Speaker 1: Hi, it's kateline Brook here. Before we get into today's episode,
Speaker 1: I wanted to quickly tell you why we're revisiting this conversation.
Speaker 1: If you've been following entertainment news over the past few weeks,
Speaker 1: you'll know Rosie O'Donnell is everywhere. She's back in the
Speaker 1: spotlight with her deeply personal new one woman show Common Knowledge,
Speaker 1: which has critics raving and also punters like me. She's
Speaker 1: been opening up in a series of major interviews about grief, motherhood,
Speaker 1: her move to Ireland, her candid and transparent approach to
Speaker 1: discussing her recent cosmetic work, her decades long friendship with Madonna,
Speaker 1: and yes, the public feud with Donald Trump that's found
Speaker 1: its way back into the headlines. It's reminded me just
Speaker 1: how fascinating Rosy O'Donnell is. For decades. She's been one
Speaker 1: of those rare people who's constantly evolving, constantly surprising us.
Speaker 1: She's never afraid to tell the truth about her life,
Speaker 1: even when it's missy or uncomfortable. So it felt like
Speaker 1: the perfect time to bring back this conversation, whether you're
Speaker 1: hearing it for the first time or listening again. With
Speaker 1: everything that's happening now. I think you'll hear ROSI a
Speaker 1: little differently. This is Rosy o'donald.
Speaker 2: I would have apologized. I would have said, I'm really
Speaker 2: sorry I heard you that much, and I hope you
Speaker 2: can forgive me. That's what I would have done. But
Speaker 2: I think in her mind she thinks I keep rehashing
Speaker 2: it for pleasure. I don't rehash it for pleasure. I
Speaker 2: rehash it because our careers have taken sort of parallel,
Speaker 2: interwoven paths. Yes, and where gay talk show hosts, and
Speaker 2: we're around the same age, so people would always ask
Speaker 2: me about it, and I have a hard time not
Speaker 2: telling the truth.
Speaker 1: Hello, and welcome to No Filter. I'm Kateline Rook, and today,
Speaker 1: what a magnificent day. We're talking to Rosie o'donnald, a
Speaker 1: woman whose name is synonymous with laughter, honesty, and a
Speaker 1: fearless speaking of her mind. From a childhood marred by
Speaker 1: tragedy to breaking records on her groundbreaking talk show, to
Speaker 1: acting alongside legends like Madonna and Tom Hanks in films
Speaker 1: like Sleepless in Seattle a league of their own, and
Speaker 1: now and then, Rosie has lived a life in the
Speaker 1: public eye that few could imagine. Along the way she's
Speaker 1: been celebrated, she's been ridiculed and sometimes made the punchline
Speaker 1: of her own story. She's had some famously public feuds,
Speaker 1: and yes, we talk about her recent appearance in and
Speaker 1: Just like That, Who can Forget It? In this episode,
Speaker 1: Rosie opens up about her childhood marked by loss and trauma,
Speaker 1: the lessons she's carried through decades in showbiz, her experiences
Speaker 1: as a mother of five, and the moments that have
Speaker 1: shaped her into the activist, performer and person she is today.
Speaker 1: Here is Rosie O'Donnell. And by the way, she took
Speaker 1: me by surprise by showing up early. Who does that?
Speaker 1: Nobody's ever early?
Speaker 2: I'm always early, are you? Yes? Always?
Speaker 1: All right? Well, I've got to ask permission, miss Miss?
Speaker 1: Can I go to the dunny? Miss?
Speaker 2: What does that mean? I don't even know what that means.
Speaker 1: The dunny is Australian slang and it's the toilet.
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, go to the danny by all means.
Speaker 1: The dunny, the dunny. You need to learn this before
Speaker 1: you arrive in Australia.
Speaker 2: Not that you're not kidding people. There's so many things
Speaker 2: I have to learn.
Speaker 1: What else do you think.
Speaker 2: Well, you know, first of all, I'm terrified of customs
Speaker 2: because they watch nothing to declare. Oh yeah, and you
Speaker 2: know whatever somebody has, like a plumb or a border
Speaker 2: security from Yeah, that show is terrifies me. And I'm
Speaker 2: also afraid of the spaders.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, okay.
Speaker 2: And I also like how everyone says yes.
Speaker 1: No, yes, no, that's really probably our defining national trade.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Where does it come from? Yes?
Speaker 1: No, it just kind of it just kind of developed,
Speaker 1: I think. I mean, I think it's one of those
Speaker 1: things that you know, I'm giving up on the dunny
Speaker 1: by the way, because I'm so happy to have you here.
Speaker 2: Well, if you gotta go, you gotta go.
Speaker 1: I I was just it was a you know, I
Speaker 1: was it was a preparatory we It wasn't just in key. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it wasn't an essential one. It was just like, well,
Speaker 1: you and I are about to embark on a road
Speaker 1: trip together of discovery, and I didn't want.
Speaker 2: To be I didn't want to have to start.
Speaker 1: No, that's right, and I don't want to be disrespectful
Speaker 1: to you.
Speaker 2: Well, I would understand being a woman as sixty three
Speaker 2: years old. If you gotta go, you gotta go.
Speaker 1: You know, And I think that's true at any age,
Speaker 1: to be honest. You know, remember as were when you're older,
Speaker 1: you know, as a kid, that thing where you'd stand
Speaker 1: with your legs twisted together because you just didn't want
Speaker 1: to go? What is that? Why do you hate going
Speaker 1: to the toilet when you're little?
Speaker 2: Well, do you want to know this? I never pee
Speaker 2: in public?
Speaker 1: Oh well I would hope not.
Speaker 2: No, I mean, like in a bathroom in public. I
Speaker 2: never like, if I'm on this, oh, like that I'm
Speaker 2: going to take that's twenty two hours, I probably will
Speaker 2: not pee the whole time.
Speaker 1: What do you do? Is it a psychological thing that you.
Speaker 2: Just I think it is. It's not like I'm telling
Speaker 2: myself not to It's almost like when I leave the house,
Speaker 2: my body goes yeah no, yeah, no.
Speaker 1: Yeah, no, that's it.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I know exactly. I think that. I was a
Speaker 2: little kid and my mom used to get very nervous
Speaker 2: in public bathrooms and she would put the little toilet
Speaker 2: paper like you know, and then put the little seat thing,
Speaker 2: that little paper, yeah, and try to make us like hover.
Speaker 1: Yeah, hovering when you're a kid not easy at any age.
Speaker 1: I can't hop it now. I don't have the I
Speaker 1: don't have the thyme muscles. Not a hover, No, nor
Speaker 1: do I get that right now, I'm more of a collapse.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's what I am too. I'll just collapse right
Speaker 2: on it. But now it's like I never My friends
Speaker 2: call me the camel because I just never will go
Speaker 2: to the bathroom in public.
Speaker 1: Okay, do you think that this is a psychological thing?
Speaker 2: Yes?
Speaker 1: And what do you think it's It stems from.
Speaker 2: It stems from my mother making me afraid to go
Speaker 2: to the bathroom in public. She had five kids, we
Speaker 2: were all on one year apart, not even ten months,
Speaker 2: Irish twins, and she would just get very overwhelmed when
Speaker 2: we would go to the bathroom and she would put
Speaker 2: down all this toilet paper and everything. And so I
Speaker 2: got it in my head that it's a very trying
Speaker 2: thing to do. And like even the whole time I
Speaker 2: was at school, I never went to the bathroom. I
Speaker 2: would go in the morning. I would when I do
Speaker 2: a movie. If I don't have my own bathroom in
Speaker 2: my trailer, I will wait the whole day. And it's
Speaker 2: not like I feel like I have to go. It's
Speaker 2: not like I'm holding it in it's almost like my
Speaker 2: body goes, Nope, don't do it.
Speaker 1: You know, it's interesting because you lost your mom young,
Speaker 1: when you thread the pieces of her together, because I
Speaker 1: think always as a child, you're always trying to work
Speaker 1: out the tapestry of yourself, and often that comes from
Speaker 1: your parents. Do you yes, when you have reminiscences like
Speaker 1: that of her, how much of a complete picture do
Speaker 1: you have? Do you think in her absence?
Speaker 2: Really not a very good one. I was ten and
Speaker 2: I have a child's image of her still, like I
Speaker 2: don't know her as a woman. I never got to
Speaker 2: see her age. I never got to see her go
Speaker 2: through menopause, have children's your children have become a grandparent.
Speaker 2: I never got to do that. So I have like
Speaker 2: a very idealized childlike view of my mother, and I've
Speaker 2: spent a lot of time trying to get to know
Speaker 2: her as an adult. She was an only child, and
Speaker 2: when she died we never mentioned her again, Like her
Speaker 2: name was never spoken. Nobody said the word mommy in
Speaker 2: the house. Nobody, you know. We came over to Ireland
Speaker 2: after she died. My father took five kids who were
Speaker 2: grieving to the north of Iren, not quite northern Ireland,
Speaker 2: but like Dunney Gall and we never mentioned her again.
Speaker 2: And when we came home from Ireland after the summer,
Speaker 2: all of her stuff was taken out of the house,
Speaker 2: so it was like she disappeared. Now at that time, who.
Speaker 1: Had done that? Rosie? Was that like Auntie Neighbors? Yes,
Speaker 1: and your father's behaestore, yes, exactly. He was not someone
Speaker 1: to share with you kids, your mom.
Speaker 2: No, there was no Oprah Winfrey show to learn about grieving,
Speaker 2: you know, there was no nobody talking about the trauma
Speaker 2: that that puts kids through. Right, it happened. And then
Speaker 2: we went to church one one, you know, a month
Speaker 2: after she died. And you know how in church they
Speaker 2: say and the parishioners who have gone to their rest,
Speaker 2: and then they would say the name, and they said,
Speaker 2: my mother's name is my name Roseanne O'Donnell. And my
Speaker 2: brothers started crying, and my father got up and took
Speaker 2: us out of the church. And we never went back
Speaker 2: to church. And my mother was the head of the
Speaker 2: parish council. She was very into Catholicism, so we were
Speaker 2: sort of robbed of every memory and smell and photo
Speaker 2: and instance of her. I only have like that's one
Speaker 2: photo right there of her, but I only have about
Speaker 2: three photos of her, you know, And it's taken me
Speaker 2: a long time. This show that I'm doing when I
Speaker 2: come to Australia has a lot to do with my mom.
Speaker 2: It starts and ends with her, the whole show, and
Speaker 2: it's sort of, you know, me coming to terms with
Speaker 2: being a motherless child and then becoming the mother. And
Speaker 2: how do you learn to do that? What guideposts do
Speaker 2: you follow? What what lanterns are lit in the caverns
Speaker 2: of your soul, you know, to get you through when
Speaker 2: you haven't had that or seen that.
Speaker 1: So you were very young, Yeah, you were eleven, nearly eleven.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it was right before my eleventh birthday. So she
Speaker 2: died on Saint Patrick's Day and four days later I
Speaker 2: turned eleven.
Speaker 1: How was that birthday horrible?
Speaker 2: Because the funeral was on my birthday and everyone who
Speaker 2: came to that afterwards had gifts for me. So here
Speaker 2: I was grieving my mother and being given presents and
Speaker 2: it just felt so wrong, you know. And my little
Speaker 2: brother Timmy is one day before me, so he and I.
Speaker 2: His birthday was on the wake and my birthday was
Speaker 2: on the funeral, and we were besieged with gifts that year,
Speaker 2: and both of us never really have loved our birthdays since.
Speaker 1: You know, It's funny because of course people want to
Speaker 1: show and would have wanted to show you their love
Speaker 1: and to show you how they were feeling. And it's interesting,
Speaker 1: isn't it that we tend to want to do that
Speaker 1: with things, But things given in the face of like
Speaker 1: such a devastating emotional catastrophe actually become.
Speaker 2: Tainted, totally empty. There was no you know. I remember
Speaker 2: my brother Timmy got the gunfire at the OK Corral,
Speaker 2: which was a toy that we had both really wanted
Speaker 2: where you had like a gun like and you had
Speaker 2: to shoot it was in plastic shoot like at a carnival,
Speaker 2: like knock down the picture of right. And I remember
Speaker 2: he got it and we both looked at it and
Speaker 2: looked at each other, and we never really played with it,
Speaker 2: even though that was the toy that we wanted, you know.
Speaker 2: So it was very difficult to to grow up in
Speaker 2: a place where you suffer a loss and then you're
Speaker 2: not allowed to discuss it with anyone. You weren't even
Speaker 2: allowed to say the word mom. So when I would
Speaker 2: get on the phone and somebody would call and say,
Speaker 2: it's your mother home. I'd say, no, she's out. I
Speaker 2: couldn't tell anyone until I was in college that my
Speaker 2: mother had died.
Speaker 1: And what was the atmosphere with your dad in the
Speaker 1: house where your mother is gone.
Speaker 2: Well, you know, he comes from a traditional Irish Catholic
Speaker 2: family where emotions are not encouraged or displayed, you know,
Speaker 2: where drinking is the way you get through things, where
Speaker 2: talking and emoting were not his forte. So he was
Speaker 2: very kind of overwhelmed and didn't know what to do
Speaker 2: with these five small children that I remember when he
Speaker 2: told us that she died. My little brother Timmy said,
Speaker 2: who was only five, said who's going to take care
Speaker 2: of us now? And I said daddy, And he said,
Speaker 2: who's that? Who's that at five years old? Because my
Speaker 2: mother was the one who took care of us and
Speaker 2: my father was at work. You know, back in the
Speaker 2: early seventies, you know, men put on a suit and
Speaker 2: went to work and didn't like their life and came
Speaker 2: home and often had a couple of drinks and didn't
Speaker 2: interact with their kids very much, and all of a sudden,
Speaker 2: it was just him, and it.
Speaker 1: Was tough who stepped up into the role.
Speaker 2: Did anybody, Yes, the neighbors. So there was my mother's
Speaker 2: best friend across the street, Leone, and she became the
Speaker 2: mother and our family. Although for me, I went across
Speaker 2: the street diagonal to Jackie, who was my best friend
Speaker 2: since I'm three. Yes, when I was three, knocked on
Speaker 2: her door and I said to the mother, do you
Speaker 2: have anyone here who's three? And she said yes, and
Speaker 2: we've been best friends ever since. And that woman who's
Speaker 2: still alive, she's ninety years old. She took me in
Speaker 2: and got me my first bra and sanitary napkins and
Speaker 2: all the things that a kid needed who didn't have
Speaker 2: a mother, and she filled in. And then there were
Speaker 2: teachers at school who did that. You know, I was
Speaker 2: a kid who was longing for motherly connection. So all
Speaker 2: my friends' mothers, my friends would get mad at me.
Speaker 2: We were teenagers, and I would always like suck up
Speaker 2: to the mom's and they were having that normal reaction
Speaker 2: of pushing away from your parent when you're a teenager.
Speaker 2: But I never never lived through that, nor did I
Speaker 2: want to do it, nor was I prepared when my
Speaker 2: own children went through that.
Speaker 1: Yes, because you'd not experienced it.
Speaker 2: No, And because I couldn't imagine not wanting your other around,
Speaker 2: because that was the biggest need that I had in
Speaker 2: my life, was wanting a mother. There do you.
Speaker 1: Think you're because running parallel with your life so many
Speaker 1: so many professional achievements, but with you there's been a
Speaker 1: very strong current of family. Do you think that's where
Speaker 1: that desire came from to forge your own family?
Speaker 2: One hundred percent? And you know, my friends always were
Speaker 2: concerned and curious and questioning about whether they wanted to
Speaker 2: be a parent. But I knew it right from the beginning.
Speaker 2: I knew that I would have a lot of kids.
Speaker 2: When I figured out that I was gay, I knew
Speaker 2: that I would adopt a lot of kids. It was
Speaker 2: never a barrier to me wanting to get my goal,
Speaker 2: which is to have a family and make the family
Speaker 2: the center of my life. Now you know, I'm the
Speaker 2: next show that I'm doing is going to be called
Speaker 2: bad parenting because I parented my children with the idea
Speaker 2: that a ten or eleven year old would have about
Speaker 2: what made a perfect mom. It wasn't an adult understanding
Speaker 2: of parenting. It was a child's need. And so I'm
Speaker 2: going to do a show that that's basically about what
Speaker 2: I learned at sixty three, what I have accumulated, the
Speaker 2: knowledge of what I did wrong, you know, and why
Speaker 2: I made those sort of errors that you know, every person,
Speaker 2: every parent feels that. I believe. But when you were
Speaker 2: missing a mother and wanted nothing but to be the
Speaker 2: perfect mother, you're pretty harsh on yourself for the ways
Speaker 2: that you didn't succeed.
Speaker 1: When you say a parenting, like an eleven year old
Speaker 1: would say, an ideal parent is that like lots of snacks,
Speaker 1: being overly like, not disciple planning, how does that benefit?
Speaker 2: Yet not disciplining, not forcing them to follow through. So
Speaker 2: if they signed up for gymnastics and they didn't want
Speaker 2: to go, I would say, you don't have to go,
Speaker 2: and my partner would say, well, that's ridiculous, they have
Speaker 2: to go. I'm like, why do they have to go? Like,
Speaker 2: I didn't want them to feel pain, and I tried
Speaker 2: to avoid it at all costs, and I smoothed the
Speaker 2: road in front of them too much so that the
Speaker 2: tiniest bump in adulthood became a big trauma for them.
Speaker 2: They weren't used to being a survivor because I made
Speaker 2: it too easy, And with my older two it's much
Speaker 2: more pronounced because I was at the height of my
Speaker 2: fame and uh easy they you know. Yeah. And when
Speaker 2: you're when you're famous and you take four little kids,
Speaker 2: you know, stair step to the mall and they're all
Speaker 2: under six, everyone'st you and says, oh my god, those
Speaker 2: kids are so gorgeous. But when you're famous and they
Speaker 2: ignore the kids, everyone comes to you, and that does
Speaker 2: something because kids need to be sort of the center
Speaker 2: of the world when they're that age, and when you
Speaker 2: have a famous parent, you're definitely not and it affects them,
Speaker 2: I think in later life. And my older too much
Speaker 2: more than the younger two. And then I have the
Speaker 2: little one, you know, who's twelve. Yes that's ten yeah,
Speaker 2: ten years younger, yes, exactly ten years younger than my
Speaker 2: former youngest.
Speaker 1: But you know, the parenting mistakes which I think often
Speaker 1: we recognize in retrospect. I have four children and I'm
Speaker 1: kind of in the sick of it still. It's one
Speaker 1: of those things where you think it's going to abate.
Speaker 2: It just it seems it doesn't.
Speaker 1: It just goes on and on.
Speaker 2: Well, I never knew that children would need their parents
Speaker 2: past teenage teenager. So when my like thirty year old
Speaker 2: son calls me and needs me as much as he
Speaker 2: did when he was seven, I'm stunned because I didn't
Speaker 2: have that. So I just sort of took care of
Speaker 2: myself and we were all, you know, very resilient and
Speaker 2: very able to tackle obstacles because there were so many.
Speaker 2: But when my kids now maybe have a little bit
Speaker 2: of a failure to launch or you know, the older two,
Speaker 2: especially when they have challenges in their life, I think
Speaker 2: this is all on me, you know, not so much
Speaker 2: with the two ones who are just a little bit younger,
Speaker 2: but weren't in the height of my fame.
Speaker 1: So you're talking about Parker and Chelsea, the two eldest.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yes, they're like thirty and twenty eight, and the
Speaker 2: two of them have struggled, I think more than the
Speaker 2: two younger ones. And it's almost like I was a
Speaker 2: different parent. I had left my show when Blake was
Speaker 2: a baby. I had viv after I was on TV,
Speaker 2: and it was a different reality for them than it
Speaker 2: was for the older kids.
Speaker 1: Well, every child has a different experience of being their parents' child.
Speaker 2: Yes, there's some Naterighaisy you know that comic. He's very
Speaker 2: very you know, and he does a great funny bit.
Speaker 2: I'm not going to paraphrase it, but something like apparently
Speaker 2: my younger brothers were raised by their best friends. And
Speaker 2: I thought that is so funny because I understand that.
Speaker 2: I get that, you know how you're you're raised with
Speaker 2: different parents and their different levels of growth and maturity.
Speaker 2: And you know, when my first kid was born, I
Speaker 2: was afraid, I was nervous, I was worried, I was anxious.
Speaker 2: And by the fourth kid, you're not you know, it's
Speaker 2: not you or an old hand at it. And I
Speaker 2: think you can definitely tell that they had different parents.
Speaker 1: Well, we say, in our family, our youngest learned to
Speaker 1: eat by picking up the crumbs the others dropped. Yes,
Speaker 1: very resilient and they kind of have to be because
Speaker 1: you're outnumbered. You were very outnumbered. Yes, When you were
Speaker 1: talking about your upbringing and your quest to find someone
Speaker 1: to feel that your mother shaped hole in your life
Speaker 1: because you also were gay, At what point did you
Speaker 1: realize did you always know and who was the person
Speaker 1: that you could go to to share that with, if anyone?
Speaker 2: Well, I think my mother knew, you know, because I
Speaker 2: would never wear a dress, I would, you know. And
Speaker 2: I had a sister who's one year younger than me,
Speaker 2: had the same exact upbringing, and she's straight as can be,
Speaker 2: and she had a mother die when she was nine,
Speaker 2: you know, and I was almost eleven, so not that different.
Speaker 2: But my older brother, one year older than me, is
Speaker 2: also gay, and I think my mother knew that both
Speaker 2: of us were gay and different. And when I wanted
Speaker 2: to play the drums and she was in the hospital
Speaker 2: fifth grade, I needed a permission slip, and she didn't
Speaker 2: want me to because she didn't think girls should play drums,
Speaker 2: and that a lot of things that I liked to
Speaker 2: do were boy things like play sports and ride a
Speaker 2: skateboard and learn to juggle and balance things on my hand,
Speaker 2: like I did what were traditionally at the time more
Speaker 2: boyish things. And I think it worried her. I think
Speaker 2: it concerned her. But then she was gone, and I
Speaker 2: kind of always knew, like I was never in in
Speaker 2: any way in finding out anything about the boys in
Speaker 2: my class, but the girls, I totally wanted to know
Speaker 2: all their secrets, all their stories. I wanted to meet
Speaker 2: their parents. I wanted to, you know, and without even
Speaker 2: really knowing that that meant that I was gay. My
Speaker 2: focus and my interest was always female, and I knew
Speaker 2: that from a very young age. And when I got
Speaker 2: to be of the age where you had to start
Speaker 2: kissing boys, I knew I didn't want to do that.
Speaker 2: I knew that if I was going to kiss anyone,
Speaker 2: even though at the time it seemed like unfathomable because
Speaker 2: there was no one gay on TV in nineteen seventy three.
Speaker 2: There was no one, and the women who were gay,
Speaker 2: like Martina Navtalova and Billy Jean King, had press conferences
Speaker 2: announcing that they weren't because those were the top yes
Speaker 2: And I remember it vividly, vividly that they said no,
Speaker 2: they were or not, and that they know that there
Speaker 2: were rumors about them, but they made a big point
Speaker 2: of saying they were not gay. And I remember being
Speaker 2: a gay kid thinking, oh my god, there's no one
Speaker 2: out there, there's no one out there who's like and
Speaker 2: it was very lonely and isolating. But when I got
Speaker 2: my license, I was sixteen years old. You get your
Speaker 2: drivers permit and you can drive on your own, like
Speaker 2: within twenty miles of your house, and I would drive
Speaker 2: in the car and say out loud, I am gay.
Speaker 2: I am gay, because that was the only place I
Speaker 2: could do it was in the car where nobody else
Speaker 2: in the car with me and I was alone. And
Speaker 2: that's how I sort of got myself used to the
Speaker 2: fact that this was who I was. And then I
Speaker 2: had a teacher in seventh grade who was twenty seven
Speaker 2: and I was thirteen, and she mothered me. She's the
Speaker 2: first person to say I love you to me. She
Speaker 2: was the first person to give me a hug. I
Speaker 2: opened a school and named it after her. I still
Speaker 2: have it in New York City, the Maravell Arts Center.
Speaker 2: And she took me into her family, and she was
Speaker 2: the first person I told and she was absolutely fine
Speaker 2: with it. She was like, you know, you can't wish
Speaker 2: that you had blue eyes. If you have brown eyes,
Speaker 2: you can't wish it away. Row just be who you are,
Speaker 2: you know. And at that time, in nineteen seventy five,
Speaker 2: that was very keeling and very freeing. And she too
Speaker 2: died of breast cancer like my mother did.
Speaker 1: How much longer after you knew her.
Speaker 2: She died when right before Vivi was born, So that
Speaker 2: was twenty two years ago. So I was a grown
Speaker 2: adult in a relationship with children. But she died and
Speaker 2: she had two children that are my godkids, and I'm
Speaker 2: still very involved in their life. And you know, at
Speaker 2: the funeral, I sat in the front row with the family,
Speaker 2: and she was totally a mother figure. Her and Jackie's mother,
Speaker 2: Bernice really raised me in a maternal, loving, consistent way.
Speaker 1: Coming up next, Rosie recalls her first forays into romance,
Speaker 1: when shyness and uncertainty about expressing herself made things complicated,
Speaker 1: and when you started to feel romantic. So being a
Speaker 1: child and knowing that you're into drumming is one thing,
Speaker 1: but you know, when you hit the point, as you said,
Speaker 1: you weren't interested in kissing boys, when you realize that
Speaker 1: your interest in girls was romantic, or when you felt
Speaker 1: that first really strong romantic urge for a woman. When
Speaker 1: was that?
Speaker 2: I think it was with Mary Rose when I was
Speaker 2: in eleventh or tenth or eleventh grade, and we were
Speaker 2: very good friends. And she's not gay, she's married and
Speaker 2: has children. But I was in love with her, no
Speaker 2: doubt about it. But I did not ever take it
Speaker 2: to any kind of next level, nor did I think
Speaker 2: that I ever would it wasn't until I was in college,
Speaker 2: my freshman year of college, that I first fell in
Speaker 2: love love with a girl who was also not gay.
Speaker 2: And it was unrequited, and but I was as in
Speaker 2: love as I've ever been with anyone. And I would,
Speaker 2: you know, I would see her everywhere in the in
Speaker 2: the college. I would like see some She was the
Speaker 2: first person I ever saw who had a hooded sweatshirt
Speaker 2: with no zipper, and I remember thinking that was the
Speaker 2: coolest thing in the world, you know. And she has
Speaker 2: since moved to Norway, and we had a chance to
Speaker 2: discuss this when we were older, and she sort of
Speaker 2: apologized because she wasn't really understanding what it meant to me.
Speaker 2: And even though we were so close and we used
Speaker 2: to sleep in the same bed, but never do anything
Speaker 2: because I was so afraid. It's so you know, really Catholic,
Speaker 2: kind of prudish, you know. I had no uh, I
Speaker 2: had no game, I had no moxie, and I still don't.
Speaker 2: And people I've been with are like, you know, there's
Speaker 2: not a lot of rosy O'Donnell in you, because they
Speaker 2: have an image that I'm like this tough New Yorker
Speaker 2: that will, you know, be very kind of aggressive, and
Speaker 2: I'm I'm the opposite. I'm like totally the bush, you know,
Speaker 2: I'm I'm not someone I always like want to cuddle,
Speaker 2: I want to like It's it's pretty funny that that
Speaker 2: the women that I've been with have all said, uh,
Speaker 2: you know, people would be shocked to find out how
Speaker 2: you actually are versus your image, you know, And I
Speaker 2: never tried to have an image that was different than
Speaker 2: I was. It just you know, from New York, tough boyish.
Speaker 2: You know, people just assume strike told very not exactly,
Speaker 2: and it's very not how I actually am.
Speaker 1: So if I think about it, now, your most recent
Speaker 1: foraight that we've all enjoyed you in and just like that, yes,
Speaker 1: that's not a million miles removed from you. Then for
Speaker 1: you to play no, it's none who pops up in
Speaker 1: New York City, very.
Speaker 2: Innocent fan of the Broadway, fan of Broadway. Broadway had
Speaker 2: never been sexual. And you know, and I'm friends with
Speaker 2: Cynthia and have been for many years, and it wasn't
Speaker 2: acting to be in love with her. I you know,
Speaker 2: I've been in love with her for a long time,
Speaker 2: not in any again romantic or sexual way, but just
Speaker 2: in love with who she is as a person and
Speaker 2: her politics and the way she loves her family and
Speaker 2: her wife and carries herself in the world. So Michael
Speaker 2: Patrick King, who created and writes that show, wrote it
Speaker 2: for me because he knows me. We knew each other
Speaker 2: since we did stand up together when we were in
Speaker 2: our twenties. So he wrote that part for me knowing
Speaker 2: that it wouldn't be a lot of acting on my part.
Speaker 1: Yeah, which you'll very capable of, by the way.
Speaker 2: Yes, I love you know, literally, my goal was always
Speaker 2: to be an actress, never to be a stand up comic.
Speaker 2: It always was to act. And you know, I loved
Speaker 2: I loved getting to do all the roles that I have,
Speaker 2: and I kind of knew in my forties that it
Speaker 2: would take till I was in my sixties to start
Speaker 2: getting those kinds of roles, the Geraldine Page roles, the
Speaker 2: Colleen Dehurst roles, the you know, serious actress, dramatic actress.
Speaker 2: And I've been very lucky that I've had the opportunity
Speaker 2: to do that since I've been over sixty.
Speaker 1: You know, It's it's funny because when that was so audacious,
Speaker 1: that scene in in just like that, that meeting the
Speaker 1: whole like it was properly shocking. And one of the
Speaker 1: questions as a viewer at the time, not even aware
Speaker 1: that I was going to have this conversation with you,
Speaker 1: was did Rosie like, did you workshop that with the writers?
Speaker 1: Did you workshop that with the creators? It came fully intact.
Speaker 1: And how was it when you first saw the script
Speaker 1: and you went, I'm my first sexual encounter as this
Speaker 1: nun is going to be with Miranda, Like, how were
Speaker 1: you when you read the script?
Speaker 2: I was fine. You know, I had done Niptock and
Speaker 2: Julian McMahon who passed away recently. We had a sex
Speaker 2: scene in that movie and that show, and so I
Speaker 2: had done a sex scene before and I wasn't like nervous.
Speaker 2: But I will tell you this. Michael Patrick King said
Speaker 2: when he was directing it, you guys are in bed,
Speaker 2: can you be a little more like you're in bed?
Speaker 2: And I was like, I can't, really.
Speaker 1: It was too mighty or too no that I.
Speaker 2: Was too shy. I was too you know. I wasn't
Speaker 2: like if you're like you see people in a sex
Speaker 2: scene and people who have no issues kind of with
Speaker 2: being a sexual, aale alive person are able to be
Speaker 2: physical in a way that I'm not comfortable with, you know,
Speaker 2: And it takes a lot. It takes a lot. I
Speaker 2: haven't had many lovers. I've had, you know, much less
Speaker 2: than all of my friends. And it usually is a
Speaker 2: very long commitment. It's not a casual thing. I've never
Speaker 2: had a one night stand. I've never you know, just
Speaker 2: sort of been a free person in that way. I've
Speaker 2: always been very vulnerable and very tender, you know. I
Speaker 2: need it to be nice and not not scary.
Speaker 1: And almost like you need to know, a lot of
Speaker 1: people feel very strong physical attractions to people. I personally
Speaker 1: don't feel that. Though. I can recognize that someone is
Speaker 1: physically attractive, but I need to have some sort of
Speaker 1: communion with them.
Speaker 2: That's exactly. Yes, I can't even go there. Like people
Speaker 2: have said, oh, so and so is so hot that
Speaker 2: you work with, and I'm like, no, I may look
Speaker 2: at someone and think, wow, they're physically beautiful, they're physically
Speaker 2: handsome or pretty, but I'd never think of sexual being
Speaker 2: with them sexually. Like I always made a joke that
Speaker 2: if you want to have a relationship, a physical sexual
Speaker 2: relationship with me, you need like a big sign that
Speaker 2: says I am flirting with them because I won't get it.
Speaker 2: You know, I think everyone's my friend, and I don't
Speaker 2: like kind of function on that level. And I remember
Speaker 2: going to gay bars when I was young and never
Speaker 2: feeling that that urge of oh that person's hot. I
Speaker 2: want to let them kiss me. I have to. And
Speaker 2: there's a word for it. I forget what it is
Speaker 2: now demisexual where you have to have an emotional connection
Speaker 2: in order to be sexual. And that's sort of where
Speaker 2: it is me.
Speaker 1: And yet you've been right. They explained that that concept.
Speaker 2: Yeah, exactly, because we were just going over this and
Speaker 2: trying to, you know, find my way to be more
Speaker 2: comfortable in my own sexual truth. And they said to me,
Speaker 2: this is what I think is happening for you, that
Speaker 2: you you needed to be emotionally there before you can
Speaker 2: go physically there. And that's that's true for me.
Speaker 1: And then, so what what does it mean? So as
Speaker 1: you recently have done so you've changed really everything about
Speaker 1: your life. You've moved to Ireland with Clay, You're now
Speaker 1: a dog owner, a dog love.
Speaker 2: I am, Yes.
Speaker 1: It seems to me that you've really pivoted into a
Speaker 1: new expression of yourself.
Speaker 2: You know, I think I've matured into it. And somebody
Speaker 2: that I know, so, you know, with menopause comes tremendous wisdom,
Speaker 2: and I think it's true. I have stopped sort of
Speaker 2: caring about what other people think, and I've just been
Speaker 2: able to sort of do myself in a way that
Speaker 2: I never was before, even though my survival mechanism was
Speaker 2: to be tough and to be you know, forward and challenging.
Speaker 2: And you know, I would say what I thought, and
Speaker 2: this was because I had siblings that needed to be
Speaker 2: taken care of. And I remember when my mother died,
Speaker 2: my little brother looked up at me and said, you
Speaker 2: have to be the mommy now. And I took that
Speaker 2: very seriously. He was five years old, and I thought, okay,
Speaker 2: I do you know. So I've kind of come into
Speaker 2: myself as I've aged in a way that is freeing,
Speaker 2: and it's provided me with a kind of clarity and
Speaker 2: ease that I never really had in my life.
Speaker 1: And how will that manifest? Do you think in terms
Speaker 1: of a romantic.
Speaker 2: Life, Well, you know, I have a long term relationship
Speaker 2: that is kind of complicated and and but it provides
Speaker 2: me with tremendous solace and stability. And it's not kind
Speaker 2: of traditional, it's not you know it. There's complications, you know,
Speaker 2: but I find that, you know, every relationship I've had
Speaker 2: has been really long, really long, and I don't do casual.
Speaker 2: I don't do I do like an intense devotion. And
Speaker 2: so getting a divorce the first time with Kelly, you know,
Speaker 2: was very very painful because I never wanted to do
Speaker 2: that to my kids. I never wanted to do that
Speaker 2: to myself, but mostly my kids. I think that I
Speaker 2: made the mother part of my life the most prominent part,
Speaker 2: and not the relationship and not the wife, so correct,
Speaker 2: and that's not a healthy way to.
Speaker 1: Do, no, and that's very common in all models of relationships,
Speaker 1: in hatro relationships as well.
Speaker 2: Yes, And I you know, I remember like for my kids,
Speaker 2: I would think think of them first, and for my
Speaker 2: Wayfey did not, and it was painful for her, I believe,
Speaker 2: And you know, I had a tendency to dissociate and
Speaker 2: to focus all my energy on the kids and on
Speaker 2: my role as a mother, and that was my priority
Speaker 2: and it was known and that had to be very
Speaker 2: very painful.
Speaker 1: You know. I was watching the crews that you did
Speaker 1: that you organized, yes for gay families and their kids,
Speaker 1: an amazing piece of activism, which at the time didn't
Speaker 1: wasn't really presented like activism, which is why I think
Speaker 1: it was probably so powerful. So you charted a cruise ship,
Speaker 1: you opened it up to gay couples, their families, their kids, people,
Speaker 1: straight people came along with their gay kids or whatever.
Speaker 1: It was a really remarkable up liliae Docco. But in
Speaker 1: it you are and so you're with Kelly at the time,
Speaker 1: and you've I think you've got the four kids. Then yes,
Speaker 1: Kelly says this amazing thing. Actually, you quote her and
Speaker 1: you say, Kelly always sees in a relationship, someone is
Speaker 1: the flower and someone is and you were like, I'm
Speaker 1: the flower and she's the gardener.
Speaker 2: Yes, and that becomes very tired to both people in
Speaker 2: that role. In order to really have beautiful, nurturing, caring relationship,
Speaker 2: you have to take turns at being the gardener and
Speaker 2: the flower. Yes, And that's what I've learned. But I
Speaker 2: had no ability to do that. I just thought, well,
Speaker 2: I wasn't good at taking care of people because I
Speaker 2: had never been taken care of. I wasn't good at
Speaker 2: taking care of anyone except for my children, because my
Speaker 2: desire as a child to be taken care of was
Speaker 2: so huge and overwhelming that it dominated everything. You know,
Speaker 2: I don't want to say that, you know, necessarily Kelly
Speaker 2: was jealous of the relationship with my kids that I had,
Speaker 2: but I think she wanted some of that for herself
Speaker 2: and I was unable to do that.
Speaker 1: And at the time, of course, you had a very
Speaker 1: high profile, very famous, and even though you're not a
Speaker 1: person who's led to the fame, you're led to the work.
Speaker 1: It's impossible, I think, to not be affected by how
Speaker 1: the outside world treats you differently when you have that
Speaker 1: level of fame and in fact that totally yeah, and
Speaker 1: the time paucity that you have, So there's an inherent
Speaker 1: inequality in a relationship.
Speaker 2: Totally, and financially there was a huge inequality, and attention wise,
Speaker 2: there's huge inequality, not just with my partner but also
Speaker 2: with my children. Again, I talk about going to the
Speaker 2: mall and having everyone focus on me and no focus
Speaker 2: on the kid. You know that, you know, Kelly would
Speaker 2: everyone in show business knew that I was gay because
Speaker 2: I always sat next to her at the Emmy's you know,
Speaker 2: I never had a boy with me and was never
Speaker 2: pretending everyone knew, but she was sort of pushed aside.
Speaker 2: You know. My publicist was Lois Smith, legendary publicist of
Speaker 2: Marilyn Monroe, you know. And she was an older woman
Speaker 2: and ran and owned PMK. This very powerful. So when
Speaker 2: I started my show, I met Kelly. I had two children. Kelly, yes,
Speaker 2: my talk show, and Lois, my publicist, was like, when
Speaker 2: we would go out in public, she would get in
Speaker 2: between us. She would you know, yeah, she would like
Speaker 2: run interfere in a way. And I remember one time
Speaker 2: when I was doing Greece on Broadway before I had children,
Speaker 2: this reporter asked me if I was seeing anyone and
Speaker 2: I said no, and he said and I wasn't And
Speaker 2: he said, well, what are the qualifications. I said, all
Speaker 2: applicants are welcome. And he said would that be a
Speaker 2: woman or a man? And I said, yes, could be
Speaker 2: either one. Well, Lois called Helen Gurley Brown. It was
Speaker 2: in Cosmo magazine. The writer was Patrick Pachenko. I remember
Speaker 2: it vividly, a gay man, and she had it taken out,
Speaker 2: not at my request, at her own request, had it
Speaker 2: taken out of the interview. And I remember Patrick being
Speaker 2: sort of offended and felt like that I had done it,
Speaker 2: but I had not done it. There were forces that
Speaker 2: be at that time that just didn't want it known.
Speaker 2: It was before Ellen was out, It was before everybody
Speaker 2: was closeted. Except Katie Lang and Elton John. That was it.
Speaker 2: Everyone else was not out, and so the concept of
Speaker 2: being an entertainer who was gay and still working was
Speaker 2: foreign to me. When Will and Grace came out, they
Speaker 2: told me, oh, there's a new show coming. It's a
Speaker 2: gay man living with Lucille Ball like woman friend, and
Speaker 2: I thought, well, that'll last a week like I You know,
Speaker 2: I remembered Love Sidney. Do you remember that show with
Speaker 2: Tommy Randall. No, this was like in the early seventies.
Speaker 2: It was a show where he was playing a gay man,
Speaker 2: although they never said he was a gay man. He
Speaker 2: had a big photo of his dead partner over the fireplace,
Speaker 2: and sometimes the end he would go over and look
Speaker 2: at it. Now, nothing was said, but it was definitely implied,
Speaker 2: and the Catholic Church went crazy and everybody was protesting
Speaker 2: it and it got pulled off the air. So I
Speaker 2: never thought it would be possible in my lifetime to
Speaker 2: be an out gay person and have a career in
Speaker 2: show business.
Speaker 1: After the Break, Rosie shares the story behind one of
Speaker 1: the most painful public moments of her career, when Ellen
Speaker 1: DeGeneres told everyone that they weren't friends. And so then
Speaker 1: when you mentioned Ellen before when she came out in
Speaker 1: her sitcom, how was that? I mean, that was a
Speaker 1: sensation for viewers around the world. How did that feel
Speaker 1: for you?
Speaker 2: Very threatening? Very threatening, because you know, everyone then wanted
Speaker 2: to know, well, what are you getting now? She came
Speaker 2: on my show, and I felt strongly that I didn't
Speaker 2: want to leave her out there alone, that I could
Speaker 2: not gay person act as though I was not the
Speaker 2: same as her. So we talked before in the dressing
Speaker 2: room and she said she was going to say that
Speaker 2: her character was going to become Lebanese. And then I said, okay,
Speaker 2: well I'm going to talk about that with you. Let
Speaker 2: me in, and she said okay. So I said, oh
Speaker 2: my god, I like Casey Kasem, maybe I'm Lebanese, right,
Speaker 2: And everyone who was gay at home got it, everybody,
Speaker 2: you know, because I wouldn't leave her out there alone.
Speaker 2: I couldn't do it. And so we had this, you know,
Speaker 2: really sort of decoded, coded interaction that anyone who was
Speaker 2: gay new. But you know, the public didn't really pick
Speaker 2: up on it. The news media didn't really, you know,
Speaker 2: and nobody would ask back then. But I remember it
Speaker 2: felt very threatening. I was on this very famous, this
Speaker 2: very successful show. I was winning all the Emmy Awards,
Speaker 2: and it just felt like, oh, this could really threaten me.
Speaker 2: But still my internal clock wouldn't allow me to distance
Speaker 2: myself from her. I had to stand by her and
Speaker 2: hold her hand, and that's what I chose to do.
Speaker 2: And then, you know, it was funny because she never
Speaker 2: really I didn't think, appreciated that moment. And she was
Speaker 2: on Larry King and he asked her, when I left
Speaker 2: my show on my own volition after being offered a
Speaker 2: lot of money to stay because my mother died at
Speaker 2: forty and I was turning forty, and I had all
Speaker 2: these children and I wanted to be around for them
Speaker 2: and go to their softball games and their school plays.
Speaker 2: Larry King asked her, and Kelly and I were in
Speaker 2: bed watching it, and he asked her, whatever happened to
Speaker 2: Rosie o'donald her show went down the tubes, and Ellen said,
Speaker 2: I don't know Rosie, we're not friends. And that was
Speaker 2: like one of the most painful things that ever happened
Speaker 2: to me in show business in my life. I couldn't
Speaker 2: believe it.
Speaker 1: Why did she say that.
Speaker 2: I don't know? Because I have photos of her holding
Speaker 2: my newborn babies. I knew her for thirty years, Like,
Speaker 2: I don't know, Rosie, we're not friends. It was so
Speaker 2: upsetting to me that I had t shirts made I
Speaker 2: don't know, Rosie, we're not friends, and I gave them
Speaker 2: out to my stack because it was very painful, and
Speaker 2: you know, we've never sort of gotten over it it.
Speaker 1: Did she Did she ever reach out to you to
Speaker 1: explain it or what her thinking was?
Speaker 2: Or no?
Speaker 1: I mean, I'm not the first person to say this,
Speaker 1: but she's a strange creature.
Speaker 2: Well, you know she's We're not similar. I can say
Speaker 2: that for sure. We're not emotionally. No. And I was
Speaker 2: never asked to go on her show. When I was,
Speaker 2: it was long after they had been on for many years,
Speaker 2: and she had the same staff as my show, the
Speaker 2: same producers, the same everything. And now I don't blame
Speaker 2: her for doing that. I didn't create the genre of
Speaker 2: a merv Griffin Mike Douglas Walk Show. You know, this
Speaker 2: was what I grew up watching. But I did think
Speaker 2: that she was all of a sudden in the position
Speaker 2: I was in, where she was starting a show and
Speaker 2: wanted it to be successful and get the money and
Speaker 2: the accolades that came with it. And instead of deciding
Speaker 2: to stand next to me and hold my hand, which
Speaker 2: is what I did to her, she did the opposite.
Speaker 2: And I couldn't believe it. You know, I couldn't believe it.
Speaker 1: It's interesting you say she had the same producers and
Speaker 1: the same staff, because your relationship with those producers and
Speaker 1: that staff was very different than what led to the
Speaker 1: demise of her own show, which was that the relationship
Speaker 1: with those the workers, the people that made the show
Speaker 1: was deeply unsatisfying to them. They felt excluded and they
Speaker 1: felt diminished.
Speaker 2: Yes, we had a family, for sure. I'm still friends
Speaker 2: with many of the people who were on my staff
Speaker 2: thirty years ago. I you know, I'm very proud of
Speaker 2: them who all went on and did daytime TV for
Speaker 2: the next twenty years. And we're still close. You know,
Speaker 2: every anniversary we all get together and have a party,
Speaker 2: and you know, I don't know it my desire to
Speaker 2: create family is the biggest force in my life. And
Speaker 2: I do it everywhere I go, and you know, I
Speaker 2: do it with my staff here in my life and
Speaker 2: in my house. You know, I create. And uh, I
Speaker 2: don't think that that she's similar to me in that way.
Speaker 1: Did you know when when they were that they were
Speaker 1: having troubles the people that you were still in contact with.
Speaker 2: Well, I knew the way she treated me must be
Speaker 2: the way she treats others. And I felt, you know,
Speaker 2: very betrayed. And so I didn't imagine that they had
Speaker 2: a similar kind of relationship that I had with that
Speaker 2: she had that with her staff. And you hear things,
Speaker 2: you know, you hear things from from different people. But
Speaker 2: you know, I'm I'm now sixty three and she's you know,
Speaker 2: a few years older than me. I don't wish her
Speaker 2: any ill will, but you know, I never could kind
Speaker 2: of get past it. And and a lot of times,
Speaker 2: you know, she has said or written me and said,
Speaker 2: why are you still talking about this, oh, you know
Speaker 2: all these years?
Speaker 1: Ah?
Speaker 2: And I didn't quite know how to answer that. I said, well, well,
Speaker 2: it was profound for me, It was a profound moment.
Speaker 1: And so she'll address it to that point, but not
Speaker 1: to the point of resolution or explanation or assuming more
Speaker 1: apology right now, that's interesting.
Speaker 2: I would have apologized. I would have said, I'm really
Speaker 2: sorry I heard you that much, and I don't know
Speaker 2: why I did that, and it was a mistake, and
Speaker 2: I hope you can forgive me. That's what I would
Speaker 2: have done. But I think in her mind she thinks
Speaker 2: I keep rehashing it for pleasure. I don't rehash it
Speaker 2: for pleasure. I you know, I rehash it because our
Speaker 2: careers have taken sort of parallel into woven paths. Yes,
Speaker 2: and I'm often you know where gay talk show hosts, uh,
Speaker 2: And we're around the same age, so people would always
Speaker 2: ask me about it, and I have a hard time
Speaker 2: not telling the truth.
Speaker 1: There's one exception. She was never in Sleepless in Seattle.
Speaker 2: That's true. Such for the league of their own Yah. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 2: I'm very lucky. I had amazing movie roles. And you know, again,
Speaker 2: it's because of you know, my need to emotionally connect.
Speaker 2: Like Penny Marshall and and Nora Ephron. They became family
Speaker 2: in my life and they're both gone. But you know,
Speaker 2: Nora got me a department in her building, the Apthorpe,
Speaker 2: and I lived there and her husband, Nick's office was
Speaker 2: on my floor, and I would go to the Hamptons
Speaker 2: with them, and Penny and I stayed close her whole life.
Speaker 2: And you know, even though she struggled in a lot
Speaker 2: of ways, you know, we we maintained our friendship. I'm
Speaker 2: still close to Madonna thirty years later. You know, I
Speaker 2: don't I don't let people go, you know. And and
Speaker 2: so I think that a lot of my success is
Speaker 2: the way that I love. And on my TV show,
Speaker 2: you could see that I loved Barbara streisand that I
Speaker 2: loved the guests that I had on whether it was
Speaker 2: Florence Henderson from The Brady Bunch or somebody like Tom Cruise,
Speaker 2: I loved them equally because they matter to me in
Speaker 2: my life and world. And I think my success is
Speaker 2: largely based on my capacity to love. And it made
Speaker 2: people feel warm and feel connected.
Speaker 1: What does it mean mean for those relationships? You're very
Speaker 1: good at relationships, and they're very alive, and so many
Speaker 1: people speak with such love and fondness in regard for you.
Speaker 1: But what does it mean for those relationships now that
Speaker 1: you have moved to the other side of the world.
Speaker 2: Very hard, Yeah, very hard. But I knew why I did.
Speaker 2: It was not a political statement as much as it
Speaker 2: was self preservation. I knew that the last time he
Speaker 2: was in office was very difficult for me. I was
Speaker 2: eating too much, I was drinking Trump I was drinking
Speaker 2: too much. You know. I talked about him in two
Speaker 2: thousand and seven and he hasn't stopped using me as
Speaker 2: a punchline ever since. And many, many, many male comedians
Speaker 2: did what I did and worse, but he didn't go
Speaker 2: after them in the way that he went after me,
Speaker 2: because he's misogynistic and sexist and cruel. He's innately a
Speaker 2: cruel human being. And I think that our tumult caused
Speaker 2: a tremendous amount of seris in my life. You know,
Speaker 2: it created a lot of problems. I would be with
Speaker 2: my little child who has autism and CVS, which is
Speaker 2: like a drugstore in America, and guy with a MAGA
Speaker 2: hat would come over and go, hey, screw you. Trump won,
Speaker 2: and I have a five year old with automn Why
Speaker 2: is that man cursing at us? You know, his his
Speaker 2: ability to denigrate people and dismiss them and humiliate them,
Speaker 2: encouraged other people to do the same, and it was
Speaker 2: difficult when he was in office the first time, even
Speaker 2: though there were guardrails up. So I read Project twenty
Speaker 2: twenty five and knew that I had to go to
Speaker 2: save myself and to be a fully aware, alive, and
Speaker 2: healthy parent for this child who was special needs. You
Speaker 2: knows I never had a child who was special needs
Speaker 2: before Clay, and that's where my focus is and my commitment.
Speaker 2: So I wanted to take her to a place where
Speaker 2: decency still lived and where I wouldn't have to witness
Speaker 2: what he was going to do to the country, which
Speaker 2: he outlined in the Heritage Foundation's Project twenty twenty five.
Speaker 2: And I read and was to find out most Americans
Speaker 2: did not read it. So some Americans thought I was overreacting,
Speaker 2: and now they're liking saying, you know, you were very prescient.
Speaker 2: I'm like, I wasn't so prescient. I just did my
Speaker 2: reading and research, and I knew what he was capable of.
Speaker 1: It's interesting because you were not one of those people
Speaker 1: who said, if Trump gets elected, I'm leaving the country,
Speaker 1: and there have been quite a few of those, but
Speaker 1: you didn't leave them to do No, most of them
Speaker 1: didn't do it. You didn't say you were going to
Speaker 1: do it, but you did it. And how is that?
Speaker 1: How long have you been in Ireland now?
Speaker 2: Since January fifteenth. I wanted to leave before the inauguration,
Speaker 2: and I didn't tell anyone because I didn't want it
Speaker 2: to be a big public thing. I wanted to go
Speaker 2: quietly and keep my child's life calm. And also I
Speaker 2: thought many people wouldn't believe it because I'm not a traveler,
Speaker 2: like going to Australia has been a dream of mine always.
Speaker 2: But I think I would have the guts to do it,
Speaker 2: so I didn't tell anyone. I mean, I told my
Speaker 2: older brother and my sisters, you know, I told my
Speaker 2: immediate family, but even them they were saying, I don't
Speaker 2: think you're going to do it. Ro I think you'll
Speaker 2: go and then you'll come right back. But I knew
Speaker 2: I had to do it. I was sure that I
Speaker 2: had to do it, and so I came to Ireland,
Speaker 2: where I had had two cousins who I knew from
Speaker 2: when I was a child, who were here or won
Speaker 2: my age, and one about twelve years older than me,
Speaker 2: And I came knowing two people and surprised myself truthfully
Speaker 2: that I did it and that it's been quite a success.
Speaker 2: And then you know, people say to me, why do
Speaker 2: you still talk about him and the country if you left. Well,
Speaker 2: I never gave up my citizenship, nor would I, although
Speaker 2: I'm getting my dual citizenship to become an Irish citizen
Speaker 2: as well, because my grandparents are from Ireland and I
Speaker 2: care about my country. I love my country. I am
Speaker 2: very patriotic, and I knew that I would not be
Speaker 2: able to deal with what was about to happen, and
Speaker 2: it certainly has. And I think the United States is
Speaker 2: in serious trouble at this point with him arming the
Speaker 2: National Guard and calling the national Guard not on January sixth,
Speaker 2: but now to cities where there are no unrest, there
Speaker 2: are no insurrections, where there is not mass violence.
Speaker 1: Do you think if you because that has been a
Speaker 1: huge price to pay for you having been outspoken, do
Speaker 1: you think and not that I'm you know, you don't
Speaker 1: strike me as someone who lives with your great but
Speaker 1: you do live with reflection. Do you do you wish
Speaker 1: that you had spoken differently in two thousand and seven
Speaker 1: or not spoken?
Speaker 2: No, because what I spoke about was not just making
Speaker 2: fun of him. There were he owned beauty pageants, And
Speaker 2: if you grew up in New York, like I, you
Speaker 2: knew who he was from the get go. In New York,
Speaker 2: he's not respected and he never was. And I grew
Speaker 2: up watching his planes be repossessed off the runways at LaGuardia,
Speaker 2: watching him try to sell steaks and vodka. He's a
Speaker 2: con man, and he's a grifter, and he's a logo slapper.
Speaker 2: He's not a builder, and he's all illusion and if
Speaker 2: you are a New Yorker, you knew this. So he
Speaker 2: had a woman, Tara O'Connor, who was I believe eighteen
Speaker 2: or nineteen Miss teen USA or whatever his title was,
Speaker 2: and she kissed a girl in the village and he
Speaker 2: made her have a press conference and apologized to the country,
Speaker 2: and it was on right before the view came on
Speaker 2: the live press con conference, and she was crying and
Speaker 2: thanking him for a second chance. And all it looked
Speaker 2: to me was like a prostitute and a pimp controlling
Speaker 2: the prostitute, saying, you're going to say this to save
Speaker 2: face for me, And I said that, and then I
Speaker 2: said some facts about him that he never paid his vendors,
Speaker 2: that he was charged with sexual abuse by twenty six women.
Speaker 2: I said, all the facts about him that were very
Speaker 2: easy to find. It was not like I had to
Speaker 2: do tremendous amount of research. All you had to do
Speaker 2: was have an Internet connection. And the American media, the
Speaker 2: Fourth Estate, has really left the public down by not
Speaker 2: telling the truth about him. They were complicit.
Speaker 1: I have never thought of it in the context of
Speaker 1: that before. And I know there are people who say, Rosie, well,
Speaker 1: you started it when you had a crack at Trump
Speaker 1: and you poked the bear. But when you say male comedians,
Speaker 1: you're right, had been doing that for decad with no
Speaker 1: bloose back. And also other women he has picked off.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, I think that he is afraid of smart, informed,
Speaker 2: strong women, and you know, he thinks women are to
Speaker 2: be abused, to be grabbed by the pussy, as he said.
Speaker 2: I thought when that happened that that would be it
Speaker 2: for him. You know, I remember when Gary Hart had
Speaker 2: a girl sit on his lap, a grown woman, not
Speaker 2: a child, and that was the end of his tandidacy.
Speaker 2: And here he is saying what he says and being
Speaker 2: who he is, And I think that strong women scare
Speaker 2: him and infuriate him, and I'm one of them.
Speaker 1: And yet yet he was married to two strong women.
Speaker 2: I don't know how strong they were. Oh really, I
Speaker 2: was at his wedding.
Speaker 1: I had heard that you were someone's plus one and
Speaker 1: you went to Donald Trump's wedding.
Speaker 2: I was friendly with Marlon Maples because her leading man
Speaker 2: in will Rogers Folly's was my leading man in Greece,
Speaker 2: and so he was invited to the wedding and we
Speaker 2: were doing Greece on Broadway, and he invited me, and
Speaker 2: so we didn't stay very long, and we went into
Speaker 2: the plaza or wherever it was that I don't even remember,
Speaker 2: and as he walked down the aisle, he shook people's
Speaker 2: hands who were famous in the audience. But he had
Speaker 2: stood her up a few times, so people weren't necessarily
Speaker 2: sure that he was going to marry her. And you know,
Speaker 2: so I was there and when he started going at
Speaker 2: me like that was a very big moment where I said, well,
Speaker 2: tell him, I have some photos of me at his wedding.
Speaker 2: You know, I've never had a conversation with him in
Speaker 2: my life. No, he wanted to be on my show.
Speaker 2: I would never have him on my show. And then
Speaker 2: we did a fundraiser for money where during sweeps, if
Speaker 2: you would come out and sweep the floor.
Speaker 1: Sweeps is your isn't it. Sweeps is when you do
Speaker 1: the writings. Yeah.
Speaker 2: Yeah, So once he came out and swept the floor
Speaker 2: and I didn't talk to him. I just went like
Speaker 2: that and that was that. But you know, I knew
Speaker 2: that he and I were oil and water from the
Speaker 2: get go. And any woman that he is threatened by
Speaker 2: Taylor Swift, he attacks Taylor Swift, Meryl Street, he said
Speaker 2: was an overrated actress, AOC, you know, AOC. He thinks
Speaker 2: he is a low IQ person. You know, I think
Speaker 2: that everything he says indicts him, and strong women are
Speaker 2: his kryptonite. He falls apart.
Speaker 1: Do you think that the rest of your life is
Speaker 1: in Ireland or do you not think that? Futuristically and
Speaker 1: the country's been very beautiful and reason to meet you.
Speaker 2: Oh, unbelievably. I'm much more at peace here. I don't
Speaker 2: worry about violence, I don't worry about confrontation. I don't
Speaker 2: worry about my child walking to get an ice cream
Speaker 2: with her friends. You know, I met the lollipop lady,
Speaker 2: which is the crossing guard here in school. And she
Speaker 2: said to me, what's your name and I said Rosie,
Speaker 2: and your surname and I said o'donald. She said, oh,
Speaker 2: just like the famous actress was like that me, you know.
Speaker 2: And so she said to me, why do you walk
Speaker 2: your kid to school every day? Nobody else with the
Speaker 2: kid who's twelve, walks them to school every day. They
Speaker 2: walk with them with their friends. And I said, well,
Speaker 2: I'm from New York. Kids disappear on their way to school.
Speaker 2: There's a constant fear that you sort of live with
Speaker 2: in the city and in the cities sometimes. And she said, well,
Speaker 2: you're not in New York anymore, Rosie o'donnald. You're in Dublin, Ireland,
Speaker 2: and you're safe. And it made a huge difference in
Speaker 2: my life and my ability to calm down, my ability
Speaker 2: to enjoy the moments. And there is no celebrity worship
Speaker 2: in Ireland, and I think that's beautiful. Everyone treats you
Speaker 2: as a person. They say to you, well, welcome to Ireland.
Speaker 2: They don't say can I have an autograph? Can I
Speaker 2: have a picture? They say you're welcome here.
Speaker 1: If the move was instigated twofold. I gather for Clay,
Speaker 1: for Clay's wellbeing, and of course by extension your wellbeing.
Speaker 1: Have you noticed a difference in your mental health?
Speaker 2: Completely? Completely. I am not as worried as I was
Speaker 2: now ever since I was little. World tragedies affect me
Speaker 2: in a way that they don't most people. And my
Speaker 2: therapist has said to me, most people have windows in
Speaker 2: their house. They have a screen, they have a glass pane,
Speaker 2: they have a shade, they have curtains, and they sometimes
Speaker 2: have show. But all your windows are open, so it
Speaker 2: comes right into you and you're devastated by it. So
Speaker 2: as a kid, when I watched the Vietnam War on TV,
Speaker 2: my father would tell me I wasn't allowed to watch
Speaker 2: TV anymore because I would cry about the fall of
Speaker 2: Saigon and all of the pain that we had to
Speaker 2: witness over dinner every night. And every time there's a
Speaker 2: world crisis, I don't do very well. And now there's
Speaker 2: a very big world crisis, whether it's Gaza or the
Speaker 2: United States falling into fascism, and I'm able to stay
Speaker 2: above the water. I don't go sinking underneath. And I
Speaker 2: think a lot of that is because I'm not in
Speaker 2: the United States. And I have a son who's just
Speaker 2: newly married and wants to have a family, and I
Speaker 2: know when he has a child, I will want to
Speaker 2: be there and be an act of grandmother to that baby.
Speaker 2: And that's going to be a challenge for me. Is
Speaker 2: it safe for me to go back? Will I be
Speaker 2: all right and my child be all right if I
Speaker 2: go back, even for the summer to visit you know, how.
Speaker 1: Is it when you've gone back? Have you been back?
Speaker 2: Oh?
Speaker 1: You haven't, not even to Broadway.
Speaker 2: No. I gone to the West End. I saw Avida.
Speaker 2: It was fantastic. I saw a lot of shows on
Speaker 2: the West End. But no. And in fact, my daughter
Speaker 2: graduated college and I didn't go back because the security
Speaker 2: people said to me they didn't think it was wise,
Speaker 2: because I think Trump will use me to rile his base,
Speaker 2: to get them, you know, and I'm his nemesis in
Speaker 2: his mind, and you know, and to them to a
Speaker 2: lot of like a third of the country. And that's
Speaker 2: a very difficult place to be very difficult.
Speaker 1: But a place that will not be difficult for you
Speaker 1: to bay will be Australia.
Speaker 2: Yes, I've heard that. It's very much like Ireland. I've
Speaker 2: heard that the people are loving and kind like Ireland,
Speaker 2: that there's a warmth and and a pride in the
Speaker 2: nation like Ireland. And you know, America is so big.
Speaker 2: It's too big. It's too many people. And it's almost
Speaker 2: like four different countries. Yes, the East, the West, the South,
Speaker 2: you know, the north. It's very different. And I'm so
Speaker 2: excited to come and I have dreamed of it my
Speaker 2: whole life. The two places I wanted to go was Hawaii,
Speaker 2: which I did make it too, and Australia. And so
Speaker 2: when I got offered to do the Sydney Opera House,
Speaker 2: I really couldn't believe it. For a couple of days,
Speaker 2: I was like, are you icic? You know, and iconic
Speaker 2: beyond words? And you know, in twenty thirteen I was
Speaker 2: booked to come here, but I couldn't go because I
Speaker 2: didn't sell enough tickets so it had to be canceled.
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, So when they told when they asked me
Speaker 2: to do this, I said, just so you know, in
Speaker 2: twenty thirteen, I couldn't sell tickets. And you know, I
Speaker 2: think Donald Trump has made me think he really has.
Speaker 2: My brother said, if he only knew that he reignited
Speaker 2: your career. You know, he would be miserable.
Speaker 1: That and a sexual lassignation with Miranda in it and
Speaker 1: just exact yeah, just Colin, Colin Bay right right.
Speaker 2: So you know, I mean, I'm thrilled that their ticket
Speaker 2: sales are going well, and there's talk that we may
Speaker 2: do other cities if we sell out in Sydney, and
Speaker 2: that would be thrilling for me. I'm going to be
Speaker 2: there for three weeks, and uh, you know, I'm I'm
Speaker 2: over the moon about the whole thing. And and my
Speaker 2: kid does not want to come. They have a hard
Speaker 2: time on planes for that long and long my cousins, Yeah,
Speaker 2: my cousins are going to stay here with her and
Speaker 2: take care of her and get school, and so I'm
Speaker 2: happy about that. But it's the longest I've ever been
Speaker 2: away from her, So that will be interesting to see
Speaker 2: how I do, not how they do. I think they'll
Speaker 2: be fine, but it's me that I worry about more.
Speaker 1: You know. You know, you've had such a vigorous social
Speaker 1: life and social presence for so long, and you've navigated
Speaker 1: public love and public feuds and public scrutiny. How do
Speaker 1: you want people to remember or think of Rosie O'Donnell,
Speaker 1: like not the headlines, but you yourself.
Speaker 2: You know. The first thing I think of is that,
Speaker 2: you know, she cared too much, you know, mostly about
Speaker 2: children and women, and those are the people that I
Speaker 2: always wanted to protect and take care of. And so
Speaker 2: if I'm remembered for that, you know that that will
Speaker 2: be a life well lived to me. I don't really,
Speaker 2: you know, think that any awards that I've received, like,
Speaker 2: I don't even have them, you know, I have a
Speaker 2: lot of Emmy awards, and people are like, where are they?
Speaker 2: They're in storage somewhere. Because I never wanted to have
Speaker 2: this house that was full of my accolades. I wanted
Speaker 2: it to be a house for children, like you know,
Speaker 2: this is my house, right, It's little pigs and little
Speaker 2: stuffed animals, and it's bright, it's colorful, like so I
Speaker 2: wanted it to be a family house. And so I
Speaker 2: think if my legacy could be that she was all
Speaker 2: about you know, family and women and kids, that that
Speaker 2: would be fine with me. But I know I'm an
Speaker 2: incendiary soul in America that there are people who you know,
Speaker 2: use FA as people to tell their own story and
Speaker 2: who you like and who you love and who you
Speaker 2: loathe really define who you are, not who they are.
Speaker 1: Well, it's interesting because your audience will have some of
Speaker 1: those will have been the people that voted for Trump,
Speaker 1: who once were Democrat voters. I think there's a tendency
Speaker 1: around the world now for people to get voted out
Speaker 1: as much as people get voted in.
Speaker 2: Yes, but I never worry about that.
Speaker 1: No, But you are of appeal to those people. There
Speaker 1: is a universality about you, as there has to be
Speaker 1: in performers that transcends.
Speaker 2: That, you know, and I'm very, very high on the
Speaker 2: concept of uniting the country. That these people who voted
Speaker 2: for him, you know, they were lied to by the media.
Speaker 2: They were lied to by The Apprentice, which was a
Speaker 2: fictional show, reality show, and they sold him for ten
Speaker 2: years as a successful business man and it was all
Speaker 2: a lie. And they were lied to for a long
Speaker 2: time by very powerful systems. And when they say I
Speaker 2: regret it, and I now see, we have to say,
Speaker 2: welcome back, come on in, you know, my sister, my brother,
Speaker 2: come on back. We understand and it's not your fault
Speaker 2: and we can do this together and save our nation.
Speaker 2: And that's what I hope that you know a lot
Speaker 2: of times people will write on TikTok or something that
Speaker 2: I voted for him and I regret it, and people
Speaker 2: will say, well, too bad, I hope everything bad happens.
Speaker 2: I'm like, that's not what I feel. I feel like
Speaker 2: everyone who says that is entitled to have the same
Speaker 2: respect and decency that we afford each other.
Speaker 1: Do you believe in God?
Speaker 2: Yes? I do. It's you know, a kidding, I really do. Yeah.
Speaker 2: And I found that as I've gotten older, it's it's
Speaker 2: grown My connection to God and to a spiritual truth.
Speaker 2: It's grown as I've gotten older, and and it provides
Speaker 2: me with tremendous amount of solace. I don't believe it's
Speaker 2: a man in a in a chair up in heaven.
Speaker 2: I believe that that's the universe. The creation of the
Speaker 2: universe and the creation of all of all things is God.
Speaker 2: And and I find it in musicals. I find it
Speaker 2: in a baby's laugh. I find it in you know,
Speaker 2: an old woman at tesco who is checking out the fruit.
Speaker 2: And I think that would be my mom if she
Speaker 2: had lived, you know. And I find that God in
Speaker 2: all these places in my life. And it's been tremendously healing.
Speaker 1: That little motherless girl has made quite a life for
Speaker 1: herself and quite a family.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's hard to believe sometimes, but I'm proud of it.
Speaker 1: You should be, and your mum would be. I think
Speaker 1: so too, Rosie O'Donnell. Yes, thank you for joining us
Speaker 1: on No Filter.
Speaker 2: I just want to tell you this is one of
Speaker 2: the best interviews I've ever had. It was you were
Speaker 2: really new your stuff, and you didn't ask questions that
Speaker 2: people typically ask me, and I'm very happy that I
Speaker 2: did it.
Speaker 1: Well. You are just so fascinating and you've been such
Speaker 1: a gift to the culture and continue to be, and
Speaker 1: you share of yourself so generously that it would be
Speaker 1: remiss of me to not extend the same to you.
Speaker 2: Well, thank you.
Speaker 1: So it's an honor to have you on No Filter
Speaker 1: and to have you with our listeners, and it's very
Speaker 1: interesting to watch you now become the gardener as well
Speaker 1: as the flower exactly.
Speaker 2: I hope I get to meet you when I'm there.
Speaker 2: I hope so too, And thank you so much for
Speaker 2: having me.
Speaker 1: May the what is it the road rise to meet you.
Speaker 1: May the wind always be at your back. The Irish
Speaker 1: blessing totally true.
Speaker 2: I thank you for that, and I hope that's the
Speaker 2: same for you.
Speaker 1: Thanks o'donald. You're a beauty, a true beauty. I tell
Speaker 1: you what. When they talk about breaking the mold when
Speaker 1: they made certain people, they certainly break the mold when
Speaker 1: they made Rosie O'Donnell. This has been a conversation that
Speaker 1: only miss o'donald could give us. It's insightful and bold
Speaker 1: and entirely unforgettable and so honest. And she allows herself
Speaker 1: such rawness and to go to places where most people
Speaker 1: would kind of close up like a clamshell. Few people
Speaker 1: have lived as loudly, as honestly, or as unapologetically as
Speaker 1: Rosie O'Donnell. And from her fearless beginnings as a funny
Speaker 1: popular kid carrying private pain, to breaking barriers on television
Speaker 1: and in film, to navigating public feuds and life under
Speaker 1: intense scrutiny, Rosie has done it all on her own terms.
Speaker 1: But she also is capable, which some people are not,
Speaker 1: of self reflection. She shares the stories that made her laugh,
Speaker 1: the moments that broke her heart, the lessons that have
Speaker 1: guided her as a mother, an activist, and a woman
Speaker 1: unafraid to speak her mind. I can't wait to catch
Speaker 1: up face to face when she's here.