October 14, 2020 • 34 mins
Artists bring meaning to our lives that we simply couldn’t find elsewhere. What can we learn from those who are shaping our time through their creativity and courage? Billy Porter is an actor, singer, fashion icon, and activist who has devoted his life to art, as best seen in the groundbreaking hit series Pose. He joins Pete to discuss how fashion can be a form of activism, what it's like to confront and challenge the definition of masculinity, complications within the gay community, and being part of the generation who blazed the trail for queer artists.
Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.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 (00:05):
Hi, I'm Pete Bodh Judge and this is the deciding decade.
Sometimes people say politicians are like actors, and when they
say it, they usually don't mean it as a compliment.
There's some truth to that. Just look at our president,
who was a reality TV star who feels like he's
(00:26):
acting more than governing most of the time. But I
think that comparison often sells short the importance of actors
of artists in their vulnerability, their creativity, their courage. Artists
bring meaning to our lives that we simply couldn't find
anywhere else. So I don't think we give artists enough
credit for shaping and maybe even saving so many lives.
(00:49):
Art has shaped my life, especially music and literature that
helped me to understand who I am for my husband Chaston,
Theater and film have been the most impactful, and I've
noticed that we have turned to and dug further and
further into these creative sources to help us navigate the
times that we're facing right now, and we're seeing how
many of the experiences of the most vulnerable are being
(01:11):
given new expression through the arts today. So what can
art do for us going forward? And what can we
learn from those who are shaping our time through their
creativity and courage. My guest today speaks to this and
embodies this with boldness, courage, and grace, and I'm very
eager for you to hear from it. Billy Porter is
(01:33):
an actor, singer, fashion icon, and activist who you have
hopefully seen in the extraordinary and compelling TV show Pose.
He has started on Broadway off Broadway in film and television.
He performed at the Democratic National Convention this summer. He's
a Tony, Grammy and Emmy winner, and was the first
openly gay black man to be nominated for and win
(01:55):
in any leading acting category at the Primetime Emmy's On
an off screen, he has inspired so many in the
l g B t Q plus community and beyond with
his authenticity and his courage, and whose activism I think
is helping to change what's possible in our future. Welcome Billy,
and I have to ask, having uh mentioned your awards
in the introduction, what's the plan to get that? Oscar?
(02:21):
I don't really have a plan. First of all, thank
you for having me. It's so good to be having
this conversation with you. Pleasure. Um. You know I'm trying
to get some movies. I got some movies, I got
some plans. We're trying to make it happen. I don't know.
I've been in the business long enough to like hold
the idea of awards in a very specific kind of space.
(02:43):
I don't do it for the awards. I'm an artist first.
I'm gonna be practicing my art whether I win awards
or not, as that has been proven for the thirty
years prior to this moment in my life. Simultaneously, who
doesn't like to win awards? To be truthfully honest with you,
(03:03):
As a black, gay artist, they actually do mean something
for me, a lot more than they do from my
white counterparts. They do open doors for me that are
open to my white counterparts anyway. So they don't have
to win awards to have these doors opened. Um. But
(03:25):
I'm very grateful to be in this position. Doors have
been opening, and I'm walking through every single one of
them that I have the energy and breath to do well.
The little doubt that there are more awards in your future,
of course, you've You've made news not only with the
awards that you've earned and one, but with your appearances.
(03:47):
I think I'm not out of line describing you as
a fashion god. And that's an intimidating conversation for me
because I routinely will come downstairs and Chaston will look
at me, and I Brad will go up and all
he'll say is are you going to be wearing that?
And I know it's time to go back upstairs and
improve upon myself. And it strikes me that, especially for
(04:11):
people who aren't very involved or aware of fashion, it
can be maybe viewed as something that's not as important
in this very important time of big world events and
social upheaval. And yet it's clear in the way you've
spoken about some of your fashion choices that have made
headlines that this is language that maybe even fashion in
(04:33):
this way is activism. And I wonder what have you
sought to say with that language and what impact do
you seek to have when you're making the splash that
you so often make when you appear on a red carpet. Yeah,
first and foremost being first generation post civil rights movement,
the focus of black people were to make sure that
(04:55):
your children were educated. First. Second on the list was
you're judged by your appearing. You know, the first thing
that people see is what you look like. So one
must dress for the job one wants, not the job
one has. And what you're saying is not just a
job job, but speaking metaphorically, it's like fashion is art.
(05:19):
For me, art is activism. It always has been. Artists
have always been at the forefront of creating change, of
speaking truth to power. We always have we always will be.
I use this pandemic as an example. You're lost in
your house for six months, what are you doing the
(05:41):
most of watching television, reading books, arts and crafts, listening
to music. We all go back to the art. It's important,
especially now, especially now. So therefore coming up in the
business and understanding the impact that fashion can have, mainly
(06:07):
for women, you know, because women can wear anything. You know,
men are relegated to the penguin suit and that's it,
which is something you've challenged correct and you can get
it in different colors. You know, people are starting to
wear patterns, but it's it's considered masculine. Masculinity its top
(06:29):
on the list for everything and everybody. The patriarchy is masculine.
So unconsciously we live in a space where we all
receive the message that masculine is better. I want to
explore this because you said in an interview once you
said my masculinity was in question before I could even
comprehend the thought. So I'm wondering, first of all, when
(06:52):
you did comprehend the thought, what would masculinity mean to you,
especially growing up in Pittsburgh, and how has that changed.
Are you seeking to change the definition of masculinity or
is it something that you view is kind of set
that that you're seeking to confront and challenge both things. Actually,
it's standing up and confronting and challenging the status quo
(07:13):
while simultaneously trying to change the conversation. You know, what
does being a man truly mean? What does that mean?
I was five years old when I was sent to
a psychologist for a year every Wednesday after kindergarten because
my family was confused, scared in fear of the other,
(07:37):
and fear that their boy was too effeminate, was not
going to be masculine enough, therefore would not be able
to be successful in the world. Because that's the messaging,
and it's true for a lot of people. I personally
took myself out of that game and challenged myself to
(08:00):
look at myself in the mirror and go what would
it look like if I was just showing up as myself?
It was there a specific moment when you felt conscious
of making that choice or is it something that that
you grew into. Yeah. I was watching Oprah over twenty
years ago and she had on Maya Angelou and Yalla
Van Sant and they were talking about setting an intention
(08:23):
for your life and making sure that that intention is
based in service. When the intention for your life is
based in service, no matter what it is, everything else
will work itself out. And so I asked myself the question,
in a world, in an industry that's inherently narcissistic, what
does service look like for me? And it hit me
(08:44):
like a ton of bricks. It is your gayness. It
is your queerness. It's the very thing that every single
solitary person in your life is telling you. Billy, your
gayness is your liability. Butcher, you won't make it unless
you're masculine enough. That was the only messaging that I
(09:04):
got for the better part of my life, and still
today it can infiltrate. I am challenging that with my
very presence. It's easy to be who you are, and
what you are is what popular that was not popular.
That meant I don't work, That meant I don't eat.
How did you know that wasn't where the story ends?
(09:24):
How did you know that not by being yourself chosen?
Were there moments where you gave up hope where we were?
There moments where your thought that you know, I'm myself,
but that's cost me every Yes, yes, absolutely. It was
not glamorous. It was not easy. You know. There were
many many days where I couldn't even get out of
bed in the morning. There were many self destructive behaviors
(09:48):
that came along with this journey. But there was something
you must have held onto to bring you through that
to this point. Was it in yourself? Well, I was
just talking about this. I didn't have a plan. B.
I don't have a plan. B. I can't do anything else.
This is the gift. These are the gifts that I've
been given. This is what I can contribute to the world.
(10:10):
So when it's all you have, there is no choice
but to continue to just put one foot in front
of the other. That's all I focused on. Don't look
at the mountain, don't look at how far you have
to climb, Look at what's the next step. Today. So
what does that tell us about what the next steps
(10:30):
are going to be in the years ahead. I'm thinking
about a show like Posts, extraordinary television show that might
not have been possible, would not have been possible ten
years ago, might not have been possible five years ago,
it wasn't possible, so it was So what do you
think is now going to be possible five years from
an hour or ten years from now that we can't
(10:52):
even imagine today? What are those next steps? Well, you
know I have to say that Pose and Ryan Murphy
and Stephen Canals and Brad Feltcha and the entire team
Jet Market Lady Jake. You know, casting me in this
show and being in this particular show has taught me
to dream the impossible. You know, My dreams have always
(11:14):
been big and huge, but they've and grant but they've
always been based on and springboarded off of things that
I had already seen. The impossible has happened in my life.
That's what poses. You know, I also related to something
for us gay men of a certain age, gay marriage,
(11:36):
marriage equality. There was no context to even place the
mustard seed of a dream inside, Like it just wasn't
the thing, you know, It's like I'd never, ever, in
a million years I thought that my life would look
like this. You know, I spent the first thirty years
(11:56):
of my career trying to be straight about so I
could eat, trying to be masculine enough so I could eat.
And now I'm being called to just simply be myself.
And by being yourself, you're changing what people I think
understand to be possible. I should say for people who
haven't seen it, the post centers on the lives of
largely black, queer Americans in the nineteen eighties, and I
(12:21):
kept thinking, as I'm watching it, what those characters would
think to see where we are today? What do do
you ever imagine a dialogue between you, Billy Porter, and
the character you play or the characters you're surrounded within
the show? Yeah, I mean I I I'm just gobsmacked.
You know. Every time I get a script, I just
(12:45):
weep with joy. I just can't believe it. You know,
Like I'm fifty one, I lived through the AIDS crisis.
I lost a lot of friends, you know, we lost
a generation. A quick are people of people in general,
but mostly queer people and queer artists. And to be
(13:07):
able to step into that. Boy, you came out in
(13:30):
the right at the peak of the AIDS crisis. Do
you think having lived through and confronted AIDS gives the
queer community any kind of special insight or special preparedness
or special compassion when it comes to what the world
is facing with COVID or is it a is it
a completely different Well, I think there are parallels. I'm black,
(13:54):
and so the parallels inside of this virus in general,
you know, the layers of how it started, we don't
know what it is, how do we contract it, what
do we do about it? Is there a vaccine? How
(14:14):
do you know? Like all of that part it's so
PTSD inducing. It's just we're right back, and I had
a lot of friends who are experiencing the same kind
of PTSD, you know, as a black man. The fact
that this particular COVID nineteen virus is affecting people of
(14:37):
color in a larger proportion to the rest of the
population is also reminiscent of the age crisis. So I
have been really just trying to work on in this
time of this global reset, is what I'm calling it.
Working on self care, working on boundaries, working on balance,
(15:00):
know like we're the first generation in full as gay
men to be living this light out proud and proud
in public, Like we're the first generation to be doing that.
There's a learning curve, there's a steep learning curve, and
I'm doing it specifically in the middle of all of this,
(15:22):
you know, the pandemic, my career taking off. It's like
it all happens at the same time. There is a
power in that. There is a piece in that in
knowing that what we're going through right now as a community,
as a culture, as Americans, is not new. That's a
(15:44):
remarkable thing to hear. The word peace used to describe
the incredibly complicated and painful moment we're living in. But
the piece he's in the connection to other times or
where do you find that piece? Well, there's a piece
that passes all understanding, right that's in the Bible. There
is in this moment. For me, this global reset has
(16:06):
caused me to go inside and do all of the
work I say, I'm putting my oxygen masks on first.
I'm dealing with old traumas that threatened to thwart my progress.
I'm dealing with all of the bad habits. I'm dealing
with the shame that is insidious inside of the gay community,
(16:33):
you know, the shame that propels us into darkness, and
very often into the type of darkness where there is
no light. I'm not doing that. I'm not going out
like that. That's a choice, that's a decision, and then
(16:55):
one must do the work to make sure that the
outcome from this work is of some sort of use.
I can't be of use to anything or anybody until
I'd take care of myself. Well. Part of that work
that you're describing for you takes place at that intersection
of being black and being at this moment, and I
(17:17):
saw in an interview you said that this moment has
lit a fire inside of me and truly thrusted me
into using my platform to deliver the message that black
queer people are black first, queer second. And when I
first heard that, I felt that that was a really
interesting choice. I wanted to ask you, and then I wondered,
is that a choice or are you saying that the
(17:38):
world will always see black queer people first according to
their blackness and then according to their queerness. There's a
reality that I'm responding to. You look at my skin
and I'm black. That's what people are judging me for.
Before I opened up my mouth, before I take a step,
before any of the things that are detectable, you know,
(17:58):
um behaviors to anybody in on my sexuality. The decision
has already been made based on this color of my skin.
So that's just the truth of it. Um. I have
found in my quest for understanding and my quest for
being part of my own community, that I do stand
(18:23):
at the intersection of these two struggles. You know, the
queer community is in civil rights fight of their life
right now, especially the trans especially the trans community which
has gay men. We have a complicated relationship to write.
We're under this umbrella of l g B, t Q plus,
but the gay community has not always been there for we.
(18:44):
You know, we haven't always understood. My angelus says, when
you know better, you do better. We know better. It's
time to do better. But with that said, I just
I have lived a life of feeling very misunderstood, rejected,
dismissed from my own because of my gayness. And that's
(19:09):
a conversation, in a really complicated conversation that I am
having with my own community. Unfortunately, and historically communities of color,
particularly in the African American community. In my case, I'm
always speaking from my experience. The homophobia, the transphobia is
(19:31):
so toxic and so destructive that I've seen it literally
killed people. And like I said before, I'm not going
out like that. Another thing I'm thinking about watching poses
thinking about, and my life is very different from these characters.
Mostly characters of color in and around New York ball
Room seem very different from my life. But I feel
(19:54):
on one hand connected by the simple fact that I'm
part of a community or a tradition in the lgbt
Q community that threads back through their lives, and on
the other hand, seeing what they were up against and
seeing what they confronted within living memory, even within my
lifetime technically but not within my lifetime that I was
aware of the world. I'm also mindful that the acceptance
(20:19):
not total, but the acceptance that I've known as an
out candidate for president is is built in part on
they're living their lives authentically and yet knowing that many
of them were destroyed for Yes, and you know, it's
not lost on me that I am a part of
the generation who kicked the door down. I'm a part
(20:40):
of the generation who blazed the trail. And it's not
lost on me that very often the people who are
the trail blazers are not the ones that get to
benefit from the trail having been blazed. I am getting
to experience both. That takes my breath away because it
(21:02):
creates inside of me an unquenchable fire that will never
go out, because I have the history that is the
worst of all of it. When you don't know your history,
you are doomed to repeat it. It is our purpose
(21:24):
that we don't know our history. It is our purpose
that our public school system does not teach the truth
about anything in our history. I go back to the
learning about Christopher Columbus, and it was a cartoon, a
cartoon about how these levely white people came and you know,
(21:48):
discovered America as if there was nobody else here. Y'all,
solid is what happened. You colonize a group of people.
We don't know the truth, you know, and that's a
difficult thing. It's like when I think about the young
people that you know, the last election cycle, who when
(22:09):
Bernie didn't win the nomination, took their toys and went
home and didn't show up at the polls. This is
not blame, This is not to harp on the past,
But I say this in context of they didn't know.
We just wanted a better life for our kids, and
they were born into this life that was better. They
(22:33):
didn't have their history. There are some people, I'm sure
who were thinking even now, who were thinking about how
(22:55):
they're going to vote. But what really worries me are
the people who are thinking about whether they're going to vote.
And you have been so vocal and so outspoken on
why it is so important to vote and why you
don't just get to take your your your toys and
go home. But what is the message to people who
you know, believe because they're under no illusions about the
(23:16):
problems in America, are therefore so cynical about the entire
system that they want nothing to do with it, even voting.
That is the whole point of what voter suppression means.
Voter suppression isn't just intimidation at the polls. Voter suppression
is getting into the psyche of the culture and making
(23:37):
us believe that our votes don't matter. And when you
think that way, and when you allow that to take hold,
they have one You know, and I use day in quote.
It's like, that's the whole point to destroy democracy is
to make people think that the very action that makes
(24:01):
a society democratic doesn't work. The one thing, the rue
right that we have still is to get out and vote.
Why do you think they're attacking it so much? Why
do you think that it's not a national holiday. It's
on purpose. So what we must do is continue to
(24:25):
use our right or we lose our right. You know,
I'm trying to get you know, I'm trying to wrap
my mind around how you look at what has happened
in the last four years. And there's still a question
of if if Biden and parrass I don't understand the logic,
(24:47):
I don't, you know. And this is not Democrat and
republic speak. This is not I'm not talking about that
because I'm the kind of Democrat who will vote for
a Republican if they're better. You know, I'm looking at
the policy, I'm looking at the human being. You know,
it's really not about Democrat or Republican. You know, I'm
(25:08):
very progressive, so most of the time it will be democratic.
But in this moment, I'm talking about specifically, in this
moment today, after what we've seen over the last four years,
how is it even a question? Yeah? You know. Part
of how I talk about it is that we may
have disagreements, especially within my party, over how to do
(25:31):
certain things, how to make good on the reality that
black lives matter, how to raise wages, how to get
everybody healthcare. But the question we're going into in November
is is whether to do any of those things, whether
to expand or reduce healthcare, whether to raise wages or
keep exactly. Yeah, And that's just a different conversation. And
(25:51):
then I hope we will have good people elected and
we can go right back to arguing over exactly how
to do these things in government. But first we gotta
we gotta set the question as a country over whether
we're going to be moving three steps forward, as you say,
or two steps back or five steps back. And I
have to say this, This is the reality that keeps
me up at night. The reality is the Republican Party
(26:16):
as it stands today. I'm not talking about the Party
of Lincoln. I'm not talking about that these people chose
whiteness over humanity. They held their noses and they voted
for this monster. They closed their eyes and lined up
(26:37):
behind him. Every white man, particularly in a position of
power to check him and stop him, chose to not
do it. I can go all the way back to Comy,
I can go to Muller with his anemic response to Maddis.
(26:57):
I'm calling them all out. Y'all had a chance to
make sure that the American people were taken care of,
and you chose your whiteness instead, period, Because I assure
you if it was the black president or the woman
president doing any of this, they would have been removed
(27:20):
without pop m the Republican Party was fine. But everything
that he's doing because they want to cut social Security,
because they want conservative judges on the court, because they
want to steal the Supreme Court, because they want social
Security to go away, they want Medicaid and Medicare to
(27:41):
go away. They want all of those things. And they
thought he could be a puppet to make sure that
all of that stuff could happen. They did not anticipate
COVID and narcissism. They didn't anticipate the power of narcissism.
Intersecting about pandemic and now we're seeing what's at stakes.
(28:03):
I mean, I remember conservatives, I talked to sometimes saying,
all right, look, we don't like him either, but it
doesn't matter that much. We'll deal with it exactly. And
now we're seeing just how much is at stake. And
that's privilege, because when Reagan got in office in nine
that changed my life and everybody I know for the worst.
(28:27):
So anybody who says the president doesn't matter that much
are people who are not affected, who have the privilege
of not being affected by policies that take everything away
from which is also the kind of privilege that would
make somebody think it's okay not to vote. I want
to turn to a question that Chaston, who was very
(28:47):
excited to know that we'd be speaking as in fact,
I remember, I don't know if you remember this. We
were somewhere in the middle of the campaign. We're at
l A X waiting to catch a flight, and Chaston
nudges me and says, that's that's Billy Order over there,
and that's Billy Porter, and I was doing the same
thing on the other side of them. On the other side,
I was like, oh, that a Buddha jad When we
(29:11):
struck up a wonderful conversation, and I've been glad to
be in conversation ever since. But Chaston wanted me to
ask you something that I knows on his mind and
our because he's been thinking about those who aren't seen
within the queer community. He said, many people in the
queer community feel left out, unseen, or or unsafe in
this country. And do you really have a way of
inviting people in, of making people feel seen and harnessing
(29:34):
your own story and your own talent to to help
do that and to do good so for someone as
visible as you are, who, even though it was not guaranteed,
learned the power of being yourself. What do you have
to say to others who aren't quite ready to share
their truth or who are questioning whether they're ever going
to belong well? I mean, RuPaul says it all the time.
(30:00):
You know, if you don't love yourself, how the hell
can you love anybody else? It seems really simple, it See,
you know, we hear it so often that we stop
hearing it. You know, we hear it so often that
I don't believe that as a collective we totally understand
what that means. This pandemic, this global reset, you know,
(30:26):
has taught me that the only way I can move
forward is to figure out how to love myself, is
to figure out how to let go of the shame.
What a wonderful response to the moment we're in, because
I think some people have become clearly very productive in
this moment. Others have found it very hard to get
anything done. But if I understand you, right, it feels
(30:48):
like you're saying that turning inward is not a bad thing.
When it comes to being ready and able to have
more to offer out in the world. You have to
get you have to get that right first. You know,
you have to it yourself right first. Otherwise your foundation
is built on sinking sand. I've built a strong foundation.
(31:09):
It's been through the years, metaphorically the concrete. You know,
I poured the concrete my entire life. I'm standing of
some strong foundation now and it's and I'm ready for
whatever comes, for whatever this election is, for whatever comes,
I'm ready. You know, there are people who came before me,
(31:31):
on whose shoulders I stand, who died for me to
be here. So who do I think I am that
I'm just supposed to flit through life with no problem. No,
I'm gonna be here and I'm gonna make it better
for those who come behind me. That's my goal, that's
my service. One of the things that that strikes me
talking to you is you have zero illusions about the
(31:52):
problems that surround us, the pain of our moment, the
trouble in the history and the present of this country.
And yet you have never sounded to me pessimistic. You
talk about a global reset, you talk about time and
space for enlargement, You talk about hopes and dreams for
the future. Do you believe that is going to be
better than I believe that will be better? It's my faith,
(32:19):
it's my hope. That's one of the good things that
I took from religion that I believe to be man made.
Religion is man made, spirituality is divine. Faith, and hope
was instilled in me. It's the only way that I
understand how to move through life, because otherwise I'm debilitated.
I've seen the other version of what darkness can bring.
(32:43):
So be the light that you want to see and
hope for the best. I mean, that's all we got,
and remember to embrace possibility and positivity. There were a
(33:03):
lot of poignant moments in that conversation, and one in
particular is when Billy said, just tell the truth, and
it makes me think that it's more important than ever
to find truth, not just publicly but on the inside,
more important than ever to find personal, deep truths and
then find ways to give them expression. There's humanity there
that we all really need to tap into and are
(33:25):
going to continue to need amidst all of the devastation
that's happening around us. I really do hope that we
can continue to find belonging love of others by better
loving ourselves and real truth through art. I very much
believe it's going to be central to shaping and saving
ourselves in our country, and I'm so grateful for people
like Billy doing this service simply by being the remarkable
(33:48):
people that they are. For more podcasts from My Heart Radio,
visit the I Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever
you live into your favorite shows. M
Hi, I'm Pete Bodh Judge and this is the deciding decade.
Sometimes people say politicians are like actors, and when they
say it, they usually don't mean it as a compliment.
There's some truth to that. Just look at our president,
who was a reality TV star who feels like he's
(00:26):
acting more than governing most of the time. But I
think that comparison often sells short the importance of actors
of artists in their vulnerability, their creativity, their courage. Artists
bring meaning to our lives that we simply couldn't find
anywhere else. So I don't think we give artists enough
credit for shaping and maybe even saving so many lives.
(00:49):
Art has shaped my life, especially music and literature that
helped me to understand who I am for my husband Chaston,
Theater and film have been the most impactful, and I've
noticed that we have turned to and dug further and
further into these creative sources to help us navigate the
times that we're facing right now, and we're seeing how
many of the experiences of the most vulnerable are being
(01:11):
given new expression through the arts today. So what can
art do for us going forward? And what can we
learn from those who are shaping our time through their
creativity and courage. My guest today speaks to this and
embodies this with boldness, courage, and grace, and I'm very
eager for you to hear from it. Billy Porter is
(01:33):
an actor, singer, fashion icon, and activist who you have
hopefully seen in the extraordinary and compelling TV show Pose.
He has started on Broadway off Broadway in film and television.
He performed at the Democratic National Convention this summer. He's
a Tony, Grammy and Emmy winner, and was the first
openly gay black man to be nominated for and win
(01:55):
in any leading acting category at the Primetime Emmy's On
an off screen, he has inspired so many in the
l g B t Q plus community and beyond with
his authenticity and his courage, and whose activism I think
is helping to change what's possible in our future. Welcome Billy,
and I have to ask, having uh mentioned your awards
in the introduction, what's the plan to get that? Oscar?
(02:21):
I don't really have a plan. First of all, thank
you for having me. It's so good to be having
this conversation with you. Pleasure. Um. You know I'm trying
to get some movies. I got some movies, I got
some plans. We're trying to make it happen. I don't know.
I've been in the business long enough to like hold
the idea of awards in a very specific kind of space.
(02:43):
I don't do it for the awards. I'm an artist first.
I'm gonna be practicing my art whether I win awards
or not, as that has been proven for the thirty
years prior to this moment in my life. Simultaneously, who
doesn't like to win awards? To be truthfully honest with you,
(03:03):
As a black, gay artist, they actually do mean something
for me, a lot more than they do from my
white counterparts. They do open doors for me that are
open to my white counterparts anyway. So they don't have
to win awards to have these doors opened. Um. But
(03:25):
I'm very grateful to be in this position. Doors have
been opening, and I'm walking through every single one of
them that I have the energy and breath to do well.
The little doubt that there are more awards in your future,
of course, you've You've made news not only with the
awards that you've earned and one, but with your appearances.
(03:47):
I think I'm not out of line describing you as
a fashion god. And that's an intimidating conversation for me
because I routinely will come downstairs and Chaston will look
at me, and I Brad will go up and all
he'll say is are you going to be wearing that?
And I know it's time to go back upstairs and
improve upon myself. And it strikes me that, especially for
(04:11):
people who aren't very involved or aware of fashion, it
can be maybe viewed as something that's not as important
in this very important time of big world events and
social upheaval. And yet it's clear in the way you've
spoken about some of your fashion choices that have made
headlines that this is language that maybe even fashion in
(04:33):
this way is activism. And I wonder what have you
sought to say with that language and what impact do
you seek to have when you're making the splash that
you so often make when you appear on a red carpet. Yeah,
first and foremost being first generation post civil rights movement,
the focus of black people were to make sure that
(04:55):
your children were educated. First. Second on the list was
you're judged by your appearing. You know, the first thing
that people see is what you look like. So one
must dress for the job one wants, not the job
one has. And what you're saying is not just a
job job, but speaking metaphorically, it's like fashion is art.
(05:19):
For me, art is activism. It always has been. Artists
have always been at the forefront of creating change, of
speaking truth to power. We always have we always will be.
I use this pandemic as an example. You're lost in
your house for six months, what are you doing the
(05:41):
most of watching television, reading books, arts and crafts, listening
to music. We all go back to the art. It's important,
especially now, especially now. So therefore coming up in the
business and understanding the impact that fashion can have, mainly
(06:07):
for women, you know, because women can wear anything. You know,
men are relegated to the penguin suit and that's it,
which is something you've challenged correct and you can get
it in different colors. You know, people are starting to
wear patterns, but it's it's considered masculine. Masculinity its top
(06:29):
on the list for everything and everybody. The patriarchy is masculine.
So unconsciously we live in a space where we all
receive the message that masculine is better. I want to
explore this because you said in an interview once you
said my masculinity was in question before I could even
comprehend the thought. So I'm wondering, first of all, when
(06:52):
you did comprehend the thought, what would masculinity mean to you,
especially growing up in Pittsburgh, and how has that changed.
Are you seeking to change the definition of masculinity or
is it something that you view is kind of set
that that you're seeking to confront and challenge both things. Actually,
it's standing up and confronting and challenging the status quo
(07:13):
while simultaneously trying to change the conversation. You know, what
does being a man truly mean? What does that mean?
I was five years old when I was sent to
a psychologist for a year every Wednesday after kindergarten because
my family was confused, scared in fear of the other,
(07:37):
and fear that their boy was too effeminate, was not
going to be masculine enough, therefore would not be able
to be successful in the world. Because that's the messaging,
and it's true for a lot of people. I personally
took myself out of that game and challenged myself to
(08:00):
look at myself in the mirror and go what would
it look like if I was just showing up as myself?
It was there a specific moment when you felt conscious
of making that choice or is it something that that
you grew into. Yeah. I was watching Oprah over twenty
years ago and she had on Maya Angelou and Yalla
Van Sant and they were talking about setting an intention
(08:23):
for your life and making sure that that intention is
based in service. When the intention for your life is
based in service, no matter what it is, everything else
will work itself out. And so I asked myself the question,
in a world, in an industry that's inherently narcissistic, what
does service look like for me? And it hit me
(08:44):
like a ton of bricks. It is your gayness. It
is your queerness. It's the very thing that every single
solitary person in your life is telling you. Billy, your
gayness is your liability. Butcher, you won't make it unless
you're masculine enough. That was the only messaging that I
(09:04):
got for the better part of my life, and still
today it can infiltrate. I am challenging that with my
very presence. It's easy to be who you are, and
what you are is what popular that was not popular.
That meant I don't work, That meant I don't eat.
How did you know that wasn't where the story ends?
(09:24):
How did you know that not by being yourself chosen?
Were there moments where you gave up hope where we were?
There moments where your thought that you know, I'm myself,
but that's cost me every Yes, yes, absolutely. It was
not glamorous. It was not easy. You know. There were
many many days where I couldn't even get out of
bed in the morning. There were many self destructive behaviors
(09:48):
that came along with this journey. But there was something
you must have held onto to bring you through that
to this point. Was it in yourself? Well, I was
just talking about this. I didn't have a plan. B.
I don't have a plan. B. I can't do anything else.
This is the gift. These are the gifts that I've
been given. This is what I can contribute to the world.
(10:10):
So when it's all you have, there is no choice
but to continue to just put one foot in front
of the other. That's all I focused on. Don't look
at the mountain, don't look at how far you have
to climb, Look at what's the next step. Today. So
what does that tell us about what the next steps
(10:30):
are going to be in the years ahead. I'm thinking
about a show like Posts, extraordinary television show that might
not have been possible, would not have been possible ten
years ago, might not have been possible five years ago,
it wasn't possible, so it was So what do you
think is now going to be possible five years from
an hour or ten years from now that we can't
(10:52):
even imagine today? What are those next steps? Well, you
know I have to say that Pose and Ryan Murphy
and Stephen Canals and Brad Feltcha and the entire team
Jet Market Lady Jake. You know, casting me in this
show and being in this particular show has taught me
to dream the impossible. You know, My dreams have always
(11:14):
been big and huge, but they've and grant but they've
always been based on and springboarded off of things that
I had already seen. The impossible has happened in my life.
That's what poses. You know, I also related to something
for us gay men of a certain age, gay marriage,
(11:36):
marriage equality. There was no context to even place the
mustard seed of a dream inside, Like it just wasn't
the thing, you know, It's like I'd never, ever, in
a million years I thought that my life would look
like this. You know, I spent the first thirty years
(11:56):
of my career trying to be straight about so I
could eat, trying to be masculine enough so I could eat.
And now I'm being called to just simply be myself.
And by being yourself, you're changing what people I think
understand to be possible. I should say for people who
haven't seen it, the post centers on the lives of
largely black, queer Americans in the nineteen eighties, and I
(12:21):
kept thinking, as I'm watching it, what those characters would
think to see where we are today? What do do
you ever imagine a dialogue between you, Billy Porter, and
the character you play or the characters you're surrounded within
the show? Yeah, I mean I I I'm just gobsmacked.
You know. Every time I get a script, I just
(12:45):
weep with joy. I just can't believe it. You know,
Like I'm fifty one, I lived through the AIDS crisis.
I lost a lot of friends, you know, we lost
a generation. A quick are people of people in general,
but mostly queer people and queer artists. And to be
(13:07):
able to step into that. Boy, you came out in
(13:30):
the right at the peak of the AIDS crisis. Do
you think having lived through and confronted AIDS gives the
queer community any kind of special insight or special preparedness
or special compassion when it comes to what the world
is facing with COVID or is it a is it
a completely different Well, I think there are parallels. I'm black,
(13:54):
and so the parallels inside of this virus in general,
you know, the layers of how it started, we don't
know what it is, how do we contract it, what
do we do about it? Is there a vaccine? How
(14:14):
do you know? Like all of that part it's so
PTSD inducing. It's just we're right back, and I had
a lot of friends who are experiencing the same kind
of PTSD, you know, as a black man. The fact
that this particular COVID nineteen virus is affecting people of
(14:37):
color in a larger proportion to the rest of the
population is also reminiscent of the age crisis. So I
have been really just trying to work on in this
time of this global reset, is what I'm calling it.
Working on self care, working on boundaries, working on balance,
(15:00):
know like we're the first generation in full as gay
men to be living this light out proud and proud
in public, Like we're the first generation to be doing that.
There's a learning curve, there's a steep learning curve, and
I'm doing it specifically in the middle of all of this,
(15:22):
you know, the pandemic, my career taking off. It's like
it all happens at the same time. There is a
power in that. There is a piece in that in
knowing that what we're going through right now as a community,
as a culture, as Americans, is not new. That's a
(15:44):
remarkable thing to hear. The word peace used to describe
the incredibly complicated and painful moment we're living in. But
the piece he's in the connection to other times or
where do you find that piece? Well, there's a piece
that passes all understanding, right that's in the Bible. There
is in this moment. For me, this global reset has
(16:06):
caused me to go inside and do all of the
work I say, I'm putting my oxygen masks on first.
I'm dealing with old traumas that threatened to thwart my progress.
I'm dealing with all of the bad habits. I'm dealing
with the shame that is insidious inside of the gay community,
(16:33):
you know, the shame that propels us into darkness, and
very often into the type of darkness where there is
no light. I'm not doing that. I'm not going out
like that. That's a choice, that's a decision, and then
(16:55):
one must do the work to make sure that the
outcome from this work is of some sort of use.
I can't be of use to anything or anybody until
I'd take care of myself. Well. Part of that work
that you're describing for you takes place at that intersection
of being black and being at this moment, and I
(17:17):
saw in an interview you said that this moment has
lit a fire inside of me and truly thrusted me
into using my platform to deliver the message that black
queer people are black first, queer second. And when I
first heard that, I felt that that was a really
interesting choice. I wanted to ask you, and then I wondered,
is that a choice or are you saying that the
(17:38):
world will always see black queer people first according to
their blackness and then according to their queerness. There's a
reality that I'm responding to. You look at my skin
and I'm black. That's what people are judging me for.
Before I opened up my mouth, before I take a step,
before any of the things that are detectable, you know,
(17:58):
um behaviors to anybody in on my sexuality. The decision
has already been made based on this color of my skin.
So that's just the truth of it. Um. I have
found in my quest for understanding and my quest for
being part of my own community, that I do stand
(18:23):
at the intersection of these two struggles. You know, the
queer community is in civil rights fight of their life
right now, especially the trans especially the trans community which
has gay men. We have a complicated relationship to write.
We're under this umbrella of l g B, t Q plus,
but the gay community has not always been there for we.
(18:44):
You know, we haven't always understood. My angelus says, when
you know better, you do better. We know better. It's
time to do better. But with that said, I just
I have lived a life of feeling very misunderstood, rejected,
dismissed from my own because of my gayness. And that's
(19:09):
a conversation, in a really complicated conversation that I am
having with my own community. Unfortunately, and historically communities of color,
particularly in the African American community. In my case, I'm
always speaking from my experience. The homophobia, the transphobia is
(19:31):
so toxic and so destructive that I've seen it literally
killed people. And like I said before, I'm not going
out like that. Another thing I'm thinking about watching poses
thinking about, and my life is very different from these characters.
Mostly characters of color in and around New York ball
Room seem very different from my life. But I feel
(19:54):
on one hand connected by the simple fact that I'm
part of a community or a tradition in the lgbt
Q community that threads back through their lives, and on
the other hand, seeing what they were up against and
seeing what they confronted within living memory, even within my
lifetime technically but not within my lifetime that I was
aware of the world. I'm also mindful that the acceptance
(20:19):
not total, but the acceptance that I've known as an
out candidate for president is is built in part on
they're living their lives authentically and yet knowing that many
of them were destroyed for Yes, and you know, it's
not lost on me that I am a part of
the generation who kicked the door down. I'm a part
(20:40):
of the generation who blazed the trail. And it's not
lost on me that very often the people who are
the trail blazers are not the ones that get to
benefit from the trail having been blazed. I am getting
to experience both. That takes my breath away because it
(21:02):
creates inside of me an unquenchable fire that will never
go out, because I have the history that is the
worst of all of it. When you don't know your history,
you are doomed to repeat it. It is our purpose
(21:24):
that we don't know our history. It is our purpose
that our public school system does not teach the truth
about anything in our history. I go back to the
learning about Christopher Columbus, and it was a cartoon, a
cartoon about how these levely white people came and you know,
(21:48):
discovered America as if there was nobody else here. Y'all,
solid is what happened. You colonize a group of people.
We don't know the truth, you know, and that's a
difficult thing. It's like when I think about the young
people that you know, the last election cycle, who when
(22:09):
Bernie didn't win the nomination, took their toys and went
home and didn't show up at the polls. This is
not blame, This is not to harp on the past,
But I say this in context of they didn't know.
We just wanted a better life for our kids, and
they were born into this life that was better. They
(22:33):
didn't have their history. There are some people, I'm sure
who were thinking even now, who were thinking about how
(22:55):
they're going to vote. But what really worries me are
the people who are thinking about whether they're going to vote.
And you have been so vocal and so outspoken on
why it is so important to vote and why you
don't just get to take your your your toys and
go home. But what is the message to people who
you know, believe because they're under no illusions about the
(23:16):
problems in America, are therefore so cynical about the entire
system that they want nothing to do with it, even voting.
That is the whole point of what voter suppression means.
Voter suppression isn't just intimidation at the polls. Voter suppression
is getting into the psyche of the culture and making
(23:37):
us believe that our votes don't matter. And when you
think that way, and when you allow that to take hold,
they have one You know, and I use day in quote.
It's like, that's the whole point to destroy democracy is
to make people think that the very action that makes
(24:01):
a society democratic doesn't work. The one thing, the rue
right that we have still is to get out and vote.
Why do you think they're attacking it so much? Why
do you think that it's not a national holiday. It's
on purpose. So what we must do is continue to
(24:25):
use our right or we lose our right. You know,
I'm trying to get you know, I'm trying to wrap
my mind around how you look at what has happened
in the last four years. And there's still a question
of if if Biden and parrass I don't understand the logic,
(24:47):
I don't, you know. And this is not Democrat and
republic speak. This is not I'm not talking about that
because I'm the kind of Democrat who will vote for
a Republican if they're better. You know, I'm looking at
the policy, I'm looking at the human being. You know,
it's really not about Democrat or Republican. You know, I'm
(25:08):
very progressive, so most of the time it will be democratic.
But in this moment, I'm talking about specifically, in this
moment today, after what we've seen over the last four years,
how is it even a question? Yeah? You know. Part
of how I talk about it is that we may
have disagreements, especially within my party, over how to do
(25:31):
certain things, how to make good on the reality that
black lives matter, how to raise wages, how to get
everybody healthcare. But the question we're going into in November
is is whether to do any of those things, whether
to expand or reduce healthcare, whether to raise wages or
keep exactly. Yeah, And that's just a different conversation. And
(25:51):
then I hope we will have good people elected and
we can go right back to arguing over exactly how
to do these things in government. But first we gotta
we gotta set the question as a country over whether
we're going to be moving three steps forward, as you say,
or two steps back or five steps back. And I
have to say this, This is the reality that keeps
me up at night. The reality is the Republican Party
(26:16):
as it stands today. I'm not talking about the Party
of Lincoln. I'm not talking about that these people chose
whiteness over humanity. They held their noses and they voted
for this monster. They closed their eyes and lined up
(26:37):
behind him. Every white man, particularly in a position of
power to check him and stop him, chose to not
do it. I can go all the way back to Comy,
I can go to Muller with his anemic response to Maddis.
(26:57):
I'm calling them all out. Y'all had a chance to
make sure that the American people were taken care of,
and you chose your whiteness instead, period, Because I assure
you if it was the black president or the woman
president doing any of this, they would have been removed
(27:20):
without pop m the Republican Party was fine. But everything
that he's doing because they want to cut social Security,
because they want conservative judges on the court, because they
want to steal the Supreme Court, because they want social
Security to go away, they want Medicaid and Medicare to
(27:41):
go away. They want all of those things. And they
thought he could be a puppet to make sure that
all of that stuff could happen. They did not anticipate
COVID and narcissism. They didn't anticipate the power of narcissism.
Intersecting about pandemic and now we're seeing what's at stakes.
(28:03):
I mean, I remember conservatives, I talked to sometimes saying,
all right, look, we don't like him either, but it
doesn't matter that much. We'll deal with it exactly. And
now we're seeing just how much is at stake. And
that's privilege, because when Reagan got in office in nine
that changed my life and everybody I know for the worst.
(28:27):
So anybody who says the president doesn't matter that much
are people who are not affected, who have the privilege
of not being affected by policies that take everything away
from which is also the kind of privilege that would
make somebody think it's okay not to vote. I want
to turn to a question that Chaston, who was very
(28:47):
excited to know that we'd be speaking as in fact,
I remember, I don't know if you remember this. We
were somewhere in the middle of the campaign. We're at
l A X waiting to catch a flight, and Chaston
nudges me and says, that's that's Billy Order over there,
and that's Billy Porter, and I was doing the same
thing on the other side of them. On the other side,
I was like, oh, that a Buddha jad When we
(29:11):
struck up a wonderful conversation, and I've been glad to
be in conversation ever since. But Chaston wanted me to
ask you something that I knows on his mind and
our because he's been thinking about those who aren't seen
within the queer community. He said, many people in the
queer community feel left out, unseen, or or unsafe in
this country. And do you really have a way of
inviting people in, of making people feel seen and harnessing
(29:34):
your own story and your own talent to to help
do that and to do good so for someone as
visible as you are, who, even though it was not guaranteed,
learned the power of being yourself. What do you have
to say to others who aren't quite ready to share
their truth or who are questioning whether they're ever going
to belong well? I mean, RuPaul says it all the time.
(30:00):
You know, if you don't love yourself, how the hell
can you love anybody else? It seems really simple, it See,
you know, we hear it so often that we stop
hearing it. You know, we hear it so often that
I don't believe that as a collective we totally understand
what that means. This pandemic, this global reset, you know,
(30:26):
has taught me that the only way I can move
forward is to figure out how to love myself, is
to figure out how to let go of the shame.
What a wonderful response to the moment we're in, because
I think some people have become clearly very productive in
this moment. Others have found it very hard to get
anything done. But if I understand you, right, it feels
(30:48):
like you're saying that turning inward is not a bad thing.
When it comes to being ready and able to have
more to offer out in the world. You have to
get you have to get that right first. You know,
you have to it yourself right first. Otherwise your foundation
is built on sinking sand. I've built a strong foundation.
(31:09):
It's been through the years, metaphorically the concrete. You know,
I poured the concrete my entire life. I'm standing of
some strong foundation now and it's and I'm ready for
whatever comes, for whatever this election is, for whatever comes,
I'm ready. You know, there are people who came before me,
(31:31):
on whose shoulders I stand, who died for me to
be here. So who do I think I am that
I'm just supposed to flit through life with no problem. No,
I'm gonna be here and I'm gonna make it better
for those who come behind me. That's my goal, that's
my service. One of the things that that strikes me
talking to you is you have zero illusions about the
(31:52):
problems that surround us, the pain of our moment, the
trouble in the history and the present of this country.
And yet you have never sounded to me pessimistic. You
talk about a global reset, you talk about time and
space for enlargement, You talk about hopes and dreams for
the future. Do you believe that is going to be
better than I believe that will be better? It's my faith,
(32:19):
it's my hope. That's one of the good things that
I took from religion that I believe to be man made.
Religion is man made, spirituality is divine. Faith, and hope
was instilled in me. It's the only way that I
understand how to move through life, because otherwise I'm debilitated.
I've seen the other version of what darkness can bring.
(32:43):
So be the light that you want to see and
hope for the best. I mean, that's all we got,
and remember to embrace possibility and positivity. There were a
(33:03):
lot of poignant moments in that conversation, and one in
particular is when Billy said, just tell the truth, and
it makes me think that it's more important than ever
to find truth, not just publicly but on the inside,
more important than ever to find personal, deep truths and
then find ways to give them expression. There's humanity there
that we all really need to tap into and are
(33:25):
going to continue to need amidst all of the devastation
that's happening around us. I really do hope that we
can continue to find belonging love of others by better
loving ourselves and real truth through art. I very much
believe it's going to be central to shaping and saving
ourselves in our country, and I'm so grateful for people
like Billy doing this service simply by being the remarkable
(33:48):
people that they are. For more podcasts from My Heart Radio,
visit the I Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever
you live into your favorite shows. M
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