July 15, 2026 • 32 mins
Rosie O'Donnell has never lived quietly, and this conversation is equally unfiltered. She reflects on the childhood loss that shaped her, the comedy that saved her, and the convictions that have defined her public life.
She also opens up about leaving America for Ireland and her theory on why Trump is so obsessed with her!
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hi, everyone, It's Sophia. Welcome to work in Progress. Welcome
back to work in Progress friends. We have a guest
that I am just delighted to host today. She is
(00:23):
someone I have looked up to for such a long time,
a woman who has never fit in a single box.
We are joined today by none other than the iconic
Rosio O'Donnell from her incredible career in stand up, daytime, television, film,
broadway activism. No, I didn't geek out on her about
a league of their own, but you know I wanted to.
She has built a career defined by being undefinable. She
(00:48):
has been a courageous leader on the forefront of social goodness,
and in recent years her bravery and her candor the
things that she's lived with for aids in the public eye,
have only sharpened. She's expanded her life beyond familiar borders,
and I mean that geographically, politically, and creatively. And this
(01:11):
summer she is launching here in the US in New
York City, a new live, one woman show called Common
Knowledge that is tapping into everything that she believes is
true and more. It's commentary without filter, it's comedy, storytelling,
(01:31):
its richness about human life, and it's something that is
uniquely Rosi o' donal. Today I get to ask her
all about her upbringing, the history and events that shaped her,
and why she thinks comedy cuts through all the noise.
Let's dive in with Rosi o' donald.
Speaker 2 (02:02):
Hi, guys, we got Rosie O'Donnell on the Stones. Hello.
Speaker 1 (02:09):
Hi, I'm so excited that you're here.
Speaker 2 (02:12):
Well, you know, I did some reading on you because
my daughter said, oh my god, Sophia Bush and I
was like, is she related to any of the Bush
from She's an actress from One Tree Hill, which I
didn't Now I feel horrible that I didn't watch it.
Speaker 1 (02:31):
You don't need to feel horrible about it.
Speaker 2 (02:34):
Well, I would have liked to have, you know, seen
your work. But you know, apparently everyone says you're really
killing it on this podcast thing.
Speaker 1 (02:41):
Oh thank you. I just I love it, you know,
it's I recently went and got to guest host your
old show. I went to hang out with all the
ladies on the View.
Speaker 2 (02:52):
How was that?
Speaker 1 (02:53):
It was so fun? But I said, I said, you know,
the View and Oprah like, your Show's raised me. And
when I think about being able to watch not just
women whose work I loved, you know, professionals who like
do great comedy and great things. But watching you all
(03:14):
sit down and have conversations about what matters you know,
you you really you're like one of the original users
of a platform for good. So I have to thank you.
Speaker 2 (03:25):
Very very nice, thank you for saying that. I mean,
I'll tell you the God's honest truth is that when
I was little and my mother was sick, I thought,
if Barbara Streisand's mother was sick, she would go on
the Tonight Show at Johnny Carson and ask everyone to
send ten dollars, and everyone would and they'd get a
thousand dollars and they'd get the mother the medicine that
(03:46):
they needed. So I knew there was power in celebrity,
and to me there was a one. It was Barbara Streisand, right,
So if I wanted to be famous at all, it
was because of that. Yeah, I wanted to be in
the Justice League. I thought, when I achieved a level
of success and financial something, we would form a women's
(04:10):
Justice League and it would be like, you know, Gloria
Steinem and obrah and Diane Sawyer and Katie Curic and
Maya Angelou and Adola Shabaz and you know, and I
would join because I would have my own charity and
I would do right and we would solve the problems
of children in America. You know, That's that's what I
(04:32):
fantasized was going to happen from fame.
Speaker 1 (04:36):
I've never heard anybody else talk about even something adjacent
to what I thought as a kid. That's so cool. Yeah,
and I wonder too, you know, you say it, and
it's like we had all those women, those examples, and
you know, as much as I know the role can
be reductionist in certain senses, we also grew up watching
(04:59):
all these ladies do good for kids and families. So
you kind of figure, oh, when the women get to
the upper echelon, that's what they do. They solve things
for the women and the children.
Speaker 2 (05:12):
And yes, and and that was my belief, like not
just wish, that was my belief that this would all happen.
And you know, I have that belief that there's going
to be all the women bonding together, all the powerful
women bonding together and saying, you know, we've had enough
(05:34):
of this, yeah, and this epstein Uh situation and this
you know, child abuse and this listen, Yeah, you're here, America.
We don't have the choice to pretend it's not happening.
Speaker 1 (05:50):
Right, right. What a surreal thing too, when you when
you consider the last couple of decades, you watch, you know,
we have we had the historic miter and then we
began to shift the percentages of power in Congress. And
you watched a version of the Justice League, right, the
women launched Times Up and the lead of Defense Fund.
(06:10):
And look at the backlash. I mean you look at
these fascists. You look at Pete Heggsa's pastor on NPR
yesterday saying they're going to take away women's right to vote.
Speaker 2 (06:19):
Look at his tattoo. I got's sake, I branded himself
with that. Yes, okay, America, no more willful blindness.
Speaker 1 (06:30):
I know it.
Speaker 2 (06:31):
Before there's trouble at the gates, ladies and gentlemen. Yeah,
at the gates the border of Mexico. We're talking about
the decency gates. They have a leak in them. We
need to solve this crisis. And I don't get, really, Sophia,
I don't get why so little has happened with so
(06:52):
much proof.
Speaker 1 (06:54):
I know it. That's the part that's crazy to me
because we know and the wilfulness, you know, when you
think about all the proof in the files. And I
went into the Epstein reading room here in New York.
We held the It was a fantastic experience and also
absolutely just gut wrenching. But you stand in this space
(07:17):
and you go like, this is all evidence, and they
don't want to believe it. And yet when women say
this happens to us, they say, we're lying. Oh what
a false accusation will do. Oh these women, oh, they oh,
they ask for too much. You know, we've had one
generation of essential equality, not even total equality, but essential
Like I was born into at least an era where
(07:40):
I was the first generation that didn't have to have
a man co sign on my rent or a mortgage.
You know, I'm forty three, so it would have taken
me until I was six to be able to get
a small business loan. So like, this is why I
say essential equality. But it's all rolling back. And I
(08:01):
wonder when you think about it, because the central tenant
for you, change the world for women and children, central
tenant for me. And you spoke about the aha moment
when you were little and your mom was sick, and
I wonder, I ask everyone who comes on the show
to think about themselves around eight or nine years old,
and I wonder if that if you got to encounter
(08:23):
that little version of yourself, would she see herself in you?
Would you see yourself in her? And how close was
it to that age that you had your ah, we
have to change the world for other kids' moment.
Speaker 2 (08:37):
The first moment that I remember being undone by was
the news footage from the Vietnam War, the former spot
on and there was a plane, there was a locked shot,
and there was a plane that was pushed like this
big in the screen, and one of those walk upstairs
(08:59):
was pushed on and it was jam packed with people
and the reporters talking and the people are climbing up
and an old woman gets kicked or pushed and she
falls out of the screen. And I started crying, and
my father couldn't console me. And my feelings always were
(09:22):
a little bit too much and yeah, and so highly
sensitive people, I think in some ways right. I saw
Alanis Morris Thatt's documentary on that, and I thought, I
completely relate to that. You know, why do you care?
It's not happening to you was the common refrain that
(09:42):
I always get, this is not happening to you. I
know it's not to happen to me in order for
me to have feelings about it. I know people like that.
I've worked with people like that. When there was a
story that related to a group that they didn't I
was worthy, there would be little if any interest, you know,
(10:04):
but somebody similar to them was the only way in
someone different than them was a no entry zone.
Speaker 1 (10:14):
Yeah, it's an immediate closed door.
Speaker 2 (10:17):
And I don't think they know it, you know. But
you know the point is I knew early on that
I had to try to do something to help, right
I wanted my mother had died, but I wanted my
father to adopt a Vietnamese baby because it was a
plane full of babies that crashed. This is right after
(10:41):
my mother died. I'm like in a turmoil. You know,
no one's talking about it, and you know, I dreamed
of doing Broadway with Barber Streis. Wow, that was my
delusion that got me kind of, you know, out of
the the stuff. You know.
Speaker 1 (11:03):
What an incredible thing though, that as a child who
was experiencing grief, you immediately related to the grief of
others in thought, if I can't solve my own, maybe
my own can make space for someone else to have
less grief. Maybe we can welcome someone in to this
hole we're living with and do some good with it.
(11:26):
And the flip side was and maybe the big way
to solve all of it, maybe the Justice League comes
from following the thing that makes me the happiest. I
could then maybe fill holes for everybody else. That's pretty profound, Rosie.
Speaker 2 (11:43):
You know, it's the way my brain works. And it's
kind of hard because I don't always understand in some
ways why people don't see it, like it's beyond my
comprehension because of what I do feel, and ably I
can't believe that people don't see it. Like I don't know,
(12:04):
I don't know what to do, and I feel with
every ounce of my being that the only way to
heal is to welcome them back. Because they were lied
to by billionaire corporate executives. Yes, about a man who
was now president that was pure fiction, and they sold
(12:26):
it as fact and you believed it. And he's robbing
the country and raping and pillaging people metaphorically and physically
literally evidence to prove it yes, and he's hiding it
from us. Yes, and why doesn't everyone see this?
Speaker 1 (12:45):
And now a word from our sponsors who make this
show possible. Do you think that because it's so obvious
and the sort of shame that comes with admitting you've
(13:07):
been duped is so big that people are doubling down
because they can't bear the pain of what they assisted.
Speaker 2 (13:17):
Listen, I think we all have to come to that
point in some way or another in our own lives.
And we can all name that moment right right now,
when I, you know, tricked into thinking something was different
than really was and what was the damage done to it?
You know, well, what's the damage done to our country?
(13:39):
There are many metrics which we can look at. None
of them are good. Yeah, and it's now or never.
I feel like, you know, Paul Revere and the and
the Boy who Cried Wolf all at the same time,
I'm like, you people, are you not not? You know?
I when when I'm doing this one woman show in
(14:02):
New York and when I rehearse the lines just sitting
by myself at night, my kid in the other room,
thirteen years old, goes, that's a lie, Mom, I never
said that. That is absolutely unsure. You're exaggerating Again, I go,
I'm just rehearsing. Let me do it. I don't like
that you do this show. I don't think you should
(14:23):
do it. And I tried to explain, here's how mommy
makes a lie. As an artist, I take the true
things that happen and I make something beautiful out of them. Yeah,
and so what's happened to me in the last dozen
years is you. It's been you me for a dozen years. Yeah,
(14:46):
that's what I've been doing. And so this is about
you and me. Wow, you're a good team. Kid. But
I understand. My other children said the same thing, you know.
I told her that. I said your siblings felt the same. Yes,
And it's not like I don't care. I do care.
And I don't think it's easy to have a famous mother,
especially one who fails the need to tell everyone everything right.
Speaker 1 (15:09):
But there's something really interesting in that too, you know. Comedy.
Comedy cuts through noise and polarity, and it manages to
get everybody in the same room in a way that
I don't think anything else does.
Speaker 2 (15:26):
I think you're right.
Speaker 1 (15:28):
I'm wondering, like it also takes a certain courage, you know,
I can't wait to come see the show. By the way,
we'll get to the show. But I'm thinking about it, Like,
you know, I'm a big emotional puddle all the time,
and I have a sense of humor. And when I
really get fired up about something, especially politics, people are like,
why don't you do comedy? And I'm like, I think
(15:49):
I would. I would die. But I can write, you know,
very emotional observations. And I'm coming near the to the
end of writing my first book, and I think about
this thing that your kid is talking about, like what
are you doing telling the stories? But when you tell
the stories with humor, I don't know, it takes all
(16:10):
the tension out of the room. Do you think comedy
became part of your identity because in a big Irish
Catholic family, you know, I know, because I have them,
Like it's a it's a noisy household. You got to
figure out how to be heard or or did you
find it as a as a language to sort of
(16:31):
give yourself the mic in a world that didn't really
want to listen to women, let alone queer women, let
alone smart women. God forbid, you're smart and politically opinionated,
you know, Like how did you find it to get
to this point?
Speaker 2 (16:46):
Now? You know I had so many You know, I
was born in nineteen sixty two, so I remember Vietnam. Yeah,
I remember the neighbor, Charlie Kassick, coming back with a
hole in his helmet and showing us because my mother
put a big twin sheet that she wrote Welcome home
(17:09):
Charlie in red paint on and she hung it from
our windows of our bedroom and we walked over and
I'm young, you know, I'm young in this story, and
we give Charlie Kussick the steak. Now, we didn't rarely
have steak a lot because it was expensive, but we
made my mother made a special dinner. And she wasn't
a particularly good cook, very oldish meat and potatoes, not
(17:31):
a lot of seasoning, but she brought that over there.
So I remember that. I remember the women's movement. I
remember getting our bodies ourselves in seventh grade from a
math teacher who was a feminine. Then, you know, I
would go to women's bookstores. I would read Glorious Dina,
(17:52):
Miss magazine. I subscribed right away to MS magazine. I
MS was the greatest thing in the world. And you
know when Trump attacked me. I thought, well, watch what
happens when the National Organization of Women. Here's what he
just did. And guess what happened? Nothing? Yeah, And I
was like, no, are you serious? I'm serious this this
(18:14):
joke of a human. You're gonna let him do this
to me? Everybody else? Like, I was like, And he
went on shows with you know, other entertainers, comedians. Yeah,
so he went on those shows and talked to them
and you know, ha, ha, isn't that funny? Isn't that funny?
For twenty years?
Speaker 1 (18:33):
It's so crazy to me, Rosie, he's so obsessed with you.
Speaker 2 (18:38):
Like he's serious. Theory. We both grew up in Long Island.
He grew up in Queens. I grew grew up in Comack. I'm,
you know, twenty years younger than him. Right, he's eighty,
I'm sixty. I'm sixty four, he's eighty whatever he is. Yeah,
So he grew up with girls like me, tough, probably
(18:59):
gay Irish girls who didn't take from no stupid rich boy,
wanna be asshole, liar, megalomaniac, no social skills, no empathy,
no compassion. I would have told him to his face
in third, fourth, fifth, grade. And I think when I
did it to him, quote unquote on the view, he
couldn't believe that I had the balls to attack him
(19:23):
because he thinks he is heralded and held up and
belongs on Mount Rushmore and you know solved one hundred
and eight wars and is the number one person on
tic TAC And you know, dumb has a B at
the end in it. This is the president of the
United States of America doesn't understand that he's being tested
(19:44):
for dementia when he brags about acing his cognitive tests.
Speaker 1 (19:48):
Isn't it crazy?
Speaker 2 (19:49):
It's absolutely unbelievable.
Speaker 1 (19:52):
It's also wild to me how just childish he is,
Like my favorite thing, the thing I say now my
Trump too, like well there we go is constantly like
and another one for he is not smarter than a
fifth grader, Like he couldn't beat a fifth grader on
that game show. And he acts like a kid. He's
like he is like the cranky little rich kid in
(20:13):
Willy Wonka who can't share his toys. Yeah, even with
the Kennedy Center, like they made him take off. I
keep I was saying online that you know he put
his like press on name up there like press on
nails and they ripped it off, and he's so angry
that he put a tarp over the Kennedy Center And
like I retweet one of the articles. I talked about
this man all day, every day. It's what I do.
Speaker 2 (20:32):
Here's a question, why is it still up? I know?
Are you telling me no person could go and figure
out how to take it down on what authority? I
just block the name of the JFK Performing Arts Center.
We can't allow him to call FEIFA and change the
soccer score. You don't think he thinks he's all powerful? Now,
(20:55):
fuck you FEIF A man? Fuck you really what you
gave him that piece award because he didn't get the modell.
You're like as corrupt as he is.
Speaker 1 (21:05):
I know, the piece of change.
Speaker 2 (21:07):
And let our guy go in the best guy in
a game where he's supposed to sit out, and you
think that's fair and that's not news in America. How
shameful it is, and that that man didn't stand up
and say I refuse, Yeah, I refuse to play today
because I was given a red card and those are
the rules of the game that I love and I've
given my life to.
Speaker 1 (21:28):
Yeah, it's pretty crazy, and even the fact that you know,
I did I did hear. I don't know if I
believe it. I don't know what to believe anymore. The
news is insane.
Speaker 2 (21:36):
That's so true.
Speaker 1 (21:37):
But like, you know, the one of the guys from
FIFA got up and was like, listen, First of all,
the president can call whoever he wants. It's a completely
independent board that reviews this. I have nothing to do
with it. I had nothing to do with this. YadA YadA.
All the refs made the decision. You know, they said
something like MESSI did the same thing, didn't even get
a foul, let alone a red card.
Speaker 2 (21:56):
Whatever.
Speaker 1 (21:56):
I don't know, I don't care. What makes me crazy
is even the suggestion that he would ay if he's
powerless and just wants to take credit. He's again, he's
a petty little bitch boy, which is what I called
him on the internet, and bray Burke got very upset
with me, and I was like, that's the seventh nicest
thing I've called him this week, Like, what are you
talking about?
Speaker 2 (22:16):
Badly kidding me? With all of the things that you
could say about this man that.
Speaker 1 (22:20):
I know it, that's like a gift exactly. I was like,
he is, he can't share it. You don't think this
is petty. He's the President of the United States is
putting a tarp over the Kennedy Center, Like, what are
we doing? But so it's like the thing for me
with Febas. If he's just saying, oh, I did it
and he knows he didn't, he's a child. And if
he's saying I did it and he tried to do it,
(22:41):
he's a criminal. Like the fact that we're tolerating. You know,
this is this is the office of.
Speaker 2 (22:47):
Jimmy Carter exactly. Peanut farm. Like peanut farm, but go
ahead and make a couple of billion dollars for you
and your corrupt children who stole from charity. So you
don't have the right to have a charity in New
York anymore, or anyone in your family. How about that
president of the United States of America.
Speaker 1 (23:06):
They can't operate a charity, but they're launching the meme coins.
I mean, it is so crazy to me.
Speaker 2 (23:13):
Yeah, but why why isn't anyone doing anything? I know, Sophia, seriously.
Speaker 1 (23:20):
Why And that's something I really appreciated about the thing
Larry David just released, you know, the sort of spoof
talking about, well, don't worry. Even if the guy, even
if somebody like this did get into office, the Congress
would do their job. And it's like, but they're not.
Speaker 2 (23:33):
But they're not, you know, they're not. And history is
recording all of it. History is recording all of it.
All of you people who stood by him, all of
these defense who okayed all of his racist, bigoted, unfair, criminal,
crooked behavior. You're all going to go down with him. Yeah,
and you deserve to.
Speaker 1 (23:55):
And now a word from our sponsors. You know what
I think makes me crazy is when you consider, you know,
put them put the morals in column A and and
go into columb go into the math. When you think
(24:18):
about the way America has grown, has innovated, has boomed
with scientific innovation, technological innovation, with you know, entrepreneurship. When
you look at the schism in the economy that began
(24:39):
when they started changing all the tax laws for the
ultra wealthy, and this wealth gap that is widened in
our country, the idea that anybody can get ahead here
now is a ruse. It's a fallacy. And you see
like the ultra rich getting so so rich, and people
at the bottom remaining there. The cost of you know,
(25:00):
has increased by thirty to fifty percent depending on where
you live, but minimum wage has not gone up. And
they're telling you it's because of your neighbor, not because
of the ultra wealthy that are literally hoarding the money
from everyone else. And that's what's hard for no taxes,
I know, And that's what's hard for.
Speaker 2 (25:19):
Meeting government subsidies. And yeah, it's a billionaire ponzie scheme. Yeah,
and that's what they're doing.
Speaker 1 (25:27):
And doctor King called that out. Yes, you know, we've
been talking about this since the sixties.
Speaker 2 (25:34):
He was never a successful businessman. They never could quantify
his wealth in order to put him on the Forbes list,
and every year he called and complained to them, but
they had to like announce, well, there's no way to
quantify what he says his wealth is.
Speaker 1 (25:49):
Yeah, we can't put it rifter.
Speaker 2 (25:51):
And you know, like I said on the View all
those years ago, he's like, you know, a snake oil
salesman on Little House on the Prairie. Yeah, that's right,
And it's very hard for people to realize that they
fell for it. But it's not your fault. You were
fed this lie for ten years from the Celebrity Apprentice
(26:11):
when there was video of who he really is and
saying the way things says about minorities, and they hid
that too. Look what he does, Look what he says,
Look who he is. Yeah, this is the best the
United States has to offer.
Speaker 1 (26:26):
Does it ever? Because look, you you strike me as
a person. Well I know this about you as at
least an observer who's always looked up to you, and
the way you use your platform. But I also know
what it's like to be a woman who uses her
platform and what comes with it. Have there ever been
moments where you are afraid to say something? Or do
(26:49):
you think your commitment to telling it like you see
it to the truth is bigger than the sum of
all your.
Speaker 2 (26:57):
Parts, totally bigger. Because I was afraid at the Million
My March. They made me wear a mettle vest, a
gun vest whatever, bulletproof vest. I was scared there. Yeah,
where Martin Luther King spoke, I was the host of that.
After Columbine, I couldn't believe children were being shot in
(27:22):
schools in America. It was when I had to go
on medication. I was having dreams at night that people
were in my house with guns and shooting my children,
and I would wake up in a cold sweat, and
I was with my show still and trying to like
pretend like everything was okay, but I was not okay.
And and then I got medicated, and you know, I
(27:46):
thank god, I was medicated when nine to eleven happened,
thank god. And then when Katrina happened, you know, and
world events have a strong undertow for me, one that
I'm only learning how to resist because you know, everyone
(28:06):
is just one person, and you may think that this
is the right way to do it, but other people
have their own way of being in the world. And
who am I to say you have to do it
my way? You know, you have to find your tribe,
the people who want to do and inspire you to
(28:27):
be better. Like for me, Mark Ruffalo, I was lucky
enough to work with Mark Ruffalo on an HBO series
that we did, and I love him very much, and
I'm so proud of him and his advocacy and his
musing his platform and his voice. And I look up
to him tremendously, you know, and Cynthia Nixon, like there
(28:50):
are people that I have met and know and love
that are the same. You know, whether or not you
think that's good or bad, that's for you to decide.
But to me, it's your responsibility. If you've been given
so much by this country. Yeah, use your voice to
(29:10):
say hold on people, because we are on a scary slope.
And it's not like fascists are at the door. They're
in the Supreme Court.
Speaker 1 (29:21):
Yeah, they're everywhere.
Speaker 2 (29:22):
Okay, Yeah, time to wake up in case of emergency,
break glass, break the glass, pull the alarm. It's now,
it's now, it's right now, you know. And artists have
to do their best to keep creating, to keep being funny,
to keep being brave. Yeah, artists, you know, have something
(29:42):
to say that people follow.
Speaker 1 (29:44):
And yeah, but you've been brave a long time. I
mean you, thank you.
Speaker 2 (29:50):
Sorry, It's okay.
Speaker 1 (29:51):
Even when I think you know about the personal the
personal courage, not just using your voice to talk about
what's going on in the world, you know, for other people,
for community, but with yourself, I mean you spoke. I
think the first time you spoke publicly about being gay
was two thousand and two, right, it was in a.
Speaker 2 (30:11):
Set, Yes, it was Diane Sawyer. Yeah, it was after
nine to eleven is what I remember, and everything changed
after nine to eleven. I was very lucky that not
even happened. And then six months later I was off.
Now they had asked me at the beginning of the
(30:31):
season to re sign, but I wouldn't. But they kept
making it more and more money, and it was crazy money. Wow,
it already had crazy And I knew I wanted to
go to my kids plays at school, and I knew
I wanted to be a participatory mother in a way
that my mother didn't get to be. So I said no,
you know, but that was right near where I was
(30:55):
driving off the exit, you know, of select eat them.
I was like, Okay, I'm gonna take a right turn here,
you know, I'm going to see how I can do.
And you know, because make no mistake, it's a drug,
you know, fame is a drug. And I'm a little
bit refamous now. It's weird. That's what my kids are
(31:17):
calling it. Mommy, You're re famous, And it's true because
the times and the perception has changed in the country,
and I can feel it. There's a shift. There's been
a shift and people are waking up and seeing and
now it's just in the doing. So what do we do?
Are you telling me that we don't have as many smart,
(31:39):
brilliant people on the side of truth that I'm going
to say, this is how you fix this problem, because
this is a problem for America.
Speaker 1 (31:50):
I just want to pick Rosie's brain forever. So join
us for part two. We'll see you back here soon
Hi, everyone, It's Sophia. Welcome to work in Progress. Welcome
back to work in Progress friends. We have a guest
that I am just delighted to host today. She is
(00:23):
someone I have looked up to for such a long time,
a woman who has never fit in a single box.
We are joined today by none other than the iconic
Rosio O'Donnell from her incredible career in stand up, daytime, television, film,
broadway activism. No, I didn't geek out on her about
a league of their own, but you know I wanted to.
She has built a career defined by being undefinable. She
(00:48):
has been a courageous leader on the forefront of social goodness,
and in recent years her bravery and her candor the
things that she's lived with for aids in the public eye,
have only sharpened. She's expanded her life beyond familiar borders,
and I mean that geographically, politically, and creatively. And this
(01:11):
summer she is launching here in the US in New
York City, a new live, one woman show called Common
Knowledge that is tapping into everything that she believes is
true and more. It's commentary without filter, it's comedy, storytelling,
(01:31):
its richness about human life, and it's something that is
uniquely Rosi o' donal. Today I get to ask her
all about her upbringing, the history and events that shaped her,
and why she thinks comedy cuts through all the noise.
Let's dive in with Rosi o' donald.
Speaker 2 (02:02):
Hi, guys, we got Rosie O'Donnell on the Stones. Hello.
Speaker 1 (02:09):
Hi, I'm so excited that you're here.
Speaker 2 (02:12):
Well, you know, I did some reading on you because
my daughter said, oh my god, Sophia Bush and I
was like, is she related to any of the Bush
from She's an actress from One Tree Hill, which I
didn't Now I feel horrible that I didn't watch it.
Speaker 1 (02:31):
You don't need to feel horrible about it.
Speaker 2 (02:34):
Well, I would have liked to have, you know, seen
your work. But you know, apparently everyone says you're really
killing it on this podcast thing.
Speaker 1 (02:41):
Oh thank you. I just I love it, you know,
it's I recently went and got to guest host your
old show. I went to hang out with all the
ladies on the View.
Speaker 2 (02:52):
How was that?
Speaker 1 (02:53):
It was so fun? But I said, I said, you know,
the View and Oprah like, your Show's raised me. And
when I think about being able to watch not just
women whose work I loved, you know, professionals who like
do great comedy and great things. But watching you all
(03:14):
sit down and have conversations about what matters you know,
you you really you're like one of the original users
of a platform for good. So I have to thank you.
Speaker 2 (03:25):
Very very nice, thank you for saying that. I mean,
I'll tell you the God's honest truth is that when
I was little and my mother was sick, I thought,
if Barbara Streisand's mother was sick, she would go on
the Tonight Show at Johnny Carson and ask everyone to
send ten dollars, and everyone would and they'd get a
thousand dollars and they'd get the mother the medicine that
(03:46):
they needed. So I knew there was power in celebrity,
and to me there was a one. It was Barbara Streisand, right,
So if I wanted to be famous at all, it
was because of that. Yeah, I wanted to be in
the Justice League. I thought, when I achieved a level
of success and financial something, we would form a women's
(04:10):
Justice League and it would be like, you know, Gloria
Steinem and obrah and Diane Sawyer and Katie Curic and
Maya Angelou and Adola Shabaz and you know, and I
would join because I would have my own charity and
I would do right and we would solve the problems
of children in America. You know, That's that's what I
(04:32):
fantasized was going to happen from fame.
Speaker 1 (04:36):
I've never heard anybody else talk about even something adjacent
to what I thought as a kid. That's so cool. Yeah,
and I wonder too, you know, you say it, and
it's like we had all those women, those examples, and
you know, as much as I know the role can
be reductionist in certain senses, we also grew up watching
(04:59):
all these ladies do good for kids and families. So
you kind of figure, oh, when the women get to
the upper echelon, that's what they do. They solve things
for the women and the children.
Speaker 2 (05:12):
And yes, and and that was my belief, like not
just wish, that was my belief that this would all happen.
And you know, I have that belief that there's going
to be all the women bonding together, all the powerful
women bonding together and saying, you know, we've had enough
(05:34):
of this, yeah, and this epstein Uh situation and this
you know, child abuse and this listen, Yeah, you're here, America.
We don't have the choice to pretend it's not happening.
Speaker 1 (05:50):
Right, right. What a surreal thing too, when you when
you consider the last couple of decades, you watch, you know,
we have we had the historic miter and then we
began to shift the percentages of power in Congress. And
you watched a version of the Justice League, right, the
women launched Times Up and the lead of Defense Fund.
(06:10):
And look at the backlash. I mean you look at
these fascists. You look at Pete Heggsa's pastor on NPR
yesterday saying they're going to take away women's right to vote.
Speaker 2 (06:19):
Look at his tattoo. I got's sake, I branded himself
with that. Yes, okay, America, no more willful blindness.
Speaker 1 (06:30):
I know it.
Speaker 2 (06:31):
Before there's trouble at the gates, ladies and gentlemen. Yeah,
at the gates the border of Mexico. We're talking about
the decency gates. They have a leak in them. We
need to solve this crisis. And I don't get, really, Sophia,
I don't get why so little has happened with so
(06:52):
much proof.
Speaker 1 (06:54):
I know it. That's the part that's crazy to me
because we know and the wilfulness, you know, when you
think about all the proof in the files. And I
went into the Epstein reading room here in New York.
We held the It was a fantastic experience and also
absolutely just gut wrenching. But you stand in this space
(07:17):
and you go like, this is all evidence, and they
don't want to believe it. And yet when women say
this happens to us, they say, we're lying. Oh what
a false accusation will do. Oh these women, oh, they oh,
they ask for too much. You know, we've had one
generation of essential equality, not even total equality, but essential
Like I was born into at least an era where
(07:40):
I was the first generation that didn't have to have
a man co sign on my rent or a mortgage.
You know, I'm forty three, so it would have taken
me until I was six to be able to get
a small business loan. So like, this is why I
say essential equality. But it's all rolling back. And I
(08:01):
wonder when you think about it, because the central tenant
for you, change the world for women and children, central
tenant for me. And you spoke about the aha moment
when you were little and your mom was sick, and
I wonder, I ask everyone who comes on the show
to think about themselves around eight or nine years old,
and I wonder if that if you got to encounter
(08:23):
that little version of yourself, would she see herself in you?
Would you see yourself in her? And how close was
it to that age that you had your ah, we
have to change the world for other kids' moment.
Speaker 2 (08:37):
The first moment that I remember being undone by was
the news footage from the Vietnam War, the former spot
on and there was a plane, there was a locked shot,
and there was a plane that was pushed like this
big in the screen, and one of those walk upstairs
(08:59):
was pushed on and it was jam packed with people
and the reporters talking and the people are climbing up
and an old woman gets kicked or pushed and she
falls out of the screen. And I started crying, and
my father couldn't console me. And my feelings always were
(09:22):
a little bit too much and yeah, and so highly
sensitive people, I think in some ways right. I saw
Alanis Morris Thatt's documentary on that, and I thought, I
completely relate to that. You know, why do you care?
It's not happening to you was the common refrain that
(09:42):
I always get, this is not happening to you. I
know it's not to happen to me in order for
me to have feelings about it. I know people like that.
I've worked with people like that. When there was a
story that related to a group that they didn't I
was worthy, there would be little if any interest, you know,
(10:04):
but somebody similar to them was the only way in
someone different than them was a no entry zone.
Speaker 1 (10:14):
Yeah, it's an immediate closed door.
Speaker 2 (10:17):
And I don't think they know it, you know. But
you know the point is I knew early on that
I had to try to do something to help, right
I wanted my mother had died, but I wanted my
father to adopt a Vietnamese baby because it was a
plane full of babies that crashed. This is right after
(10:41):
my mother died. I'm like in a turmoil. You know,
no one's talking about it, and you know, I dreamed
of doing Broadway with Barber Streis. Wow, that was my
delusion that got me kind of, you know, out of
the the stuff. You know.
Speaker 1 (11:03):
What an incredible thing though, that as a child who
was experiencing grief, you immediately related to the grief of
others in thought, if I can't solve my own, maybe
my own can make space for someone else to have
less grief. Maybe we can welcome someone in to this
hole we're living with and do some good with it.
(11:26):
And the flip side was and maybe the big way
to solve all of it, maybe the Justice League comes
from following the thing that makes me the happiest. I
could then maybe fill holes for everybody else. That's pretty profound, Rosie.
Speaker 2 (11:43):
You know, it's the way my brain works. And it's
kind of hard because I don't always understand in some
ways why people don't see it, like it's beyond my
comprehension because of what I do feel, and ably I
can't believe that people don't see it. Like I don't know,
(12:04):
I don't know what to do, and I feel with
every ounce of my being that the only way to
heal is to welcome them back. Because they were lied
to by billionaire corporate executives. Yes, about a man who
was now president that was pure fiction, and they sold
(12:26):
it as fact and you believed it. And he's robbing
the country and raping and pillaging people metaphorically and physically
literally evidence to prove it yes, and he's hiding it
from us. Yes, and why doesn't everyone see this?
Speaker 1 (12:45):
And now a word from our sponsors who make this
show possible. Do you think that because it's so obvious
and the sort of shame that comes with admitting you've
(13:07):
been duped is so big that people are doubling down
because they can't bear the pain of what they assisted.
Speaker 2 (13:17):
Listen, I think we all have to come to that
point in some way or another in our own lives.
And we can all name that moment right right now,
when I, you know, tricked into thinking something was different
than really was and what was the damage done to it?
You know, well, what's the damage done to our country?
(13:39):
There are many metrics which we can look at. None
of them are good. Yeah, and it's now or never.
I feel like, you know, Paul Revere and the and
the Boy who Cried Wolf all at the same time,
I'm like, you people, are you not not? You know?
I when when I'm doing this one woman show in
(14:02):
New York and when I rehearse the lines just sitting
by myself at night, my kid in the other room,
thirteen years old, goes, that's a lie, Mom, I never
said that. That is absolutely unsure. You're exaggerating Again, I go,
I'm just rehearsing. Let me do it. I don't like
that you do this show. I don't think you should
(14:23):
do it. And I tried to explain, here's how mommy
makes a lie. As an artist, I take the true
things that happen and I make something beautiful out of them. Yeah,
and so what's happened to me in the last dozen
years is you. It's been you me for a dozen years. Yeah,
(14:46):
that's what I've been doing. And so this is about
you and me. Wow, you're a good team. Kid. But
I understand. My other children said the same thing, you know.
I told her that. I said your siblings felt the same. Yes,
And it's not like I don't care. I do care.
And I don't think it's easy to have a famous mother,
especially one who fails the need to tell everyone everything right.
Speaker 1 (15:09):
But there's something really interesting in that too, you know. Comedy.
Comedy cuts through noise and polarity, and it manages to
get everybody in the same room in a way that
I don't think anything else does.
Speaker 2 (15:26):
I think you're right.
Speaker 1 (15:28):
I'm wondering, like it also takes a certain courage, you know,
I can't wait to come see the show. By the way,
we'll get to the show. But I'm thinking about it, Like,
you know, I'm a big emotional puddle all the time,
and I have a sense of humor. And when I
really get fired up about something, especially politics, people are like,
why don't you do comedy? And I'm like, I think
(15:49):
I would. I would die. But I can write, you know,
very emotional observations. And I'm coming near the to the
end of writing my first book, and I think about
this thing that your kid is talking about, like what
are you doing telling the stories? But when you tell
the stories with humor, I don't know, it takes all
(16:10):
the tension out of the room. Do you think comedy
became part of your identity because in a big Irish
Catholic family, you know, I know, because I have them,
Like it's a it's a noisy household. You got to
figure out how to be heard or or did you
find it as a as a language to sort of
(16:31):
give yourself the mic in a world that didn't really
want to listen to women, let alone queer women, let
alone smart women. God forbid, you're smart and politically opinionated,
you know, Like how did you find it to get
to this point?
Speaker 2 (16:46):
Now? You know I had so many You know, I
was born in nineteen sixty two, so I remember Vietnam. Yeah,
I remember the neighbor, Charlie Kassick, coming back with a
hole in his helmet and showing us because my mother
put a big twin sheet that she wrote Welcome home
(17:09):
Charlie in red paint on and she hung it from
our windows of our bedroom and we walked over and
I'm young, you know, I'm young in this story, and
we give Charlie Kussick the steak. Now, we didn't rarely
have steak a lot because it was expensive, but we
made my mother made a special dinner. And she wasn't
a particularly good cook, very oldish meat and potatoes, not
(17:31):
a lot of seasoning, but she brought that over there.
So I remember that. I remember the women's movement. I
remember getting our bodies ourselves in seventh grade from a
math teacher who was a feminine. Then, you know, I
would go to women's bookstores. I would read Glorious Dina,
(17:52):
Miss magazine. I subscribed right away to MS magazine. I
MS was the greatest thing in the world. And you
know when Trump attacked me. I thought, well, watch what
happens when the National Organization of Women. Here's what he
just did. And guess what happened? Nothing? Yeah, And I
was like, no, are you serious? I'm serious this this
(18:14):
joke of a human. You're gonna let him do this
to me? Everybody else? Like, I was like, And he
went on shows with you know, other entertainers, comedians. Yeah,
so he went on those shows and talked to them
and you know, ha, ha, isn't that funny? Isn't that funny?
For twenty years?
Speaker 1 (18:33):
It's so crazy to me, Rosie, he's so obsessed with you.
Speaker 2 (18:38):
Like he's serious. Theory. We both grew up in Long Island.
He grew up in Queens. I grew grew up in Comack. I'm,
you know, twenty years younger than him. Right, he's eighty,
I'm sixty. I'm sixty four, he's eighty whatever he is. Yeah,
So he grew up with girls like me, tough, probably
(18:59):
gay Irish girls who didn't take from no stupid rich boy,
wanna be asshole, liar, megalomaniac, no social skills, no empathy,
no compassion. I would have told him to his face
in third, fourth, fifth, grade. And I think when I
did it to him, quote unquote on the view, he
couldn't believe that I had the balls to attack him
(19:23):
because he thinks he is heralded and held up and
belongs on Mount Rushmore and you know solved one hundred
and eight wars and is the number one person on
tic TAC And you know, dumb has a B at
the end in it. This is the president of the
United States of America doesn't understand that he's being tested
(19:44):
for dementia when he brags about acing his cognitive tests.
Speaker 1 (19:48):
Isn't it crazy?
Speaker 2 (19:49):
It's absolutely unbelievable.
Speaker 1 (19:52):
It's also wild to me how just childish he is,
Like my favorite thing, the thing I say now my
Trump too, like well there we go is constantly like
and another one for he is not smarter than a
fifth grader, Like he couldn't beat a fifth grader on
that game show. And he acts like a kid. He's
like he is like the cranky little rich kid in
(20:13):
Willy Wonka who can't share his toys. Yeah, even with
the Kennedy Center, like they made him take off. I
keep I was saying online that you know he put
his like press on name up there like press on
nails and they ripped it off, and he's so angry
that he put a tarp over the Kennedy Center And
like I retweet one of the articles. I talked about
this man all day, every day. It's what I do.
Speaker 2 (20:32):
Here's a question, why is it still up? I know?
Are you telling me no person could go and figure
out how to take it down on what authority? I
just block the name of the JFK Performing Arts Center.
We can't allow him to call FEIFA and change the
soccer score. You don't think he thinks he's all powerful? Now,
(20:55):
fuck you FEIF A man? Fuck you really what you
gave him that piece award because he didn't get the modell.
You're like as corrupt as he is.
Speaker 1 (21:05):
I know, the piece of change.
Speaker 2 (21:07):
And let our guy go in the best guy in
a game where he's supposed to sit out, and you
think that's fair and that's not news in America. How
shameful it is, and that that man didn't stand up
and say I refuse, Yeah, I refuse to play today
because I was given a red card and those are
the rules of the game that I love and I've
given my life to.
Speaker 1 (21:28):
Yeah, it's pretty crazy, and even the fact that you know,
I did I did hear. I don't know if I
believe it. I don't know what to believe anymore. The
news is insane.
Speaker 2 (21:36):
That's so true.
Speaker 1 (21:37):
But like, you know, the one of the guys from
FIFA got up and was like, listen, First of all,
the president can call whoever he wants. It's a completely
independent board that reviews this. I have nothing to do
with it. I had nothing to do with this. YadA YadA.
All the refs made the decision. You know, they said
something like MESSI did the same thing, didn't even get
a foul, let alone a red card.
Speaker 2 (21:56):
Whatever.
Speaker 1 (21:56):
I don't know, I don't care. What makes me crazy
is even the suggestion that he would ay if he's
powerless and just wants to take credit. He's again, he's
a petty little bitch boy, which is what I called
him on the internet, and bray Burke got very upset
with me, and I was like, that's the seventh nicest
thing I've called him this week, Like, what are you
talking about?
Speaker 2 (22:16):
Badly kidding me? With all of the things that you
could say about this man that.
Speaker 1 (22:20):
I know it, that's like a gift exactly. I was like,
he is, he can't share it. You don't think this
is petty. He's the President of the United States is
putting a tarp over the Kennedy Center, Like, what are
we doing? But so it's like the thing for me
with Febas. If he's just saying, oh, I did it
and he knows he didn't, he's a child. And if
he's saying I did it and he tried to do it,
(22:41):
he's a criminal. Like the fact that we're tolerating. You know,
this is this is the office of.
Speaker 2 (22:47):
Jimmy Carter exactly. Peanut farm. Like peanut farm, but go
ahead and make a couple of billion dollars for you
and your corrupt children who stole from charity. So you
don't have the right to have a charity in New
York anymore, or anyone in your family. How about that
president of the United States of America.
Speaker 1 (23:06):
They can't operate a charity, but they're launching the meme coins.
I mean, it is so crazy to me.
Speaker 2 (23:13):
Yeah, but why why isn't anyone doing anything? I know, Sophia, seriously.
Speaker 1 (23:20):
Why And that's something I really appreciated about the thing
Larry David just released, you know, the sort of spoof
talking about, well, don't worry. Even if the guy, even
if somebody like this did get into office, the Congress
would do their job. And it's like, but they're not.
Speaker 2 (23:33):
But they're not, you know, they're not. And history is
recording all of it. History is recording all of it.
All of you people who stood by him, all of
these defense who okayed all of his racist, bigoted, unfair, criminal,
crooked behavior. You're all going to go down with him. Yeah,
and you deserve to.
Speaker 1 (23:55):
And now a word from our sponsors. You know what
I think makes me crazy is when you consider, you know,
put them put the morals in column A and and
go into columb go into the math. When you think
(24:18):
about the way America has grown, has innovated, has boomed
with scientific innovation, technological innovation, with you know, entrepreneurship. When
you look at the schism in the economy that began
(24:39):
when they started changing all the tax laws for the
ultra wealthy, and this wealth gap that is widened in
our country, the idea that anybody can get ahead here
now is a ruse. It's a fallacy. And you see
like the ultra rich getting so so rich, and people
at the bottom remaining there. The cost of you know,
(25:00):
has increased by thirty to fifty percent depending on where
you live, but minimum wage has not gone up. And
they're telling you it's because of your neighbor, not because
of the ultra wealthy that are literally hoarding the money
from everyone else. And that's what's hard for no taxes,
I know, And that's what's hard for.
Speaker 2 (25:19):
Meeting government subsidies. And yeah, it's a billionaire ponzie scheme. Yeah,
and that's what they're doing.
Speaker 1 (25:27):
And doctor King called that out. Yes, you know, we've
been talking about this since the sixties.
Speaker 2 (25:34):
He was never a successful businessman. They never could quantify
his wealth in order to put him on the Forbes list,
and every year he called and complained to them, but
they had to like announce, well, there's no way to
quantify what he says his wealth is.
Speaker 1 (25:49):
Yeah, we can't put it rifter.
Speaker 2 (25:51):
And you know, like I said on the View all
those years ago, he's like, you know, a snake oil
salesman on Little House on the Prairie. Yeah, that's right,
And it's very hard for people to realize that they
fell for it. But it's not your fault. You were
fed this lie for ten years from the Celebrity Apprentice
(26:11):
when there was video of who he really is and
saying the way things says about minorities, and they hid
that too. Look what he does, Look what he says,
Look who he is. Yeah, this is the best the
United States has to offer.
Speaker 1 (26:26):
Does it ever? Because look, you you strike me as
a person. Well I know this about you as at
least an observer who's always looked up to you, and
the way you use your platform. But I also know
what it's like to be a woman who uses her
platform and what comes with it. Have there ever been
moments where you are afraid to say something? Or do
(26:49):
you think your commitment to telling it like you see
it to the truth is bigger than the sum of
all your.
Speaker 2 (26:57):
Parts, totally bigger. Because I was afraid at the Million
My March. They made me wear a mettle vest, a
gun vest whatever, bulletproof vest. I was scared there. Yeah,
where Martin Luther King spoke, I was the host of that.
After Columbine, I couldn't believe children were being shot in
(27:22):
schools in America. It was when I had to go
on medication. I was having dreams at night that people
were in my house with guns and shooting my children,
and I would wake up in a cold sweat, and
I was with my show still and trying to like
pretend like everything was okay, but I was not okay.
And and then I got medicated, and you know, I
(27:46):
thank god, I was medicated when nine to eleven happened,
thank god. And then when Katrina happened, you know, and
world events have a strong undertow for me, one that
I'm only learning how to resist because you know, everyone
(28:06):
is just one person, and you may think that this
is the right way to do it, but other people
have their own way of being in the world. And
who am I to say you have to do it
my way? You know, you have to find your tribe,
the people who want to do and inspire you to
(28:27):
be better. Like for me, Mark Ruffalo, I was lucky
enough to work with Mark Ruffalo on an HBO series
that we did, and I love him very much, and
I'm so proud of him and his advocacy and his
musing his platform and his voice. And I look up
to him tremendously, you know, and Cynthia Nixon, like there
(28:50):
are people that I have met and know and love
that are the same. You know, whether or not you
think that's good or bad, that's for you to decide.
But to me, it's your responsibility. If you've been given
so much by this country. Yeah, use your voice to
(29:10):
say hold on people, because we are on a scary slope.
And it's not like fascists are at the door. They're
in the Supreme Court.
Speaker 1 (29:21):
Yeah, they're everywhere.
Speaker 2 (29:22):
Okay, Yeah, time to wake up in case of emergency,
break glass, break the glass, pull the alarm. It's now,
it's now, it's right now, you know. And artists have
to do their best to keep creating, to keep being funny,
to keep being brave. Yeah, artists, you know, have something
(29:42):
to say that people follow.
Speaker 1 (29:44):
And yeah, but you've been brave a long time. I
mean you, thank you.
Speaker 2 (29:50):
Sorry, It's okay.
Speaker 1 (29:51):
Even when I think you know about the personal the
personal courage, not just using your voice to talk about
what's going on in the world, you know, for other people,
for community, but with yourself, I mean you spoke. I
think the first time you spoke publicly about being gay
was two thousand and two, right, it was in a.
Speaker 2 (30:11):
Set, Yes, it was Diane Sawyer. Yeah, it was after
nine to eleven is what I remember, and everything changed
after nine to eleven. I was very lucky that not
even happened. And then six months later I was off.
Now they had asked me at the beginning of the
(30:31):
season to re sign, but I wouldn't. But they kept
making it more and more money, and it was crazy money. Wow,
it already had crazy And I knew I wanted to
go to my kids plays at school, and I knew
I wanted to be a participatory mother in a way
that my mother didn't get to be. So I said no,
you know, but that was right near where I was
(30:55):
driving off the exit, you know, of select eat them.
I was like, Okay, I'm gonna take a right turn here,
you know, I'm going to see how I can do.
And you know, because make no mistake, it's a drug,
you know, fame is a drug. And I'm a little
bit refamous now. It's weird. That's what my kids are
(31:17):
calling it. Mommy, You're re famous, And it's true because
the times and the perception has changed in the country,
and I can feel it. There's a shift. There's been
a shift and people are waking up and seeing and
now it's just in the doing. So what do we do?
Are you telling me that we don't have as many smart,
(31:39):
brilliant people on the side of truth that I'm going
to say, this is how you fix this problem, because
this is a problem for America.
Speaker 1 (31:50):
I just want to pick Rosie's brain forever. So join
us for part two. We'll see you back here soon
Host
Sophia Bush
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