July 17, 2026 • 28 mins
More with Rosie O'Donnell as she shares the heartbreaking reason she came out publicly in 2002 and what raising a child with autism has taught her about parenting and acceptance. Plus, hear all about her new one-woman show and what fans can expect when she fills in as host on Jimmy Kimmel Live!
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hi, everyone, it's Sophia. Welcome to work in progress. Welcome
back Whipsmarties. Let's dive right back into our fantastic conversation
(00:20):
with Rosie O'Donnell. When you came out in public, I mean, yes,
all bets were kind of off societally. I think people
realized so much of what they thought they cared about
was bullsh after nine to eleven happened, Like what are
we fighting about? Look what happens in the world.
Speaker 2 (00:36):
You know.
Speaker 1 (00:37):
It's it's that seismic experience of when you have a
death in the family and then everyone stops fighting. You're like,
I can't believe we waste it all this time. But
it was still I mean, it was still a risk.
Like I remember watching Ellen and she came out and
her show got canceled, Like I remember those things.
Speaker 2 (00:56):
Yes, but I came out because we had a foster
child that we were not allowed to adopt, and because
we were gay. And there were two male nurses, Lofton
and Cruteau, who had taken AIDS babies during the AIDS
crisis when the parents had both died of drug addiction,
(01:18):
taken the HIV positive children and adopt it. Fostered them,
and then some of them zero converted to negative because
of their care and treatment, and sometimes that happens with babies.
So they went adopt the fourteen year old that had
Cyril converted as a toddler, and the Florida state government
(01:41):
wouldn't allow them to adopt the child that they raised
because he was now a viable adoption and they didn't
want gay people to adopt it, so they couldn't even
adopt the foster child they raised. And that was exactly
the position I was in. I could not adopt the
(02:01):
foster child I raised because I'm gay, So my choice
would be to lie are you now or have you
ever been? A homosexual? To lie on the court papers.
Therefore maybe having strange people try to nullify the adoption,
and it would have been probably nullified because I am
a lesbian and there's you know, nothing's going to change that.
(02:23):
I mean, I don't expect any changes. But look at
Jojo Siwa, but she is very she's a very young person.
Speaker 1 (02:30):
You know, she's finding herself.
Speaker 2 (02:32):
She's figuring stuff out. That's what I say. I mean,
every gay woman I know has a dalliance with men
at some time. I mean, there's very few gold star lesbians,
as they call themselves.
Speaker 1 (02:44):
Yeah, I know a few, but not a lot. I mean,
I spent a very long time thinking I was just
a bisexual woman out here. Turns out yeah, I don't
think so.
Speaker 2 (02:53):
Yeah. Well, you know, it's hard to telling ourselves, right,
it's hard to figure out. You know. In my show,
I talked about my daughter saying to me, are you
non binary? And I said no? And they said are
you sure? And I said yes, And they said, then
what are you? And I said, I'm an og lesbian bitch.
(03:16):
Bitch's pejorative, especially for a feminist even years old.
Speaker 1 (03:21):
Yeah, You're like, let me have my terms.
Speaker 2 (03:25):
Well I was just like, that's a pretty elaborate thought
process for it. I'm little bit to go to.
Speaker 1 (03:30):
But for an eleven year old to know pejorative in
the first place is already wildly impressive.
Speaker 2 (03:35):
Well. She has a thing called hyperlexia, which means and echolalia,
two things that a lot of autistic kids have. One
of them is when there's like a tape recorder in
your brain. This is echolalia, and if you hear something,
your brain records it and then you can recite it.
In the dialect that you heard it. Wow. So she
(03:59):
was at school and the boy kept calling her psycho.
So I asked the teacher which was the father, and
they told me. I went over to the father, introduced
myself and said, why does your kid call my kid
a psycho? And he goes, listen, it's very upsetting. But
my son is very sensitive and she tells them scary stories.
I said, really, I've never heard her tell a scary story.
(04:21):
What's the scary story? Says where's waldough? Se where's the
striped shirt? How scary is Where's Waldo? He goes, that's
what he tells me. I go home. I say, Clay,
do you have a story? Where's Waldo? She said yeah?
I tell her at school a lot. Half the kids
like it, half the kids hate it. Those are pretty
good odds. I said, yeah, you're right, there's a pretty
(04:42):
good odds. Can you tell me the story? She says, yeah.
She takes a breath. She goes, it was a dark
and dreamy night in the bowels of the kingdom. The
dungeons were full of stink from rets and fitting. I
said to a stop, stop, what are you doing? She said,
that's that's the story of of where it's Waldo. That's
how it begins, and she can recite the entire thing
(05:07):
that's called echolalia. And then she has hyperlexia. When she
was in second grade, the teacher said, we have to
test her vocabulary. They give kids in second grade one
hundred words, and she got ninety nine right and the
only word she got wrong was broom and that's because
she said a sweeper because she used to watch pepper
Pig and that's what they called on pepper Pig. And
(05:30):
when she was two to four and a half, she
spoke with a British accent where people would say, we'd
be at the park and she'd say, Mommy, might I
have a spot of tea? And the woman would say,
you adopted from London. I said, no, she's from Texas.
She has autism, echalia and hyperlexia.
Speaker 1 (05:53):
Wow.
Speaker 2 (05:55):
So she's like this little.
Speaker 1 (05:57):
She's like a little linguistic prodigy.
Speaker 2 (05:59):
Yes, incredible, and she has you know, she has moderate autism.
You know, not people say hers is very light. I'm
like their's is very light. I'm like, no, it's actually moderate.
And you know, I just don't always discuss the more
difficult stuff because I feel as though, you know, that's
(06:22):
her business. The light that I show her in is
the brilliance of her.
Speaker 1 (06:26):
Yeah. Of course, is it an interesting thing to have
a young one with neuro difference because one of the
things that fascinates me even learning about my own where
I'm like, oh, it's not just me, Like these are interesting, Okay,
nothing like being an overachiever who gets diagnosed in your forties.
(06:47):
That's a fun journey.
Speaker 2 (06:48):
Yes, exactly.
Speaker 1 (06:50):
I think about what it must be like to be
a kid learning how your brain works. Now because there's
so much research. I mean, even like a few months ago,
researchers believe that they've proven that ADHD is a developmental advantage,
and they sort of went through the whole reasoning of
this and what it offers in terms of creative problem
(07:11):
solving and how ADHD brains helped us survive crazier times
when there weren't guaranteed resources, and like, I wish I'd
known this.
Speaker 2 (07:20):
I completely believe that. Wow. Yeah, I always tell people,
you know, add has really worked for me. Yea, So
you know, I don't know what to tell you. But
when I was on my show the University of Seattle,
I believe It was a Bill Gates study was doing
all this autism research, and they called and sent a letter.
(07:42):
They wanted to test me for autism because of my
ability to retain lyrics and ingles and songs, and they said,
it's really not normal what you're able to do. And
I was like, Wow, that's exciting, but I have a
kid and I can't I'm doing a show. I can't
really to be tested for three days and in case
(08:02):
I might have autism, which at the time, you know,
I didn't think twice about it, But now that I've
been raising this child, I go, I see. You know,
I used to think all my friends who had kids
who were autistic, I thought I should be the one
to get an autistic kid. I would understand. And I
think I do the way that you have to if
(08:25):
you're an autism parent, and you learn your own language
and routines with them that are often misunderstood by people
who love you and love the child. Yes, you know,
like my child sleeps in the bed with me still
and they're thirteen, and it's exhausting. It's exhausting to not,
(08:49):
you know, to be hit with, you know, a kid,
you know, not in a violent way. Just sleeping. Sleeping.
Speaker 1 (08:56):
Kids are very active.
Speaker 2 (08:58):
Very active, and you know a lot of people have
judgment in my world and say, you know, you have
to do this, you have to do that. And I
thought she was out now she was out for about
six months, and then I went away to Australia to
work for three weeks. And when I came back back
in the bed right. So everyone that I talk to,
(09:19):
all of our helpers, everyone says, when they're ready, they
will go, I'll go, and then that will be that.
Don't worry, this is not going to be you know,
they're going to end up their whole life doing this.
Speaker 1 (09:34):
You know, right, what a gift though to be in
this time. You know that your kid gets to be
raised by you, because if if you were your kid's
age with your parents, you might not have been given
the patience, no, no, to develop in the way you
needed to.
Speaker 2 (09:53):
Yeah, everyone thought that you have to be stricter with
these kids. My kids think that too, They're like, you
have to be stricter with them. I'm like, listen, you guys,
this is a different situation. You guys didn't sleep with me.
Remember what do you think I changed as a mom?
Or did the kid change what's and there's a diagnosis
(10:16):
you know, yeah, there's a doctor's diagnosis of this. This
is someone who does not have Apple software. They have
some strange computer that you have to figure out how
to use, and it's not one you've ever seen before,
and you're not good at coding, and you don't know
the lab and you just keep freaking hitting the keys
(10:40):
and trying this and trying that, and you know, and
mostly their self esteem. Now, if I were to send
you pictures of how they just went out, We're here
in the Jersey Shore and we are doing a family
two weeks hang out at the Jersey Shore, and my
(11:02):
son who just had a baby, and his wife are
coming with the baby who's three months old. So that's unbelievable.
But we were at the Jersey Shore and she had
on a green wig, she's thirteen goggles and leather gloves
it's eighty five degrees and a skirt and boots, different
(11:24):
kinds of she addresses like Cyndi Lauper in nineteen eighty.
Speaker 1 (11:27):
I was going to say this, this feels very Betsy Johnson
Cyndy Lauper. Yes, yes, yes.
Speaker 2 (11:31):
Nineteen eighty so cool. Yeah, so many artists I know
have ADHD autism spectrum, they have something, they have some
four letter three little ditty. And you know, figuring out
yourself is a life journey. You know, it's not like you.
Oh well, that's what I am. So therefore I stop
growing and I just stay in this one definition of
(11:53):
who I am. But moving to Ireland really forced me
to step back out of my comfort zone.
Speaker 1 (12:01):
You know, I was going to ask if some of
this feels related to getting so far outside the system
you've been used to, because a different brain is, to
your point, a different operating system. And I'm so curious
what it's been like to live overseas and outside of
this sort of American ness we're all so steeped in.
Speaker 2 (12:25):
Well, you know the greatest thing about it is the
lack of celebrity culture in Ireland, because you know, people
would say to us, welcome Clay, welcome Rosie, you belong
here in Ireland. Never can I have a picture? Can
I have? So Clay and I go to this place
(12:46):
and where it's an outdoor place, we can get a
burger and couple next to us with a little baby
and Clay's playing with the baby and me and the
couple are talking. So it turns out we sort of
had dinner together, but not at the same tabe really close.
And yeah, after about two hours they said, thank you
for talking to us, Rosie and I just want to
(13:07):
let you know we're both big fans. And I said, oh,
you just thought you'd bring it up here at the
end of the dinner. And he goes, well, it's not
the most important thing, no, is it? And I was
like a sentence never heard in America. Wow. And so
there's a lack of celebrity culture which allows you to
be seen and live as a full, completely integrated person,
(13:29):
you know, with no none of the tendrils of fame
right right. It drags behind you sometimes, and you know,
it's very hard to talk about because in America it's
held up as the be all, end all. So if
you say anything about it that you know, people are
getting mad.
Speaker 1 (13:48):
You know, God forbids you complain.
Speaker 2 (13:51):
You're ruining my dream of what it is. Just be
quiet and be happy you're there, you know.
Speaker 1 (13:56):
Yeah, and now a word from our sponsors who make
this show possible. That thing that you said, you know,
to be able to really be a full, an integrated human,
(14:17):
what I think people don't understand is that the box
like it clamps around you and then it squeezes, you know,
like like one of those Indiana Jones kind of scenes
where the rocks are getting closer. And doesn't mean you
don't love what you do. It means you love it
so much that you put up with the weirdness of
people not treating you like a person anymore.
Speaker 2 (14:39):
But sometimes it's gone before you know it. Right now,
it can be gone in a flash, like mine was
gone after the first day of my show.
Speaker 1 (14:48):
Wow, really just overnight.
Speaker 2 (14:51):
Overnight.
Speaker 1 (14:52):
Holy Now.
Speaker 2 (14:53):
I had done a bunch of movies I had, you know.
Speaker 1 (14:55):
So it was different.
Speaker 2 (14:57):
I was not known, but to be superno and in
the category with someone as powerful and meteor aesque as
Oprah Winfrey. Yeah, oh, I mean that's a pretty powerful soul. Yes,
in every way that you can measure it.
Speaker 1 (15:18):
You know, when you think about getting some of your
personhood back over there in a way, do you think
the space Ireland gave you is why you're ready to
come back and do your next show.
Speaker 2 (15:34):
I think the space Ireland gave me made me want
to come back and see my son's baby. And I
had been doing it in Australia, in Scotland, and I
had been doing it in Europe, so I've done about
fifty or sixty show performances of it already.
Speaker 1 (15:53):
My god, I didn't realize.
Speaker 2 (15:55):
Yeah. So then when I'm going to be in America
to see my son's baby, I said, can we just
do like, you know, four, like twelve shows, maybe four
a week and in a little theater. Daryl Roth, who's
a big Broadway producer I've worked with before and I
really enjoy her. She's just one another Tony and so
(16:15):
she said, you know, let me present it and we'll
do twelve shows. What do you say? And you know,
so we're going to do that, and you know, I
wanted to see with the changes that I've made because
the play is essentially a love letter to Ireland, it
(16:36):
really is, and so I had to take out a
lot of the Irish stuff. The second part of the
show is really much more about all the Irish stuff, right,
And it starts with the day my mother died and
it ends with the last day I saw her. So
there are very sad parts in it as well, and
(16:57):
sometimes people in the audience cry, you know, and where
they're very startled at the beginning when that's how it starts.
They're like, right, wa, wait a minute, isn't it supposed to
be a comedy.
Speaker 1 (17:07):
Show, right, They're like, wait, Rosie, you're.
Speaker 2 (17:09):
So where's the trump jokes? Right? Right?
Speaker 1 (17:13):
Right? We thought we thought you were gonna call him patty.
Speaker 2 (17:17):
Little bit exactly, come on, do it? Do it?
Speaker 1 (17:21):
Yeah? Wow? Well, so you kick off next week in
New York Wednesday, the twenty second. What do you think
it's going to feel like to be back in New
York for you? Because like this, I know, Ireland's home,
but like this is home too, right.
Speaker 2 (17:36):
Yeah, this is definitely home. You know. It feels good
and familiar. It also feels very loud. I feel a
little bit more anxiety, just you know, in New York.
Sometimes the day's New York wins. You know. New York
is is a beast, right And that's where I'm staying
and where I'm doing the show, And you know, I'm
(17:57):
I'm home. I sold everything before I left, and so
I'm hoping to get like a place in New Jersey
near my kids so that I could when i'm home,
we can have a home base here as well. You know.
So I'm planning on doing that, and you know, I
don't know how long we'll stay there. I think it
really does depend on what happens politically in the country
(18:19):
and if I feel mentally healthy enough to you know,
battle those those demons. And some days I do. Some
days I feel very strong, and other days I feel like,
oh boy, this is a lot. You know. Yeah, he's
like bombards you. It's always he's doing something. You can't
(18:40):
even watch the soccer game or you know, he ruins everything.
Speaker 1 (18:44):
In Really like dealing with him is like a very
horrible version of the Tomato festival that happens in Italy
every summer. Well, just getting compelted in the face all
the time.
Speaker 2 (18:58):
It's like stop, you know.
Speaker 1 (19:00):
And I know that's their whole thing. Like him and Bannon,
they're like flood the zone wich shit and they won't
know what to But it's like nobody wants to be
on the receiving end of a fire hose of shit,
and that that's your goal, just like says so much
about you, So I get it. There are days like
I got asked this morning if I'd seen something horrible,
(19:21):
and I was like no, I just like sometimes I
need a day where I don't look at the news.
But then because I'm such a communicator of the news
to people, I get yelled at if I haven't communicated
about the most recent and I'm like, I don't know
what to tell you, guys. I'm just one person, and
sometimes I got to turn off.
Speaker 2 (19:37):
Yeah, but I gotta tell you, I took all of
the American news channels off of my TV and I
only watch Irish and English Now and sometimes wash Al
Jazeera just to see what's happening over there. And I
have so much commer for it. I can't tell you
the difference that it makes in my mental health and
(19:58):
my happines this level, you know, to experience joy still,
and because it's very, very hard to experience joy when
you're in the thick of the Epstein Library, Yes, when
you're in the thick of that young boy that was
(20:19):
left on the island.
Speaker 1 (20:21):
My friends, it's so awful.
Speaker 2 (20:24):
That you can't believe what the Supreme Court is doing,
and doing boldly in front of everyone. And is he
going to let us have elections? That's my big question.
Is he going to let us or is he going to,
you know, make some sort of tragic event occur and
then declare that it's too dangerous and this is a
time of war and we can't all vote, right, so
(20:48):
you know, I think it's scary.
Speaker 1 (20:51):
Yeah, and now a word from our sponsors. Part of
the practice for me, because I can really get sucked
under with it all, you know. And then I'm not
sleeping and then it's like two o'clock and I haven't
eaten anything, and I'm just like, oh, this is not
(21:13):
a good I'm not treating my body kindly like I
would never treat my kid this way? What am I doing?
And I think about it and I come back a lot.
There's a poem I love by a poet, Jack Gilbert,
and he it's called a Brief for the Defense. After
(21:33):
our show, I'm going to send it to you, but
the sort of thesis of it, and he talks about how,
no matter what, you could essentially be having the most
glorious day, and then you look over there and somebody's
suffering in the most hideous way. And the thesis of
the point when of the poem, when he really drills
it down, is there's all sorts of things we can't
(21:54):
live without, even hope sometimes, but we cannot survive without delight,
Like the human spirit has to have delight, and so
when you when you claim it, you keep it alive
for everyone else who can't touch it in the moment.
And it's kind of my reminder, you know, if I've
(22:15):
spent all day calling representatives or on forty six zooms
and then raging about a thing, and I'm writing an
op ed, I go, I gotta like get outside and
listen to the kid's laugh exactly because I have to
remember what I'm fighting for, Like I have to have
that exactly.
Speaker 2 (22:32):
You have to do it, and you know, and that's
what I'm you know, I'm fighting for peace of mind
and my own mental health, and I know enough to
take it seriously. Some people don't survive, people I know
in love, you know, ye I lost family members and
(22:55):
loved ones, and you know, nobody gets out of this unscathed, right.
Speaker 1 (23:00):
Yeah, Well, but I hear delight even when you talk
about the show, when you talk about going to host
Jimmy Kimmel, like.
Speaker 2 (23:10):
Fine, grand baby, I have pure delight being here on
the Jersey Shore. Even though there was a horrible storm
last night and the lightning hit so close to the
house that the fire alarm went off and kept saying
fire fire. Every time strike the alarm went off and
screamed fire fire, which was not good for anyone. I
(23:32):
don't think, wow, but there was no fire.
Speaker 1 (23:35):
Knock woodna, I'll knock on my wood too, thank god.
You know, it's my favorite question to ask everybody, But
I'm really curious for you because you everyone's holding their world,
but you're a person who holds really like you hold
your arms outstretched wide for a lot of people and
(23:57):
a lot of experience. Is you know you're in this season,
that this refamous, as your kids say, like a reinvention,
a moving, a reclamation, all these things. For you, what
feels like you're work in progress right now?
Speaker 2 (24:17):
You know, my work in progress is to maintain my equilibrium.
I don't think I'm at my best when I am raging.
And that's why, you know, the view for me was
very difficult because there were things that were enraging by
the way the show was run and the subjects that
(24:37):
we were often asked to talk about. That I thought,
you know, this is the meaning to women or you know,
whatever the issues were, that is not the best use
of my time or talent. You know, when I know that,
and I took a while to learn that, And so
you know, my philanthropy can't interrupt my ability to find
(25:01):
the delight in life. And that means you have to participate.
You have to participate. You know. I used to smoke
pot before I went to Ireland because it's illegal there.
So in a year and a half, I haven't smoked
any pot, right, And I feel a little bit clearer,
to tell you the tea. I feel more present, obviously
(25:25):
in my life, and less forgetful, less taken out of something,
you know. And if you would have told me a
year and a half or two years ago, oh, you're
gonna go there and you're gonna quit pot and you're
gonna feel better, I would have said, no freaking way,
you know, no way. And I'm not advocating it for
(25:45):
anyone besides someone who thinks they'd like to participate more
in their own life and spend less time trying to
quell the twelve monkeys in your brain.
Speaker 1 (25:57):
Right, But I think what I'm here hearing you say
is you're really open to possibilities you didn't see coming totally,
and that feels like a really cool place to be.
Speaker 2 (26:09):
Yeah, And I feel like what you're supposed to, what's
supposed to happen, will happen. And I'm at peace with that,
you know. I'm like, they're like, what what do you
want to do after Jimmy Kimmel. I just want to
do my best. I just want to, you know, be
as good as I can be and be joyful and
be uh, be happy, and and know that some of
(26:32):
those people who believed in him are good people and
they were led astray and and we have to lay
our arms open for them too. We all have been there,
and this is liberty and justice for all. Still.
Speaker 1 (26:51):
I also think when you've got when you've gone full
circle through the emotions of it, I understand the anger
is righteous. I'm angry all the time. I think when
you're frustrated people haven't been listening, great, but you can't
stay in the frustration or the anger. The whole point
of knowing better is also doing better. And so if
(27:14):
we can do better, if we've known better, we have
to be willing to say, oh, you're ready to do better,
then come do it with us, because the the other
part of it is like, well, we're going to cut
off our nose despite our face, like, no, we're not.
Speaker 2 (27:30):
We're not freeing the insurrectionists. No we're not. We're not saying,
you know, every crime that you've ever committed is forgiven
over your new found understanding of who this man is.
But I do think there has to be you know,
that roomy quote right in the field next to right
(27:53):
and wrong, there's the people. I'll go.
Speaker 1 (27:55):
I'll meet you there, ya Right.
Speaker 2 (27:57):
So that's what I'm what I'm hoping for, that's what
I'm trying to manifest. That's what I'm meaning and knowing. Like, listen,
Jimmy asked me to do. This is quite an honor.
I'm going to do it, you know. I love that
for you, and I'm going to try my best, you know,
and have fun and enjoy it, you know, enjoy it.
Speaker 1 (28:22):
Yeah,
Hi, everyone, it's Sophia. Welcome to work in progress. Welcome
back Whipsmarties. Let's dive right back into our fantastic conversation
(00:20):
with Rosie O'Donnell. When you came out in public, I mean, yes,
all bets were kind of off societally. I think people
realized so much of what they thought they cared about
was bullsh after nine to eleven happened, Like what are
we fighting about? Look what happens in the world.
Speaker 2 (00:36):
You know.
Speaker 1 (00:37):
It's it's that seismic experience of when you have a
death in the family and then everyone stops fighting. You're like,
I can't believe we waste it all this time. But
it was still I mean, it was still a risk.
Like I remember watching Ellen and she came out and
her show got canceled, Like I remember those things.
Speaker 2 (00:56):
Yes, but I came out because we had a foster
child that we were not allowed to adopt, and because
we were gay. And there were two male nurses, Lofton
and Cruteau, who had taken AIDS babies during the AIDS
crisis when the parents had both died of drug addiction,
(01:18):
taken the HIV positive children and adopt it. Fostered them,
and then some of them zero converted to negative because
of their care and treatment, and sometimes that happens with babies.
So they went adopt the fourteen year old that had
Cyril converted as a toddler, and the Florida state government
(01:41):
wouldn't allow them to adopt the child that they raised
because he was now a viable adoption and they didn't
want gay people to adopt it, so they couldn't even
adopt the foster child they raised. And that was exactly
the position I was in. I could not adopt the
(02:01):
foster child I raised because I'm gay, So my choice
would be to lie are you now or have you
ever been? A homosexual? To lie on the court papers.
Therefore maybe having strange people try to nullify the adoption,
and it would have been probably nullified because I am
a lesbian and there's you know, nothing's going to change that.
(02:23):
I mean, I don't expect any changes. But look at
Jojo Siwa, but she is very she's a very young person.
Speaker 1 (02:30):
You know, she's finding herself.
Speaker 2 (02:32):
She's figuring stuff out. That's what I say. I mean,
every gay woman I know has a dalliance with men
at some time. I mean, there's very few gold star lesbians,
as they call themselves.
Speaker 1 (02:44):
Yeah, I know a few, but not a lot. I mean,
I spent a very long time thinking I was just
a bisexual woman out here. Turns out yeah, I don't
think so.
Speaker 2 (02:53):
Yeah. Well, you know, it's hard to telling ourselves, right,
it's hard to figure out. You know. In my show,
I talked about my daughter saying to me, are you
non binary? And I said no? And they said are
you sure? And I said yes, And they said, then
what are you? And I said, I'm an og lesbian bitch.
(03:16):
Bitch's pejorative, especially for a feminist even years old.
Speaker 1 (03:21):
Yeah, You're like, let me have my terms.
Speaker 2 (03:25):
Well I was just like, that's a pretty elaborate thought
process for it. I'm little bit to go to.
Speaker 1 (03:30):
But for an eleven year old to know pejorative in
the first place is already wildly impressive.
Speaker 2 (03:35):
Well. She has a thing called hyperlexia, which means and echolalia,
two things that a lot of autistic kids have. One
of them is when there's like a tape recorder in
your brain. This is echolalia, and if you hear something,
your brain records it and then you can recite it.
In the dialect that you heard it. Wow. So she
(03:59):
was at school and the boy kept calling her psycho.
So I asked the teacher which was the father, and
they told me. I went over to the father, introduced
myself and said, why does your kid call my kid
a psycho? And he goes, listen, it's very upsetting. But
my son is very sensitive and she tells them scary stories.
I said, really, I've never heard her tell a scary story.
(04:21):
What's the scary story? Says where's waldough? Se where's the
striped shirt? How scary is Where's Waldo? He goes, that's
what he tells me. I go home. I say, Clay,
do you have a story? Where's Waldo? She said yeah?
I tell her at school a lot. Half the kids
like it, half the kids hate it. Those are pretty
good odds. I said, yeah, you're right, there's a pretty
(04:42):
good odds. Can you tell me the story? She says, yeah.
She takes a breath. She goes, it was a dark
and dreamy night in the bowels of the kingdom. The
dungeons were full of stink from rets and fitting. I
said to a stop, stop, what are you doing? She said,
that's that's the story of of where it's Waldo. That's
how it begins, and she can recite the entire thing
(05:07):
that's called echolalia. And then she has hyperlexia. When she
was in second grade, the teacher said, we have to
test her vocabulary. They give kids in second grade one
hundred words, and she got ninety nine right and the
only word she got wrong was broom and that's because
she said a sweeper because she used to watch pepper
Pig and that's what they called on pepper Pig. And
(05:30):
when she was two to four and a half, she
spoke with a British accent where people would say, we'd
be at the park and she'd say, Mommy, might I
have a spot of tea? And the woman would say,
you adopted from London. I said, no, she's from Texas.
She has autism, echalia and hyperlexia.
Speaker 1 (05:53):
Wow.
Speaker 2 (05:55):
So she's like this little.
Speaker 1 (05:57):
She's like a little linguistic prodigy.
Speaker 2 (05:59):
Yes, incredible, and she has you know, she has moderate autism.
You know, not people say hers is very light. I'm
like their's is very light. I'm like, no, it's actually moderate.
And you know, I just don't always discuss the more
difficult stuff because I feel as though, you know, that's
(06:22):
her business. The light that I show her in is
the brilliance of her.
Speaker 1 (06:26):
Yeah. Of course, is it an interesting thing to have
a young one with neuro difference because one of the
things that fascinates me even learning about my own where
I'm like, oh, it's not just me, Like these are interesting, Okay,
nothing like being an overachiever who gets diagnosed in your forties.
(06:47):
That's a fun journey.
Speaker 2 (06:48):
Yes, exactly.
Speaker 1 (06:50):
I think about what it must be like to be
a kid learning how your brain works. Now because there's
so much research. I mean, even like a few months ago,
researchers believe that they've proven that ADHD is a developmental advantage,
and they sort of went through the whole reasoning of
this and what it offers in terms of creative problem
(07:11):
solving and how ADHD brains helped us survive crazier times
when there weren't guaranteed resources, and like, I wish I'd
known this.
Speaker 2 (07:20):
I completely believe that. Wow. Yeah, I always tell people,
you know, add has really worked for me. Yea, So
you know, I don't know what to tell you. But
when I was on my show the University of Seattle,
I believe It was a Bill Gates study was doing
all this autism research, and they called and sent a letter.
(07:42):
They wanted to test me for autism because of my
ability to retain lyrics and ingles and songs, and they said,
it's really not normal what you're able to do. And
I was like, Wow, that's exciting, but I have a
kid and I can't I'm doing a show. I can't
really to be tested for three days and in case
(08:02):
I might have autism, which at the time, you know,
I didn't think twice about it, But now that I've
been raising this child, I go, I see. You know,
I used to think all my friends who had kids
who were autistic, I thought I should be the one
to get an autistic kid. I would understand. And I
think I do the way that you have to if
(08:25):
you're an autism parent, and you learn your own language
and routines with them that are often misunderstood by people
who love you and love the child. Yes, you know,
like my child sleeps in the bed with me still
and they're thirteen, and it's exhausting. It's exhausting to not,
(08:49):
you know, to be hit with, you know, a kid,
you know, not in a violent way. Just sleeping. Sleeping.
Speaker 1 (08:56):
Kids are very active.
Speaker 2 (08:58):
Very active, and you know a lot of people have
judgment in my world and say, you know, you have
to do this, you have to do that. And I
thought she was out now she was out for about
six months, and then I went away to Australia to
work for three weeks. And when I came back back
in the bed right. So everyone that I talk to,
(09:19):
all of our helpers, everyone says, when they're ready, they
will go, I'll go, and then that will be that.
Don't worry, this is not going to be you know,
they're going to end up their whole life doing this.
Speaker 1 (09:34):
You know, right, what a gift though to be in
this time. You know that your kid gets to be
raised by you, because if if you were your kid's
age with your parents, you might not have been given
the patience, no, no, to develop in the way you
needed to.
Speaker 2 (09:53):
Yeah, everyone thought that you have to be stricter with
these kids. My kids think that too, They're like, you
have to be stricter with them. I'm like, listen, you guys,
this is a different situation. You guys didn't sleep with me.
Remember what do you think I changed as a mom?
Or did the kid change what's and there's a diagnosis
(10:16):
you know, yeah, there's a doctor's diagnosis of this. This
is someone who does not have Apple software. They have
some strange computer that you have to figure out how
to use, and it's not one you've ever seen before,
and you're not good at coding, and you don't know
the lab and you just keep freaking hitting the keys
(10:40):
and trying this and trying that, and you know, and
mostly their self esteem. Now, if I were to send
you pictures of how they just went out, We're here
in the Jersey Shore and we are doing a family
two weeks hang out at the Jersey Shore, and my
(11:02):
son who just had a baby, and his wife are
coming with the baby who's three months old. So that's unbelievable.
But we were at the Jersey Shore and she had
on a green wig, she's thirteen goggles and leather gloves
it's eighty five degrees and a skirt and boots, different
(11:24):
kinds of she addresses like Cyndi Lauper in nineteen eighty.
Speaker 1 (11:27):
I was going to say this, this feels very Betsy Johnson
Cyndy Lauper. Yes, yes, yes.
Speaker 2 (11:31):
Nineteen eighty so cool. Yeah, so many artists I know
have ADHD autism spectrum, they have something, they have some
four letter three little ditty. And you know, figuring out
yourself is a life journey. You know, it's not like you.
Oh well, that's what I am. So therefore I stop
growing and I just stay in this one definition of
(11:53):
who I am. But moving to Ireland really forced me
to step back out of my comfort zone.
Speaker 1 (12:01):
You know, I was going to ask if some of
this feels related to getting so far outside the system
you've been used to, because a different brain is, to
your point, a different operating system. And I'm so curious
what it's been like to live overseas and outside of
this sort of American ness we're all so steeped in.
Speaker 2 (12:25):
Well, you know the greatest thing about it is the
lack of celebrity culture in Ireland, because you know, people
would say to us, welcome Clay, welcome Rosie, you belong
here in Ireland. Never can I have a picture? Can
I have? So Clay and I go to this place
(12:46):
and where it's an outdoor place, we can get a
burger and couple next to us with a little baby
and Clay's playing with the baby and me and the
couple are talking. So it turns out we sort of
had dinner together, but not at the same tabe really close.
And yeah, after about two hours they said, thank you
for talking to us, Rosie and I just want to
(13:07):
let you know we're both big fans. And I said, oh,
you just thought you'd bring it up here at the
end of the dinner. And he goes, well, it's not
the most important thing, no, is it? And I was
like a sentence never heard in America. Wow. And so
there's a lack of celebrity culture which allows you to
be seen and live as a full, completely integrated person,
(13:29):
you know, with no none of the tendrils of fame
right right. It drags behind you sometimes, and you know,
it's very hard to talk about because in America it's
held up as the be all, end all. So if
you say anything about it that you know, people are
getting mad.
Speaker 1 (13:48):
You know, God forbids you complain.
Speaker 2 (13:51):
You're ruining my dream of what it is. Just be
quiet and be happy you're there, you know.
Speaker 1 (13:56):
Yeah, and now a word from our sponsors who make
this show possible. That thing that you said, you know,
to be able to really be a full, an integrated human,
(14:17):
what I think people don't understand is that the box
like it clamps around you and then it squeezes, you know,
like like one of those Indiana Jones kind of scenes
where the rocks are getting closer. And doesn't mean you
don't love what you do. It means you love it
so much that you put up with the weirdness of
people not treating you like a person anymore.
Speaker 2 (14:39):
But sometimes it's gone before you know it. Right now,
it can be gone in a flash, like mine was
gone after the first day of my show.
Speaker 1 (14:48):
Wow, really just overnight.
Speaker 2 (14:51):
Overnight.
Speaker 1 (14:52):
Holy Now.
Speaker 2 (14:53):
I had done a bunch of movies I had, you know.
Speaker 1 (14:55):
So it was different.
Speaker 2 (14:57):
I was not known, but to be superno and in
the category with someone as powerful and meteor aesque as
Oprah Winfrey. Yeah, oh, I mean that's a pretty powerful soul. Yes,
in every way that you can measure it.
Speaker 1 (15:18):
You know, when you think about getting some of your
personhood back over there in a way, do you think
the space Ireland gave you is why you're ready to
come back and do your next show.
Speaker 2 (15:34):
I think the space Ireland gave me made me want
to come back and see my son's baby. And I
had been doing it in Australia, in Scotland, and I
had been doing it in Europe, so I've done about
fifty or sixty show performances of it already.
Speaker 1 (15:53):
My god, I didn't realize.
Speaker 2 (15:55):
Yeah. So then when I'm going to be in America
to see my son's baby, I said, can we just
do like, you know, four, like twelve shows, maybe four
a week and in a little theater. Daryl Roth, who's
a big Broadway producer I've worked with before and I
really enjoy her. She's just one another Tony and so
(16:15):
she said, you know, let me present it and we'll
do twelve shows. What do you say? And you know,
so we're going to do that, and you know, I
wanted to see with the changes that I've made because
the play is essentially a love letter to Ireland, it
(16:36):
really is, and so I had to take out a
lot of the Irish stuff. The second part of the
show is really much more about all the Irish stuff, right,
And it starts with the day my mother died and
it ends with the last day I saw her. So
there are very sad parts in it as well, and
(16:57):
sometimes people in the audience cry, you know, and where
they're very startled at the beginning when that's how it starts.
They're like, right, wa, wait a minute, isn't it supposed to
be a comedy.
Speaker 1 (17:07):
Show, right, They're like, wait, Rosie, you're.
Speaker 2 (17:09):
So where's the trump jokes? Right? Right?
Speaker 1 (17:13):
Right? We thought we thought you were gonna call him patty.
Speaker 2 (17:17):
Little bit exactly, come on, do it? Do it?
Speaker 1 (17:21):
Yeah? Wow? Well, so you kick off next week in
New York Wednesday, the twenty second. What do you think
it's going to feel like to be back in New
York for you? Because like this, I know, Ireland's home,
but like this is home too, right.
Speaker 2 (17:36):
Yeah, this is definitely home. You know. It feels good
and familiar. It also feels very loud. I feel a
little bit more anxiety, just you know, in New York.
Sometimes the day's New York wins. You know. New York
is is a beast, right And that's where I'm staying
and where I'm doing the show, And you know, I'm
(17:57):
I'm home. I sold everything before I left, and so
I'm hoping to get like a place in New Jersey
near my kids so that I could when i'm home,
we can have a home base here as well. You know.
So I'm planning on doing that, and you know, I
don't know how long we'll stay there. I think it
really does depend on what happens politically in the country
(18:19):
and if I feel mentally healthy enough to you know,
battle those those demons. And some days I do. Some
days I feel very strong, and other days I feel like,
oh boy, this is a lot. You know. Yeah, he's
like bombards you. It's always he's doing something. You can't
(18:40):
even watch the soccer game or you know, he ruins everything.
Speaker 1 (18:44):
In Really like dealing with him is like a very
horrible version of the Tomato festival that happens in Italy
every summer. Well, just getting compelted in the face all
the time.
Speaker 2 (18:58):
It's like stop, you know.
Speaker 1 (19:00):
And I know that's their whole thing. Like him and Bannon,
they're like flood the zone wich shit and they won't
know what to But it's like nobody wants to be
on the receiving end of a fire hose of shit,
and that that's your goal, just like says so much
about you, So I get it. There are days like
I got asked this morning if I'd seen something horrible,
(19:21):
and I was like no, I just like sometimes I
need a day where I don't look at the news.
But then because I'm such a communicator of the news
to people, I get yelled at if I haven't communicated
about the most recent and I'm like, I don't know
what to tell you, guys. I'm just one person, and
sometimes I got to turn off.
Speaker 2 (19:37):
Yeah, but I gotta tell you, I took all of
the American news channels off of my TV and I
only watch Irish and English Now and sometimes wash Al
Jazeera just to see what's happening over there. And I
have so much commer for it. I can't tell you
the difference that it makes in my mental health and
(19:58):
my happines this level, you know, to experience joy still,
and because it's very, very hard to experience joy when
you're in the thick of the Epstein Library, Yes, when
you're in the thick of that young boy that was
(20:19):
left on the island.
Speaker 1 (20:21):
My friends, it's so awful.
Speaker 2 (20:24):
That you can't believe what the Supreme Court is doing,
and doing boldly in front of everyone. And is he
going to let us have elections? That's my big question.
Is he going to let us or is he going to,
you know, make some sort of tragic event occur and
then declare that it's too dangerous and this is a
time of war and we can't all vote, right, so
(20:48):
you know, I think it's scary.
Speaker 1 (20:51):
Yeah, and now a word from our sponsors. Part of
the practice for me, because I can really get sucked
under with it all, you know. And then I'm not
sleeping and then it's like two o'clock and I haven't
eaten anything, and I'm just like, oh, this is not
(21:13):
a good I'm not treating my body kindly like I
would never treat my kid this way? What am I doing?
And I think about it and I come back a lot.
There's a poem I love by a poet, Jack Gilbert,
and he it's called a Brief for the Defense. After
(21:33):
our show, I'm going to send it to you, but
the sort of thesis of it, and he talks about how,
no matter what, you could essentially be having the most
glorious day, and then you look over there and somebody's
suffering in the most hideous way. And the thesis of
the point when of the poem, when he really drills
it down, is there's all sorts of things we can't
(21:54):
live without, even hope sometimes, but we cannot survive without delight,
Like the human spirit has to have delight, and so
when you when you claim it, you keep it alive
for everyone else who can't touch it in the moment.
And it's kind of my reminder, you know, if I've
(22:15):
spent all day calling representatives or on forty six zooms
and then raging about a thing, and I'm writing an
op ed, I go, I gotta like get outside and
listen to the kid's laugh exactly because I have to
remember what I'm fighting for, Like I have to have
that exactly.
Speaker 2 (22:32):
You have to do it, and you know, and that's
what I'm you know, I'm fighting for peace of mind
and my own mental health, and I know enough to
take it seriously. Some people don't survive, people I know
in love, you know, ye I lost family members and
(22:55):
loved ones, and you know, nobody gets out of this unscathed, right.
Speaker 1 (23:00):
Yeah, Well, but I hear delight even when you talk
about the show, when you talk about going to host
Jimmy Kimmel, like.
Speaker 2 (23:10):
Fine, grand baby, I have pure delight being here on
the Jersey Shore. Even though there was a horrible storm
last night and the lightning hit so close to the
house that the fire alarm went off and kept saying
fire fire. Every time strike the alarm went off and
screamed fire fire, which was not good for anyone. I
(23:32):
don't think, wow, but there was no fire.
Speaker 1 (23:35):
Knock woodna, I'll knock on my wood too, thank god.
You know, it's my favorite question to ask everybody, But
I'm really curious for you because you everyone's holding their world,
but you're a person who holds really like you hold
your arms outstretched wide for a lot of people and
(23:57):
a lot of experience. Is you know you're in this season,
that this refamous, as your kids say, like a reinvention,
a moving, a reclamation, all these things. For you, what
feels like you're work in progress right now?
Speaker 2 (24:17):
You know, my work in progress is to maintain my equilibrium.
I don't think I'm at my best when I am raging.
And that's why, you know, the view for me was
very difficult because there were things that were enraging by
the way the show was run and the subjects that
(24:37):
we were often asked to talk about. That I thought,
you know, this is the meaning to women or you know,
whatever the issues were, that is not the best use
of my time or talent. You know, when I know that,
and I took a while to learn that, And so
you know, my philanthropy can't interrupt my ability to find
(25:01):
the delight in life. And that means you have to participate.
You have to participate. You know. I used to smoke
pot before I went to Ireland because it's illegal there.
So in a year and a half, I haven't smoked
any pot, right, And I feel a little bit clearer,
to tell you the tea. I feel more present, obviously
(25:25):
in my life, and less forgetful, less taken out of something,
you know. And if you would have told me a
year and a half or two years ago, oh, you're
gonna go there and you're gonna quit pot and you're
gonna feel better, I would have said, no freaking way,
you know, no way. And I'm not advocating it for
(25:45):
anyone besides someone who thinks they'd like to participate more
in their own life and spend less time trying to
quell the twelve monkeys in your brain.
Speaker 1 (25:57):
Right, But I think what I'm here hearing you say
is you're really open to possibilities you didn't see coming totally,
and that feels like a really cool place to be.
Speaker 2 (26:09):
Yeah, And I feel like what you're supposed to, what's
supposed to happen, will happen. And I'm at peace with that,
you know. I'm like, they're like, what what do you
want to do after Jimmy Kimmel. I just want to
do my best. I just want to, you know, be
as good as I can be and be joyful and
be uh, be happy, and and know that some of
(26:32):
those people who believed in him are good people and
they were led astray and and we have to lay
our arms open for them too. We all have been there,
and this is liberty and justice for all. Still.
Speaker 1 (26:51):
I also think when you've got when you've gone full
circle through the emotions of it, I understand the anger
is righteous. I'm angry all the time. I think when
you're frustrated people haven't been listening, great, but you can't
stay in the frustration or the anger. The whole point
of knowing better is also doing better. And so if
(27:14):
we can do better, if we've known better, we have
to be willing to say, oh, you're ready to do better,
then come do it with us, because the the other
part of it is like, well, we're going to cut
off our nose despite our face, like, no, we're not.
Speaker 2 (27:30):
We're not freeing the insurrectionists. No we're not. We're not saying,
you know, every crime that you've ever committed is forgiven
over your new found understanding of who this man is.
But I do think there has to be you know,
that roomy quote right in the field next to right
(27:53):
and wrong, there's the people. I'll go.
Speaker 1 (27:55):
I'll meet you there, ya Right.
Speaker 2 (27:57):
So that's what I'm what I'm hoping for, that's what
I'm trying to manifest. That's what I'm meaning and knowing. Like, listen,
Jimmy asked me to do. This is quite an honor.
I'm going to do it, you know. I love that
for you, and I'm going to try my best, you know,
and have fun and enjoy it, you know, enjoy it.
Speaker 1 (28:22):
Yeah,
Host
Sophia Bush
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