by her as well, because she's she's
one of those women who's like a mosquito, you know,
like did you like Like they get out of the
pool and then she makes them put on dry pool
clothes and then when they get back in the pool,
they have to put the wet ones back on. I'm like,
just skip the pool. Skip it. It's a nightmare for
(32:03):
all of us to watch this. I mean, she and
she's so materialistic, Like she's always about my money and
the things and where my old This is a nice
house you rented, you thinking about buying and it's like no,
no one's talking about that. And and you know, she
thinks the only key to happiness is to be married
(32:24):
to have children. She still thinks there's a chance I'm
gonna have a child, Like I'm forty four. It's a wrap.
She tells you are very fertile. I can tell. I'm like.
But so I was going on vacation with them, and
on the on the flight out, Chunk and Eye flew
Iberian Air or something, and I got sleeping pills for
(32:44):
him because I had never taken him on a flight
and I wanted to make sure he didn't pee or anything.
So I was like, okay, I'll probably knock him out.
And then it's some like twist of fate. I just said, no,
I'm not going to do that. I don't want to
give him a sleeping bill. He's never taken one. It
was the most responsible parenting i'd ever very impressed for
me to take it over. Thank you welcome for me
to take an overnight flight without taking a sleeping pill.
(33:06):
That's saying I love you, you know what I mean,
Like I had never done that. I had never taken
a flight without taking a sleeping pill that was that long.
But I stayed up with him and whatever. So I
got there and I was like, you guys, I did it.
I nailed it, like I'm a number one parent. And
then halfway through the trip, my brothers and sisters are
all there. I was really annoyed with my Russian sister
in law and we were on a sailboat and I
was taking the boys into these coves to swim in
(33:27):
these caves that were underwater, and they were and she
was just like, you can't go with Chelsea's it's not safe.
And finally I just swam home like Julia Roberts and
sleeping with the enemy. I was like, literally, we're on
about sailing. I'm beautiful, my and I was like, I'm
just gonna swim back to the house. She is so
fucking annoying. And you know what's so funny about her,
(33:50):
She's so annoying, but she doesn't even if you tell
her she's annoying. She's like like she doesn't hold she
doesn't hold a grudge about it. She'll just pick up
the converse where she goes, yes, anyway, Chelsea, that's not nice.
What were you saying? And I'm like, huh, So I swam.
I swam to shore on my aunt, who's awesome. She's
a real bitch, so like we have a good rapport
(34:12):
and she doesn't say much. I walked in. I was like,
can you believe them? Like they put so much sunblock
on their sons, like it was you couldn't even see them,
you know. And I walked in, I go, can you
believe fucking Olga? And then and my brother Glenn, they
bicker about everything, you know, like she could see a
can open and it's a thing. You're like, oh my god,
everything's a safety hazard. So I said, I go, can
(34:34):
you believe how they act? I mean, what's up with
that sun block on my aunt's Like I can't believe
she doesn't even put it in their mouths? I mean.
And I looked at Chunk's meds and what I discovered
was that they were dogg easan X basically the equivalent
to a humans annex. And I was like, uh, game changer.
And I popped one flitted in a half because it
(34:56):
hits you faster, and I was like, listen, I'm gonna
go knock myself the funk out. Because it was a Thursday.
We had until Saturday, and I was like, I was
at the end of my rope. And so I basically
slept for the next two days and I just wake
up in the morning, go downstairs, take a half of
zana X popping, and go back upstairs. My I'm like,
I can't deal with any more Russian accents anytime they
(35:17):
asked me, I'm like, I just can't. So we get
on the plane on the way back from my Orca
and I popped the last X. Chunk had five and
I was on my fifth one. I popped it and
realized I didn't have any for chunk and I was like,
oh funk, I can't throw up a zan X on
a plane. And I'm like, oh dad, that was so
I was like, what do I do? I mean, what
(35:40):
do you do if you take something you're not supposed to?
Of course that's the first thought, and I go for
me anyway, and so it isn't So I pass out
and I wrapped chinks leash around my waist and I'm
just hoping he's going to pass out too. And then
(36:01):
I was falling asleep, and I was like, I had
one of these baby sleeping pills that I brought but
never used because I had, you know, pilferred my own sons,
and so I gave him a Sonata, which is like
a light four hours sleeping pill, and we both fall asleep.
We wake up four hours later. The woman is like
pulling me by my hair. The flight attendant, she's like,
(36:21):
your dog is running around the first class cabin and
foaming at the math and I am literally like you
should have I mean, there's dog hair everywhere. And I
had a leash around my belly and I was so
out of it, you know, I was trying. I'm like, oh, chuck,
(36:41):
I'm like chunk, and I could hear it. Me sounded
like a wearabolf, he was like. And I was like,
oh glad, this is gonna be a nightmare. Oh my god,
Oh my god. And so I'm running and I get
up to go just jump for him to like lurch
and the rope burn around my waist from the leash.
I was like ah, and then I please miss help
(37:02):
and the woman's like in her seat, She's like, I'm
not a flight attendant. I'm not helping you. I don't
work here. I was like, please go get me, and
she's like, I'm not and I was like, oh shut
I'm on my own on this flight. So I get
him and he is just and my chunk was cool,
like he would never be uncool. He did never even
would let himself get an erection in front of me
or go to the bathroom. He was just a gentleman.
(37:23):
He would turn around if I saw him go to
the bathroom, he would turn around and run away. I
was like, that's what I like. I like that, you know, respect,
And so it was hard to see him in that condition,
especially knowing that I had done that to him. And
and then finally then the flight attendants where you know,
they were like you're a nightmare, and I was like, listen,
(37:43):
can we get us? I'm like, can we get some food?
I was like, fucking, I just gotta give him water.
He was so thirsty. You know, the vets said before,
you know, if you take your dog on a plane,
just remember the pill makes them very thirsty. And I
got yeah, but you just told me I can't give
him water for fourteen hours, so then he's gonna be
thirsty and dying. For water, and she's like, you have
to choose. Fucking vets. They never give you any real information.
(38:09):
Every VET I've ever gone to, they're like, oh, you
could you rescue a dog? And they're like, oh, it
could be four, could be twelve. I'm like, that's a
pretty big margin of error. Eight years. So the vet.
You know, So he did get thirsty. So I finally
just gave him water. I even tried to give him
orange juice, anything, and I ordered a mistake. The flight
(38:30):
attendant came over and was like, would you like anything
for your traveling companion? The steak was for him, um,
And then he finally calmed down. And I was just
so scared that I was gonna get off the plane
and it was gonna be fucking arrested. You know, by
the by the I don't know some from by Peter,
you know, news would have spread. I'm like, that's the
(38:53):
that's the ship I need to deal with. Chelsea Handler
kills her dog on plane from my Orca. Well, your
your book is so much about death that and I
read it. I'm like, she I don't remember this story.
She killed chunk on a plane, Like I was sure
that that's how it was gonna end. I was so
relieved that he survived it. He did survive. He he
wasn't really ever the same after that trip. But I mean,
(39:15):
I do feel badly that I did something to him.
It would just really knocked him out. And I won't
take any more dogs to my WORKA That is not
a smart move, you know what I mean. They can't handle.
It's too long and it's not fair. But I don't
really know what the point of that story. I really like.
I like your drag story. You know. Your drug stories
are always funny to me, Like I like the one
(39:36):
where you um right, They're so funny, Like I like
the one where you um, didn't you take a like
a yeast infection like suppository orally? Yes, that happened right, Yes,
I was in Whistler. I was in Whistler, Canada, and
I thought I had a situation. Yeah, And I called
my doctor and they sent me a pill and I
(39:57):
took it orally, and then like like a day later,
I was like, I wonder if that was supposed to
go in my Pikachu. Yeah, And then I called my doctor.
I was like, hey, quick, quick question. I was like
(40:20):
that pill that diff lucan or what you know, and
he goes, yeah, and I'm like, that goes and he's
like nothing. I'm like, where does that go? It's like
I'm sorry, I'm like, where does that pill go? He's
like I don't I don't understand the question. I'm like, yeah,
(40:41):
you do anyway, So wait, patients, and then I want
to talk about politics, because that's another change that right now. Okay,
but let's talk about k Yeah. Yeah, I mean Bett,
oh right, you're in that. You're in the seat of
(41:02):
it right here, like this isn't it. That's how actually,
that's how we became kind of we we yeah, because
we met a while ago, like in the airport in
Friday lights. But this was like in your old days.
And then I remember I didn't go to a birthday
party you invited me to, which was on some island
(41:23):
and where it was like in like a club like club.
You were going to be in a club like twenty
four hours a day every day for your birthday. And
I was like, I'm working, I can't go, and you
almost didn't forgive me. Yeah, I wouldn't get mad at people.
She would get really pissed, like if you didn't show up.
She was like, you're done. I'm done with you. So
but thankfully we you know, time passed and you had
(41:45):
your down But yeah, but politics kind of brought us
back together again. Yeah, it was nice because after that election,
you became friends with people, not this is an example
of us, but you actually became friends with people that
normally you wouldn't talk to. You're like, oh, yeah, we're
on the same team here, let's try figure this out.
And I know that you and I both were like
scrambling about what to do and hysterical, and I didn't realize,
(42:06):
you know, I learned about Like for me, it was
like I threw myself in, which I know you did too.
You just so like, oh my god, what are we
gonna do. We gotta get the mid terms going, like
you're we're going to go in and fix everything. But
luckily it was a collective of so many people that
went in And actually, so I think you realize who.
I think the way the way we're dealing now with
the way the country is, I think it is very
representative of who we are as individuals. Because in order
(42:29):
to change the country, you have to invest yourself. You
have to invest yourself financially. You have to invest yourself
with your time, You have to invest yourself with your passion.
You have to invest yourself with the way you talk
to people around you, with your community, with your family.
And there are some people who are capable and willing
to do that, and there's some people who aren't. And
that's an indication of character. So I think that that's
you know that we're seeing that a lot amongst ourselves
(42:51):
right now too, you know, and that's how we come well.
You actually Kiani was roommates with Kirston Gila Brand. Yes,
Kirston Jilli Brand. See you're not. It's like, I'm smattering,
smattering of applause. It's amazing. We are. They are very
lucky because we have many truly incredible candidates right now
and possible possible presidential nominee. I like, amazing. There are
(43:15):
a lot of good candidates. And it's I mean, I like,
I mean, like you. I got so burnt out with
the mid terms that I was like, oh my god,
I don't ever want to deal with politics again. I
can't stand this ship. But it's necessary. You can't just
dip in and out. You have to kind of harness
your outrage and make it something positive and go and
do something good. So I'm trying to pace myself and
not burn out or burn the candle at both ends
(43:36):
with this and be active and be aware of everything
that's going on politically. So it's, um, it's like a
fun I'm right here, sweetie. You can see me open
your Oh sweet what drugs is she taking? Who knows?
People get ship faced when they come see me? Right?
(43:59):
We want to to show Like ten years ago, we
did a show. We were in Long Island and it
was a theater that was in the round, and which
means like you're in the center of a crowd, so
like your ass is facing half the people. It's it's
not a great setup, but it's old school and we're
in this theater in Long Island and after we're done,
the security guard like watching me off the stage because
you're surrounded by people, and he was being very protective
and he's like, sorry, there's vomit everywhere, like every girl
(44:23):
there had thrown up. He's like, wow, you really attract
quite a crowd. He's like, last time I saw this
was zz top. I'm like, yeah, I'm sure this theater
has seen its share of vomit. Yes, I'm sure it has.
But anyway, I'm optimistic about the future because I think
we have to be and we have to live in
a state of hopefulness. And I really wanted to get
(44:45):
my head on straight. And the thing that I learned
the most is like, in order to be of use
to anyone really in this world, you have to get
your ship together, and you have to clean out your
own injuries. And now amen, sister, and sister Amen speak
it so also, you're living an honest life, living an
(45:07):
honest and true life. You are even sober, and I'm
living living an honest life. Cheers, cheers. I didn't say
you were living a sober life. But I want to
read this last part of the book for you guys
before you get get going, because wow, we have these
I Decide bracelets and these necklaces and t shirts that
(45:29):
say I decide because of something I wrote in the book.
Hold on, let me get rid of my camel toe.
And second, don't see, don't let other people decide what
kind of mood you're going to be in. Don't let
anyone change your life in one day. Don't let death
(45:52):
take you down and keep you down. You go down,
but get back up. If we don't give into our
despair and instead lock it away, we failed to properly
more in the people we love. How on earth are
we honoring the very people we are grieving if we
failed to more in them fully, we should be celebrating
the people we've lost. I missed thirty years of celebrating
my brother. I decide to grow up. I decided to
(46:14):
be better. I decided to take my life back. All
the proceeds for the T shirts and the bracelet's go
to UM True Colors United, which is an organization for
l g B t q I a youth through a
homeless Thank you so much for the support and I
totally appreciate it. And thank you to Pottie Brittain, my
very good friend, for being here tonight. Thank you guys.
(46:40):
Um Okay, Brandon, Well, that was a live show, so
you now, I just want to make an announcement to
everybody that I've had twenty one shows and you haven't
been to one, and l A is the city you've
dwell in and you didn't even come to that show.
Brandon had plans in the night of my show. You're
in LA, Yes, but my new plan is to come
to one of your other shows, like I really like
to go to New Orleans or St. Louis. Maybe naturally, well,
we need to add first left, you're not coming to
(47:01):
any those shows. I added new dates where I'm gonna
be doing stand up. So though that's Westbury, Long Island,
I'm coming to Atlanta. I'm coming home to Mountclair, New Jersey, St. Louis, Minneapolis,
New Orleans, and Nashville. So go to live nation dot
com for tickets to a live show where I will
be doing stand up and Brandon will not be. We'll
be back next week with my psychiatrist who's going to
break down the angiogram for everybody who's been asking questions
(47:23):
about that. Life will be the Death of Me as
a production of I Heeart Radio. For more podcasts from
my Heart Radio, visit the i Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts,
or wherever you listen to your favorite shows. Oh
Hi, I'm Chelsea Handler. Welcome to Life Will Be the
Death of Me, a production of I Heart Radio. Thank You, Dallas.
That's a very very warm welcome. I know it's gonna
be one of those nights because it always is in Dallas.
(00:22):
It's always one of those nights. And that's why I
always come back here when I go on tour. I Um,
I haven't been on tour in a really long time,
and I didn't feel like standing up while I was
doing it, so and I didn't want to go on
tour until I had something to say. And so this
(00:46):
is me with something to say. I wrote a new book.
It's called Life Will Be the Death of Me, and um,
I'm gonna read the first chapter of the book to
set the tone for everybody about where I was in
my life when I wrote this. The book is dedicated
to my future husband, whoever he is. If you're here,
(01:11):
if you're a straight man here tonight by yourself. There
are no straight men here by themselves, no fucking way,
And if they are, they're seventy. The chapter is called
(01:31):
where have I Been All my life? I don't remember
the actor and I don't remember the movie, but I
remember it was five o'clock in the afternoon, and I
had just taken a couple of hits off of my
vape pen. I needed to load my picks account, which
held pre released movies that I was expected to screen
before a star of one of the movies was a
guest on my Netflix talk show. I was sitting on
(01:52):
one of my overpriced Shaise lounges, the kind that celebrities
and Russians purchased for their bedrooms, when I found myself
once again unable to convert the TV that descends from
the ceiling from Apple TV two picks rich people have
descending to smart television's. The idea is that they descend
silently and gracefully from the ceiling, But because I am
(02:16):
nouveau che rich, mine sounds more like a helicopter is
fucking landing. I'd like to blame my inability to change
the mode of my television picks on the fact that
I was stoned, but that would be a lie. I'd
be even less capable if I were sober. I called
my assistant Brandon at his house to tell him to
(02:37):
tell my other assistant, Tanner, who was downstairs in my house,
to come upstairs and help me with the television. I
hung up the phone. I looked down at the table
and saw the vait pen. How many more hits of
marijuana am I gonna need to take to get through
this movie? I knew things that hit a new low
(03:00):
or high, depending on how you looked at the situation.
I picked up the iPad that controls the TV along
with everything else in my house, from the window shades
to the exterior lights in my backyard to my pulse
probably and tried to pretend that I was troubleshooting so
that Tanner would think I had at least tried to
figure it out on my own, as if that had
(03:20):
ever happened before. How did I become so useless? And
how many assistants did I actually have? The answer is
to Brandon and Tanner. Brandon is gay and has an
incredible attention to detail. Tanner is straight, and before he
met me, he thought the Four Seasons was a weather pattern.
(03:42):
Before I met Tanner, I thought Venma was an online
liquor store. I didn't want to watch another stupid movie
that I didn't care about, and I really didn't want
to interview another action star blow viating about his motivation
for playing a half man, half mur made. I didn't care,
and I wasn't doing anyone any favors by pretending that
(04:05):
I did. Did I ever care? The answer is yes.
There was a time when all of this mattered to me.
There was a time when being famous and having this
kind of success and money and having a TV show
was what drove me to want more and more and more.
And now I found myself exhausted and ashamed by the
meaninglessness of it all. I remember coming home a couple
(04:26):
of weeks before the two thousand and sixteen election on
a windy fall night, which for Los Angeles is rare.
Anytime there's weather in Los Angeles, even rain, it's exciting.
The constant sunshine can start to grade on your nerves.
I went up to my bedroom, I opened up my
sliding glass doors, I grabbed my vapen, and I turned
on some Neil Young and I lay on my bed
(04:48):
in the dark, watching the wind blow my bedroom drapes around,
hearing the ruffling of the leaves, and watching that lanterns
that hang from my backyard trees swinging into each other,
thinking if there's an electrical fire, I hope the dogs
will at least bark to wake me up. But overall,
my thought was, this is fucking awesome. This is exactly
(05:09):
what I hoped adulthood would be like. No kids, no husband,
no responsibilities, just a TV show on Netflix and whatever
else I felt like doing whenever I felt like doing it.
Not trapped, not stock, not dependent on a single person,
(05:29):
but myself, free to be you and me. I couldn't
believe how lucky my life had turned out, how many
of my dreams had come true, and also my good
fortune in being alive during this time in history, the
year we were going to elect our first female president
that didn't happen. I suppose I could blame my state
(05:52):
of mind on the election of Donald Trump, so I
will I have the Trump family and their horrifying personalities
and was disgusting veneers to thank for my midlife crisis,
along with more than half the population of the world.
I couldn't grasp how in this day and age we
(06:13):
elected a man who insulted everybody he's insulted and done
everything he's done since. The contrast in decency between Barack
Obama and Donald Trump was too much for me to bear.
It was like electing snooky to the Senate. Now people
were seriously talking about Dwayne the Rock Johnson for president.
(06:36):
How on earth did we get there? Although, if I'm
being honest, at that point, I would have taken an
actual rock. I kept hearing the word elitists, you know,
like that everyone in California, New York lives in a bubble,
that the election of this lunatic was a result of
all of us not knowing anything about the rest of
the country. And that didn't bring true for me because
(06:58):
I had traveled all over the country doing stand up
for so many years. I've been to every major city
in some minor cities multiple times. I wasn't an elitist.
My father was a used car dealer. I didn't have
a trust fund or wealthy parents. We weren't even allowed
to answer the phone growing up, because more often than
not it would be a bill collector. Had four hundred
dollars when I drove across the country alone to move
(07:20):
to Los Angeles and then was broke for seven years,
living paycheck to paycheck while simultaneously getting fired from every
waitressing job I ever had. I worked for everything I
ever have and never even went to college. How could
I be an elitist without ever going to college. And then, oh,
wait a minute, I remember. I grew up wanting to
(07:41):
get as far away from my life and my parents
as possible. I had created a life in which there
was a zero tolerance policy for any discomfort. I could
handle physical discomfort, like dental work or elective surgery to
make my thigh smaller, but not any discomfort related to
not having money. Sure, I was just graping by on
those cross country trips in the beginning of my stand
(08:03):
up career, barely making enough money from small comedy clubs
to cover my hotel room for the week. But after
a few years I was making more money. And then
the clubs turned into theaters, and then arenas, and then
private planes and Schureford cars, and sometimes I'd be in
a city for less than twenty four hours and then
onto the next city. So here I was, again not
taking into account the optics, or for that matter, the
(08:23):
reality of my own entitlement. I had become exactly what
I always wanted to be, an elitist. I did live
in a bubble inside a bigger bubble, which was inside
an even bigger bubble. That's three bubbles, two assistants to
cleaning ladies who are basically more like my nanny's a driver,
(08:46):
a pool guy, a landscape or a florists because I
need flowers all the time. A houseman. What's a houseman,
you asked, Someone who walks the dog and polishes the
outdoor furniture, And oh, who somebody who cleans up the
dog ship because he can't do that even basically he's
an outdoor butler. When was the last time I cleaned
up dogship? Probably the last time I flew coach. I
(09:11):
hated having these thoughts. I hated it because in the
process something clicked for me, and I realized that I
had made a career of overhydrating people with honesty, yet
I was being dishonest with myself. And now that I
was aware of this situation, I would have to do
something about it, because I couldn't just carry on the
way I'd been carrying on, just coasting and cashing checks
(09:33):
for essentially being a loudmouth. So I took another hit
of my vape. What I really wanted to do is
watch the news. Even though the news was giving me diarrhea.
The whole administration was giving me diarrhea. I'm probably hurtpies too,
For all I know, my outrage was high. I had
(09:54):
spent the year after the election being sucked into the
vortex of news cycles that accompanied Donald Trump's sent seeing
my subsequent mental hernia. The news was like a high
speed merry go round that never slowed down long enough
to figure out when it was safe to hop on
or off. So, like everything else in my life thus far,
I hopped on and I stayed on. I had spent
the better part of my day in a wormhole googling
(10:15):
pictures of young Robert Mueller because I was developing strong
sexual feelings toward him, as well as his investigation. In
an interesting plot twist, it turns out Bob Muller is
even hotter in his early seventies than he was when
(10:37):
he was in the Marines. I was more attracted to
present day Bob Muller than I would have had I
been alive during nam The guy fucking kills me. I mean,
who is hotter than Bob Mueller? Daniel day lewis playing
Bob Mueller? Maybe, I mean potentially, but he's gonna have
to stop with his shoe cobbling to fill him. Another
(10:59):
movie Daniel day Lewis and his shoe cobbling. It's like,
no one's talking about your shoes, buddy, Okay, just sucking act.
But Mueller was the only hope I had that Donald Trump,
in that terrible vampire family he spawned, would end up
in prison. The investigation into Donald Trump and he's conspiring
(11:26):
with Russia and all the other crimes. I'm sure he'll
be indicted for It made me realize what real men
look like. They look like Bob Mueller, a seventy four
year old with a six pack, possibly an eight pack
underneath his shirt. When he walks, you can see it.
He's ripped. Keeping your ship together is what that's called.
(11:48):
Everybody a prosecutor, a marine, and the director of the FBI.
How on earth is any woman worth her salt meant
to control herself around him and not sit directly on
his face. Very few seven year old men have a
head of hair like that. And if anyone knows their
(12:08):
way around seven year old men, it's me. They're my
core demographic, the thickness, the salt and pepper. It's one
thing after another with that Patriot. My best friend Mary
and I have spent many a night deliberating about what
(12:29):
he drinks when he gets home after a long day.
Was it a Scotch on the rocks or a Scotch
neat one ice cube? Mary would say it would be
a McCallen. People who use one ice cube usually annoy me,
but this was different. I knew that Bob Muller knew
better than I did, and if he wanted to use
one ice cube, then he was trying to accomplish something
(12:52):
different with his libation. I'd be willing to switch over
to scotch or whiskey, or even use one ice cube
for the rest of my life if the reward meant
seeing Donald Trump dragged out of the White House topless, handcuffed,
while his hairpiece detached from the tape on his head,
(13:15):
and and then flew around like a cyclone landing in
the rose garden. I'm not embarrassed by my feelings about
Robert Mueller or for Robert Mueller. I'm surprised, maybe, but
I'm not embarrassed. I am legitimately attracted to him and
everything he stands for. I respect the ship out of him,
and I suspect there will be a lot of people
(13:35):
naming their baby boys Bob after this whole ship show
is over. Who would have thought Bob would finally take off?
Imagining Bob Bobby sitting in his boxers and a little
boy's Hayning undershirt with short sleeves while drinking a McCallan
on the rock, probably in a leather club chair, maybe
(14:01):
me feel like Bob Muller and I had a lot
more in common than anyone who would have guessed, even me.
I imagine us playing Clue together deep in the Catskills,
learning entirely new strategies to a game I thought I
had already intellectually mastered. I understand Bob Muller is married
and unavailable, so I would like to go on the
record and say I respect that, while also remaining deeply
(14:24):
attracted to him. It wouldn't matter if he was interested
in me or not. I don't need people to like
me in order for me to like them. That's a
new thing I'm toying with, and I like it. It's fun.
Through the months of thick fog and despair after the election,
he was the one bright spot. He also represented a
seminal moment for me personally. I had finally found the
(14:45):
first Republican. I could see myself being penetrated by back
to my midlife crisis. There's a line I'd written down
from Victor Frankel's memoir Surviving the High. It's about surviving
the Holocaust. It's called man search for Meeting. It was
a line that stopped me cold when I read it.
It said, it did not really matter what we expected
(15:08):
from life, but rather what life expected from us. I
had never thought about what life expected from me. I
had only thought about what I expected from life. That
was a book put her down her It was a
look up at the sky and wonder, where the funk
have I been all my life? Moment? How lost was
I if that question had never occurred to me? And
(15:28):
it hadn't ever occurred to me. I had to read
it to think it. What a fucking dummy I was
rewarding myself over and over again with homes and cars
and vacations and gross extravagance. I justified all of it
because I worked for everything I had. I came from nothing.
I told myself for years that was my story. Work hard,
fight hard, don't give up. You can do anything you deserve.
(15:48):
This the idea that I came from nothing is a joke.
My parents were disappointing, like with their personalities, but I
always felt loved by lots of people. I never went hungry,
I never struggled. I was white, pretty Jewish, and had
(16:09):
a ton of misplaced self confidence. So life got easier
the more focused I became. I got to Hollywood, and
I was rewarded for all of that behavior. My life
was a bubble, that's exactly what it had become, a big,
vapid bubble. And what were my ties to being famous?
What were my ties to being a celebrity? Wealth and
fame existed as a couple in my mind they went together.
(16:31):
Did that mean I could still have one without the other?
And if so, which one would I choose? And is
this my whole identity? Is this my whole life? It
can't be. Do I get to fall in love again
with a man? No, a man can't help you with this.
You got yourself here, So the question is what are
you gonna do with yourself now? What is my enough?
(16:52):
I never had to care about the state of the
world before the world was a vague thought and a
whimsical fancy that was for the adults. I thought that
by traveling to so many different countries these I was
doing my due diligence. That by edifying myself with other
cultures and sharing my experiences on camera on my show,
I was somehow making a worthy contribution to society. America
(17:12):
wasn't a problem. There was no problem. We had elected
a black president and we were about to elect a woman.
Racism and feminism were fights again. It didn't happen, sweeties,
who maybe we're not talking about the same thing. Racism
and feminism were fights we had already won. America was
(17:35):
being handled by people smarter and more skilled in politics,
and they took care of this stuff so that people
like me could live the American dream and remained blissfully
ill informed. I had spent my adulthood on a cigarette
boat going a hundred miles per hour, and now I
felt like I had somehow become a ruined on one
of those terrible all inclusive carnival cruise ships. Time speeds
(17:57):
up as it goes by. Someone explained to me that
there is a mathematical reason for this. As you age,
each year becomes a smaller percentage of the life you
have already lived. I'm forty two, as I write this.
So one year now represents a small percentage of my
forty two years, about two point three eight. But when
I was eight, one year was a really long time.
(18:18):
It was an eighth of my life. And that is
why summer lasted for about four years when you were
a kid. And this may be why I now feel
an urgency to know more, to do more, and to
be more. Don't get me wrong, I don't believe life
is too short. I believe life is too long. It's exhausting.
(18:39):
I don't fear dying. I want people to know that
if I die early, it's not some tragedy. If I
die to night, it's not I'd be relieved. I'm wiped
out and I've had a great adventure. I have two
hundred and fifty thousand dollars set aside for my funeral
because I want everyone to have one big fucking party
in my honor. I want to have a great funeral,
(19:02):
filled with dancing and little people and mushrooms and then
little people on mushrooms. I wanted to be a celebration
for all the people who love me and for all
the people who are happy to see me go. But
in the meantime between now and then. This is my
attempt at taking stock of how I got here, where
(19:22):
I've been, and where exactly it is that I'm going.
What exactly is it that I might bring to the
table to answer the question that Victor Frankel forced me
to ask myself. Do I have the conviction to examine
myself unflinchingly, to reveal the good, the bad, the ugly,
the beautiful the answers. Yes, I have a lot to
be embarrassed about, and I intend to advertise it. I'm
(19:46):
sick of my voice, of my ambition, of my entitlement.
I'm sick of not knowing more, and I'm embarrassed it
took me this along to figure it out. Life has
been too easy. I've gotten almost everything I've ever wanted,
and I'm forty two. Something smells fishy. M After all
is said and done, I'd like to be cremated and
have my ashes scattered over Bob Muller's grave or inside it,
(20:19):
or his inside mine, or inside of me, or in
one of Daniel dy Lewis's clogs. Thank you, Thanks guys. Okay,
we're gonna take a quick break and we'll be right back.
(20:43):
I'm gonna bring out somebody that you're all gonna love
very much. And she's a very good friend of mine,
and she was nice enough to fly out here to
interview me for uh for tonight, and uh you might
know her. Please welcome Connie Britton. Wait where do you want? Okay? Hi,
(21:23):
Hi Dallas? Yeah, good good. Let's tell everybody how we met? Okay?
Was it on my TV show? Um? We we met? Uh? No,
you thought we met on your TV show. We did
not meet on your TV show. We met in an airport.
You accosted me. You were dating Ted Harbor, remember Ted
(21:44):
Harbor from previous books. That was one of my first
older boyfriends. That was the twenty when twenty years between
my age and their age was acceptable. When when I
was in my twenties and thirties, I date fifty year old.
Now that I'm forty four, I'm not dating a fucking
sixty four year old, do you know what I mean?
So the margin has to like shrink, So I mean
(22:06):
I'm open minded. Then that's why I'm single. So yes,
I'm it's working. It's working out great for you think
working wonderfully. No, but you were a fan of Friday
Night Lights. I know I'm so happy to be back
in Texas. I love y'all. And you accostomed me in
(22:27):
the airport and and somehow we ended up with each
other's numbers. And I don't know if you remember this,
And I wanted to start by saying, I'm so fucking
proud of you. This book is number one. I'm like
two different New York Times bestseller lists. I'm so proud
(22:50):
of you because this book is like nothing else you've
ever done, It's nothing else you've ever written, and it
is a reflection of who you've become. And I say
that as we're talking about when we met, because when
we met, this is Chelsea's like, bless your heart. I
was out of control and then we we like texted
each other, and then you invited me to some birthday
party that you had on you were having on some
(23:12):
island in like in like a club where it's like
going to be a club like twenty four hours a day.
And I was in the middle of working on something
I don't know what, and I couldn't go, and you
were so mad at me, so I tossed. She was
so pissed. She was seven anger, anger, like just sucking
agitation but also also like somehow that I couldn't go.
(23:34):
It was like I was abandoning her. You don't do
that anymore. No, No, now you're so healthy. I'm a
lot healthier than I was. Yeah, but you don't realize
when you're in those states, when you're just kind of
going and you're just like, you know, my my career
when it started in in this town, you just go
a million miers per hour. You know, you never can
take a break either, and it becomes an addiction, and
(23:55):
then all of a sudden, you're just out. You're not
even paying attention to what's happening, and your life just
kind of passes you by. So it was good to
have a wake up call because when I hear stories
like this, I cringe. I'm like, oh god, I was
so fucking annoying. No, but you weren't. You were still
you always have had this heart. But now you're letting
us really see it, and you're letting yourself really see it.
And I'm really proud of you, and I um, i'd
(24:17):
like to thank Dan for that. Dan's my psychiatrist. I
I have, I have uh, really irrational feelings for Dan.
I really want Dan badly. Like you want Robert Mueller,
I want Dan. Yeah, I get it, I get it.
(24:38):
Dan was the first psychiatrist that I ever went to
that I wasn't attracted to. And that's why I stuck
with it, because I knew that if it wasn't if
it's a sexual thing, you're with girls were so screwed up,
you know, you A dentist can be borderline good looking,
and all of a sudden, you're like, you know, just
because he has some control over you. If you ever,
(24:59):
like anybody, anytime I've been put under by an anesthesiologist,
you're just like, oh my god, Like you're immediately attracted
to them, just because they're like, they have your life
in your hands, you know, in their hands. I know
that's so. Yeah. I love I love being drugged. What
what are wead? What's happening? Um? Connie doesn't like drugs.
(25:22):
Just so you know, I gave her a hit of weed.
I'm into cannabis now. Yeah, she's into cannabis. Now is it?
It's not legal here right? Okay? And it will be,
it will be at some point. It's gonna be legal everywhere.
But um, I'm coming out with my own cannabis line.
At the end of the summer, and because it's helped me,
(25:45):
It's helped me so much, especially with like you know,
just relaxing, calming, slimming down. Cannabis was my gateway drug
to like meditation and all that ship. But because that's
how that goes, you always start with drugs before you
met it tate healthy first. I have to calm down
for long enough to metadate. So yeah, I need some weed. Um.
(26:06):
We went over. We were over at our friend Charlie's
Theron's house one night, and so we're there and I
had my weed pen, a sample of my weed pen.
I said, Connie, here, try it, and She's like, I
never really smoke. I was like, then don't. I don't
want the drama, you know what I mean, if you're
gonna like I was like that place. Wait. Also, it
(26:28):
was a dinner party where all these people were supposed
to show up and and like we were the only
two people who came. So it ended up being and
it was like this beautiful dinner party for like three
or three women, three of us, two of him were
real stoned. I was stoned, but I'm always a little
bit stoned. So you were stoned and then we moved
(26:49):
to the living room and some other people came over,
so it was Rita Aura, the musician, and carl tell
Avine came over. So She's on the couch lying behind me,
and I'm talking chit chatting, and I don't even notice,
and I just went to go sit back. I'm like,
who's that. They're like, Connie, She's been sleeping for like
two hours. And then and then three weeks later, I
(27:11):
get it in text from car tel Avine saying, Hey,
I'm having a party at my house, a housewarming or whatever.
It is her birthday. I thought it was too I
got there, it was a housewarm inte. I'm like, why
the fund did I go to this? I was like,
I thought this is an important night. I mean, so
she said, hey, I have I'm having a housewarming party.
Will you invite Connie and Charlie's And I was like, yeah, yeah,
(27:34):
I will. And then I invited you and You're like, oh,
that's so sweet. I don't even know cards all Avine,
and I was like, well, she met you the other
night while you were asleep on the couch, and I
must have made a great impression because she invited me
to her not birthday party. So whatever, I'm a great sleeper.
(27:56):
If you could make a good impression while you're sleeping,
I think that's solid. Feel pretty good about it. You
used to You used to be more of a sleeper too.
That was another thing. Two years ago at your birthday party,
you basically announced everybody who was still at your birthday party, Okay, guys,
I'm going to bed. You know it was. It was
as awkward as that sounds like. It was not any
(28:19):
less awkward than that. It was literally like I looked
at Brandon, I'm like, Okay, should we go. We're gonna go.
I'm gonna go. Yeah, that's that's yeah. I'd like to
do a French exit. But it's hard to do that
at your own house. Yeah, you know what I mean.
It's hard to just like yeah, anyway anyway. So but
(28:39):
now here you are, you're in Texas. I'm in Texas.
Which the other thing. The other thing about Chelsea is
she's had a crush on well, you've had a crush
on a couple of my teeth. The thing, the reason
I'm friends with Connie is because she works with men
that I would like to get penetrated by. Kyle Chandler.
Obviously it's ridiculous, and obviously had a huge crush on him,
(29:03):
and then he did the other show after you, and
then I was like, oh my god, like I have
a real obsession with him. So I had to stop
watching him because it was unhealthy because he's married and
doesn't want anything to do with me. I tried to
get him on my show to interview me. I mean
to interview him on my old show, and Connie would
try and be at our liaison, but then you know,
he's like, I'm not gonna do it. He's like, tell
(29:26):
that that's real sweet. She could come out what you
offered to, like go meet him, like in a tepee
or something, which he said, did she come down and
do the the interview? And where does he live in Austin?
In Austin And I was like, yeah, I'll go to Austin.
We could do it in the woods. Yeah, And he's like,
tell that crazy bitch. I don't want her to interview me.
(29:49):
And then she worked with Eric Banna because and that's
another one of mine. Although did you guys all see
Dirty John and how many people? Although in Dirty John,
I wasn't as in to him as I've been time. Yeah,
well it's hard to get into a sociopath. Yeah, well
you did a good job. I'm an actress. It's gone acting. Yes, yes, Okay,
(30:12):
well this sounds like a good time to take a break.
Tell the story about Chunk on the plane. Oh well, Chunk.
Chunk was my old dog. Yeah, Chunk was. He was
such a stud I'm gonna cry in the book too,
by the way, just saying, um, he Chunk was great. Chunk.
(30:32):
It was like my family dog. He was my first dog.
He made me a mother, and I wasn't a great mother, um,
which is why I'm glad I didn't ever have children,
because you know, that would be a disaster. And so
I think I also am like people should thank me
for that too, Like I don't get enough recognition. I
feel like, you know, not contributing to like putting out
another one of me. I think it's a responsible decision making. Um,
(30:56):
but Chunk and I I was a really good mom
until I took Chunk, you my ORCA. I brought him
to Spain because I thought he would deserve to trip overseas.
And and when I before, I had never taken on
an international flight, so it was like twelve or fourteen
hours totally with a layover in Germany, and we were
going to see my family and my family and I
we all get along, but we're a little bit like
(31:17):
my brother is married to this Russian and she's kind
of a buzz kill, and um, she's very Russian, you know,
like she's very overprotective. She doesn't she's superstitious. It's all
like she thinks everyone who's gay is has been molested.
It's like it's hard to deal with her, you know.
She's always like Chelsea when you get the boyfriends and
I'm like, what are you have you been listening to
anything I've ever said that is not going to complete me?
(31:42):
And so she has three boys with my brother and
they're all horrified by her as well, because she's she's
one of those women who's like a mosquito, you know,
like did you like Like they get out of the
pool and then she makes them put on dry pool
clothes and then when they get back in the pool,
they have to put the wet ones back on. I'm like,
just skip the pool. Skip it. It's a nightmare for
(32:03):
all of us to watch this. I mean, she and
she's so materialistic, Like she's always about my money and
the things and where my old This is a nice
house you rented, you thinking about buying and it's like no,
no one's talking about that. And and you know, she
thinks the only key to happiness is to be married
(32:24):
to have children. She still thinks there's a chance I'm
gonna have a child, Like I'm forty four. It's a wrap.
She tells you are very fertile. I can tell. I'm like.
But so I was going on vacation with them, and
on the on the flight out, Chunk and Eye flew
Iberian Air or something, and I got sleeping pills for
(32:44):
him because I had never taken him on a flight
and I wanted to make sure he didn't pee or anything.
So I was like, okay, I'll probably knock him out.
And then it's some like twist of fate. I just said, no,
I'm not going to do that. I don't want to
give him a sleeping bill. He's never taken one. It
was the most responsible parenting i'd ever very impressed for
me to take it over. Thank you welcome for me
to take an overnight flight without taking a sleeping pill.
(33:06):
That's saying I love you, you know what I mean,
Like I had never done that. I had never taken
a flight without taking a sleeping pill that was that long.
But I stayed up with him and whatever. So I
got there and I was like, you guys, I did it.
I nailed it, like I'm a number one parent. And
then halfway through the trip, my brothers and sisters are
all there. I was really annoyed with my Russian sister
in law and we were on a sailboat and I
was taking the boys into these coves to swim in
(33:27):
these caves that were underwater, and they were and she
was just like, you can't go with Chelsea's it's not safe.
And finally I just swam home like Julia Roberts and
sleeping with the enemy. I was like, literally, we're on
about sailing. I'm beautiful, my and I was like, I'm
just gonna swim back to the house. She is so
fucking annoying. And you know what's so funny about her,
(33:50):
She's so annoying, but she doesn't even if you tell
her she's annoying. She's like like she doesn't hold she
doesn't hold a grudge about it. She'll just pick up
the converse where she goes, yes, anyway, Chelsea, that's not nice.
What were you saying? And I'm like, huh, So I swam.
I swam to shore on my aunt, who's awesome. She's
a real bitch, so like we have a good rapport
(34:12):
and she doesn't say much. I walked in. I was like,
can you believe them? Like they put so much sunblock
on their sons, like it was you couldn't even see them,
you know. And I walked in, I go, can you
believe fucking Olga? And then and my brother Glenn, they
bicker about everything, you know, like she could see a
can open and it's a thing. You're like, oh my god,
everything's a safety hazard. So I said, I go, can
(34:34):
you believe how they act? I mean, what's up with
that sun block on my aunt's Like I can't believe
she doesn't even put it in their mouths? I mean.
And I looked at Chunk's meds and what I discovered
was that they were dogg easan X basically the equivalent
to a humans annex. And I was like, uh, game changer.
And I popped one flitted in a half because it
(34:56):
hits you faster, and I was like, listen, I'm gonna
go knock myself the funk out. Because it was a Thursday.
We had until Saturday, and I was like, I was
at the end of my rope. And so I basically
slept for the next two days and I just wake
up in the morning, go downstairs, take a half of
zana X popping, and go back upstairs. My I'm like,
I can't deal with any more Russian accents anytime they
(35:17):
asked me, I'm like, I just can't. So we get
on the plane on the way back from my Orca
and I popped the last X. Chunk had five and
I was on my fifth one. I popped it and
realized I didn't have any for chunk and I was like,
oh funk, I can't throw up a zan X on
a plane. And I'm like, oh dad, that was so
I was like, what do I do? I mean, what
(35:40):
do you do if you take something you're not supposed to?
Of course that's the first thought, and I go for
me anyway, and so it isn't So I pass out
and I wrapped chinks leash around my waist and I'm
just hoping he's going to pass out too. And then
(36:01):
I was falling asleep, and I was like, I had
one of these baby sleeping pills that I brought but
never used because I had, you know, pilferred my own sons,
and so I gave him a Sonata, which is like
a light four hours sleeping pill, and we both fall asleep.
We wake up four hours later. The woman is like
pulling me by my hair. The flight attendant, she's like,
(36:21):
your dog is running around the first class cabin and
foaming at the math and I am literally like you
should have I mean, there's dog hair everywhere. And I
had a leash around my belly and I was so
out of it, you know, I was trying. I'm like, oh, chuck,
(36:41):
I'm like chunk, and I could hear it. Me sounded
like a wearabolf, he was like. And I was like,
oh glad, this is gonna be a nightmare. Oh my god,
Oh my god. And so I'm running and I get
up to go just jump for him to like lurch
and the rope burn around my waist from the leash.
I was like ah, and then I please miss help
(37:02):
and the woman's like in her seat, She's like, I'm
not a flight attendant. I'm not helping you. I don't
work here. I was like, please go get me, and
she's like, I'm not and I was like, oh shut
I'm on my own on this flight. So I get
him and he is just and my chunk was cool,
like he would never be uncool. He did never even
would let himself get an erection in front of me
or go to the bathroom. He was just a gentleman.
(37:23):
He would turn around if I saw him go to
the bathroom, he would turn around and run away. I
was like, that's what I like. I like that, you know, respect,
And so it was hard to see him in that condition,
especially knowing that I had done that to him. And
and then finally then the flight attendants where you know,
they were like you're a nightmare, and I was like, listen,
(37:43):
can we get us? I'm like, can we get some food?
I was like, fucking, I just gotta give him water.
He was so thirsty. You know, the vets said before,
you know, if you take your dog on a plane,
just remember the pill makes them very thirsty. And I
got yeah, but you just told me I can't give
him water for fourteen hours, so then he's gonna be
thirsty and dying. For water, and she's like, you have
to choose. Fucking vets. They never give you any real information.
(38:09):
Every VET I've ever gone to, they're like, oh, you
could you rescue a dog? And they're like, oh, it
could be four, could be twelve. I'm like, that's a
pretty big margin of error. Eight years. So the vet.
You know, So he did get thirsty. So I finally
just gave him water. I even tried to give him
orange juice, anything, and I ordered a mistake. The flight
(38:30):
attendant came over and was like, would you like anything
for your traveling companion? The steak was for him, um,
And then he finally calmed down. And I was just
so scared that I was gonna get off the plane
and it was gonna be fucking arrested. You know, by
the by the I don't know some from by Peter,
you know, news would have spread. I'm like, that's the
(38:53):
that's the ship I need to deal with. Chelsea Handler
kills her dog on plane from my Orca. Well, your
your book is so much about death that and I
read it. I'm like, she I don't remember this story.
She killed chunk on a plane, Like I was sure
that that's how it was gonna end. I was so
relieved that he survived it. He did survive. He he
wasn't really ever the same after that trip. But I mean,
(39:15):
I do feel badly that I did something to him.
It would just really knocked him out. And I won't
take any more dogs to my WORKA That is not
a smart move, you know what I mean. They can't handle.
It's too long and it's not fair. But I don't
really know what the point of that story. I really like.
I like your drag story. You know. Your drug stories
are always funny to me, Like I like the one
(39:36):
where you um right, They're so funny, Like I like
the one where you um, didn't you take a like
a yeast infection like suppository orally? Yes, that happened right, Yes,
I was in Whistler. I was in Whistler, Canada, and
I thought I had a situation. Yeah, And I called
my doctor and they sent me a pill and I
(39:57):
took it orally, and then like like a day later,
I was like, I wonder if that was supposed to
go in my Pikachu. Yeah, And then I called my doctor.
I was like, hey, quick, quick question. I was like
(40:20):
that pill that diff lucan or what you know, and
he goes, yeah, and I'm like, that goes and he's
like nothing. I'm like, where does that go? It's like
I'm sorry, I'm like, where does that pill go? He's
like I don't I don't understand the question. I'm like, yeah,
(40:41):
you do anyway, So wait, patients, and then I want
to talk about politics, because that's another change that right now. Okay,
but let's talk about k Yeah. Yeah, I mean Bett,
oh right, you're in that. You're in the seat of
(41:02):
it right here, like this isn't it. That's how actually,
that's how we became kind of we we yeah, because
we met a while ago, like in the airport in
Friday lights. But this was like in your old days.
And then I remember I didn't go to a birthday
party you invited me to, which was on some island
(41:23):
and where it was like in like a club like club.
You were going to be in a club like twenty
four hours a day every day for your birthday. And
I was like, I'm working, I can't go, and you
almost didn't forgive me. Yeah, I wouldn't get mad at people.
She would get really pissed, like if you didn't show up.
She was like, you're done. I'm done with you. So
but thankfully we you know, time passed and you had
(41:45):
your down But yeah, but politics kind of brought us
back together again. Yeah, it was nice because after that election,
you became friends with people, not this is an example
of us, but you actually became friends with people that
normally you wouldn't talk to. You're like, oh, yeah, we're
on the same team here, let's try figure this out.
And I know that you and I both were like
scrambling about what to do and hysterical, and I didn't realize,
(42:06):
you know, I learned about Like for me, it was
like I threw myself in, which I know you did too.
You just so like, oh my god, what are we
gonna do. We gotta get the mid terms going, like
you're we're going to go in and fix everything. But
luckily it was a collective of so many people that
went in And actually, so I think you realize who.
I think the way the way we're dealing now with
the way the country is, I think it is very
representative of who we are as individuals. Because in order
(42:29):
to change the country, you have to invest yourself. You
have to invest yourself financially. You have to invest yourself
with your time, You have to invest yourself with your passion.
You have to invest yourself with the way you talk
to people around you, with your community, with your family.
And there are some people who are capable and willing
to do that, and there's some people who aren't. And
that's an indication of character. So I think that that's
you know that we're seeing that a lot amongst ourselves
(42:51):
right now too, you know, and that's how we come well.
You actually Kiani was roommates with Kirston Gila Brand. Yes,
Kirston Jilli Brand. See you're not. It's like, I'm smattering,
smattering of applause. It's amazing. We are. They are very
lucky because we have many truly incredible candidates right now
and possible possible presidential nominee. I like, amazing. There are
(43:15):
a lot of good candidates. And it's I mean, I like,
I mean, like you. I got so burnt out with
the mid terms that I was like, oh my god,
I don't ever want to deal with politics again. I
can't stand this ship. But it's necessary. You can't just
dip in and out. You have to kind of harness
your outrage and make it something positive and go and
do something good. So I'm trying to pace myself and
not burn out or burn the candle at both ends
(43:36):
with this and be active and be aware of everything
that's going on politically. So it's, um, it's like a
fun I'm right here, sweetie. You can see me open
your Oh sweet what drugs is she taking? Who knows?
People get ship faced when they come see me? Right?
(43:59):
We want to to show Like ten years ago, we
did a show. We were in Long Island and it
was a theater that was in the round, and which
means like you're in the center of a crowd, so
like your ass is facing half the people. It's it's
not a great setup, but it's old school and we're
in this theater in Long Island and after we're done,
the security guard like watching me off the stage because
you're surrounded by people, and he was being very protective
and he's like, sorry, there's vomit everywhere, like every girl
(44:23):
there had thrown up. He's like, wow, you really attract
quite a crowd. He's like, last time I saw this
was zz top. I'm like, yeah, I'm sure this theater
has seen its share of vomit. Yes, I'm sure it has.
But anyway, I'm optimistic about the future because I think
we have to be and we have to live in
a state of hopefulness. And I really wanted to get
(44:45):
my head on straight. And the thing that I learned
the most is like, in order to be of use
to anyone really in this world, you have to get
your ship together, and you have to clean out your
own injuries. And now amen, sister, and sister Amen speak
it so also, you're living an honest life, living an
(45:07):
honest and true life. You are even sober, and I'm
living living an honest life. Cheers, cheers. I didn't say
you were living a sober life. But I want to
read this last part of the book for you guys
before you get get going, because wow, we have these
I Decide bracelets and these necklaces and t shirts that
(45:29):
say I decide because of something I wrote in the book.
Hold on, let me get rid of my camel toe.
And second, don't see, don't let other people decide what
kind of mood you're going to be in. Don't let
anyone change your life in one day. Don't let death
(45:52):
take you down and keep you down. You go down,
but get back up. If we don't give into our
despair and instead lock it away, we failed to properly
more in the people we love. How on earth are
we honoring the very people we are grieving if we
failed to more in them fully, we should be celebrating
the people we've lost. I missed thirty years of celebrating
my brother. I decide to grow up. I decided to
(46:14):
be better. I decided to take my life back. All
the proceeds for the T shirts and the bracelet's go
to UM True Colors United, which is an organization for
l g B t q I a youth through a
homeless Thank you so much for the support and I
totally appreciate it. And thank you to Pottie Brittain, my
very good friend, for being here tonight. Thank you guys.
(46:40):
Um Okay, Brandon, Well, that was a live show, so
you now, I just want to make an announcement to
everybody that I've had twenty one shows and you haven't
been to one, and l A is the city you've
dwell in and you didn't even come to that show.
Brandon had plans in the night of my show. You're
in LA, Yes, but my new plan is to come
to one of your other shows, like I really like
to go to New Orleans or St. Louis. Maybe naturally, well,
we need to add first left, you're not coming to
(47:01):
any those shows. I added new dates where I'm gonna
be doing stand up. So though that's Westbury, Long Island,
I'm coming to Atlanta. I'm coming home to Mountclair, New Jersey, St. Louis, Minneapolis,
New Orleans, and Nashville. So go to live nation dot
com for tickets to a live show where I will
be doing stand up and Brandon will not be. We'll
be back next week with my psychiatrist who's going to
break down the angiogram for everybody who's been asking questions
(47:23):
about that. Life will be the Death of Me as
a production of I Heeart Radio. For more podcasts from
my Heart Radio, visit the i Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts,
or wherever you listen to your favorite shows. Oh
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