June 9, 2025 • 51 mins
In this heartfelt episode of the Silver Disobedience® Perception Dynamics™ podcast, host Dian Griesel (also known as Silver Disobedience) interviews the colorful and inspiring Ray DeForest, best known for his drag persona, Doris Dear. Ray shares the highs and lows of his life, including his recent health difficulties with prostate cancer, his deeply rooted love for his family, and the challenging but rewarding journey of creating and sustaining his drag performances. The episode dives into topics of diversity, authenticity, and the complicated dynamics of life and career in the arts. Ray's story is one of resilience, joy, and the pursuit of authenticity. More about Ray can be found here: https://dorisdear.com
Please SUBSCRIBE! I’m Dian Griesel, Ph.D. aka @SilverDisobedience to my million+ monthly blog readers. You can learn more about me here: https://diangriesel.com
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But for starters…I am a perception analyst, hypnotherapist, author of 16 books and a Wilhelmina model. For 30 years I have helped my clients to achieve greater understanding as to how perceptions impact everything we do whether personally or professionally.
This episode was recorded in collaboration with The Manhattan Center, New York City, New York.
https://www.themanhattancenter.com/
00:00 Introduction and Guest Announcement00:40 Ray's Cancer Journey02:04 From Ray to Doris Deer05:25 Creating Doris Deer's Girl Talk08:50 The Joy of Performing as Doris17:33 Corporate Speaking and Diversity19:47 Challenges in Diversity and Inclusion27:06 Understanding Hormone Depletion and Muscle Strength29:22 Respect and Pronouns: A Discussion on Trans and Gay Communities30:31 The Insistence of Acceptance and Personal Identity33:44 AI and Its Impact on the Entertainment Industry34:17 Union Strikes and AI Protections41:47 Mentorship and Career in the Arts48:46 Finding Joy and Acceptance in Life50:43 Conclusion and Farewell
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
Hello everybody, I'm Diane Grissell.
I'm also known as Silver Disobedience, and this is the
Silver Disobedience Perception Dynamics podcast.
And I've got a really fun guest today that is having an extra
good day. So I'm honored to be celebrating
with him, but he's going to tellyou why in a moment.
His name's Ray Deforest and we are going to be talking about
(00:24):
drag, SAG, AFTRA and we're just spill some tea as we sit around
here and chat. Ray, it's a pleasure to have you
here. Hello, it's a pleasure to be
here. OK, so today is a big day for
you. Why?
So last August I got diagnosed with grade 5 prostate cancer,
(00:49):
which is kind of the worst kind of prostate cancer you can have.
And on top of that, most prostate cancer is inside the
prostate and many times they pull the prostate.
My cancer is on the outside of the prostate, which they now
can't pull out because they can't guarantee every cell will
be caught and the cells could goeverywhere in the body.
(01:09):
And when we found that out, theyalso said most likely that
cancer is throughout my body andthere's not great future for me.
So you're dealing what you get that that sort of thing in your
life and you suddenly are looking at the end of your life
(01:31):
coming a lot sooner than you thought.
I'm 66, I'll be 67 in October. And then they did a scan.
They found out that there was not a single cell they could
find anywhere else in my body, which meant I could get
treatment. And last Thursday, which would
have been less than a week ago, what they did a blood test and
they said that my cancer is undetectable.
(01:54):
That is the best news I could have today.
Yeah. What a way to start an episode
on a really good note. Yes, on a really good note.
Now you have had a colorful, interesting life.
Very colorful, OK. People know you by your drag
name as well, which is Doris dear yes.
(02:16):
So let's talk about the evolution of Ray to Doris and
how this became an alter ego personality.
Yeah, So my mom, I lost my dad to complications after colon
cancer surgery. And then many years later, my
mom was diagnosed with Alzheimer's.
(02:39):
And I grew up in a family in Staten Island, NY.
I know good old Staten Island. We were a hard working middle
class family, but it was truly afamily full of joy and love and
celebration. My mom was a model in the late
40s early 50s, walked runways inParis and New York and gave it
(03:03):
up to be a housewife. And they were.
My dad worked was a hard workingunion guy for Bell Telephone and
ended up at one point becoming vice president of of the union.
So I come by my union work naturally, apparently, and we
were just all a loving, supportive, very close family.
(03:27):
So the five years of watching mymom go through Alzheimer's was
especially hard on me. You know, I was mom's boy and my
sister was dead's girl. So it was really hard working
through all her Alzheimer's. I mean, it's a hard thing.
How old were you? This was 11 years ago.
(03:50):
Oh, wow. And I learned very quickly, you
don't, you know, people argue, mom, you've got to remember like
they're not capable. That capability is is lost
through this disease. And I just learned to live in
the moment with her was a great lesson for me in many ways and
my humanity, which really helpedme recently through my cancer
(04:12):
diagnosis. And I would show up and
sometimes it was 1970 to her, sometimes she didn't know.
In the end, she didn't know any of us.
But the loss of her eventually was so intense for me, the
trying to find a way to mourn and also remember to celebrate
(04:34):
my family, even though there wasgreat loss.
And I always told stories about growing up in Staten Island with
Taffy and Duke, who are my parents, and their parties in
the Rumpus room every Saturday night, where everyone would come
over, dressed up and go down into the Rumpus room in the
basement and party till sunrise.Were kids allowed to those
(04:58):
parties in the. Rumpus room?
No, but my sister and I would sneak down the stairs and watch
and they would smoke too much and drink too much and sing and
damn. And I used to think, wow, they,
my parents. And then I realized, well, they
were only in their 40s. So I looked at what I did in my
40s and well, you know, apple tree, it's all right there.
(05:22):
So I decided, and I had been, I've been a full time actor
since 19 years old, an actor, storyteller, singer.
So to deal with the loss of my mom, I decided to write a show
and I sort of started crafting the show.
I found a musical director, we picked songs.
I was telling stories and I was doing it as myself, as Ray.
(05:47):
And it didn't feel right. It was sad.
And I didn't want to do something that was sad.
It was meant to be a celebration, and I had done, my
partner and I, we just celebrated 20 years together.
He's an amazing Angel in my life.
Especially lately, we decided hehim and I had been working for a
(06:12):
nonprofit, the Imperial Court, where you kind of do drag to
raise money. And we would raise money for
lots and lots of nonprofits. And so I had Dundra.
I mean, if you're in the LGBTQ community, eventually you put on
the heels and the dress and go parade or something.
Have fun. And it's fun.
And he said to me, I think you should.
(06:35):
I was telling him it would didn't work for me.
He said, I think you should do it in drag.
And I thought, oh, but I'm an actor.
I don't do drag. I don't do shows in a bar and
jump splits. And I'm a terrible lip syncher.
And he said, no, I you should think about it.
So I talked to several friends of mine who I really trust their
(06:59):
opinions. And I decided, OK.
And I created a character based on my mother with stories
combining my sister and I created a show, Doris Dears Girl
Talk GURL. And no one knew I had ever known
(07:20):
I would do this kind of thing. And I did it in a theater at the
Triad Theater Uptown in New Yorkon 72nd St.
And I remember being in the backin the dressing room and my
partner came in and I said, look, I know no one's out there.
Just make sure they no one wantsto sit up front.
Make them sit up front. There's nothing worse than being
(07:40):
on stage and looking at you don't see a single soul city up
front. And he looked at me says, great,
we just turned away 20 people. Wow.
And I thought, first show how I've never done a cabaret show
of any kind. How do people even know we were
sold out? The theater said, we love this.
(08:00):
It's something very special. Your message, your joy, your
hopefulness, your celebration offamily.
No one's doing this come back and I've been coming back for 11
years now to sold out shows. We produced a streaming series
and COVID, we did Four Seasons with seven awards, seven major
(08:22):
awards. I now I'm a judge for them, the
national Daytime Emmys and all these other things.
I judge and I mentor and. Did that all come as a result of
this show? Yeah, yes, everything.
I found the most unbelievable joy in this character.
(08:48):
And in many ways I've always said, and I know we both don't
sort of like this word, but I said I've never been so
authentic on stage as when I'm Doris and Doris.
Doris. There's my Staten Island accent,
by the way. That's OK, I have a Long Island
one that pops out every song. Yeah.
(09:08):
You know, Doris, Doris, Tia, I, you know, she gives me the
freedom to storytelling in a waythat as Ray, it doesn't come as
naturally. And I am a storyteller as Ray,
but it's different. And when I do these shows, you
know, because I write them, I produce them.
(09:30):
I have a huge orchestra. I mean, there's six months of
work in these little shows and Iget to live those that when I do
2 shows over a weekend, I get tolive with my family again
because they're all gone. I lost my sister right before
COVID to her brain aneurysm verysuddenly.
So they're all gone. But then here I am on stage
(09:53):
telling their stories, celebrating all the stories I
tell are true. I mean, they're theatrical lies
because I am a storyteller, but they're all true.
And people continually say to me, you took me back to an
easier time. And you reminded me how even if
(10:15):
you grew up in a family that wasn't perfect, there was still
love and joy there. And I love that.
I love. I love the joy it gives me, and
I love the joy it brings to others.
And the first time I did the show, I always so I worked in
Vegas as a singer and the biggest show in the world in
(10:37):
Jubilee. And Debbie Reynolds at the time
had a show. She had our hotel and like she
was trying to get a museum for all those costumes she she
owned. And I got to know her and she
would do a show in the hotel andshe would stand outside for as
long as it took to meet with every single person in that
theater. And, and I said, why do you do
(10:58):
that? Everybody knows who you are.
And she said, you know what? She said, Ray, always remember
that those people in that theater are why you're working.
And if you didn't have them you you're not working.
That's a good lesson. Yeah.
And I do that. I stand out at after the show
and I meet everybody and that first couple of shows who.
(11:19):
Makes them Ray or Doris. Who makes what?
Who meets them? After Doris, Doris always meets
them. Yeah.
And I never break the character until I get home, close the door
and that, and then everything comes off.
But I would have these wives come up and say, my husband
would like to give you a hug, isthat I guess, Of course.
(11:41):
And these husbands, because my audience is mostly straight
couples of a certain age, maybe 4045 plus, who have families and
I'd say, and I, they would, I would hug them and I could feel
them sort of exhale and relax into me.
(12:03):
And these are seconds long and then take a breath and step away
and say thank you, you're just great.
And I first I thought, what is, do they like the, the fake
double D's? Like what are they?
What are they enjoying about allthis?
And I'm, you know, I'm 7 foot 2 and the whole outfit and I
(12:23):
realized that I represent everyone's mother, that I
represent the men. They would lean in and exhale
and it was like being on the couch.
You're head in mom's lap. You don't have a mortgage,
There's no stress, everything you're being taken care of.
(12:46):
And I grew to accept that and, and release that to them and let
them have that moment. And it's sort of just brings me
so much joy that I can give joy to others and in turn, it gives
joy to me. And I think that's that's just
such a wonderful thing. And that's a great thing that
(13:08):
Doris gave me. And I thought I was only doing 1
show would be over. And it's 11 years now and I'd
say it's 90% of my career and it's fantastic and it's taught
me so much. That's very heartwarming.
That is very heartwarming. And it's interesting, your
psychological insight into the dynamic you're creating with
(13:32):
people. Yeah, I mean, and so many people
said, well, I came the first time because, you know, you're
my friend, I want to support you.
And then they said, But I come back because I've never sat
through anything so wonderful and joyous.
Now when you create a show, how long do you run that show and
then do you change up the content?
(13:54):
Are you writing a news? Show.
Every show is. Different.
Every show is different. And don't repeat anything.
And I try not to repeat stories,although there's always a little
overlap. Yeah.
So I do it like one of my big shows every year is a Christmas
show. I have 8 or 9 guests from
Broadway, Cabaret, Pop World, the, the Metropolitan Opera.
(14:16):
They come in and guest and we, they sing, they do a solo.
We talk about the joy of family and the holidays and what it
means to them. But every year it's a different
show, you know, every year it's a new topic, a new celebration
and it's always new. And then I do solo shows,
usually one or two during the year.
And I have a Sondheim show, I have my girl talk show.
(14:39):
I have more girl talk and more and more girl talk and it's and
it's great, but it's a lot. I mean, it's a lot of work.
You're, I'm constantly writing. I use, I try to do creative
thinking where one of the great exercises I love is 10 ideas in
(14:59):
10 minutes. You just take a pad and you have
10. You set a timer and you got to
write 10 ideas in 10 minutes, and it's a great exercise for
me. It's sort of like being in the
shower, right? Everybody has great ideas in the
shower, and what they think is that when you're in the shower,
(15:21):
there's nothing else. It's just water.
It's noise, and it's that kind of noise that your brain enjoys
and sort of opens it up and you have, I have great ideas in the
shower and I always have my phone in case I want to scream.
You know, Siri, take a note. But I love the practice of just
(15:42):
10 ideas in 10 minutes because sometimes it comes up with a lot
of not so great. And then all of a sudden there's
a nugget that I go, Oh yeah, that's going on the To Do List,
You know, So I love that sort ofcreative thinking and the
creative, I love the creative mindset mindset, which is
(16:08):
basically, you know, I've been delving into this now there's a
lot of research into the creative mindset where some
people believe that they have a set of abilities and that's it.
And if they're successful or not, it's all based on that.
But the creative mindset says that you have a set of
(16:31):
abilities, but you're constantlyexpanding them and learning and
looking at new ways to use them.So your creative mindset is
open. And they've shown scans of
brains that people who use creative mindsets, their minds
are on fire, and people who don't, they're not.
It's very limited. So I like to work in that space
(16:55):
because it just opens me up to so much stuff.
I think that's such an importantpoint and what I write every
day. And I have found just writing
every day has expanded how I think.
Now I find stories in anyone I'mspeaking to.
I'm like, Oh, that's an idea formy the next thing I'm going to
write about. But that creative mindset, what
(17:16):
I really want everyone to understand is you don't have to
just work in the arts. It it's a creative mindset.
Could be, you know, the plumber,the electrician that I mean, you
have to be pretty creative to figure out how pipes were going
to ask me, you know? For sure.
And I, I do corporate speaking, tell me so.
(17:37):
I do a lot of corporate speakingfor the very, very large
corporations. What do you talk about?
Most of it is based on diversity, especially in today's
world where diversity in large corporations is being challenged
and being told to not have DEI or DEIB anymore.
(17:59):
But they I do them as Doris and I sing a nice storytell, but I'm
always talking about how and I interview people from the
company come into the TV studio and I interview them.
We do like an hour and a half show and it's shown to all their
employees and we talk about diversity and we talk about the
(18:21):
idea of how diversity expands the minds and it opens up ways
of thinking to the rest of theiremployees because of that
diversity and how important thatis that the companies that
really believe in that, how thathas helped the companies grow in
ways that they never thought waseven possible.
(18:42):
I want to talk about that because we like to, I like to
explore the operating systems ofsociety.
And I 100% agree with you on theconcept of diversity.
Where my objection is, is I alsobelieve you have to have
excellence in whatever somebody's doing because if I'm
(19:04):
in a burning building, I'm not looking for the diverse person
to come get me. I want the person to pass the
test that can carry my weight and Get Me Out of that building.
If I'm unconscious, you know, ifI'm getting on a plane, I don't
want the person just because they were diverse.
I want the person who really like my nephew X Top Gun pilot
(19:27):
who's now flying for one of the big airlines.
I want that guy who can handle stress.
You know, a plane load of peopleis nothing to him compared to
getting shot, not at 85 times. You know, his in his, yeah, you
know, F35 or F18. So that's how do you, how do you
navigate that when you're talking with people corporately?
(19:47):
Well, I mean, there is always this argument, there's always
this argument that diversity is preventing the real person who
should get the job from getting the job because diversity, it's
often. I don't.
(20:08):
I think that companies are stilllooking for the right people.
But like in my business, for example, in the actor business,
a lot of people believe that only people in the LGBT
community should be playing LGBTpeople.
Then there's this sub, the subset of people who believe
(20:29):
that we're actors and we should be playing all roles.
Like I'm an actor if I'm hired, if I'm I'm if I'm gay, I should
certainly be able to play a straight person.
So why can't a straight person play a gay person?
It's a fair argument. And what do you think about
that? Because it is an interesting
(20:50):
when there was some movie that just they did AI instead of
hiring actual, you know, people who were very, very short.
Oh boy, let's open up the box ofAI that's.
The whole program, Oh my gosh, back to that, because I want to
talk because I know you're with,you know, SAG AFTRA and there's,
(21:12):
you know, the whole writers Guild strike, you know, there's
all that. So we I do want to get to that,
but I would love to, you know, what's your take on well,
because there's so much about, you know, cultural
appropriation, like if I want itor braids in my hair, am I
stealing it from the Indians or who knows what it's like?
In some. Ways we've gone backwards in
that. Yeah, I mean, I believe in the
(21:33):
argument, for example, gay people like we were, we were not
allowed at the table for 100 years.
We were not accepted, we were not allowed.
So if you're a director and one of the parts calls, especially
now for a trans person, I believe that.
(21:56):
I believe that it's the casting and director's job to try to
find a trans person to fill thatrole.
There are plenty of trans peoplein the union and not in the
union who are great actors. So we've never been at the
table. So let us at the table if we
don't fit OK, but at least give us the chance after us not being
(22:21):
allowed. Their position?
Yeah. And if we're not right, OK,
there was a a new musical that was Andrew Lloyd Webber, I think
was Andrew Lloyd Webber a new musical premiering many, many
years ago in London. And the star of the musical was
supposed to be of Asian descent of a certain type.
(22:43):
And they decided way before all this sort of diversity stuff
that they were going to do theirbest to find a true Asian woman
to play this role. They auditioned all over the UK,
couldn't find someone. They expanded into the rest of
your couldn't find. So they actually flew over to
Asia and auditioned there. And that's where they found Lea
(23:08):
Salonga, a very young girl who was singing pop and brought her
in because they and they did their duty to find the right
person who fit the ethnicity to create this.
And of course, we all know Lea Salonga is a huge star and she's
amazing. She's on Broadway right now in a
(23:30):
Sondheim musical. And that's the kind of work I
think that we should do. I think we, if there's a gay
role, try to find a gay person and if it doesn't and you can't
find the right person, then go further, right?
I think that's fair. Again, we weren't allowed at the
(23:51):
table. It allow us now.
And I think at times does it feel a little extreme?
Yes. But eventually it will all equal
out and settle it. And I think the trans community,
and I am not trans, so I can't say exactly what their
(24:13):
experiences. I mean, they're part of my
community. I treasure trans people.
They've been a part of every culture since the dawn of time.
And if you don't believe that, then you don't believe in
anything. You don't believe in real
history. So I feel like that community is
going through many of the thingsthat we as male gay people and
(24:38):
lesbians went through years ago,fighting for our community to
move upfront. And now they're going through it
with a subset of problems. And, and I see it just working
in our union with the trans community and how hard it is for
them right now. And within the trans community
there's many different opinions.Like there was talk about giving
(24:59):
out non binary awards and trans awards at the SAG Awards.
And I had many trans women say to me, I don't want a special
award. I want to be considered a woman.
I want to be considered a woman and win a best actress award,
not a best trans actress award. So it's a.
(25:23):
It's very complicated. It's very complicated and I
think that is where the break started to happen, particularly
when you saw it in sports. Because, I mean, you know, there
was a story just now about fencing at Wagner College in
Staten Island that they removed a girl refused.
She knelt down and refused to doher fencing with this trans
(25:50):
woman. And of course Fox News was is
all over it. This is how it should be and.
I I think it's tricky. I think it's.
Tricky, but the science. You know what, I but I grew up
when there were, there were no sports for women.
You know, maybe maybe you could play volleyball, you know, maybe
(26:11):
there was softball and there wasgymnastics, field hockey.
But you know, maybe you need a third league for that or a third
division. But when it gets to something
extremely physical, oh, that's atough one for me.
Well, except all the science. And I believe in science, all
the science shows. So for let's let's clear
(26:33):
something up for people out there.
No one becomes trans overnight. No one decides in October I'm
going to be a woman now and in January is full, is fully trans
and has got it's a very long process.
There's lots of psychology involved, being very careful.
(26:56):
Are they really ready for this? Then there's hormone therapy and
then possibly surgery. Not all trans people want to
quote UN quote pass. They just want to live how they
want to live. But the science is also very
clear that by the time they're they are fully trans and have
become women because of hormone depletion and and estrogen added
(27:23):
into their bodies and all the testosterone taking out their
must, their muscle strength goesdown by a huge percentage.
It's not like they're now men with man muscles competing
against women. Their musculature has gone so
far down, their strength is good.
So in fact, they're almost equalto women, and the science shows
(27:49):
that. Well, wait a second.
I would have to. I would have to object to that
because I've spent 27 years in biology, so the science will
never actually show that. But you can certainly alter
hormonal structure. Yes.
You know whether that altering of hormonal structure makes
someone become a male or a female.
I think that would be a stretch,but but I can understand your
(28:13):
argument, your point. I'm on hormone depletion because
of my prostate cancer. They've taken out all of my
testosterone and any other hormones.
I lost 35% of my musculature in four or five months.
You want other chemotherapies as.
Well, no chemotherapy. I had radiation radiation.
(28:34):
I used to do 3035 push ups and Istarted working out a month ago
and I couldn't do 3I became so weak.
My muscular, my percentages wentso down from the removal of my
hormones and all of that. And now my muscular is going
back up. And because I had to be very
careful about bone density and muscle loss and all that kind of
(28:58):
stuff. And I do think it's a
complicated issue. Where does it sit?
What? But so often I hear complaints
about the trans community, for example.
And again, I am not trans, so I don't know their full struggles
(29:19):
and I certainly don't understandeverything about them about it.
But what I do understand is respect for humans.
And if if someone says to me, ifsomeone says to me, I say, hey,
David, how are you? And he says, you know, I don't
like to be called David. I like to be called Dave.
Oh, OK, I'll call you Dave. So if I meet someone and say my
(29:43):
pronouns, are they them? OK, they them.
What's the big deal? Does it change my life in any
way, shape or form respecting what another person wants to be
called? Respecting what?
Another person, what they reportedly what their gender is,
if they say they're trans, OK, you're a trans woman, you're a
(30:04):
trans man, whatever. It doesn't change my life in any
way. And I just think too often we
get caught up in this thing about the trans community and
even the gay community and people get, I see these
(30:25):
arguments and I think to myself,how does this affect your life
in any way, shape or form? Well, I think, I think, I think
there was no issue with that. I mean, I was talking with
someone earlier about New York. I mean, in the 1980s, nobody
cared. I mean, nobody cared.
And it became, I think the issuebecame when it was this is who I
(30:45):
am and you must approve it, thatthere's a difference in life.
I mean, I can be a jerk, but youdon't have to approve that I'm a
jerk. You know, you can say you're
being a jerk, Diane. You know, you have the right to
say that. You know, So I think it's the
insistence. I think it's insistence.
So we went for, you know, I think it's you have to
(31:08):
personally accept yourself before you start to demand it of
others. And when you personally accept
yourself, frankly, I don't thinkyou care who signs on for that.
You know, you decided you were going to do a show as Doris.
And this is who you're doing a show as.
You know, I'm not you're not looking for approval.
You're saying this is this is a creative way.
(31:29):
I want to express my love for myfamily, my creative being.
And look at where you are 11 years later celebrating it.
Yeah. And I think we all have
different ways of I mean, in my,in my youth, oh, the youth, I
marched in parades, I marched, Iknew Larry Kramer, I marched, I
(31:49):
do that. I don't do that anymore.
I'm the strength to do that anymore.
God knows. But I mean, I, I am in parades
and stuff, but you know, like I do Doris and people see her as
an actual person because I believe she is.
And in many ways that changes people's opinions of something
(32:10):
that maybe they don't understand.
Like why would you do drag? Why are you doing?
It's never, why are you doing Doris?
Why are you doing that? It's just, Oh my gosh, I love
Doris. And to me, that's a change in
someone's perspective and idea of drag.
Like I never in my press for my show, I never call her a drag
(32:30):
queen. I just, she's just Doris.
She's just a person. I think sometimes the insistence
of acceptance is born from a history of being hidden, you
know, and so not, you know, in my as a gay man, you know, the
(32:51):
Stonewall riots happened and we insisted that people accept who
we are at a time when most gay people couldn't accept who they
were. They were afraid we could.
I mean, it was illegal in New York until I think it was 84
something that sodomy was still illegal.
They could come in your apartment if your neighbor
called the police. And I knew friends that that
(33:12):
happened because you were sleeping with someone of the
same sex. So I think a lot of the anger
and angst and the insistence of acceptance just comes from a
history of non acceptance. And I think some people use that
as a way to find their comfort, whereas again, at my age, I
(33:37):
don't really give a crap. But let's talk about something.
I bet you do give a crap. Sure, because AI is something we
touched on a minute ago and I want to make sure we explore
this. You are very active in SAG
AFTRA. The writers strike just
(33:58):
happened. We're watching all kinds of
things. We're watching I'm I've seen
models who were fit models get their all their measurements
taken and now they're their AI version is getting paid instead
of them. So it's happening in so many
areas. How is this?
What's your take on what's happening here?
So, you know, we went through a long strike period.
(34:20):
There was the writers strike andthen SAG after had our longest
strike. It was over over 100 days I
believe and we were fighting fora fair contract and our our
contracts with SAG. After that we got that we agreed
upon with the AM PTP, which is the AM PTP is for producers.
(34:41):
That's the producers kind of Guild.
It's there. It's not a union, but it's their
sort of Guild. And the AM PTP is the ones who
negotiate with SAG After with the Writers Guild for all the
producers. They're tough.
I mean, unions have some of the best negotiators out there.
(35:02):
They are strong. They stand tall.
Our president, Frank Drescher, fought long and hard.
Now strike. We got some of the best AI
protections out of all the unions that were striking at the
time. SAG After achieved some of the
best AI protections for the moment because our contracts
are. Yeah.
(35:22):
How long does that contract last?
3-4 years or something and then we renegotiate.
So we fought long and hard and we're also fighting on the
government level, trying to get protections of our image
federally. And we do have some state
protections, but we're trying toget it federally.
(35:42):
And it's actually, I think it's going on the floor soon in
Washington. So as it sits right now, you
could be a background actor filming a series and they can
say they can give you, they haveto give you advance notice that
you're going to be scanned and they're going to skip.
(36:03):
They're asking to scan you. They can scan you if you accept,
but you always have the option to say no.
Now they could say then we're not going to use you.
It's the same as nudity. We have nudity clauses.
If it's in the contract, you sayno, I don't accept those, I'm
not doing nudity. Then they could say, well,
that's part of the deal. We don't want you or OK.
(36:25):
Well, the thing that always got me in modeling contracts where
it says something like, you know, we have the right to
alter, modify, adjust. I mean, those clauses are long.
They're very long. And.
Frankly. Terrifying when you think about
putting someone's head on someone else's body or.
But as an artist, I mean. If it was a really good body,
(36:45):
maybe. Yeah, it's like most have most
actors have a rear end per second and you know, a hand
second. We always want to be perfect.
But you know, as artists, we want to work so many times we'll
in the past we would, we would accept these kind of things
because we just want to work andwe don't want to get
blackballed. But it it like they can now scan
(37:07):
you. And if you agree, then they, if
they use that scan as a background in the background for
scenes that you're not on set, you now get paid a full day's
wage. And for everything they do, you
get paid a full taste wage. And we have people watching and
making sure they're following it.
But we have that protection. Now.
We also have a set of very famous, the sort of top of our
(37:31):
union, which by the way, I'm notfor those out there.
I'm very famous in my own mind, but not many other people's.
But because I'm the, we're the hard working sort of middle
class actors. But then you have the stars now
they can be scanned and they cansell their image and sell their
voice and they get paid for it. And the union can help them
(37:54):
negotiate those contracts to make sure they're protected
correctly. And there are many stars doing
that right now. I mean, we've seen that before
in commercials when they used Marilyn Monroe in the past and
they would go to the whoever handles the Marilyn Monroe
estate and they would sign a contract and they would get paid
(38:15):
for the use of Marilyn Monroe. So now under AI, many stars will
get scanned, and then they sell that scan to companies to use
and get paid quite nicely for it.
And they don't have to go to setand they don't have to sit and
make up, and they don't have to be in the rainstorm or the snow
(38:37):
to film something. And they're making money off of
their image and they hold it. You know what I thought was
interesting when I saw the aftermath of the Super Bowl
commercials? That the AI commercials did the
worst as far as audience response, right?
Yeah, and I was in a Super Bowl commercial this season.
It was very exciting. Yeah.
(39:00):
I mean, we are fighting constantly for AI protections
because they. I mean, AI is.
I mean, I don't think I know anybody who doesn't use ChatGPT
at this point. I mean, if you're a writer, it
saves a lot of time if when I have ideas and I can feed them
through and help get a little more clarity and you know,
(39:23):
people who don't use it don't understand using ChatGPT is not
easy to have it put out something of value.
You almost have to write more for that than you would
normally. You have to, you really have to
prompt it with a lot of ideas and a lot of ways and how you
want it written to get somethingthat's even mildly usable.
(39:46):
And then you have to and then you take it and then you have to
edit and re edit and re. It's a lot of work.
It's not just how it spits it out And I put it out there.
It's a lot of work and a lot of,but everybody's using it.
The image AI stuff, I mean, six months ago it was terrible.
Here we are six months later. It's unbelievable.
I watched an entire film made with AI.
(40:08):
Is it perfect? No, but in four years it will
be. It's going to be perfect in a
year. Which is going to be
interesting, you know, renegotiating a contract because
wasn't one of the big contract issues, you know, like if
someone was redoing an ending orchange, you know, doing tests
for different endings and they were using AI imagery and the
(40:31):
writer and AI for writing the end of the script with a
different right approach. Yeah, there's all of these
issues that in our negotiations we tried to cover the Writers
Guild tried to cover the directors killed, you know,
there's all these that we all tried to get protections.
(40:51):
We all tried to build up protections looking to the
future. That's why we have really good
lawyers and really good note negotiators.
And it's a it's really complicated and it's changing
day by day. But I'm and there are people
that say the union doesn't do enough.
But I think if you know how the union works, first of all,
(41:13):
unions are federally, federally regulated.
There's a lot of rules and laws that we have to follow.
You're very active in the. Yeah.
So I serve, well, I serve on theLGBTQ committee here in New York
and nationally. I'm on the New York board for
SAG after in New York, and I'm an alternate for the national
(41:34):
board, although as an alternate you fill in spots.
I've been to every meeting over the past year because lots of
people just can't make it out toLA.
So I'm flying to LA in two weeksfor the national board meeting.
So I'm involved through the years, most of my work has come
(41:54):
through people who believed in me and supported me and helped
me have a career. So at this point in my life, I
it. I believe that mentorship is one
of the best things you can do, especially as an artist or in
any industry. I've been mentored through my
life. It's how I learned to produce.
It's how I learned to dance better, sing better, appear on
(42:15):
camera better, and so I'm tryingto give as much back as I can.
How are you doing that? Through my work union, I help
people teach. I teach people sort of cabaret
classes and how to because that's a very particular art
form as opposed to Broadway and all the different art forms.
(42:37):
I'm scheduled, I think next yearto to teach through SAG after
has a teaching platform to teachThere we go again authenticity
in acting, our favorite word buzzword because as an actor and
to so to have a career. I try to teach people on having
(42:57):
a career and what that means andI always tell them you better
love it more than anything. You better just imagine that you
couldn't do anything else otherwise you're not going to.
It's being an artist is as a career is hard and complicated.
Of course. What is it these days?
(43:18):
There is no guarantees in life, right?
But it's full of rejection and psychologically speaking, you
have to be ready. It's 90 percent, 95% rejection.
And that's hard. That's hard to live through
sometimes, especially if your personal life is in crisis or
(43:38):
going through a tough time and then you're being rejected on
your work site. Those two combined can be
debilitating. And I know that I've been
through that in my career, but Iwas scared to death even at 19
when I first stepped on my firstreal job.
(43:59):
I was scared to death to have tobe a waiter or a bartender or
work in a department store, and that fueled me to constantly be
looking for work, to constantly be better at what I do.
And now it's 48 years later and I'm still working.
Oh my gosh. You know, that's a credit,
(44:19):
that's a credit to perseverance and talent.
One of the things right, you said several times is you've
used the word complicated. If you were mentoring someone,
how do you? What does complicated mean to
you in your creative existence? Well, boy, I think that the
(44:48):
better you have a clear sense ofwho you are.
I think that's one layer that I think people should always
figure out first is to really and look when when you're young,
you don't. When you're young, you think you
can do anything, right? And that's what you should be at
(45:09):
22. You should think you could save
the world tomorrow because that's what youth is for, right?
And those are the people who go out there and really fight.
But to be like an actor or a singer, I think you really have
to be honest about who you are and what you are.
(45:30):
That doesn't mean that you put yourself in a box, but it's the
a place to start. If you know who you are, then
you tend to get a For me, I tendto get a clearer sense of where
I want to go and what I want to do and what caught.
Then it becomes what kinds of shows I'd rather do than that.
Like, I chose not to come back to New York.
(45:51):
I went, I got hired by Disney. I went down to Disney World.
I worked for five years. I worked.
I was a kid of the Kingdom, which was sort of a faux
Mouseketeer kind of a thing. We did shows, we sang Disney
medleys, we did TV specials, traveled around and all that
kind of stuff. It was an amazing training
(46:12):
ground, mostly because you're doing 7 shows a day and 90%
humidity out in front of a castle and you learn
perseverance. You learn to come out seven
times and do a great show and not show that you're about to
pass out from the heat. And it was a great training
around ground on being a professional.
(46:34):
And when that was over for many years, I would get simply hired
without an audition even becauseoh, you were a five year.
Oh, you don't. We don't need to see.
We know you can do this. And I chose.
Many people went from that and came up to New York and we're on
Broadway and I've had great careers.
I chose not to do that. I chose I grew up here and I, I,
(46:57):
I knew actors in my day and I saw the struggle in New York and
I decided to go elsewhere. I worked on cruise ships.
I lived in Denmark for three years, Bermuda for two years,
moved to Vegas. I decided to take a different
path and it was because I had a pretty good sense of what I
could do at that point in my life and what I wanted to
(47:22):
experience. So that complication that sort
of as an artist, what do I do next?
Where do I go? Do I, am I just going to get
online at the next audition and just keep doing that and hope
for the best? Instead, I had, I think, a
better, clearer view of my strengths and who I was.
(47:45):
And that led me to different to my different places and to
continue to work and never stop.And that was my choice.
So people say, I can't believe you've never been on Broadway.
And you know, they almost put you down as if, oh, you didn't
do Broadway. Oh, and I often think that's
come on, I mean, good for the people on Broadway.
(48:06):
Those people are superheroes. 8 shows a week, dancers, singers.
They have to be like superheroes.
So it's. Well, you're doing that when you
do your one one person show for 11 years now.
I. Know, right, I mean, I think you
take, I would argue you've takenBroadway to the next level.
You're self producing from startto finish, which is phenomenal.
(48:27):
Yeah, I can't wait to catch the next.
Show so I. Better be on the list of when
the of course you know the datescome out.
I'll be the first in line to buytickets.
Thank you. Yeah.
Yeah. So I don't know, It's, I think
life is complicated, right? Especially these days, politics
or what they were are no matter what side of politics you want,
(48:53):
it's all very complicated. And I, I again, I think I said
earlier, I really try to find joy in every day.
So I was just away. I was down in the Caribbean and
I was walking to get a soda or something and I was barking down
this winding path. And it was just beautiful day.
(49:15):
The sun was out. I was surrounded by all this
beautiful foliage. And there were these orange
double hibiscus blooms tucked inall the spaces.
And I just stopped. And I looked at it and I
thought, it's so beautiful what it is.
(49:35):
And I stood there and I just looked around and I put my hands
out with my palms up and I just closed my eyes.
And I took a deep breath. And I said to myself, just
you're living in this beautiful world, let's just keep trying to
make it beautiful. I like your thinking and I don't
(49:59):
want us to be out of time, but that's my ringtone.
I used the Joey Ramone version of it.
But it's it's a wonderful world because it is.
And I love that you spoke about joy and connecting and accepting
and community because those are such huge messages that everyone
can benefit from. Acceptance Authenticity.
(50:23):
You know, but. It's true, but it's true the
more we can truly become who we are ourselves and accept whoever
we are, whatever we've been dealt, how we see the world and
accept it in ourselves first. It makes life in general, yeah,
better and easier and a little less complicated it.
Brings us great gifts. Yeah, yeah.
(50:43):
Ray, thank you so much for joining me.
This was a wonderful episode, and I always hate when it's time
to say goodbye. But we have to wrap up.
Of course. It's a rap, as they say.
Rap, you know, Click, get the. Well, thank you.
Thank you, thank you. It's been such a pleasure.
I'm Diane Griselle. This has been the Silver
(51:03):
Disobedience Perception Dynamicspodcast.
We've been recording at iconic Manhattan Center where lots of
great things happen and including this interview with
Ray De Forest, also known as Doris Dear.
So you're going to have to follow him.
There'll be all kinds of links so you can get in touch because
he's a treasure and worth staying in touch with.
(51:25):
So please subscribe, share this episode with your friends and
thank you again, Ray. Thank you.
Thanks everyone, see you soon.
Hello everybody, I'm Diane Grissell.
I'm also known as Silver Disobedience, and this is the
Silver Disobedience Perception Dynamics podcast.
And I've got a really fun guest today that is having an extra
good day. So I'm honored to be celebrating
with him, but he's going to tellyou why in a moment.
His name's Ray Deforest and we are going to be talking about
(00:24):
drag, SAG, AFTRA and we're just spill some tea as we sit around
here and chat. Ray, it's a pleasure to have you
here. Hello, it's a pleasure to be
here. OK, so today is a big day for
you. Why?
So last August I got diagnosed with grade 5 prostate cancer,
(00:49):
which is kind of the worst kind of prostate cancer you can have.
And on top of that, most prostate cancer is inside the
prostate and many times they pull the prostate.
My cancer is on the outside of the prostate, which they now
can't pull out because they can't guarantee every cell will
be caught and the cells could goeverywhere in the body.
(01:09):
And when we found that out, theyalso said most likely that
cancer is throughout my body andthere's not great future for me.
So you're dealing what you get that that sort of thing in your
life and you suddenly are looking at the end of your life
(01:31):
coming a lot sooner than you thought.
I'm 66, I'll be 67 in October. And then they did a scan.
They found out that there was not a single cell they could
find anywhere else in my body, which meant I could get
treatment. And last Thursday, which would
have been less than a week ago, what they did a blood test and
they said that my cancer is undetectable.
(01:54):
That is the best news I could have today.
Yeah. What a way to start an episode
on a really good note. Yes, on a really good note.
Now you have had a colorful, interesting life.
Very colorful, OK. People know you by your drag
name as well, which is Doris dear yes.
(02:16):
So let's talk about the evolution of Ray to Doris and
how this became an alter ego personality.
Yeah, So my mom, I lost my dad to complications after colon
cancer surgery. And then many years later, my
mom was diagnosed with Alzheimer's.
(02:39):
And I grew up in a family in Staten Island, NY.
I know good old Staten Island. We were a hard working middle
class family, but it was truly afamily full of joy and love and
celebration. My mom was a model in the late
40s early 50s, walked runways inParis and New York and gave it
(03:03):
up to be a housewife. And they were.
My dad worked was a hard workingunion guy for Bell Telephone and
ended up at one point becoming vice president of of the union.
So I come by my union work naturally, apparently, and we
were just all a loving, supportive, very close family.
(03:27):
So the five years of watching mymom go through Alzheimer's was
especially hard on me. You know, I was mom's boy and my
sister was dead's girl. So it was really hard working
through all her Alzheimer's. I mean, it's a hard thing.
How old were you? This was 11 years ago.
(03:50):
Oh, wow. And I learned very quickly, you
don't, you know, people argue, mom, you've got to remember like
they're not capable. That capability is is lost
through this disease. And I just learned to live in
the moment with her was a great lesson for me in many ways and
my humanity, which really helpedme recently through my cancer
(04:12):
diagnosis. And I would show up and
sometimes it was 1970 to her, sometimes she didn't know.
In the end, she didn't know any of us.
But the loss of her eventually was so intense for me, the
trying to find a way to mourn and also remember to celebrate
(04:34):
my family, even though there wasgreat loss.
And I always told stories about growing up in Staten Island with
Taffy and Duke, who are my parents, and their parties in
the Rumpus room every Saturday night, where everyone would come
over, dressed up and go down into the Rumpus room in the
basement and party till sunrise.Were kids allowed to those
(04:58):
parties in the. Rumpus room?
No, but my sister and I would sneak down the stairs and watch
and they would smoke too much and drink too much and sing and
damn. And I used to think, wow, they,
my parents. And then I realized, well, they
were only in their 40s. So I looked at what I did in my
40s and well, you know, apple tree, it's all right there.
(05:22):
So I decided, and I had been, I've been a full time actor
since 19 years old, an actor, storyteller, singer.
So to deal with the loss of my mom, I decided to write a show
and I sort of started crafting the show.
I found a musical director, we picked songs.
I was telling stories and I was doing it as myself, as Ray.
(05:47):
And it didn't feel right. It was sad.
And I didn't want to do something that was sad.
It was meant to be a celebration, and I had done, my
partner and I, we just celebrated 20 years together.
He's an amazing Angel in my life.
Especially lately, we decided hehim and I had been working for a
(06:12):
nonprofit, the Imperial Court, where you kind of do drag to
raise money. And we would raise money for
lots and lots of nonprofits. And so I had Dundra.
I mean, if you're in the LGBTQ community, eventually you put on
the heels and the dress and go parade or something.
Have fun. And it's fun.
And he said to me, I think you should.
(06:35):
I was telling him it would didn't work for me.
He said, I think you should do it in drag.
And I thought, oh, but I'm an actor.
I don't do drag. I don't do shows in a bar and
jump splits. And I'm a terrible lip syncher.
And he said, no, I you should think about it.
So I talked to several friends of mine who I really trust their
(06:59):
opinions. And I decided, OK.
And I created a character based on my mother with stories
combining my sister and I created a show, Doris Dears Girl
Talk GURL. And no one knew I had ever known
(07:20):
I would do this kind of thing. And I did it in a theater at the
Triad Theater Uptown in New Yorkon 72nd St.
And I remember being in the backin the dressing room and my
partner came in and I said, look, I know no one's out there.
Just make sure they no one wantsto sit up front.
Make them sit up front. There's nothing worse than being
(07:40):
on stage and looking at you don't see a single soul city up
front. And he looked at me says, great,
we just turned away 20 people. Wow.
And I thought, first show how I've never done a cabaret show
of any kind. How do people even know we were
sold out? The theater said, we love this.
(08:00):
It's something very special. Your message, your joy, your
hopefulness, your celebration offamily.
No one's doing this come back and I've been coming back for 11
years now to sold out shows. We produced a streaming series
and COVID, we did Four Seasons with seven awards, seven major
(08:22):
awards. I now I'm a judge for them, the
national Daytime Emmys and all these other things.
I judge and I mentor and. Did that all come as a result of
this show? Yeah, yes, everything.
I found the most unbelievable joy in this character.
(08:48):
And in many ways I've always said, and I know we both don't
sort of like this word, but I said I've never been so
authentic on stage as when I'm Doris and Doris.
Doris. There's my Staten Island accent,
by the way. That's OK, I have a Long Island
one that pops out every song. Yeah.
(09:08):
You know, Doris, Doris, Tia, I, you know, she gives me the
freedom to storytelling in a waythat as Ray, it doesn't come as
naturally. And I am a storyteller as Ray,
but it's different. And when I do these shows, you
know, because I write them, I produce them.
(09:30):
I have a huge orchestra. I mean, there's six months of
work in these little shows and Iget to live those that when I do
2 shows over a weekend, I get tolive with my family again
because they're all gone. I lost my sister right before
COVID to her brain aneurysm verysuddenly.
So they're all gone. But then here I am on stage
(09:53):
telling their stories, celebrating all the stories I
tell are true. I mean, they're theatrical lies
because I am a storyteller, but they're all true.
And people continually say to me, you took me back to an
easier time. And you reminded me how even if
(10:15):
you grew up in a family that wasn't perfect, there was still
love and joy there. And I love that.
I love. I love the joy it gives me, and
I love the joy it brings to others.
And the first time I did the show, I always so I worked in
Vegas as a singer and the biggest show in the world in
(10:37):
Jubilee. And Debbie Reynolds at the time
had a show. She had our hotel and like she
was trying to get a museum for all those costumes she she
owned. And I got to know her and she
would do a show in the hotel andshe would stand outside for as
long as it took to meet with every single person in that
theater. And, and I said, why do you do
(10:58):
that? Everybody knows who you are.
And she said, you know what? She said, Ray, always remember
that those people in that theater are why you're working.
And if you didn't have them you you're not working.
That's a good lesson. Yeah.
And I do that. I stand out at after the show
and I meet everybody and that first couple of shows who.
(11:19):
Makes them Ray or Doris. Who makes what?
Who meets them? After Doris, Doris always meets
them. Yeah.
And I never break the character until I get home, close the door
and that, and then everything comes off.
But I would have these wives come up and say, my husband
would like to give you a hug, isthat I guess, Of course.
(11:41):
And these husbands, because my audience is mostly straight
couples of a certain age, maybe 4045 plus, who have families and
I'd say, and I, they would, I would hug them and I could feel
them sort of exhale and relax into me.
(12:03):
And these are seconds long and then take a breath and step away
and say thank you, you're just great.
And I first I thought, what is, do they like the, the fake
double D's? Like what are they?
What are they enjoying about allthis?
And I'm, you know, I'm 7 foot 2 and the whole outfit and I
(12:23):
realized that I represent everyone's mother, that I
represent the men. They would lean in and exhale
and it was like being on the couch.
You're head in mom's lap. You don't have a mortgage,
There's no stress, everything you're being taken care of.
(12:46):
And I grew to accept that and, and release that to them and let
them have that moment. And it's sort of just brings me
so much joy that I can give joy to others and in turn, it gives
joy to me. And I think that's that's just
such a wonderful thing. And that's a great thing that
(13:08):
Doris gave me. And I thought I was only doing 1
show would be over. And it's 11 years now and I'd
say it's 90% of my career and it's fantastic and it's taught
me so much. That's very heartwarming.
That is very heartwarming. And it's interesting, your
psychological insight into the dynamic you're creating with
(13:32):
people. Yeah, I mean, and so many people
said, well, I came the first time because, you know, you're
my friend, I want to support you.
And then they said, But I come back because I've never sat
through anything so wonderful and joyous.
Now when you create a show, how long do you run that show and
then do you change up the content?
(13:54):
Are you writing a news? Show.
Every show is. Different.
Every show is different. And don't repeat anything.
And I try not to repeat stories,although there's always a little
overlap. Yeah.
So I do it like one of my big shows every year is a Christmas
show. I have 8 or 9 guests from
Broadway, Cabaret, Pop World, the, the Metropolitan Opera.
(14:16):
They come in and guest and we, they sing, they do a solo.
We talk about the joy of family and the holidays and what it
means to them. But every year it's a different
show, you know, every year it's a new topic, a new celebration
and it's always new. And then I do solo shows,
usually one or two during the year.
And I have a Sondheim show, I have my girl talk show.
(14:39):
I have more girl talk and more and more girl talk and it's and
it's great, but it's a lot. I mean, it's a lot of work.
You're, I'm constantly writing. I use, I try to do creative
thinking where one of the great exercises I love is 10 ideas in
(14:59):
10 minutes. You just take a pad and you have
10. You set a timer and you got to
write 10 ideas in 10 minutes, and it's a great exercise for
me. It's sort of like being in the
shower, right? Everybody has great ideas in the
shower, and what they think is that when you're in the shower,
(15:21):
there's nothing else. It's just water.
It's noise, and it's that kind of noise that your brain enjoys
and sort of opens it up and you have, I have great ideas in the
shower and I always have my phone in case I want to scream.
You know, Siri, take a note. But I love the practice of just
(15:42):
10 ideas in 10 minutes because sometimes it comes up with a lot
of not so great. And then all of a sudden there's
a nugget that I go, Oh yeah, that's going on the To Do List,
You know, So I love that sort ofcreative thinking and the
creative, I love the creative mindset mindset, which is
(16:08):
basically, you know, I've been delving into this now there's a
lot of research into the creative mindset where some
people believe that they have a set of abilities and that's it.
And if they're successful or not, it's all based on that.
But the creative mindset says that you have a set of
(16:31):
abilities, but you're constantlyexpanding them and learning and
looking at new ways to use them.So your creative mindset is
open. And they've shown scans of
brains that people who use creative mindsets, their minds
are on fire, and people who don't, they're not.
It's very limited. So I like to work in that space
(16:55):
because it just opens me up to so much stuff.
I think that's such an importantpoint and what I write every
day. And I have found just writing
every day has expanded how I think.
Now I find stories in anyone I'mspeaking to.
I'm like, Oh, that's an idea formy the next thing I'm going to
write about. But that creative mindset, what
(17:16):
I really want everyone to understand is you don't have to
just work in the arts. It it's a creative mindset.
Could be, you know, the plumber,the electrician that I mean, you
have to be pretty creative to figure out how pipes were going
to ask me, you know? For sure.
And I, I do corporate speaking, tell me so.
(17:37):
I do a lot of corporate speakingfor the very, very large
corporations. What do you talk about?
Most of it is based on diversity, especially in today's
world where diversity in large corporations is being challenged
and being told to not have DEI or DEIB anymore.
(17:59):
But they I do them as Doris and I sing a nice storytell, but I'm
always talking about how and I interview people from the
company come into the TV studio and I interview them.
We do like an hour and a half show and it's shown to all their
employees and we talk about diversity and we talk about the
(18:21):
idea of how diversity expands the minds and it opens up ways
of thinking to the rest of theiremployees because of that
diversity and how important thatis that the companies that
really believe in that, how thathas helped the companies grow in
ways that they never thought waseven possible.
(18:42):
I want to talk about that because we like to, I like to
explore the operating systems ofsociety.
And I 100% agree with you on theconcept of diversity.
Where my objection is, is I alsobelieve you have to have
excellence in whatever somebody's doing because if I'm
(19:04):
in a burning building, I'm not looking for the diverse person
to come get me. I want the person to pass the
test that can carry my weight and Get Me Out of that building.
If I'm unconscious, you know, ifI'm getting on a plane, I don't
want the person just because they were diverse.
I want the person who really like my nephew X Top Gun pilot
(19:27):
who's now flying for one of the big airlines.
I want that guy who can handle stress.
You know, a plane load of peopleis nothing to him compared to
getting shot, not at 85 times. You know, his in his, yeah, you
know, F35 or F18. So that's how do you, how do you
navigate that when you're talking with people corporately?
(19:47):
Well, I mean, there is always this argument, there's always
this argument that diversity is preventing the real person who
should get the job from getting the job because diversity, it's
often. I don't.
(20:08):
I think that companies are stilllooking for the right people.
But like in my business, for example, in the actor business,
a lot of people believe that only people in the LGBT
community should be playing LGBTpeople.
Then there's this sub, the subset of people who believe
(20:29):
that we're actors and we should be playing all roles.
Like I'm an actor if I'm hired, if I'm I'm if I'm gay, I should
certainly be able to play a straight person.
So why can't a straight person play a gay person?
It's a fair argument. And what do you think about
that? Because it is an interesting
(20:50):
when there was some movie that just they did AI instead of
hiring actual, you know, people who were very, very short.
Oh boy, let's open up the box ofAI that's.
The whole program, Oh my gosh, back to that, because I want to
talk because I know you're with,you know, SAG AFTRA and there's,
(21:12):
you know, the whole writers Guild strike, you know, there's
all that. So we I do want to get to that,
but I would love to, you know, what's your take on well,
because there's so much about, you know, cultural
appropriation, like if I want itor braids in my hair, am I
stealing it from the Indians or who knows what it's like?
In some. Ways we've gone backwards in
that. Yeah, I mean, I believe in the
(21:33):
argument, for example, gay people like we were, we were not
allowed at the table for 100 years.
We were not accepted, we were not allowed.
So if you're a director and one of the parts calls, especially
now for a trans person, I believe that.
(21:56):
I believe that it's the casting and director's job to try to
find a trans person to fill thatrole.
There are plenty of trans peoplein the union and not in the
union who are great actors. So we've never been at the
table. So let us at the table if we
don't fit OK, but at least give us the chance after us not being
(22:21):
allowed. Their position?
Yeah. And if we're not right, OK,
there was a a new musical that was Andrew Lloyd Webber, I think
was Andrew Lloyd Webber a new musical premiering many, many
years ago in London. And the star of the musical was
supposed to be of Asian descent of a certain type.
(22:43):
And they decided way before all this sort of diversity stuff
that they were going to do theirbest to find a true Asian woman
to play this role. They auditioned all over the UK,
couldn't find someone. They expanded into the rest of
your couldn't find. So they actually flew over to
Asia and auditioned there. And that's where they found Lea
(23:08):
Salonga, a very young girl who was singing pop and brought her
in because they and they did their duty to find the right
person who fit the ethnicity to create this.
And of course, we all know Lea Salonga is a huge star and she's
amazing. She's on Broadway right now in a
(23:30):
Sondheim musical. And that's the kind of work I
think that we should do. I think we, if there's a gay
role, try to find a gay person and if it doesn't and you can't
find the right person, then go further, right?
I think that's fair. Again, we weren't allowed at the
(23:51):
table. It allow us now.
And I think at times does it feel a little extreme?
Yes. But eventually it will all equal
out and settle it. And I think the trans community,
and I am not trans, so I can't say exactly what their
(24:13):
experiences. I mean, they're part of my
community. I treasure trans people.
They've been a part of every culture since the dawn of time.
And if you don't believe that, then you don't believe in
anything. You don't believe in real
history. So I feel like that community is
going through many of the thingsthat we as male gay people and
(24:38):
lesbians went through years ago,fighting for our community to
move upfront. And now they're going through it
with a subset of problems. And, and I see it just working
in our union with the trans community and how hard it is for
them right now. And within the trans community
there's many different opinions.Like there was talk about giving
(24:59):
out non binary awards and trans awards at the SAG Awards.
And I had many trans women say to me, I don't want a special
award. I want to be considered a woman.
I want to be considered a woman and win a best actress award,
not a best trans actress award. So it's a.
(25:23):
It's very complicated. It's very complicated and I
think that is where the break started to happen, particularly
when you saw it in sports. Because, I mean, you know, there
was a story just now about fencing at Wagner College in
Staten Island that they removed a girl refused.
She knelt down and refused to doher fencing with this trans
(25:50):
woman. And of course Fox News was is
all over it. This is how it should be and.
I I think it's tricky. I think it's.
Tricky, but the science. You know what, I but I grew up
when there were, there were no sports for women.
You know, maybe maybe you could play volleyball, you know, maybe
(26:11):
there was softball and there wasgymnastics, field hockey.
But you know, maybe you need a third league for that or a third
division. But when it gets to something
extremely physical, oh, that's atough one for me.
Well, except all the science. And I believe in science, all
the science shows. So for let's let's clear
(26:33):
something up for people out there.
No one becomes trans overnight. No one decides in October I'm
going to be a woman now and in January is full, is fully trans
and has got it's a very long process.
There's lots of psychology involved, being very careful.
(26:56):
Are they really ready for this? Then there's hormone therapy and
then possibly surgery. Not all trans people want to
quote UN quote pass. They just want to live how they
want to live. But the science is also very
clear that by the time they're they are fully trans and have
become women because of hormone depletion and and estrogen added
(27:23):
into their bodies and all the testosterone taking out their
must, their muscle strength goesdown by a huge percentage.
It's not like they're now men with man muscles competing
against women. Their musculature has gone so
far down, their strength is good.
So in fact, they're almost equalto women, and the science shows
(27:49):
that. Well, wait a second.
I would have to. I would have to object to that
because I've spent 27 years in biology, so the science will
never actually show that. But you can certainly alter
hormonal structure. Yes.
You know whether that altering of hormonal structure makes
someone become a male or a female.
I think that would be a stretch,but but I can understand your
(28:13):
argument, your point. I'm on hormone depletion because
of my prostate cancer. They've taken out all of my
testosterone and any other hormones.
I lost 35% of my musculature in four or five months.
You want other chemotherapies as.
Well, no chemotherapy. I had radiation radiation.
(28:34):
I used to do 3035 push ups and Istarted working out a month ago
and I couldn't do 3I became so weak.
My muscular, my percentages wentso down from the removal of my
hormones and all of that. And now my muscular is going
back up. And because I had to be very
careful about bone density and muscle loss and all that kind of
(28:58):
stuff. And I do think it's a
complicated issue. Where does it sit?
What? But so often I hear complaints
about the trans community, for example.
And again, I am not trans, so I don't know their full struggles
(29:19):
and I certainly don't understandeverything about them about it.
But what I do understand is respect for humans.
And if if someone says to me, ifsomeone says to me, I say, hey,
David, how are you? And he says, you know, I don't
like to be called David. I like to be called Dave.
Oh, OK, I'll call you Dave. So if I meet someone and say my
(29:43):
pronouns, are they them? OK, they them.
What's the big deal? Does it change my life in any
way, shape or form respecting what another person wants to be
called? Respecting what?
Another person, what they reportedly what their gender is,
if they say they're trans, OK, you're a trans woman, you're a
(30:04):
trans man, whatever. It doesn't change my life in any
way. And I just think too often we
get caught up in this thing about the trans community and
even the gay community and people get, I see these
(30:25):
arguments and I think to myself,how does this affect your life
in any way, shape or form? Well, I think, I think, I think
there was no issue with that. I mean, I was talking with
someone earlier about New York. I mean, in the 1980s, nobody
cared. I mean, nobody cared.
And it became, I think the issuebecame when it was this is who I
(30:45):
am and you must approve it, thatthere's a difference in life.
I mean, I can be a jerk, but youdon't have to approve that I'm a
jerk. You know, you can say you're
being a jerk, Diane. You know, you have the right to
say that. You know, So I think it's the
insistence. I think it's insistence.
So we went for, you know, I think it's you have to
(31:08):
personally accept yourself before you start to demand it of
others. And when you personally accept
yourself, frankly, I don't thinkyou care who signs on for that.
You know, you decided you were going to do a show as Doris.
And this is who you're doing a show as.
You know, I'm not you're not looking for approval.
You're saying this is this is a creative way.
(31:29):
I want to express my love for myfamily, my creative being.
And look at where you are 11 years later celebrating it.
Yeah. And I think we all have
different ways of I mean, in my,in my youth, oh, the youth, I
marched in parades, I marched, Iknew Larry Kramer, I marched, I
(31:49):
do that. I don't do that anymore.
I'm the strength to do that anymore.
God knows. But I mean, I, I am in parades
and stuff, but you know, like I do Doris and people see her as
an actual person because I believe she is.
And in many ways that changes people's opinions of something
(32:10):
that maybe they don't understand.
Like why would you do drag? Why are you doing?
It's never, why are you doing Doris?
Why are you doing that? It's just, Oh my gosh, I love
Doris. And to me, that's a change in
someone's perspective and idea of drag.
Like I never in my press for my show, I never call her a drag
(32:30):
queen. I just, she's just Doris.
She's just a person. I think sometimes the insistence
of acceptance is born from a history of being hidden, you
know, and so not, you know, in my as a gay man, you know, the
(32:51):
Stonewall riots happened and we insisted that people accept who
we are at a time when most gay people couldn't accept who they
were. They were afraid we could.
I mean, it was illegal in New York until I think it was 84
something that sodomy was still illegal.
They could come in your apartment if your neighbor
called the police. And I knew friends that that
(33:12):
happened because you were sleeping with someone of the
same sex. So I think a lot of the anger
and angst and the insistence of acceptance just comes from a
history of non acceptance. And I think some people use that
as a way to find their comfort, whereas again, at my age, I
(33:37):
don't really give a crap. But let's talk about something.
I bet you do give a crap. Sure, because AI is something we
touched on a minute ago and I want to make sure we explore
this. You are very active in SAG
AFTRA. The writers strike just
(33:58):
happened. We're watching all kinds of
things. We're watching I'm I've seen
models who were fit models get their all their measurements
taken and now they're their AI version is getting paid instead
of them. So it's happening in so many
areas. How is this?
What's your take on what's happening here?
So, you know, we went through a long strike period.
(34:20):
There was the writers strike andthen SAG after had our longest
strike. It was over over 100 days I
believe and we were fighting fora fair contract and our our
contracts with SAG. After that we got that we agreed
upon with the AM PTP, which is the AM PTP is for producers.
(34:41):
That's the producers kind of Guild.
It's there. It's not a union, but it's their
sort of Guild. And the AM PTP is the ones who
negotiate with SAG After with the Writers Guild for all the
producers. They're tough.
I mean, unions have some of the best negotiators out there.
(35:02):
They are strong. They stand tall.
Our president, Frank Drescher, fought long and hard.
Now strike. We got some of the best AI
protections out of all the unions that were striking at the
time. SAG After achieved some of the
best AI protections for the moment because our contracts
are. Yeah.
(35:22):
How long does that contract last?
3-4 years or something and then we renegotiate.
So we fought long and hard and we're also fighting on the
government level, trying to get protections of our image
federally. And we do have some state
protections, but we're trying toget it federally.
(35:42):
And it's actually, I think it's going on the floor soon in
Washington. So as it sits right now, you
could be a background actor filming a series and they can
say they can give you, they haveto give you advance notice that
you're going to be scanned and they're going to skip.
(36:03):
They're asking to scan you. They can scan you if you accept,
but you always have the option to say no.
Now they could say then we're not going to use you.
It's the same as nudity. We have nudity clauses.
If it's in the contract, you sayno, I don't accept those, I'm
not doing nudity. Then they could say, well,
that's part of the deal. We don't want you or OK.
(36:25):
Well, the thing that always got me in modeling contracts where
it says something like, you know, we have the right to
alter, modify, adjust. I mean, those clauses are long.
They're very long. And.
Frankly. Terrifying when you think about
putting someone's head on someone else's body or.
But as an artist, I mean. If it was a really good body,
(36:45):
maybe. Yeah, it's like most have most
actors have a rear end per second and you know, a hand
second. We always want to be perfect.
But you know, as artists, we want to work so many times we'll
in the past we would, we would accept these kind of things
because we just want to work andwe don't want to get
blackballed. But it it like they can now scan
(37:07):
you. And if you agree, then they, if
they use that scan as a background in the background for
scenes that you're not on set, you now get paid a full day's
wage. And for everything they do, you
get paid a full taste wage. And we have people watching and
making sure they're following it.
But we have that protection. Now.
We also have a set of very famous, the sort of top of our
(37:31):
union, which by the way, I'm notfor those out there.
I'm very famous in my own mind, but not many other people's.
But because I'm the, we're the hard working sort of middle
class actors. But then you have the stars now
they can be scanned and they cansell their image and sell their
voice and they get paid for it. And the union can help them
(37:54):
negotiate those contracts to make sure they're protected
correctly. And there are many stars doing
that right now. I mean, we've seen that before
in commercials when they used Marilyn Monroe in the past and
they would go to the whoever handles the Marilyn Monroe
estate and they would sign a contract and they would get paid
(38:15):
for the use of Marilyn Monroe. So now under AI, many stars will
get scanned, and then they sell that scan to companies to use
and get paid quite nicely for it.
And they don't have to go to setand they don't have to sit and
make up, and they don't have to be in the rainstorm or the snow
(38:37):
to film something. And they're making money off of
their image and they hold it. You know what I thought was
interesting when I saw the aftermath of the Super Bowl
commercials? That the AI commercials did the
worst as far as audience response, right?
Yeah, and I was in a Super Bowl commercial this season.
It was very exciting. Yeah.
(39:00):
I mean, we are fighting constantly for AI protections
because they. I mean, AI is.
I mean, I don't think I know anybody who doesn't use ChatGPT
at this point. I mean, if you're a writer, it
saves a lot of time if when I have ideas and I can feed them
through and help get a little more clarity and you know,
(39:23):
people who don't use it don't understand using ChatGPT is not
easy to have it put out something of value.
You almost have to write more for that than you would
normally. You have to, you really have to
prompt it with a lot of ideas and a lot of ways and how you
want it written to get somethingthat's even mildly usable.
(39:46):
And then you have to and then you take it and then you have to
edit and re edit and re. It's a lot of work.
It's not just how it spits it out And I put it out there.
It's a lot of work and a lot of,but everybody's using it.
The image AI stuff, I mean, six months ago it was terrible.
Here we are six months later. It's unbelievable.
I watched an entire film made with AI.
(40:08):
Is it perfect? No, but in four years it will
be. It's going to be perfect in a
year. Which is going to be
interesting, you know, renegotiating a contract because
wasn't one of the big contract issues, you know, like if
someone was redoing an ending orchange, you know, doing tests
for different endings and they were using AI imagery and the
(40:31):
writer and AI for writing the end of the script with a
different right approach. Yeah, there's all of these
issues that in our negotiations we tried to cover the Writers
Guild tried to cover the directors killed, you know,
there's all these that we all tried to get protections.
(40:51):
We all tried to build up protections looking to the
future. That's why we have really good
lawyers and really good note negotiators.
And it's a it's really complicated and it's changing
day by day. But I'm and there are people
that say the union doesn't do enough.
But I think if you know how the union works, first of all,
(41:13):
unions are federally, federally regulated.
There's a lot of rules and laws that we have to follow.
You're very active in the. Yeah.
So I serve, well, I serve on theLGBTQ committee here in New York
and nationally. I'm on the New York board for
SAG after in New York, and I'm an alternate for the national
(41:34):
board, although as an alternate you fill in spots.
I've been to every meeting over the past year because lots of
people just can't make it out toLA.
So I'm flying to LA in two weeksfor the national board meeting.
So I'm involved through the years, most of my work has come
(41:54):
through people who believed in me and supported me and helped
me have a career. So at this point in my life, I
it. I believe that mentorship is one
of the best things you can do, especially as an artist or in
any industry. I've been mentored through my
life. It's how I learned to produce.
It's how I learned to dance better, sing better, appear on
(42:15):
camera better, and so I'm tryingto give as much back as I can.
How are you doing that? Through my work union, I help
people teach. I teach people sort of cabaret
classes and how to because that's a very particular art
form as opposed to Broadway and all the different art forms.
(42:37):
I'm scheduled, I think next yearto to teach through SAG after
has a teaching platform to teachThere we go again authenticity
in acting, our favorite word buzzword because as an actor and
to so to have a career. I try to teach people on having
(42:57):
a career and what that means andI always tell them you better
love it more than anything. You better just imagine that you
couldn't do anything else otherwise you're not going to.
It's being an artist is as a career is hard and complicated.
Of course. What is it these days?
(43:18):
There is no guarantees in life, right?
But it's full of rejection and psychologically speaking, you
have to be ready. It's 90 percent, 95% rejection.
And that's hard. That's hard to live through
sometimes, especially if your personal life is in crisis or
(43:38):
going through a tough time and then you're being rejected on
your work site. Those two combined can be
debilitating. And I know that I've been
through that in my career, but Iwas scared to death even at 19
when I first stepped on my firstreal job.
(43:59):
I was scared to death to have tobe a waiter or a bartender or
work in a department store, and that fueled me to constantly be
looking for work, to constantly be better at what I do.
And now it's 48 years later and I'm still working.
Oh my gosh. You know, that's a credit,
(44:19):
that's a credit to perseverance and talent.
One of the things right, you said several times is you've
used the word complicated. If you were mentoring someone,
how do you? What does complicated mean to
you in your creative existence? Well, boy, I think that the
(44:48):
better you have a clear sense ofwho you are.
I think that's one layer that I think people should always
figure out first is to really and look when when you're young,
you don't. When you're young, you think you
can do anything, right? And that's what you should be at
(45:09):
22. You should think you could save
the world tomorrow because that's what youth is for, right?
And those are the people who go out there and really fight.
But to be like an actor or a singer, I think you really have
to be honest about who you are and what you are.
(45:30):
That doesn't mean that you put yourself in a box, but it's the
a place to start. If you know who you are, then
you tend to get a For me, I tendto get a clearer sense of where
I want to go and what I want to do and what caught.
Then it becomes what kinds of shows I'd rather do than that.
Like, I chose not to come back to New York.
(45:51):
I went, I got hired by Disney. I went down to Disney World.
I worked for five years. I worked.
I was a kid of the Kingdom, which was sort of a faux
Mouseketeer kind of a thing. We did shows, we sang Disney
medleys, we did TV specials, traveled around and all that
kind of stuff. It was an amazing training
(46:12):
ground, mostly because you're doing 7 shows a day and 90%
humidity out in front of a castle and you learn
perseverance. You learn to come out seven
times and do a great show and not show that you're about to
pass out from the heat. And it was a great training
around ground on being a professional.
(46:34):
And when that was over for many years, I would get simply hired
without an audition even becauseoh, you were a five year.
Oh, you don't. We don't need to see.
We know you can do this. And I chose.
Many people went from that and came up to New York and we're on
Broadway and I've had great careers.
I chose not to do that. I chose I grew up here and I, I,
(46:57):
I knew actors in my day and I saw the struggle in New York and
I decided to go elsewhere. I worked on cruise ships.
I lived in Denmark for three years, Bermuda for two years,
moved to Vegas. I decided to take a different
path and it was because I had a pretty good sense of what I
could do at that point in my life and what I wanted to
(47:22):
experience. So that complication that sort
of as an artist, what do I do next?
Where do I go? Do I, am I just going to get
online at the next audition and just keep doing that and hope
for the best? Instead, I had, I think, a
better, clearer view of my strengths and who I was.
(47:45):
And that led me to different to my different places and to
continue to work and never stop.And that was my choice.
So people say, I can't believe you've never been on Broadway.
And you know, they almost put you down as if, oh, you didn't
do Broadway. Oh, and I often think that's
come on, I mean, good for the people on Broadway.
(48:06):
Those people are superheroes. 8 shows a week, dancers, singers.
They have to be like superheroes.
So it's. Well, you're doing that when you
do your one one person show for 11 years now.
I. Know, right, I mean, I think you
take, I would argue you've takenBroadway to the next level.
You're self producing from startto finish, which is phenomenal.
(48:27):
Yeah, I can't wait to catch the next.
Show so I. Better be on the list of when
the of course you know the datescome out.
I'll be the first in line to buytickets.
Thank you. Yeah.
Yeah. So I don't know, It's, I think
life is complicated, right? Especially these days, politics
or what they were are no matter what side of politics you want,
(48:53):
it's all very complicated. And I, I again, I think I said
earlier, I really try to find joy in every day.
So I was just away. I was down in the Caribbean and
I was walking to get a soda or something and I was barking down
this winding path. And it was just beautiful day.
(49:15):
The sun was out. I was surrounded by all this
beautiful foliage. And there were these orange
double hibiscus blooms tucked inall the spaces.
And I just stopped. And I looked at it and I
thought, it's so beautiful what it is.
(49:35):
And I stood there and I just looked around and I put my hands
out with my palms up and I just closed my eyes.
And I took a deep breath. And I said to myself, just
you're living in this beautiful world, let's just keep trying to
make it beautiful. I like your thinking and I don't
(49:59):
want us to be out of time, but that's my ringtone.
I used the Joey Ramone version of it.
But it's it's a wonderful world because it is.
And I love that you spoke about joy and connecting and accepting
and community because those are such huge messages that everyone
can benefit from. Acceptance Authenticity.
(50:23):
You know, but. It's true, but it's true the
more we can truly become who we are ourselves and accept whoever
we are, whatever we've been dealt, how we see the world and
accept it in ourselves first. It makes life in general, yeah,
better and easier and a little less complicated it.
Brings us great gifts. Yeah, yeah.
(50:43):
Ray, thank you so much for joining me.
This was a wonderful episode, and I always hate when it's time
to say goodbye. But we have to wrap up.
Of course. It's a rap, as they say.
Rap, you know, Click, get the. Well, thank you.
Thank you, thank you. It's been such a pleasure.
I'm Diane Griselle. This has been the Silver
(51:03):
Disobedience Perception Dynamicspodcast.
We've been recording at iconic Manhattan Center where lots of
great things happen and including this interview with
Ray De Forest, also known as Doris Dear.
So you're going to have to follow him.
There'll be all kinds of links so you can get in touch because
he's a treasure and worth staying in touch with.
(51:25):
So please subscribe, share this episode with your friends and
thank you again, Ray. Thank you.
Thanks everyone, see you soon.
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