January 23, 2024 • 43 mins
In 2000, when Rosie asked audience member, Jimmy Smagula, to stand up and play a singing game with her on live TV, who was to know it would be the beginning of a beautiful profound kinship? But as viewers, we saw their connection was electric. And now, Onward to 2024; Smagula's hopes and dreams mentioned during that short intro to his favorite comedian and talk show host, have been realized.
He's currently starring in Spamalot on Broadway, his too numerous to mention appearances on so many hit TV shows including one of the most famous scenes from the ultimate in prestige television, The Sopranos, and now Jimmy's own podcast Baby Mouth.
Listen in on this NY/NJ fast-paced, funny, and unfeigned conversation, when two friends who love and respect each other share special moments with us.Please share your questions or comments by voice memo to: OnwardRosie@gmail.com
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:11):
Hey, everybody, you found me, Rosie O'Donnell right here onward
with me, Rosie O'Donnell. Thanks for tuning in everybody. I
know you've probably heard the news from my TikTok if
you're a frequent listener. But Julie Andrews has returned. Yes,
I was gone, and then I went away for the
weekend to oh Hi, and then I came home yesterday
(00:34):
and I just sat out there for a couple of hours,
and sure enough, a whole bunch of new squirrels are there.
I mean, I don't even know where they came from,
where they live, but two of them are very chestnut
golden brown colored, a boy and a girl, and they
each took a walnut from me from my hand on
(00:55):
day one. That was like such a victory. And then
Julie came down, which was just the most fantastic thing.
I don't even know how to explain it. I don't,
I really don't. But you know, I'm a little nervous
that the dog that we're getting, the Autism service dog,
(01:15):
will chase the squirrels. But apparently they don't chase squirrels,
but their dogs, I think, aren't they going to chase squirrels.
I don't know. But right now, while you're listening to this,
I am actually in the training for the dog that
we're getting. I have to go for ten days. Can
you believe that to be trained to be the handler.
Speaker 2 (01:37):
Of the dog.
Speaker 1 (01:38):
It's probably going to be a lab. It could be
a lab doodle, or it could be a golden but
I'm pretty sure it's going to be a lab. And
you know, I told them we wanted a girl, and
that was our only request, was a girl, whatever one
they think would be good for our family and for
you know, my kiddo's needs. So many people. I know
(02:00):
it's with autism. And I've heard from a lot of
moms who've already had the dog and for a couple
of years this their dog, and they tell me how
much it changed the life of their autistic child. And
you know, that's that's the big goal here, more participation
(02:20):
in life and going out of the house and when
panic or whatever comes, the dog can go cuddle. And
I'm ready to do it. I'm making a commitment. We'll
see what happens. Good luck me, you know, ten days anywhere,
good luck me? You know, I don't know. I made
(02:42):
a very kind of obnoxious comment. I said, excuse me,
but what kind of sheets do you have?
Speaker 3 (02:49):
And the other people are like what, I'm like, no
in the bed there, because I have trouble sleeping. If
I can I bring my own sheets? What size is
the best? Like, I'm asking them all these questions. So
the people are like, I cannot believe that that's what
you're asking.
Speaker 1 (03:03):
I'm like, it's the thing. I'm most worried about. Sleeping
in a strange place with the new dog for ten
days alone without my kiddo. That's gonna be tough. But onward, people,
what other choice do we have? On word? Okay, listen
today's episode my good friend Jimmy Smagoula, star of Stage,
(03:25):
screen and TV. I met Jimmy over twenty years ago
when he was picked to play a game on my
talk show and he stood up in the audience and
sang his way into my heart. And you know, sometimes
you just connect to people and like you know them
your whole life. You know. I don't know how it happens,
but sometimes it does. And that's what happened with me
(03:45):
and Jimmy Smagoula. And we've been really close friends ever
since and I love the guy and he is killing
it in Spam a Lot on Broadway. He's done so
many Broadway shows and he's a barrel of laughs. Here's
me and Jimmy Smagoola, Happy New Year. Happy Jimmy Smagoula
(04:21):
starting We're started. I love just shut right in.
Speaker 2 (04:25):
The Flintstones, my friend. Happy new Now you.
Speaker 1 (04:29):
Now you star of spam a Lot getting specifically called
out in the New York Times interview for a brilliant performance.
Speaker 2 (04:37):
That nice. Thank you?
Speaker 1 (04:39):
How did you feel, Jim? I mean what, First of all,
what number show is this for you?
Speaker 4 (04:43):
This is my eighth Broadway show, which is a miracle.
I am a kid from New Jersey who grew up
much like you did, wanting to feel that waxy playbill
in my hand every single night of my childhood and
my parents I I would sneak into the city on
the Path train and just walk around the Broadway theater district.
Speaker 2 (05:05):
I didn't have any money.
Speaker 4 (05:06):
I would just walk around and look at the theater
and if the show was going on on a Wednesday afternoon,
I would go into the box office just to listen
to the show through the doors.
Speaker 2 (05:16):
Yeah, I would.
Speaker 1 (05:17):
Get go the days those you're you're so young that
you don't remember. I would get like stand by tickets
for ten dollars.
Speaker 2 (05:25):
Yes, I would do.
Speaker 4 (05:26):
I'd do even better than that row when I was
at NYU, which I went on a scholarship because we
had no money. But when I was at NYU, I
would stand in front of the theater a half hour
before the show, and when the people were going in,
I'd say, anybody have an extra ticket for a drama student.
Anybody had, and I would always get an extra ticket.
Speaker 1 (05:43):
Wow.
Speaker 4 (05:44):
The rich people would go, oh, my uncle's not coming,
he sick. Here you go, kid, And I would sit.
I mean, I just any whatever it took for me
to be able to sit in a Broadway theater. And
you know, I remember I saw Phantom of the Opera
when I was thirteen years old. My aunt Liz, God
rest your soul, she died when she was ninety two.
She took me because I grew up in New Jersey,
(06:06):
and they had a city trip, a town trip on
the school bus and we went and we sat in
the rear mezzanine and I sat all the way up
against the right side of the theater, in the back
of the theater and I watched Phantom of the Opera,
and then fourteen years later, I was in Phantom of
the Opera at the same theater, and I would look
(06:27):
up at the exact seat I sat in.
Speaker 2 (06:30):
Yes, can you believe that?
Speaker 1 (06:33):
Can you imagine, Jimmy, if you or I were not
born in the Tri State area, I knew what would
have happened. If we were born in Kansas.
Speaker 2 (06:41):
We would have made it.
Speaker 4 (06:42):
No, we would have made it here because I performed
with guys all the time. You met that kid, Daniel
Beeman who's in my show, who's thirty years old. He
was in Funny Girl. Now he's in my show. He's
in the ANSOMBI grow up in oh Maha, Nebraska. There's
a kid from Missouri in my show. They come from
all over the world. I performed with kids from Australia
(07:03):
when I was in Billy Elliott.
Speaker 2 (07:04):
You find a way?
Speaker 1 (07:06):
Yeah, you know? You really do? You really do? And
tell everyone? Tell well, we have a little audio clip
of when you and I met each other for the
very first time.
Speaker 4 (07:17):
And no one believes that it's for the first time,
but people, it was for the first time.
Speaker 1 (07:22):
I was doing my show, and we have this guy,
Joey Kohla, who would get all the contestants I had
nothing to do with. Who was josen? And I went
up and well, I don't even have to tell you.
Let's take a list.
Speaker 5 (07:38):
Jimmy, what you're doing, Jimmy, I'm a struggling actor, No kidd,
I'm an unemployed actor.
Speaker 1 (07:49):
Most actors are unemployed.
Speaker 4 (07:51):
What have you done, jim I've done some fun stuff, Rosie,
like what I was on the national tour of The
Phantom of the Opera at a little bit of a time.
Speaker 1 (07:57):
Excuse me, sing for me. Jimmy's being Spinola. What was
I thinking?
Speaker 2 (08:02):
You know, being alive?
Speaker 1 (08:03):
And he's prepared? Somebody hold me too close listening to you.
Speaker 2 (08:10):
Somebody heard me.
Speaker 6 (08:12):
Oh my god, somebody's sitting in my chair and ruined
my sleep and make me aware of being.
Speaker 1 (08:23):
What a voice you have, sir. And now I'm hugging him.
Now I just go Can he live in my house
and sing to me all the time?
Speaker 2 (08:31):
And my heart is funding so fast?
Speaker 1 (08:34):
Yeah? Now, that was the first time that that that
first time, that was the first time that we met.
Speaker 2 (08:39):
That was the first time we ever met. And I
told and I.
Speaker 1 (08:42):
Just felt I felt like I knew you for millions
of years.
Speaker 2 (08:46):
Well, I of course.
Speaker 4 (08:48):
I mean that's what makes you so as such an
incredible human being is that we all feel like we've
known you for millions of years. But I remember being
a kid watching Star Search and saying to my father Daddy,
my favorites coming on today, Rosie O'Donnell, she's gonna win.
Speaker 2 (09:05):
I got a. I mean, how old could I have been?
Speaker 1 (09:08):
It was eighty four. I was eighty four.
Speaker 2 (09:11):
I was nine years old.
Speaker 1 (09:12):
You were nine years old. I was twenty two years old.
And then I went out there. Yeah, and you know,
it's so it's so funny. It's a New York thing.
Maybe it's a past life thing. It's maybe it's a
love of Broadway thing.
Speaker 2 (09:28):
Yeah, you know, Yes, I don't know.
Speaker 4 (09:30):
But to be friends with you now, after dreaming about
being friends with you for most of my life, is
a very wonderful, odd, special experience.
Speaker 1 (09:41):
But you know, it's interesting because I don't feel any
of that coming from you in the best way. I'm
not complaining, believe me, I'm just saying, I just you're
just one of my friends. Like I'd never I don't
ever think could you know, Oh, oh, remember I met him,
And I just think of this Jimmy, Jimmy and Richard.
Speaker 4 (09:57):
Because I don't think of you as TV's Rosy O'Donnell.
I think if it was my friend Roro, You're just
my friend. And literally, if you said to me tomorrow
I'm quitting show business, I'm gonna go work at the
grocery store, I would still be your friend. You're just
a wonderful person to have as a friend. You've been
such a confidant for me. I've told you things I've
(10:18):
never told anybody.
Speaker 1 (10:19):
Else, and I'm going to tell the audience right now.
Believe me, I'm not I've told you a couple of
things myself. And there was that vacation we took to Florida,
Oh that we all had to swear on a bunch
of Pat Conroy novels that we would never tell what
(10:39):
happened that week.
Speaker 2 (10:40):
You know, I said to you once, why are you
my friend?
Speaker 4 (10:44):
You are in your sixties, You've had this incredible, big life,
You have so many friends, and yet at your age
and your experience in life, you still bring people in.
I mean, you've really brought me into your inner circle.
It's not like you're peripheral friends. You are one of
my dear friends now.
Speaker 1 (11:04):
And yes, and Jim, that's all that life is about
is to other people in your world. It really is.
And as I go through trying to figure out, you know,
where's the right place for me and my kiddo. And
you know, my other children are still in the New York,
New Jersey area, and I want them to know each other,
(11:27):
the children, and to be even though there's a ten
year age gap between Viv and Dakota slash Clay. I, yes,
I know that it's hard to bridge that gap, but
I think it's so important, especially for a kid with
special needs, you know, a kid with autism who doesn't
(11:48):
always perceive the world in the way that you think
they are. You know, it's it's been very interesting, but
I think it's all about the people. You know. It's
when you said if I worked in a grocery store,
you know, the place I love to go the most
is the grocery store because you can make the cashiers laugh.
And you know, it was funny. During the height of
(12:10):
my fame, it wasn't as much fun to go out
in public and make people laugh because they were expecting
you to make them laugh, because you made them laugh
every day on TV for an hour, and they have
assumed a familiarity. And yet that kept me separate from
them and not able to be equal. But now that
I have gray hair and I'm older and people don't
(12:33):
know it's me. Sometimes if I don't talk, they don't
know at all. And it's been beautiful for me to
remember how wonderful it is to make an anonymous human
connection with another person.
Speaker 4 (12:46):
That is so beautiful, And it must be nice for
you to feel that it's an authentic connection. Well, I
can tell you connection with the celebrity, it's just correction
with a human.
Speaker 1 (12:58):
I can tell when people reckon, even if they don't
say it, I can't feel it. I can tell, right,
But when people don't, I go in, you know, I
go like, okay, let's do this human to human.
Speaker 2 (13:10):
But you love people?
Speaker 1 (13:11):
Yeah, but I do love people. I do love people more.
Coming up next, don't go anywhere.
Speaker 6 (13:39):
You know.
Speaker 4 (13:39):
You came to Spam a lot, and it meant so
much to so many of us, and the wardrobe people
and the crew, and you stayed with us for forty
five minutes and it made me so happy to see
you so happy because people were so happy to see you,
and you should know you'll always have a place on Broadway.
(13:59):
No one will ever forget what you did for Broadway shows.
You single handedly saved some of them during.
Speaker 1 (14:07):
Yes, but you know what, They've saved me more times
than I can imagine. Every time in my life that
there's something really hard and really difficult emotionally to get through,
it's always a musical that brings me back.
Speaker 2 (14:20):
It's increating.
Speaker 1 (14:21):
And I remember with stuff with Chelsea, you know, which
is a challenge still. Yes, that was when Hamilton came out,
and when I was in therapy, the therapist kept saying,
you know you never crying here? How come you never
cry in here about this? You're so upset, I can tell,
but you hold it all back. I go come with
(14:42):
me to see Hamilton, because I would go once a week.
That's how much I needed to go. I needed to
hear the song about forgiveness. I needed to hear the
brilliance of that score and see the artistry on stage
and be taken out of myself, I know, and I
sure was. And I've been grateful my whole life for
(15:07):
Broadway because I don't know what I would have done.
Speaker 4 (15:09):
Not to play a therapist here, But it's probably a
real connection to your own mother, because I know she's
the one who introduced you to Barbara Streisan, and Barbara
is a broad you know, the ultimate Broadway star.
Speaker 2 (15:20):
And I'm sure that you.
Speaker 4 (15:22):
Feel your mom's love and you feel all those feelings
that you felt when you were a kid when you
go to a Broadway show.
Speaker 1 (15:29):
Yeah, I definitely do. I remember her taking us to
Radio City Musical and there was a story where she
auditioned for the Rockets and she got in but her
which is sort of strange because she was short from
what I remember. But anyway, this is the family lore.
And then when someone dies, you never know if it
was true or you.
Speaker 2 (15:46):
Know what I mean.
Speaker 1 (15:48):
Family, Yeah, nobody, nobody really knew. But she loved the
Rockets and she loved going and taking us there and
you're getting the lemon drops and having our hands covered
with sugar, you know, the night.
Speaker 4 (16:01):
And I remember when you got your first Emmy award
and you were crying and you said, I sat there
with my mother.
Speaker 2 (16:08):
Yes, it's so beautiful like.
Speaker 1 (16:09):
You in the top row, the third balcony in the back.
Speaker 2 (16:13):
I had no money. We sat in the back.
Speaker 4 (16:15):
I was so I felt so lucky to be sitting
in the back. I felt lucky to be sitting anywhere,
you know it was. I took my dad to his
first Broadway show when I was twelve, which was my
show's Broadway show, Lame Is. I remember it was at
the Broadway Theater and the whole side of the theater
was painted as Young Cosette, the.
Speaker 2 (16:34):
Whole big side of the theater.
Speaker 4 (16:36):
And I knew a girl in it. I was in
this little performing group called Pro Kids. I must have
been eleven or twelve, and she was Young Cosette. Twice
a week she sang Castle on a Cloud and she said,
come before the show and I'll give you and your
dad a tour backstage. And so we did, and I
was an aw My dad bought me the little cassette
and I listened to it every day, three times a
(16:57):
day for two weeks before we went. And after the show,
I just knew that's what I wanted to do. But
my blue collar truck driver father, who never went to
college and never went to a Broadway show and intermission
stood up and said get your coat, and I said, Daddy,
it's not over it's only intermission. It goes, oh, it's halftime.
It's nine forty five. He said, how is this thing,
(17:19):
because you know, le miss is over three hours long. Yes,
then you know those memories there. I just saw Here
Lies Love at the same theater, the Broadway Theater, and
I walked in there and I thought, my god, I
I walked in here with my dad thirty something years ago,
thirty five years ago.
Speaker 1 (17:34):
Wild. Isn't it wild? When you go into a Broadway theater,
you sit down, you're watching the show, and you realize,
I performed in this theater. Yeah, I did Susical here
like I sometimes I'm like, that was my entrance through
that stage door right there.
Speaker 4 (17:47):
You know, road Didn't you do Susical and the Rosie
O'donnald Show at the same time?
Speaker 2 (17:52):
Or is that crazy?
Speaker 1 (17:53):
And I had two foster kids and three kids.
Speaker 2 (17:57):
It was I mean, I'm sure, Yanity, but how much.
Speaker 1 (17:59):
I had helped? Of course I had helped, But you
know what, it was like a mania. It was like
a hyper like you know, I mean, I don't know
when I really when I look back and I think
of the amount of stuff that happened in my life
from the time I was thirty to the time I
was forty. Oh, it's unbelievable. You did it all that
(18:22):
in that decade. I did it all. Then I said,
check please, because you.
Speaker 4 (18:26):
Get nervous when you were like hosting the I watched,
you know, I watched the old Tony Awards. I watch
you host them. I think I feel like you never
you told me once you never get nervous.
Speaker 1 (18:35):
I don't really, you know. You know what's interesting, Jim.
Just recently I did a short film for Carol Leafer
with Kevin Pollack. Yes and again, a lot of Chelsea
stuff going down, and yes, I could not sleep, I
couldn't eat, I couldn't remember my lines. And I got
there and I I said to her, I'm really sorry everyone.
(18:57):
This is going on in my family and I haven't
been able to you know. And at the end of
we did all their coverage first, and then at the
end they almost did me line by line, you know,
and I just went, Wow, it's not the same as
it was. I don't have the ability to leave everything
(19:18):
else at the door anymore.
Speaker 4 (19:21):
You know.
Speaker 1 (19:21):
It goes with me and I find it. As you're
older and in the days you have left are shorter.
You try to mend and fix all of the things
like in real time, like it used to be, like, no,
I'm working, I have a show, as if the most
important thing in life is a show, right, you know.
Speaker 4 (19:40):
Well, at thirty five or thirty two it was it. Sure,
maybe it may have been for you, but that's not
how it is.
Speaker 5 (19:46):
You know.
Speaker 4 (19:46):
I keep saying backstage, no one over thirty five years
old should do a Broadway show. They should take your
equity card away when you turn thirty five because it's
too much, it's too exhausting.
Speaker 1 (19:55):
Well, you know who just at Emma Stone did Cabaret, right,
and she said at the Golden Globes, I don't know
that I could do another one. I thought, oh, it'll
only be three hours a day. She's like, it killed me.
It is so exhausting. And you have to have so
much discipline to take care of yourself and your throat,
(20:16):
and you're always surrounded in close contact with many other people,
and everyone's getting sick and you're trying not to miss
a show. It's really like Olympic athlete type stuff.
Speaker 4 (20:26):
Yes, and I've been sick for three weeks, and you know,
it's just and we're all sick, and there's COVID happening again,
and COVID is surging in New York, and I'm wearing
a mask again on the subway, and it's and mentally too.
It's just difficult, you know, Thank God, every single person
I'm not just saying this. Every person in that theater
is incredible. Where I work, it's incredible.
Speaker 1 (20:48):
Yes, And if you're saying Jimmy, honestly, let me just
talk a little bit about Spamalot. I thought it was
so freaking funny and the cast was so good. There
wasn't any moment where the quality dropped for a second.
Everyone hit it out of the park and it was
a joy to watch and a beautiful night of theater,
(21:10):
it really was.
Speaker 2 (21:11):
We were all so excited that you were there.
Speaker 4 (21:14):
And you know, anytime you go to see any Broadway show,
I think everybody's just so happy to see you and
you're welcome with open arms anytime you always have a
community experience. I just love you and lift you up
on Broadway forever.
Speaker 1 (21:29):
Yes, And I you know, I love that community. It
is to me where showbiz is most like what I
dreamed it would be. Oh wow, I don't find that,
you know, movie making Hollywood. You're always in a car.
You have to drive fifty minutes to get to anyone.
There's no real community, but there it's like fifteen blocks. Yeah,
(21:49):
and everybody is in that is little area and they're
running to the theater and they're going to get it
bite after at the same places that are open, and
you really come to be a part of something so
much bigger than you.
Speaker 2 (22:03):
You know. It was it was.
Speaker 1 (22:05):
Jony Sorry then I'll shut up. It was Joni Mitchell
that said about Hollywood, this illusionary place, this scared, hard
edged rat race or liberty is laced with borderlines.
Speaker 2 (22:15):
Oh you know, God, And where are we trying to
get to? You know?
Speaker 4 (22:19):
I hate that phrase. I want to make it. I
just want to make it. Where do you live? Where
are you going?
Speaker 1 (22:26):
You know, Jim. The saddest thing that I ever saw
about show business was Joan River's last documentary, Oh where
she was a grandmother in the back of the car
with her hands on her mint coat and her Bentley
and she's calling her agent and she's still trying to
make it somewhere or whatever whatever it was. She was
(22:49):
eighty years old. I know, and I thought, oh my god,
if that happens to me, somebody take me out to
a field somewhere there was no you know, and it
just made it broke my heart. It broke my heart.
Speaker 2 (23:01):
It is heartbreaking. And you know what's interesting.
Speaker 4 (23:03):
I have gotten to work with a lot of celebrities,
a lot of people who have quote unquote made it right,
big stars, Emmy Award winners, and I worked with one person.
I won't say who it is, but I worked with
one person in a show, big star, multiple Emmy Awards,
and he said to me once, I'll never carry a movie.
(23:25):
I'll never be Will Ferrell or Jack Black. No one
will ever ever trust me to carry a comedic movie ever.
It's so disappointing to me. It's so depressing to me.
And I thought to myself, this.
Speaker 7 (23:36):
Guy who, from my perception, has it all, a big
house in LA and so much money, successful, multiple awards
for everything, and.
Speaker 2 (23:49):
He's depressed about his career. He's said he's frustrated.
Speaker 4 (23:53):
So when you start to learn that as an actor
who's trying to get somewhere, I stopped trying to get anywhere.
I just want to work. I just love working. I
love acting I love working. I don't care about getting anywhere.
Speaker 1 (24:07):
But when you realize that there's nowhere get, there's nowhere
to get, there's no where to get, And that's in life.
Speaker 4 (24:13):
It's all about the journey. There's no destination for anybody, anybody,
no matter what. And if you can make a couple
of your dreams come true, that's it, you know. And
have a beautiful family and beautiful friends and laugh. I mean,
Norman Lee just died at one hundred and one years old.
All he did was laugh. I was so lucky to
know him a little bit. And I know you did too.
(24:35):
And he loved to laugh, and he loved people, and
he loved to talk and get together and that's it.
Speaker 8 (24:42):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (24:42):
I think that's it too. I think that's why he
lived so long too. Yes, you know he was constantly
all of.
Speaker 2 (24:49):
These guys who were just all day, you know.
Speaker 1 (24:52):
Right, and and they kind of knew a little something
about love, you know, Yes, they really, they really did.
Speaker 2 (24:59):
They did.
Speaker 1 (25:00):
Do you like doing tell everybody about your own podcast?
Do you have your own pipe?
Speaker 4 (25:04):
I do, and I'll tell you I haven't done you well.
First of all, you were the first guests. Yes, I
was thank you very much. It's called baby mouth and
every episode. So I grew up in New Jersey and
my mother literally fed me the same ten foods from
my entire childhood up until I was eighteen the day,
meat loaf, chicken, chicken fingers, pizza every Friday, because Jesus
(25:29):
didn't want us to eat meat on Fridays for some
reason which I still didn't understand. I think the Pope
in like nineteen seventy two said you can eat meat again,
and my father said, not, my Pope, And we still
don't have meat on Sunday.
Speaker 1 (25:41):
We didn't either. We did pizza on Fridays.
Speaker 4 (25:43):
Every friend we'd have grilled cheese for lunch and pizza
for dinner. It was never meat. Sundays, we'd have a
big Italian pasta and sausage and garlic bread. But I
never had sushi. I never had tuna fish, which is
what you and I did. I never had a caesar salad.
Thought pad tie was a soup. I didn't know that
was noodles. That's still delicious, noodle delicious, yeah, good tie.
Speaker 1 (26:08):
Now, Badi and.
Speaker 2 (26:09):
I love sushi.
Speaker 4 (26:11):
I go to sugarfish and no bou when my fancy
friends take me to Nobu.
Speaker 2 (26:15):
I can go Rosie, but it's delicious.
Speaker 4 (26:18):
So I said to myself, I'm going to start this
podcast where every week a friend of mine will come
on and I'll do a favorite food of theirs, and
I'll try it for the first time.
Speaker 2 (26:28):
Now it's not always successful. Tuna fish, I didn't enjoy.
Speaker 1 (26:31):
You did not like it. And I was hoping for
the first one that you would have been like yes,
but no, I.
Speaker 2 (26:36):
Didn't choose too much fish and I don't.
Speaker 1 (26:39):
And the mayonnaise for the way you're prepared wasn't good
for me. The capers you didn't like, the cap't.
Speaker 2 (26:45):
Like any of that now on a driss gape. Not good.
Speaker 4 (26:48):
And my mother said I could have eaten that whole thing.
My mother's name Tuna fish.
Speaker 1 (26:53):
I love it too. Why didn't you make it for
you as a kid.
Speaker 2 (26:55):
I don't know.
Speaker 4 (26:56):
She never did, and she would say to me, I
would always you know, she's our my podcast. Every episode
she's at the end and I say to her, why
didn't you feed me this? And we tell stories and
she tells me stories of her childhood. And but I
haven't recorded a new episode because I've been so busy
you know, I've produced it and I have to edit it,
(27:16):
and I have to get the guest in the food
and my mother on Zoom, which is its.
Speaker 2 (27:19):
Own show, My challenge as challenge.
Speaker 4 (27:23):
You know, she's seventy seven and it's hard to get
her on Zoom. But I love I love doing that podcast.
Speaker 1 (27:29):
What is the food that you are most surprised that
you love?
Speaker 2 (27:33):
Sushi? Absolutely?
Speaker 4 (27:34):
She she like a tuna shashimi, just raw red and
it tastes like a hamburger.
Speaker 2 (27:41):
To me, it tasted deliverous. But I couldn't believe how
good that was the sushi.
Speaker 1 (27:47):
I love sushi. There's something amazing about really good food.
Speaker 4 (27:51):
And it took me a healthy are for me. I
had Free with you the first time in Miami.
Speaker 1 (27:57):
Yes, didn't you love it?
Speaker 2 (27:58):
It was good? I'd like that. Yeah, surprising, right, Yeah,
it was surprising. I don't know. It's good to try
new things.
Speaker 4 (28:05):
And now I can really go to any restaurant and
try because you know, I couldn't go any place I
was too afraid. Fear is not a good thing to
have in life at all at all. I even tell
like if I work with young actors like you got
to work on the thing that scares you the most
and the thing you're worst at. You know, that's you
as an actor. When people see you in dramatic roles,
(28:27):
they go crazy because you didn't do them for so long.
But you see, I know this much is true, and
these incredible roles, and you bring so much to these
dramatic roles and that's well, thank you. An incredible thing.
But you said no to the fear of doing that.
I'm sure you must.
Speaker 2 (28:44):
Yeah, learned.
Speaker 1 (28:45):
Yeah, I was a little concerned, but I also knew,
you know, I knew that I could do it. I
knew that I had it in me in not an
arrogant way. Just I read the script and you know,
especially with I know this much is true. When I
met Derek the director in Front, and he said, do
you know this character, I said, oh, yes, because the
(29:06):
woman who raised me was a social worker after my
mom died, and I know exactly this person. And he's
the one who said will you cut your hair, shave
the sides and leave it front? And I was like sure, So,
you know, well I like it. You know, a lot
of people, when they're mad, mostly about my Trump comments,
come on and leave mean messages on my TikTok, and
(29:27):
they'll all say things like, oh yeah, hey dude, nice hair, butchy,
as if I didn't cut it this way myself, as
if I was like in a gang and they were
forcing me to.
Speaker 4 (29:37):
Cut my lesbian dyky lesbian gang. That's good, yeah, right,
excuse you to cut your hair. No, it looks incredible.
Speaker 1 (29:45):
No, I like it because number one, it's so easy,
and number two, I was never one of the girls
who knew how to like take my long hair and
throw it in a messy bun, right right right. I
always look like the kid who didn't have a mother,
who didn't get her hair brushed, you know, like yeah, yeah,
it's so deep really in a lot of ways, you know.
And recently Dakota did it. Dakota told me h Clay
(30:09):
a few months ago. She said, Mommy, my hair no
longer fits my head.
Speaker 2 (30:14):
Wow.
Speaker 1 (30:15):
And I said, that's fascinating. What do you think we
should do about that? And they said, I think I
need to get it cut. So we went through all
the pictures that I had of them at different ages
and said, if now you had at this length, at
one point, you had at this So she chose sort
of where it is like at her at her collar
(30:36):
or her shoulders, and she's so they are so much
happier with it that way, and.
Speaker 4 (30:43):
It's amazing the the.
Speaker 2 (30:46):
There's such a wise little kid.
Speaker 4 (30:49):
I mean, they're just a little kids, and yet they
so much about themselves. That's what I'm always fascinated by, Clay.
Whenever I'm with them, whenever they're in the room, well,
whenever I hear them say anything or you tell me
something that they say, I go like, oh my god,
they're only eleven years old.
Speaker 1 (31:06):
I'm constantly amazed by what they come up with and
the perspective with which they see the world.
Speaker 2 (31:13):
It's beautiful. It's really beautiful.
Speaker 1 (31:16):
Autism is a different operating system, and I don't know
if you've ever tried to go from Microsoft Word to Apple.
You know, very few people are fluent in both, you know,
and I feel like I.
Speaker 2 (31:28):
Get that as a mother and as a para.
Speaker 1 (31:30):
Well that's that's the question. Stay tuned for more with
me and Jimmy Smagola.
Speaker 4 (31:57):
We don't know anything. You just don't know, and that's
the fun of life. And I imagine that's the joy
and surprise of parenting. You know, I never had any
desire to be a parent. I love kids, I love babies.
I love I have a niece and a nephew who
are the cutest things in the world. And they saw
me on the Thanksgiving Day parade with spam a lot,
(32:18):
and my brother sent me a video of them going,
there's Uncle Jimmy, there's Uncle jim They're clapping.
Speaker 2 (32:23):
It's adorable, it's wonderful. I never want my own kids.
I love kids.
Speaker 1 (32:28):
Never, but not like there wasn't a time in your
life and you're twenty for thirty.
Speaker 2 (32:34):
No. Never.
Speaker 4 (32:35):
And I know women who were single women who got
to forty and said, I'm going to become pregnant.
Speaker 2 (32:41):
I need to have a child. It is a real
need for people.
Speaker 1 (32:45):
Yes, it's interesting I needed a child. I didn't need
to get pregnant, but I definitely knew I needed a
child when I hit thirty and I felt like I
had achieved so much in movies, and I did all
these amazing movies in a row. Yes you did, and
you know, then I went and did Yeah, and then
I did Broadway and then I'm like, Okay, now it's
time to have a kid.
Speaker 2 (33:04):
And have Parker. Was it during Greece or during the show.
Speaker 1 (33:08):
Right after Greece, before the show started, so he was
a few months old. He was like nine months old
or a year old when I started in uh ninety six,
because he was born in ninety five and he took
his first steps at thirty Rock in my dressing room.
Oh and yeah, it was wild. And I always think.
Speaker 4 (33:29):
I wonder if you and I would be friends if
I knew you back then, you know what.
Speaker 2 (33:33):
I mean, Like I, well, I tell you they know
each other.
Speaker 1 (33:36):
You know, Yeah, I didn't have enough time then, yeah,
because I was busy. You know, the show is hard
to do. When you look at like Kelly Clarkson or
you know, Stephen Colbert or Jimmy Fall, you have to
think this is a hard gig, and they've been doing
it for years and years.
Speaker 4 (33:53):
And years how hard it is. They think you show
up and it's fun and it's a great time. I mean,
I always think, you know, Broadway is a grind, but
doing a daytime television show is a grind. Sometimes you
don't want to be happy and have to talk to
some idiot who has a movie coming out. Sometimes you
probably just want to be angry all day or sad
all day.
Speaker 1 (34:12):
Well, you know, so something happens in the world, Columbine happened.
I couldn't stop crying. I could hardly do a show.
I could hardly talk and get I thought, how am
I going to do this? And luckily for me, I
had already decided that I was going to leave my
show and not resign the contract. And then nine to
eleven happened, and it really cemented that idea for me.
(34:34):
So I only had from September eleventh until June to
get through.
Speaker 2 (34:41):
And then I was done.
Speaker 1 (34:42):
And when world, you know, catastrophes happen, I don't do well.
And when I have a daily deliverable that could be
a problem.
Speaker 2 (34:52):
Yes, a daily deliverable, that's a great way to Yes.
Speaker 4 (34:55):
I mean even you know, I just had to go
through the death of my dog two weeks ago, and
it feels silly in a way because it's like, well,
it's a dog, but that dog was our child, that
was our fur covered child, and so you know, but
I but for me it was different because I knew
if I could get back to the show to spam
(35:16):
a lot, that it would make me happy, right, and
it did. I buried my dog, not buried, but we
said goodbye on Christmas Day, which was a Monday, and
I flew back the next day and I did the
show Tuesday night because I knew if I could get
back to that Broadway theater, yeah, I will be joyful.
And so someone well, and there's.
Speaker 1 (35:35):
Something I agree. There's something about doing a daily deliverable
like a Broadway show, where you are in an ensemble
and everyone is counting on you to be there for
yourself and for them, help them if they have a
problem or you know, so it almost lifts your spirits
and carries you through like the undertow, like it moves you,
(35:58):
you know, when it's all on you and it's the
Kelly Clarkson Show or the Rose o'donald, Yes, then it's
on you and you have to really deliver, you know,
every day without written lines, without pre written lines, just
an hour live every day and today with all of
the you know, cancelations and and you can't say this,
(36:21):
you can't say that, you know, I wonder how how
it would be to do the show live today. Not
a lot of the shows that you see on TV
or live anymore. That's Kelly, which is fun, Regis and Kelly,
and that's how old I am years ago, Kelly and Mark,
that's every day.
Speaker 7 (36:39):
Yeah, but that show was that it was an event.
Speaker 2 (36:43):
Every day.
Speaker 4 (36:43):
It was a live event, and I remember setting my
alarm so that I could tune in live to watch
it even before it was in the audience, right, you know,
it was the event. And you never knew She's going
to get in a food fight with Marjorie today? What
is she going to do to like, what's going to
happen today?
Speaker 8 (37:00):
An?
Speaker 1 (37:00):
Yeah, that we had a great point. We had the
greatest staff, we had the greatest environment. Everybody was happy
working there. Everybody felt appreciated. I think we got them
off on the summers. We had a nursery that they
could bring their kids to. I don't know. We tried
to make it good and I'm glad it came through.
But it was a joy to do and and those
(37:22):
six years were really, really wonderful. But I knew I
couldn't live at that altitude of fame. It was very,
very difficult.
Speaker 4 (37:29):
I need.
Speaker 1 (37:29):
It took a long time to get back down to earth,
you know.
Speaker 2 (37:32):
And read your I read your book, yeah, Celebrity Details,
Celebrity Detox.
Speaker 4 (37:37):
Yes, right, well you said I didn't even know how
to get home to my own house.
Speaker 1 (37:42):
Right because I've been driven, so you don't even know
that every day for six years, I didn't drive for
six years.
Speaker 2 (37:48):
Pretty. That's deep, that's deep, that's really deep.
Speaker 1 (37:53):
Life is good now, exactly. I'm enjoying my life as
it is. And listen, Jimmy, I enjoy you so much.
I'm so happy for all your success. I'm so happy
that we're friends. And I love you very much.
Speaker 2 (38:04):
I love you too.
Speaker 4 (38:05):
You're a wonderful You're a wonderful person. And you know,
it's funny when, like I said earlier, when you love
somebody through the TV and you don't really know them,
then you get to know them and they're even better.
Speaker 1 (38:18):
Oh that's the sweetest.
Speaker 2 (38:21):
You're even better. You're even better not through the TV.
Speaker 1 (38:24):
Well, thank you so much. I will be not through
the TV, I think, from now on. But that's okay.
I had some good times on that TV.
Speaker 2 (38:32):
You'll be back. You'll be back.
Speaker 1 (38:34):
You never know. People want, But I love you, and
we're gonna go when we're gonna, you know, answer some questions.
Speaker 2 (38:39):
And right, that sounds good, all.
Speaker 1 (38:42):
Right, Jimmy Spagoula starring right now in spam a lot
on Broadway. Also baby mouth this podcast, I did not
give it a listen. It's give it a listen. It's
on there all right, sweet, thank you so much.
Speaker 2 (38:53):
I love you.
Speaker 1 (38:54):
We'll be right back with a couple of questions from you,
our lovely listeners. That's my buddy, Jimmy Smagoola And we're
back and we now have some questions from you.
Speaker 2 (39:17):
Here we go, Hi, Rosie.
Speaker 8 (39:21):
My name is Alessandri. I would like to know, if possible,
what are the three movies that you most like, the
ones that you go when you need to forget everything
and just watch a move and relax. Mine are Out
of Africa, The Way We Wore and The House of Spirits.
(39:50):
Those are the movies that I watch when I need
to forget about everything else. Thank you for everything, and
thank you for your podcast. I'm a big fan. And
take care, bye bye.
Speaker 1 (40:05):
Thank you. Alas Chandri. That's a beautiful name, and that's
a wonderful question. You know, it's funny. The first movie
that came to my mind, of course, is the Sound
of Music, because there, you know, we fight against Nazis.
We sing in harmony and we climb over the Mountains
to Freedom. It seems to me the perfect film, and
(40:26):
it is by far my favorite one. And it's funny
that you said out of Africa because I had just
started college. Could it have been or I was just
out of college. I don't remember. But the movie came
out and I had been at a party all night
long at college and I went in the morning to
(40:48):
go see it. And this is how much I saw,
I Once Set to Farm in Africa. I fell asleep.
Speaker 3 (40:55):
When I woke up, I heard I Once Set a
Farm in Africa.
Speaker 1 (41:00):
I was like, well, that was a lot of money
for a nap. So that's so funny. But it is
a beautiful film. I have seen it since, but try
not to fall asleep after the first line. The other
movies the way we were, I agree, that gives me
thrills and chills. And I love the movie Mulin Rouge.
(41:21):
Yes you can, can Can. There's so many movies for me.
But you know what really lifts my soul and my
spirit when I want to really just get away and
be in my own space with my own brain. Broadway musicals.
You know, I go to see or I put on
a musical, or I just Broadway musicals lift me. They've
(41:42):
been the life raft so many times in the middle
of my stormy life, and I've gotten to the shore
safely thanks to Broadway musicals. So that's what I would say.
But thank you for the question, honey, and thank you
for calling. And I hope that I hope you're good. Okay,
we got one more, Britney, Britney speeze.
Speaker 9 (42:02):
Hi, Rosie. My name is Brittany. I am calling you
from outside of Palm Springs, California. I do have a
question for you. What is the one question you always
wished that someone would ask you? And what's your answer
to that question? Thank you, love you hmm.
Speaker 1 (42:23):
Brittany. Hi, Brittany, you know what, I can't even think
of one because I've been asked pretty much everything.
Speaker 4 (42:34):
You know.
Speaker 1 (42:34):
I've been at this business for over thirty years and
I've been asked many, many, many things in different interviews.
So I would have to think about that. Brittany. Can
I think about that and get back to you because
or go on my TikTok. When I finally figure it out,
I'll say, hey, Brittany from the podcast, this one's for you,
(42:57):
and I will figure out what that question could be.
I've really got to spend some time thinking of that one,
because off the top of my head, I can't think
of one. You know, I'm sorry. I feel like I've
failed the listeners. Thank you. All right, everyone, that's all
(43:17):
we got. On next week's show, we will listen to
and talk about the messages you left after listening to
the Lyle Menendez episode. So if you like, listen to
that episode again. So that's next week's show, and hey, everyone,
no choice onward. See you next week.
Hey, everybody, you found me, Rosie O'Donnell right here onward
with me, Rosie O'Donnell. Thanks for tuning in everybody. I
know you've probably heard the news from my TikTok if
you're a frequent listener. But Julie Andrews has returned. Yes,
I was gone, and then I went away for the
weekend to oh Hi, and then I came home yesterday
(00:34):
and I just sat out there for a couple of hours,
and sure enough, a whole bunch of new squirrels are there.
I mean, I don't even know where they came from,
where they live, but two of them are very chestnut
golden brown colored, a boy and a girl, and they
each took a walnut from me from my hand on
(00:55):
day one. That was like such a victory. And then
Julie came down, which was just the most fantastic thing.
I don't even know how to explain it. I don't,
I really don't. But you know, I'm a little nervous
that the dog that we're getting, the Autism service dog,
(01:15):
will chase the squirrels. But apparently they don't chase squirrels,
but their dogs, I think, aren't they going to chase squirrels.
I don't know. But right now, while you're listening to this,
I am actually in the training for the dog that
we're getting. I have to go for ten days. Can
you believe that to be trained to be the handler.
Speaker 2 (01:37):
Of the dog.
Speaker 1 (01:38):
It's probably going to be a lab. It could be
a lab doodle, or it could be a golden but
I'm pretty sure it's going to be a lab. And
you know, I told them we wanted a girl, and
that was our only request, was a girl, whatever one
they think would be good for our family and for
you know, my kiddo's needs. So many people. I know
(02:00):
it's with autism. And I've heard from a lot of
moms who've already had the dog and for a couple
of years this their dog, and they tell me how
much it changed the life of their autistic child. And
you know, that's that's the big goal here, more participation
(02:20):
in life and going out of the house and when
panic or whatever comes, the dog can go cuddle. And
I'm ready to do it. I'm making a commitment. We'll
see what happens. Good luck me, you know, ten days anywhere,
good luck me? You know, I don't know. I made
(02:42):
a very kind of obnoxious comment. I said, excuse me,
but what kind of sheets do you have?
Speaker 3 (02:49):
And the other people are like what, I'm like, no
in the bed there, because I have trouble sleeping. If
I can I bring my own sheets? What size is
the best? Like, I'm asking them all these questions. So
the people are like, I cannot believe that that's what
you're asking.
Speaker 1 (03:03):
I'm like, it's the thing. I'm most worried about. Sleeping
in a strange place with the new dog for ten
days alone without my kiddo. That's gonna be tough. But onward, people,
what other choice do we have? On word? Okay, listen
today's episode my good friend Jimmy Smagoula, star of Stage,
(03:25):
screen and TV. I met Jimmy over twenty years ago
when he was picked to play a game on my
talk show and he stood up in the audience and
sang his way into my heart. And you know, sometimes
you just connect to people and like you know them
your whole life. You know. I don't know how it happens,
but sometimes it does. And that's what happened with me
(03:45):
and Jimmy Smagoula. And we've been really close friends ever
since and I love the guy and he is killing
it in Spam a Lot on Broadway. He's done so
many Broadway shows and he's a barrel of laughs. Here's
me and Jimmy Smagoola, Happy New Year. Happy Jimmy Smagoula
(04:21):
starting We're started. I love just shut right in.
Speaker 2 (04:25):
The Flintstones, my friend. Happy new Now you.
Speaker 1 (04:29):
Now you star of spam a Lot getting specifically called
out in the New York Times interview for a brilliant performance.
Speaker 2 (04:37):
That nice. Thank you?
Speaker 1 (04:39):
How did you feel, Jim? I mean what, First of all,
what number show is this for you?
Speaker 4 (04:43):
This is my eighth Broadway show, which is a miracle.
I am a kid from New Jersey who grew up
much like you did, wanting to feel that waxy playbill
in my hand every single night of my childhood and
my parents I I would sneak into the city on
the Path train and just walk around the Broadway theater district.
Speaker 2 (05:05):
I didn't have any money.
Speaker 4 (05:06):
I would just walk around and look at the theater
and if the show was going on on a Wednesday afternoon,
I would go into the box office just to listen
to the show through the doors.
Speaker 2 (05:16):
Yeah, I would.
Speaker 1 (05:17):
Get go the days those you're you're so young that
you don't remember. I would get like stand by tickets
for ten dollars.
Speaker 2 (05:25):
Yes, I would do.
Speaker 4 (05:26):
I'd do even better than that row when I was
at NYU, which I went on a scholarship because we
had no money. But when I was at NYU, I
would stand in front of the theater a half hour
before the show, and when the people were going in,
I'd say, anybody have an extra ticket for a drama student.
Anybody had, and I would always get an extra ticket.
Speaker 1 (05:43):
Wow.
Speaker 4 (05:44):
The rich people would go, oh, my uncle's not coming,
he sick. Here you go, kid, And I would sit.
I mean, I just any whatever it took for me
to be able to sit in a Broadway theater. And
you know, I remember I saw Phantom of the Opera
when I was thirteen years old. My aunt Liz, God
rest your soul, she died when she was ninety two.
She took me because I grew up in New Jersey,
(06:06):
and they had a city trip, a town trip on
the school bus and we went and we sat in
the rear mezzanine and I sat all the way up
against the right side of the theater, in the back
of the theater and I watched Phantom of the Opera,
and then fourteen years later, I was in Phantom of
the Opera at the same theater, and I would look
(06:27):
up at the exact seat I sat in.
Speaker 2 (06:30):
Yes, can you believe that?
Speaker 1 (06:33):
Can you imagine, Jimmy, if you or I were not
born in the Tri State area, I knew what would
have happened. If we were born in Kansas.
Speaker 2 (06:41):
We would have made it.
Speaker 4 (06:42):
No, we would have made it here because I performed
with guys all the time. You met that kid, Daniel
Beeman who's in my show, who's thirty years old. He
was in Funny Girl. Now he's in my show. He's
in the ANSOMBI grow up in oh Maha, Nebraska. There's
a kid from Missouri in my show. They come from
all over the world. I performed with kids from Australia
(07:03):
when I was in Billy Elliott.
Speaker 2 (07:04):
You find a way?
Speaker 1 (07:06):
Yeah, you know? You really do? You really do? And
tell everyone? Tell well, we have a little audio clip
of when you and I met each other for the
very first time.
Speaker 4 (07:17):
And no one believes that it's for the first time,
but people, it was for the first time.
Speaker 1 (07:22):
I was doing my show, and we have this guy,
Joey Kohla, who would get all the contestants I had
nothing to do with. Who was josen? And I went
up and well, I don't even have to tell you.
Let's take a list.
Speaker 5 (07:38):
Jimmy, what you're doing, Jimmy, I'm a struggling actor, No kidd,
I'm an unemployed actor.
Speaker 1 (07:49):
Most actors are unemployed.
Speaker 4 (07:51):
What have you done, jim I've done some fun stuff, Rosie,
like what I was on the national tour of The
Phantom of the Opera at a little bit of a time.
Speaker 1 (07:57):
Excuse me, sing for me. Jimmy's being Spinola. What was
I thinking?
Speaker 2 (08:02):
You know, being alive?
Speaker 1 (08:03):
And he's prepared? Somebody hold me too close listening to you.
Speaker 2 (08:10):
Somebody heard me.
Speaker 6 (08:12):
Oh my god, somebody's sitting in my chair and ruined
my sleep and make me aware of being.
Speaker 1 (08:23):
What a voice you have, sir. And now I'm hugging him.
Now I just go Can he live in my house
and sing to me all the time?
Speaker 2 (08:31):
And my heart is funding so fast?
Speaker 1 (08:34):
Yeah? Now, that was the first time that that that
first time, that was the first time that we met.
Speaker 2 (08:39):
That was the first time we ever met. And I
told and I.
Speaker 1 (08:42):
Just felt I felt like I knew you for millions
of years.
Speaker 2 (08:46):
Well, I of course.
Speaker 4 (08:48):
I mean that's what makes you so as such an
incredible human being is that we all feel like we've
known you for millions of years. But I remember being
a kid watching Star Search and saying to my father Daddy,
my favorites coming on today, Rosie O'Donnell, she's gonna win.
Speaker 2 (09:05):
I got a. I mean, how old could I have been?
Speaker 1 (09:08):
It was eighty four. I was eighty four.
Speaker 2 (09:11):
I was nine years old.
Speaker 1 (09:12):
You were nine years old. I was twenty two years old.
And then I went out there. Yeah, and you know,
it's so it's so funny. It's a New York thing.
Maybe it's a past life thing. It's maybe it's a
love of Broadway thing.
Speaker 2 (09:28):
Yeah, you know, Yes, I don't know.
Speaker 4 (09:30):
But to be friends with you now, after dreaming about
being friends with you for most of my life, is
a very wonderful, odd, special experience.
Speaker 1 (09:41):
But you know, it's interesting because I don't feel any
of that coming from you in the best way. I'm
not complaining, believe me, I'm just saying, I just you're
just one of my friends. Like I'd never I don't
ever think could you know, Oh, oh, remember I met him,
And I just think of this Jimmy, Jimmy and Richard.
Speaker 4 (09:57):
Because I don't think of you as TV's Rosy O'Donnell.
I think if it was my friend Roro, You're just
my friend. And literally, if you said to me tomorrow
I'm quitting show business, I'm gonna go work at the
grocery store, I would still be your friend. You're just
a wonderful person to have as a friend. You've been
such a confidant for me. I've told you things I've
(10:18):
never told anybody.
Speaker 1 (10:19):
Else, and I'm going to tell the audience right now.
Believe me, I'm not I've told you a couple of
things myself. And there was that vacation we took to Florida,
Oh that we all had to swear on a bunch
of Pat Conroy novels that we would never tell what
(10:39):
happened that week.
Speaker 2 (10:40):
You know, I said to you once, why are you
my friend?
Speaker 4 (10:44):
You are in your sixties, You've had this incredible, big life,
You have so many friends, and yet at your age
and your experience in life, you still bring people in.
I mean, you've really brought me into your inner circle.
It's not like you're peripheral friends. You are one of
my dear friends now.
Speaker 1 (11:04):
And yes, and Jim, that's all that life is about
is to other people in your world. It really is.
And as I go through trying to figure out, you know,
where's the right place for me and my kiddo. And
you know, my other children are still in the New York,
New Jersey area, and I want them to know each other,
(11:27):
the children, and to be even though there's a ten
year age gap between Viv and Dakota slash Clay. I, yes,
I know that it's hard to bridge that gap, but
I think it's so important, especially for a kid with
special needs, you know, a kid with autism who doesn't
(11:48):
always perceive the world in the way that you think
they are. You know, it's it's been very interesting, but
I think it's all about the people. You know. It's
when you said if I worked in a grocery store,
you know, the place I love to go the most
is the grocery store because you can make the cashiers laugh.
And you know, it was funny. During the height of
(12:10):
my fame, it wasn't as much fun to go out
in public and make people laugh because they were expecting
you to make them laugh, because you made them laugh
every day on TV for an hour, and they have
assumed a familiarity. And yet that kept me separate from
them and not able to be equal. But now that
I have gray hair and I'm older and people don't
(12:33):
know it's me. Sometimes if I don't talk, they don't
know at all. And it's been beautiful for me to
remember how wonderful it is to make an anonymous human
connection with another person.
Speaker 4 (12:46):
That is so beautiful, And it must be nice for
you to feel that it's an authentic connection. Well, I
can tell you connection with the celebrity, it's just correction
with a human.
Speaker 1 (12:58):
I can tell when people reckon, even if they don't
say it, I can't feel it. I can tell, right,
But when people don't, I go in, you know, I
go like, okay, let's do this human to human.
Speaker 2 (13:10):
But you love people?
Speaker 1 (13:11):
Yeah, but I do love people. I do love people more.
Coming up next, don't go anywhere.
Speaker 6 (13:39):
You know.
Speaker 4 (13:39):
You came to Spam a lot, and it meant so
much to so many of us, and the wardrobe people
and the crew, and you stayed with us for forty
five minutes and it made me so happy to see
you so happy because people were so happy to see you,
and you should know you'll always have a place on Broadway.
(13:59):
No one will ever forget what you did for Broadway shows.
You single handedly saved some of them during.
Speaker 1 (14:07):
Yes, but you know what, They've saved me more times
than I can imagine. Every time in my life that
there's something really hard and really difficult emotionally to get through,
it's always a musical that brings me back.
Speaker 2 (14:20):
It's increating.
Speaker 1 (14:21):
And I remember with stuff with Chelsea, you know, which
is a challenge still. Yes, that was when Hamilton came out,
and when I was in therapy, the therapist kept saying,
you know you never crying here? How come you never
cry in here about this? You're so upset, I can tell,
but you hold it all back. I go come with
(14:42):
me to see Hamilton, because I would go once a week.
That's how much I needed to go. I needed to
hear the song about forgiveness. I needed to hear the
brilliance of that score and see the artistry on stage
and be taken out of myself, I know, and I
sure was. And I've been grateful my whole life for
(15:07):
Broadway because I don't know what I would have done.
Speaker 4 (15:09):
Not to play a therapist here, But it's probably a
real connection to your own mother, because I know she's
the one who introduced you to Barbara Streisan, and Barbara
is a broad you know, the ultimate Broadway star.
Speaker 2 (15:20):
And I'm sure that you.
Speaker 4 (15:22):
Feel your mom's love and you feel all those feelings
that you felt when you were a kid when you
go to a Broadway show.
Speaker 1 (15:29):
Yeah, I definitely do. I remember her taking us to
Radio City Musical and there was a story where she
auditioned for the Rockets and she got in but her
which is sort of strange because she was short from
what I remember. But anyway, this is the family lore.
And then when someone dies, you never know if it
was true or you.
Speaker 2 (15:46):
Know what I mean.
Speaker 1 (15:48):
Family, Yeah, nobody, nobody really knew. But she loved the
Rockets and she loved going and taking us there and
you're getting the lemon drops and having our hands covered
with sugar, you know, the night.
Speaker 4 (16:01):
And I remember when you got your first Emmy award
and you were crying and you said, I sat there
with my mother.
Speaker 2 (16:08):
Yes, it's so beautiful like.
Speaker 1 (16:09):
You in the top row, the third balcony in the back.
Speaker 2 (16:13):
I had no money. We sat in the back.
Speaker 4 (16:15):
I was so I felt so lucky to be sitting
in the back. I felt lucky to be sitting anywhere,
you know it was. I took my dad to his
first Broadway show when I was twelve, which was my
show's Broadway show, Lame Is. I remember it was at
the Broadway Theater and the whole side of the theater
was painted as Young Cosette, the.
Speaker 2 (16:34):
Whole big side of the theater.
Speaker 4 (16:36):
And I knew a girl in it. I was in
this little performing group called Pro Kids. I must have
been eleven or twelve, and she was Young Cosette. Twice
a week she sang Castle on a Cloud and she said,
come before the show and I'll give you and your
dad a tour backstage. And so we did, and I
was an aw My dad bought me the little cassette
and I listened to it every day, three times a
(16:57):
day for two weeks before we went. And after the show,
I just knew that's what I wanted to do. But
my blue collar truck driver father, who never went to
college and never went to a Broadway show and intermission
stood up and said get your coat, and I said, Daddy,
it's not over it's only intermission. It goes, oh, it's halftime.
It's nine forty five. He said, how is this thing,
(17:19):
because you know, le miss is over three hours long. Yes,
then you know those memories there. I just saw Here
Lies Love at the same theater, the Broadway Theater, and
I walked in there and I thought, my god, I
I walked in here with my dad thirty something years ago,
thirty five years ago.
Speaker 1 (17:34):
Wild. Isn't it wild? When you go into a Broadway theater,
you sit down, you're watching the show, and you realize,
I performed in this theater. Yeah, I did Susical here
like I sometimes I'm like, that was my entrance through
that stage door right there.
Speaker 4 (17:47):
You know, road Didn't you do Susical and the Rosie
O'donnald Show at the same time?
Speaker 2 (17:52):
Or is that crazy?
Speaker 1 (17:53):
And I had two foster kids and three kids.
Speaker 2 (17:57):
It was I mean, I'm sure, Yanity, but how much.
Speaker 1 (17:59):
I had helped? Of course I had helped, But you
know what, it was like a mania. It was like
a hyper like you know, I mean, I don't know
when I really when I look back and I think
of the amount of stuff that happened in my life
from the time I was thirty to the time I
was forty. Oh, it's unbelievable. You did it all that
(18:22):
in that decade. I did it all. Then I said,
check please, because you.
Speaker 4 (18:26):
Get nervous when you were like hosting the I watched,
you know, I watched the old Tony Awards. I watch
you host them. I think I feel like you never
you told me once you never get nervous.
Speaker 1 (18:35):
I don't really, you know. You know what's interesting, Jim.
Just recently I did a short film for Carol Leafer
with Kevin Pollack. Yes and again, a lot of Chelsea
stuff going down, and yes, I could not sleep, I
couldn't eat, I couldn't remember my lines. And I got
there and I I said to her, I'm really sorry everyone.
(18:57):
This is going on in my family and I haven't
been able to you know. And at the end of
we did all their coverage first, and then at the
end they almost did me line by line, you know,
and I just went, Wow, it's not the same as
it was. I don't have the ability to leave everything
(19:18):
else at the door anymore.
Speaker 4 (19:21):
You know.
Speaker 1 (19:21):
It goes with me and I find it. As you're
older and in the days you have left are shorter.
You try to mend and fix all of the things
like in real time, like it used to be, like, no,
I'm working, I have a show, as if the most
important thing in life is a show, right, you know.
Speaker 4 (19:40):
Well, at thirty five or thirty two it was it. Sure,
maybe it may have been for you, but that's not
how it is.
Speaker 5 (19:46):
You know.
Speaker 4 (19:46):
I keep saying backstage, no one over thirty five years
old should do a Broadway show. They should take your
equity card away when you turn thirty five because it's
too much, it's too exhausting.
Speaker 1 (19:55):
Well, you know who just at Emma Stone did Cabaret, right,
and she said at the Golden Globes, I don't know
that I could do another one. I thought, oh, it'll
only be three hours a day. She's like, it killed me.
It is so exhausting. And you have to have so
much discipline to take care of yourself and your throat,
(20:16):
and you're always surrounded in close contact with many other people,
and everyone's getting sick and you're trying not to miss
a show. It's really like Olympic athlete type stuff.
Speaker 4 (20:26):
Yes, and I've been sick for three weeks, and you know,
it's just and we're all sick, and there's COVID happening again,
and COVID is surging in New York, and I'm wearing
a mask again on the subway, and it's and mentally too.
It's just difficult, you know, Thank God, every single person
I'm not just saying this. Every person in that theater
is incredible. Where I work, it's incredible.
Speaker 1 (20:48):
Yes, And if you're saying Jimmy, honestly, let me just
talk a little bit about Spamalot. I thought it was
so freaking funny and the cast was so good. There
wasn't any moment where the quality dropped for a second.
Everyone hit it out of the park and it was
a joy to watch and a beautiful night of theater,
(21:10):
it really was.
Speaker 2 (21:11):
We were all so excited that you were there.
Speaker 4 (21:14):
And you know, anytime you go to see any Broadway show,
I think everybody's just so happy to see you and
you're welcome with open arms anytime you always have a
community experience. I just love you and lift you up
on Broadway forever.
Speaker 1 (21:29):
Yes, And I you know, I love that community. It
is to me where showbiz is most like what I
dreamed it would be. Oh wow, I don't find that,
you know, movie making Hollywood. You're always in a car.
You have to drive fifty minutes to get to anyone.
There's no real community, but there it's like fifteen blocks. Yeah,
(21:49):
and everybody is in that is little area and they're
running to the theater and they're going to get it
bite after at the same places that are open, and
you really come to be a part of something so
much bigger than you.
Speaker 2 (22:03):
You know. It was it was.
Speaker 1 (22:05):
Jony Sorry then I'll shut up. It was Joni Mitchell
that said about Hollywood, this illusionary place, this scared, hard
edged rat race or liberty is laced with borderlines.
Speaker 2 (22:15):
Oh you know, God, And where are we trying to
get to? You know?
Speaker 4 (22:19):
I hate that phrase. I want to make it. I
just want to make it. Where do you live? Where
are you going?
Speaker 1 (22:26):
You know, Jim. The saddest thing that I ever saw
about show business was Joan River's last documentary, Oh where
she was a grandmother in the back of the car
with her hands on her mint coat and her Bentley
and she's calling her agent and she's still trying to
make it somewhere or whatever whatever it was. She was
(22:49):
eighty years old. I know, and I thought, oh my god,
if that happens to me, somebody take me out to
a field somewhere there was no you know, and it
just made it broke my heart. It broke my heart.
Speaker 2 (23:01):
It is heartbreaking. And you know what's interesting.
Speaker 4 (23:03):
I have gotten to work with a lot of celebrities,
a lot of people who have quote unquote made it right,
big stars, Emmy Award winners, and I worked with one person.
I won't say who it is, but I worked with
one person in a show, big star, multiple Emmy Awards,
and he said to me once, I'll never carry a movie.
(23:25):
I'll never be Will Ferrell or Jack Black. No one
will ever ever trust me to carry a comedic movie ever.
It's so disappointing to me. It's so depressing to me.
And I thought to myself, this.
Speaker 7 (23:36):
Guy who, from my perception, has it all, a big
house in LA and so much money, successful, multiple awards
for everything, and.
Speaker 2 (23:49):
He's depressed about his career. He's said he's frustrated.
Speaker 4 (23:53):
So when you start to learn that as an actor
who's trying to get somewhere, I stopped trying to get anywhere.
I just want to work. I just love working. I
love acting I love working. I don't care about getting anywhere.
Speaker 1 (24:07):
But when you realize that there's nowhere get, there's nowhere
to get, there's no where to get, And that's in life.
Speaker 4 (24:13):
It's all about the journey. There's no destination for anybody, anybody,
no matter what. And if you can make a couple
of your dreams come true, that's it, you know. And
have a beautiful family and beautiful friends and laugh. I mean,
Norman Lee just died at one hundred and one years old.
All he did was laugh. I was so lucky to
know him a little bit. And I know you did too.
(24:35):
And he loved to laugh, and he loved people, and
he loved to talk and get together and that's it.
Speaker 8 (24:42):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (24:42):
I think that's it too. I think that's why he
lived so long too. Yes, you know he was constantly
all of.
Speaker 2 (24:49):
These guys who were just all day, you know.
Speaker 1 (24:52):
Right, and and they kind of knew a little something
about love, you know, Yes, they really, they really did.
Speaker 2 (24:59):
They did.
Speaker 1 (25:00):
Do you like doing tell everybody about your own podcast?
Do you have your own pipe?
Speaker 4 (25:04):
I do, and I'll tell you I haven't done you well.
First of all, you were the first guests. Yes, I
was thank you very much. It's called baby mouth and
every episode. So I grew up in New Jersey and
my mother literally fed me the same ten foods from
my entire childhood up until I was eighteen the day,
meat loaf, chicken, chicken fingers, pizza every Friday, because Jesus
(25:29):
didn't want us to eat meat on Fridays for some
reason which I still didn't understand. I think the Pope
in like nineteen seventy two said you can eat meat again,
and my father said, not, my Pope, And we still
don't have meat on Sunday.
Speaker 1 (25:41):
We didn't either. We did pizza on Fridays.
Speaker 4 (25:43):
Every friend we'd have grilled cheese for lunch and pizza
for dinner. It was never meat. Sundays, we'd have a
big Italian pasta and sausage and garlic bread. But I
never had sushi. I never had tuna fish, which is
what you and I did. I never had a caesar salad.
Thought pad tie was a soup. I didn't know that
was noodles. That's still delicious, noodle delicious, yeah, good tie.
Speaker 1 (26:08):
Now, Badi and.
Speaker 2 (26:09):
I love sushi.
Speaker 4 (26:11):
I go to sugarfish and no bou when my fancy
friends take me to Nobu.
Speaker 2 (26:15):
I can go Rosie, but it's delicious.
Speaker 4 (26:18):
So I said to myself, I'm going to start this
podcast where every week a friend of mine will come
on and I'll do a favorite food of theirs, and
I'll try it for the first time.
Speaker 2 (26:28):
Now it's not always successful. Tuna fish, I didn't enjoy.
Speaker 1 (26:31):
You did not like it. And I was hoping for
the first one that you would have been like yes,
but no, I.
Speaker 2 (26:36):
Didn't choose too much fish and I don't.
Speaker 1 (26:39):
And the mayonnaise for the way you're prepared wasn't good
for me. The capers you didn't like, the cap't.
Speaker 2 (26:45):
Like any of that now on a driss gape. Not good.
Speaker 4 (26:48):
And my mother said I could have eaten that whole thing.
My mother's name Tuna fish.
Speaker 1 (26:53):
I love it too. Why didn't you make it for
you as a kid.
Speaker 2 (26:55):
I don't know.
Speaker 4 (26:56):
She never did, and she would say to me, I
would always you know, she's our my podcast. Every episode
she's at the end and I say to her, why
didn't you feed me this? And we tell stories and
she tells me stories of her childhood. And but I
haven't recorded a new episode because I've been so busy
you know, I've produced it and I have to edit it,
(27:16):
and I have to get the guest in the food
and my mother on Zoom, which is its.
Speaker 2 (27:19):
Own show, My challenge as challenge.
Speaker 4 (27:23):
You know, she's seventy seven and it's hard to get
her on Zoom. But I love I love doing that podcast.
Speaker 1 (27:29):
What is the food that you are most surprised that
you love?
Speaker 2 (27:33):
Sushi? Absolutely?
Speaker 4 (27:34):
She she like a tuna shashimi, just raw red and
it tastes like a hamburger.
Speaker 2 (27:41):
To me, it tasted deliverous. But I couldn't believe how
good that was the sushi.
Speaker 1 (27:47):
I love sushi. There's something amazing about really good food.
Speaker 4 (27:51):
And it took me a healthy are for me. I
had Free with you the first time in Miami.
Speaker 1 (27:57):
Yes, didn't you love it?
Speaker 2 (27:58):
It was good? I'd like that. Yeah, surprising, right, Yeah,
it was surprising. I don't know. It's good to try
new things.
Speaker 4 (28:05):
And now I can really go to any restaurant and
try because you know, I couldn't go any place I
was too afraid. Fear is not a good thing to
have in life at all at all. I even tell
like if I work with young actors like you got
to work on the thing that scares you the most
and the thing you're worst at. You know, that's you
as an actor. When people see you in dramatic roles,
(28:27):
they go crazy because you didn't do them for so long.
But you see, I know this much is true, and
these incredible roles, and you bring so much to these
dramatic roles and that's well, thank you. An incredible thing.
But you said no to the fear of doing that.
I'm sure you must.
Speaker 2 (28:44):
Yeah, learned.
Speaker 1 (28:45):
Yeah, I was a little concerned, but I also knew,
you know, I knew that I could do it. I
knew that I had it in me in not an
arrogant way. Just I read the script and you know,
especially with I know this much is true. When I
met Derek the director in Front, and he said, do
you know this character, I said, oh, yes, because the
(29:06):
woman who raised me was a social worker after my
mom died, and I know exactly this person. And he's
the one who said will you cut your hair, shave
the sides and leave it front? And I was like sure, So,
you know, well I like it. You know, a lot
of people, when they're mad, mostly about my Trump comments,
come on and leave mean messages on my TikTok, and
(29:27):
they'll all say things like, oh yeah, hey dude, nice hair, butchy,
as if I didn't cut it this way myself, as
if I was like in a gang and they were
forcing me to.
Speaker 4 (29:37):
Cut my lesbian dyky lesbian gang. That's good, yeah, right,
excuse you to cut your hair. No, it looks incredible.
Speaker 1 (29:45):
No, I like it because number one, it's so easy,
and number two, I was never one of the girls
who knew how to like take my long hair and
throw it in a messy bun, right right right. I
always look like the kid who didn't have a mother,
who didn't get her hair brushed, you know, like yeah, yeah,
it's so deep really in a lot of ways, you know.
And recently Dakota did it. Dakota told me h Clay
(30:09):
a few months ago. She said, Mommy, my hair no
longer fits my head.
Speaker 2 (30:14):
Wow.
Speaker 1 (30:15):
And I said, that's fascinating. What do you think we
should do about that? And they said, I think I
need to get it cut. So we went through all
the pictures that I had of them at different ages
and said, if now you had at this length, at
one point, you had at this So she chose sort
of where it is like at her at her collar
(30:36):
or her shoulders, and she's so they are so much
happier with it that way, and.
Speaker 4 (30:43):
It's amazing the the.
Speaker 2 (30:46):
There's such a wise little kid.
Speaker 4 (30:49):
I mean, they're just a little kids, and yet they
so much about themselves. That's what I'm always fascinated by, Clay.
Whenever I'm with them, whenever they're in the room, well,
whenever I hear them say anything or you tell me
something that they say, I go like, oh my god,
they're only eleven years old.
Speaker 1 (31:06):
I'm constantly amazed by what they come up with and
the perspective with which they see the world.
Speaker 2 (31:13):
It's beautiful. It's really beautiful.
Speaker 1 (31:16):
Autism is a different operating system, and I don't know
if you've ever tried to go from Microsoft Word to Apple.
You know, very few people are fluent in both, you know,
and I feel like I.
Speaker 2 (31:28):
Get that as a mother and as a para.
Speaker 1 (31:30):
Well that's that's the question. Stay tuned for more with
me and Jimmy Smagola.
Speaker 4 (31:57):
We don't know anything. You just don't know, and that's
the fun of life. And I imagine that's the joy
and surprise of parenting. You know, I never had any
desire to be a parent. I love kids, I love babies.
I love I have a niece and a nephew who
are the cutest things in the world. And they saw
me on the Thanksgiving Day parade with spam a lot,
(32:18):
and my brother sent me a video of them going,
there's Uncle Jimmy, there's Uncle jim They're clapping.
Speaker 2 (32:23):
It's adorable, it's wonderful. I never want my own kids.
I love kids.
Speaker 1 (32:28):
Never, but not like there wasn't a time in your
life and you're twenty for thirty.
Speaker 2 (32:34):
No. Never.
Speaker 4 (32:35):
And I know women who were single women who got
to forty and said, I'm going to become pregnant.
Speaker 2 (32:41):
I need to have a child. It is a real
need for people.
Speaker 1 (32:45):
Yes, it's interesting I needed a child. I didn't need
to get pregnant, but I definitely knew I needed a
child when I hit thirty and I felt like I
had achieved so much in movies, and I did all
these amazing movies in a row. Yes you did, and
you know, then I went and did Yeah, and then
I did Broadway and then I'm like, Okay, now it's
time to have a kid.
Speaker 2 (33:04):
And have Parker. Was it during Greece or during the show.
Speaker 1 (33:08):
Right after Greece, before the show started, so he was
a few months old. He was like nine months old
or a year old when I started in uh ninety six,
because he was born in ninety five and he took
his first steps at thirty Rock in my dressing room.
Oh and yeah, it was wild. And I always think.
Speaker 4 (33:29):
I wonder if you and I would be friends if
I knew you back then, you know what.
Speaker 2 (33:33):
I mean, Like I, well, I tell you they know
each other.
Speaker 1 (33:36):
You know, Yeah, I didn't have enough time then, yeah,
because I was busy. You know, the show is hard
to do. When you look at like Kelly Clarkson or
you know, Stephen Colbert or Jimmy Fall, you have to
think this is a hard gig, and they've been doing
it for years and years.
Speaker 4 (33:53):
And years how hard it is. They think you show
up and it's fun and it's a great time. I mean,
I always think, you know, Broadway is a grind, but
doing a daytime television show is a grind. Sometimes you
don't want to be happy and have to talk to
some idiot who has a movie coming out. Sometimes you
probably just want to be angry all day or sad
all day.
Speaker 1 (34:12):
Well, you know, so something happens in the world, Columbine happened.
I couldn't stop crying. I could hardly do a show.
I could hardly talk and get I thought, how am
I going to do this? And luckily for me, I
had already decided that I was going to leave my
show and not resign the contract. And then nine to
eleven happened, and it really cemented that idea for me.
(34:34):
So I only had from September eleventh until June to
get through.
Speaker 2 (34:41):
And then I was done.
Speaker 1 (34:42):
And when world, you know, catastrophes happen, I don't do well.
And when I have a daily deliverable that could be
a problem.
Speaker 2 (34:52):
Yes, a daily deliverable, that's a great way to Yes.
Speaker 4 (34:55):
I mean even you know, I just had to go
through the death of my dog two weeks ago, and
it feels silly in a way because it's like, well,
it's a dog, but that dog was our child, that
was our fur covered child, and so you know, but
I but for me it was different because I knew
if I could get back to the show to spam
(35:16):
a lot, that it would make me happy, right, and
it did. I buried my dog, not buried, but we
said goodbye on Christmas Day, which was a Monday, and
I flew back the next day and I did the
show Tuesday night because I knew if I could get
back to that Broadway theater, yeah, I will be joyful.
And so someone well, and there's.
Speaker 1 (35:35):
Something I agree. There's something about doing a daily deliverable
like a Broadway show, where you are in an ensemble
and everyone is counting on you to be there for
yourself and for them, help them if they have a
problem or you know, so it almost lifts your spirits
and carries you through like the undertow, like it moves you,
(35:58):
you know, when it's all on you and it's the
Kelly Clarkson Show or the Rose o'donald, Yes, then it's
on you and you have to really deliver, you know,
every day without written lines, without pre written lines, just
an hour live every day and today with all of
the you know, cancelations and and you can't say this,
(36:21):
you can't say that, you know, I wonder how how
it would be to do the show live today. Not
a lot of the shows that you see on TV
or live anymore. That's Kelly, which is fun, Regis and Kelly,
and that's how old I am years ago, Kelly and Mark,
that's every day.
Speaker 7 (36:39):
Yeah, but that show was that it was an event.
Speaker 2 (36:43):
Every day.
Speaker 4 (36:43):
It was a live event, and I remember setting my
alarm so that I could tune in live to watch
it even before it was in the audience, right, you know,
it was the event. And you never knew She's going
to get in a food fight with Marjorie today? What
is she going to do to like, what's going to
happen today?
Speaker 8 (37:00):
An?
Speaker 1 (37:00):
Yeah, that we had a great point. We had the
greatest staff, we had the greatest environment. Everybody was happy
working there. Everybody felt appreciated. I think we got them
off on the summers. We had a nursery that they
could bring their kids to. I don't know. We tried
to make it good and I'm glad it came through.
But it was a joy to do and and those
(37:22):
six years were really, really wonderful. But I knew I
couldn't live at that altitude of fame. It was very,
very difficult.
Speaker 4 (37:29):
I need.
Speaker 1 (37:29):
It took a long time to get back down to earth,
you know.
Speaker 2 (37:32):
And read your I read your book, yeah, Celebrity Details,
Celebrity Detox.
Speaker 4 (37:37):
Yes, right, well you said I didn't even know how
to get home to my own house.
Speaker 1 (37:42):
Right because I've been driven, so you don't even know
that every day for six years, I didn't drive for
six years.
Speaker 2 (37:48):
Pretty. That's deep, that's deep, that's really deep.
Speaker 1 (37:53):
Life is good now, exactly. I'm enjoying my life as
it is. And listen, Jimmy, I enjoy you so much.
I'm so happy for all your success. I'm so happy
that we're friends. And I love you very much.
Speaker 2 (38:04):
I love you too.
Speaker 4 (38:05):
You're a wonderful You're a wonderful person. And you know,
it's funny when, like I said earlier, when you love
somebody through the TV and you don't really know them,
then you get to know them and they're even better.
Speaker 1 (38:18):
Oh that's the sweetest.
Speaker 2 (38:21):
You're even better. You're even better not through the TV.
Speaker 1 (38:24):
Well, thank you so much. I will be not through
the TV, I think, from now on. But that's okay.
I had some good times on that TV.
Speaker 2 (38:32):
You'll be back. You'll be back.
Speaker 1 (38:34):
You never know. People want, But I love you, and
we're gonna go when we're gonna, you know, answer some questions.
Speaker 2 (38:39):
And right, that sounds good, all.
Speaker 1 (38:42):
Right, Jimmy Spagoula starring right now in spam a lot
on Broadway. Also baby mouth this podcast, I did not
give it a listen. It's give it a listen. It's
on there all right, sweet, thank you so much.
Speaker 2 (38:53):
I love you.
Speaker 1 (38:54):
We'll be right back with a couple of questions from you,
our lovely listeners. That's my buddy, Jimmy Smagoola And we're
back and we now have some questions from you.
Speaker 2 (39:17):
Here we go, Hi, Rosie.
Speaker 8 (39:21):
My name is Alessandri. I would like to know, if possible,
what are the three movies that you most like, the
ones that you go when you need to forget everything
and just watch a move and relax. Mine are Out
of Africa, The Way We Wore and The House of Spirits.
(39:50):
Those are the movies that I watch when I need
to forget about everything else. Thank you for everything, and
thank you for your podcast. I'm a big fan. And
take care, bye bye.
Speaker 1 (40:05):
Thank you. Alas Chandri. That's a beautiful name, and that's
a wonderful question. You know, it's funny. The first movie
that came to my mind, of course, is the Sound
of Music, because there, you know, we fight against Nazis.
We sing in harmony and we climb over the Mountains
to Freedom. It seems to me the perfect film, and
(40:26):
it is by far my favorite one. And it's funny
that you said out of Africa because I had just
started college. Could it have been or I was just
out of college. I don't remember. But the movie came
out and I had been at a party all night
long at college and I went in the morning to
(40:48):
go see it. And this is how much I saw,
I Once Set to Farm in Africa. I fell asleep.
Speaker 3 (40:55):
When I woke up, I heard I Once Set a
Farm in Africa.
Speaker 1 (41:00):
I was like, well, that was a lot of money
for a nap. So that's so funny. But it is
a beautiful film. I have seen it since, but try
not to fall asleep after the first line. The other
movies the way we were, I agree, that gives me
thrills and chills. And I love the movie Mulin Rouge.
(41:21):
Yes you can, can Can. There's so many movies for me.
But you know what really lifts my soul and my
spirit when I want to really just get away and
be in my own space with my own brain. Broadway musicals.
You know, I go to see or I put on
a musical, or I just Broadway musicals lift me. They've
(41:42):
been the life raft so many times in the middle
of my stormy life, and I've gotten to the shore
safely thanks to Broadway musicals. So that's what I would say.
But thank you for the question, honey, and thank you
for calling. And I hope that I hope you're good. Okay,
we got one more, Britney, Britney speeze.
Speaker 9 (42:02):
Hi, Rosie. My name is Brittany. I am calling you
from outside of Palm Springs, California. I do have a
question for you. What is the one question you always
wished that someone would ask you? And what's your answer
to that question? Thank you, love you hmm.
Speaker 1 (42:23):
Brittany. Hi, Brittany, you know what, I can't even think
of one because I've been asked pretty much everything.
Speaker 4 (42:34):
You know.
Speaker 1 (42:34):
I've been at this business for over thirty years and
I've been asked many, many, many things in different interviews.
So I would have to think about that. Brittany. Can
I think about that and get back to you because
or go on my TikTok. When I finally figure it out,
I'll say, hey, Brittany from the podcast, this one's for you,
(42:57):
and I will figure out what that question could be.
I've really got to spend some time thinking of that one,
because off the top of my head, I can't think
of one. You know, I'm sorry. I feel like I've
failed the listeners. Thank you. All right, everyone, that's all
(43:17):
we got. On next week's show, we will listen to
and talk about the messages you left after listening to
the Lyle Menendez episode. So if you like, listen to
that episode again. So that's next week's show, and hey, everyone,
no choice onward. See you next week.
Popular Podcasts
On Purpose with Jay Shetty
I’m Jay Shetty host of On Purpose the worlds #1 Mental Health podcast and I’m so grateful you found us. I started this podcast 5 years ago to invite you into conversations and workshops that are designed to help make you happier, healthier and more healed. I believe that when you (yes you) feel seen, heard and understood you’re able to deal with relationship struggles, work challenges and life’s ups and downs with more ease and grace. I interview experts, celebrities, thought leaders and athletes so that we can grow our mindset, build better habits and uncover a side of them we’ve never seen before. New episodes every Monday and Friday. Your support means the world to me and I don’t take it for granted — click the follow button and leave a review to help us spread the love with On Purpose. I can’t wait for you to listen to your first or 500th episode!
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com