Speaker 1: Welcome back to she Pivots. I'm Hailey Kiyoko.
Speaker 2: Welcome back to she Pivots, the podcast where women share
Speaker 2: bold career moves and personal turning points that changed everything.
Speaker 2: I'm your host to Emily Tish Sussman. We have a
Speaker 2: very special guest for today's episode. In honor of Pride,
Speaker 2: we have the pop icon who has affectionately been dubbed
Speaker 2: lesbian Jesus. Hailey Kyoko started her career as a kid
Speaker 2: actor in commercials, playing drums before her feet really reached
Speaker 2: the pedals. She went on to play Velma and Scooby
Speaker 2: Doo and start in the Disney hit Lemonade Mouth. She
Speaker 2: moved into singing, joining a girl group when solo, and
Speaker 2: then became a pop star who rocketed to stardom when
Speaker 2: her twenty eighteen song girls Like Girls became a queer anthem.
Speaker 2: She's written two New York Times best selling novels, and
Speaker 2: this month she made her feature film directorial debut. But
Speaker 2: every one of those pivots traces back to one quiet,
Speaker 2: complicated thing she's been carrying from the beginning. She knew
Speaker 2: she was gay, and she looked around and didn't see
Speaker 2: anyone who looked like her half Japanese queered both at once.
Speaker 2: So she made the thing she never got to see
Speaker 2: to help someone else feel seen in their own lonely moments.
Speaker 2: We get into what it feels like to become a
Speaker 2: community's icon practically overnight while you're still figuring yourself out.
Speaker 2: She tells me about the high school heartbreak that twenty
Speaker 2: years later turned into a feature film, and she tells
Speaker 2: me about finding her fiance, Becka Tilly, who you may
Speaker 2: have seen on The Bachelor. This is Hailey Kiyoko, and
Speaker 2: this is how she pivots what is your name in
Speaker 2: What Do You Do?
Speaker 1: I'm Haley Kyoko and I'm a writer, musician and director.
Speaker 3: Excellent. Okay, so now we're going to go back.
Speaker 2: So you've been a performer since you were a little kids,
Speaker 2: Like you were in commercials and drums and acting and music.
Speaker 2: Was there ever a version of your life where you
Speaker 2: weren't in the entertainment industry? Or you're always like this,
Speaker 2: this is it. I'm going to be a performer of
Speaker 2: so variety.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's always been that for me, Like I was
Speaker 1: the kid doing dances with my friends in the living
Speaker 1: room for my parents, my parents' friends, and writing songs
Speaker 1: on the piano from a very young age.
Speaker 4: So performing was always a thing for me.
Speaker 2: Did you know where it was going to go? Or
Speaker 2: you were like, this is my stage, and I think
Speaker 2: about nothing else.
Speaker 4: I didn't know where I was going to go.
Speaker 1: I think initially, if we're going way way back, my
Speaker 1: first dream was to be in the Blue Man group perfect.
Speaker 4: I just really identified with.
Speaker 1: The Blue Man and the drumming and the percussion and
Speaker 1: the stage.
Speaker 4: And then my second dream was Stomp the musical.
Speaker 1: Oh Loved So I think very early on my dreams
Speaker 1: were percussive forward, Like I started playing drums when I
Speaker 1: was five and I was tap dancing, and so I
Speaker 1: just I knew I wanted to do something with rhythm,
Speaker 1: and then the dream progressed into singing and sync no
Speaker 1: strings attached. At what was the Staples Center which is
Speaker 1: now the Crypto Arena, I remember seeing them dancing and
Speaker 1: they had like fake money falling from the sky and
Speaker 1: the girls were screaming, and I was like, oh my.
Speaker 4: Gosh, I think I would like ten or something.
Speaker 1: And I was like, this is what I want to
Speaker 1: do and this is who I want to be, And
Speaker 1: I think that began this very long journey in music
Speaker 1: in general.
Speaker 3: Did you like specifically want to be them?
Speaker 1: Yeah, well I was also I was very gay, and
Speaker 1: so I like I wanted to be them, so like
Speaker 1: I wanted to be on that stage singing and dancing
Speaker 1: and having the girls screaming and being like this cool
Speaker 1: person that people liked, I like admired that.
Speaker 2: Did you try to put on their actual shows? Like
Speaker 2: you were like, these are my stuff's animals lined up?
Speaker 1: Well, yeah, no, I didn't have stuffed animals. I was
Speaker 1: like I had human beings. We were doing like, hey,
Speaker 1: come over Thursday night. We're doing dance performance in the
Speaker 1: living room. And it's so funny because obviously now that
Speaker 1: I'm a director, I look back at those moments and
Speaker 1: I was like I was directing, I was like, this
Speaker 1: is the show, this is how it's going to go,
Speaker 1: this is the vision. You know, we're going to do
Speaker 1: a five six, seven eight, we're step change here. So
Speaker 1: I think that just was part of my personality and
Speaker 1: there was never a world where I was going to
Speaker 1: be doing anything else.
Speaker 2: Yeah, okay, but you were also very entrepreneurial, Like you
Speaker 2: started selling drum charts to music stores.
Speaker 4: That's factual.
Speaker 1: I was really obsessed with business, so I would unfortunately
Speaker 1: use all my dad's printing ink, and before I even
Speaker 1: had a business, I printed out business cards. Before I
Speaker 1: even had a band, I printed my band cards and
Speaker 1: I put up flyers around the.
Speaker 4: Park join my band.
Speaker 1: No one called the home line unfortunately, so the band
Speaker 1: thing went out the window. But yeah, I was like
Speaker 1: doing drum charts and selling it to local like music stores,
Speaker 1: to like complicated by Avril Levine, I think I did
Speaker 1: swing swing by all American rejects. So I think very
Speaker 1: early on I've been somewhat.
Speaker 4: Of a hustler.
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, very much.
Speaker 4: So I didn't have a product, but I was.
Speaker 3: But you had a business card. You're like, uh, I'm ready,
Speaker 3: I'm ready to be called.
Speaker 2: So you started a garage band at sixteen that was
Speaker 2: named after your grandfather. Yes, So what did makeing music
Speaker 2: with your own band feel like? At that point? When
Speaker 2: you tried the band didn't work, and then you'd already
Speaker 2: started doing like commercial and acting work, so.
Speaker 4: People didn't join my band.
Speaker 1: And then in high school I ended up becoming friends
Speaker 1: with these guys and I basically forced them to learn
Speaker 1: an instrument and become my band and we named it
Speaker 1: after my grandpa, Ahiti, and we won Battle of the Bands,
Speaker 1: and that was like the real beginning of having just
Speaker 1: kind of like this band feeling and vibe. I kind
Speaker 1: of wrote more like cold Play esque type music back then.
Speaker 1: While that was happening, I was trying to figure out
Speaker 1: how to get into the music industry, and acting kind
Speaker 1: of became this opportunity where I got to wait for
Speaker 1: hours and hours that these calls for these commercials, but
Speaker 1: these commercials would need like a musician, so I'd basically
Speaker 1: go an audition. One of my first jobs, I booked
Speaker 1: a Kmart commercial and I was playing the bass. And
Speaker 1: then I booked a Cinnamonto's Crunch commercial and I was
Speaker 1: playing the guitar. And so I got to like pretend
Speaker 1: to be a rock star and pretend to be a
Speaker 1: musician through the lens of being an actor, and so that.
Speaker 4: Kind of helps me.
Speaker 1: I mean it's always like, how do you even how
Speaker 1: does one even get on the TV screen?
Speaker 4: How does one even do this? I was a musical theater,
Speaker 4: I had the band.
Speaker 1: I was going to these auditions and just trying to
Speaker 1: find a way, you know, back in the day around
Speaker 1: that age, I'd have my dad drive me to the
Speaker 1: Pig and Whistle in Hollywood Boulevard and I would do
Speaker 1: open mic speed. You have to like pay or you
Speaker 1: have to like be like we're gonna have fifty people
Speaker 1: show up to It was like a pay for play
Speaker 1: kind of thing. We didn't have TikTok at that time
Speaker 1: to be able to access people, and so you're just
Speaker 1: literally on the streets passing out flyers. Right.
Speaker 3: There were gatekeepers.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that has been I think one of the things
Speaker 2: it's so amazing, especially for artists, about the democratization of
Speaker 2: social media. It's also democratized access access to audiences, whereas
Speaker 2: before you probably had to try to conform in some
Speaker 2: way because there were gatekeepers like to what they wanted.
Speaker 4: Absolutely, I mean still to this day.
Speaker 2: The hustle was always there for Haley. So when Vitamin
Speaker 2: C came calling with a spot in an all girl group,
Speaker 2: she said yes and got her first real look inside
Speaker 2: the machine. So you were approached by Vitamin C to
Speaker 2: join the Stunners when you were still in high school.
Speaker 1: I again was trying to get into the music industry auditions,
Speaker 1: and then I did that for like a year or
Speaker 1: two and I learned a lot. It was It was
Speaker 1: a great experience. I got to learn what I like,
Speaker 1: I got to learn what I don't like. Definitely got
Speaker 1: to experience a little bit more of like the record
Speaker 1: label industry through that lens.
Speaker 2: Say more about that, Like what about the record label industry?
Speaker 2: It's really something I know almost nothing about. You know
Speaker 2: a lot of things, that's not one of them.
Speaker 4: You know, I was young.
Speaker 1: I think I was like nineteen eighteen or nine, I
Speaker 1: don't know, maybe I started at seventeen around that age,
Speaker 1: and so you know, you got these four or five
Speaker 1: girls performing these songs dressed up up for the male gaze.
Speaker 1: It was not necessarily something that I wanted to pursue.
Speaker 1: And I also was in the closet, so I had
Speaker 1: a really hard time navigating, Oh, I'm supposed to be
Speaker 1: like performing for the male gaze, but like I'm a
Speaker 1: lesbian and I don't want to do that. So there
Speaker 1: were a lot of moments that I felt really uncomfortable. Granted,
Speaker 1: my hair was in a pixie cut with a bleach streak,
Speaker 1: so the closet was glass. It was hard for me
Speaker 1: to navigate, but I learned how to perform in heels.
Speaker 4: So that was cool.
Speaker 2: I'm guessing you would actually started younger if I'm guessing
Speaker 2: you yeah, and your performances.
Speaker 3: You'd been practicing for that one for a long time.
Speaker 4: I like sneakers now more so.
Speaker 2: What do you feel like you got out of that
Speaker 2: that prepared you for the next thing?
Speaker 1: I think I learned that the music industry is really
Speaker 1: tough and it's really hard to get into. I think
Speaker 1: it prepared me to really challenge myself to figure out
Speaker 1: what sound I wanted, who I was as an artist,
Speaker 1: And so when that ended, I finally was able to
Speaker 1: pursue my solo career, Like what does that look like?
Speaker 1: Am I singing covers? Am I writing original music? Am
Speaker 1: I on the guitar? Is there no guitar?
Speaker 4: Is it track? Is it rock?
Speaker 1: And so that began the exploration of who am I
Speaker 1: beyond just singing on the guitar in my bedroom, pining
Speaker 1: and yearning after girls, which was so much of my
Speaker 1: identity and music before.
Speaker 4: You know, and then when you record music, the possibilities
Speaker 4: are endless.
Speaker 1: The horizon looks different and you're like, Okay, what do
Speaker 1: I look like when I'm actually physically recording music or sound.
Speaker 2: Like and you have this acting career going in parallel, right,
Speaker 2: so like at the same time was about like Scooby Doo.
Speaker 4: I was one of the first Asian Velma's thank you
Speaker 4: so much.
Speaker 2: Yes, okay, So you said that you almost did an
Speaker 2: audition for it because of your concerns about image.
Speaker 3: To like, talk me through that.
Speaker 1: I mean, it's sad like to think that I grew
Speaker 1: up in a society and so many other people do
Speaker 1: where I almost stopped myself from auditioning for Velma because
Speaker 1: I was part Asian is really sad, and then had
Speaker 1: I not gone out for it, I would have never
Speaker 1: gotten it.
Speaker 4: And I went out for it and I.
Speaker 3: Booked the role.
Speaker 1: So it's interesting how much we as people hold ourselves
Speaker 1: back due to the narrative that society is feeding us.
Speaker 1: I grew up during a time where Asian people played
Speaker 1: the sidekick in the best front, so it was really
Speaker 1: hard for me to believe that I could have main
Speaker 1: character energy, so to speak, because I never got to
Speaker 1: see that. But you know, it's seeing as believing. So
Speaker 1: when you don't see people who look like you or
Speaker 1: feel the way you feel successfully in the mainstream as
Speaker 1: the main character that's what you believe.
Speaker 4: Oh, I'm not the main character.
Speaker 2: Do you remember the first time you saw a character
Speaker 2: that really resonated with you and made you see beyond
Speaker 2: the possibility you had before.
Speaker 1: I think it was Alice Woo's movie that half of it.
Speaker 4: I think it was on Netflix. This was years. This
Speaker 4: is like I'm in my twenties. I think when this
Speaker 4: came out and Leah Lewis was the lead, and I
Speaker 4: remember going, oh my gosh, she got to be the lead,
Speaker 4: like I've never seen that before. I'll never forget that.
Speaker 1: It was a really cool, cool moment to be like, oh,
Speaker 1: you know what it is. It's someone said yes to this,
Speaker 1: and that's really powerful.
Speaker 3: Yeah. Have you ever gotten to meet her and tell her?
Speaker 4: I actually did.
Speaker 1: She came to one of my dinners for Girls Like Girls.
Speaker 1: She is so wonderful and kind and talented. It's been
Speaker 1: really cool because that was her Girls Like Girls, her moment.
Speaker 1: And then now I have these two up and coming
Speaker 1: young actors in my film.
Speaker 4: Who were both half Asian, and this is their moment.
Speaker 4: You know, my lead she was eighteen when we shot this,
Speaker 4: and I'm pretty sure Leo was, you know, around that
Speaker 4: age when she did hers too, so it's pretty wild.
Speaker 2: The Stunners didn't last and the same year the group split,
Speaker 2: Hailey lost her grandfather, the man she'd named her very
Speaker 2: first band after. What came out of that time was
Speaker 2: a song that would quietly change everything. We'll get there
Speaker 2: right after the break. I think this is probably around
Speaker 2: the same time. But your grandfather, who had been so
Speaker 2: important that you named your band after him, passed away
Speaker 2: in twenty eleven, which was the same year that Stunner's split.
Speaker 4: I think that was just life happening.
Speaker 1: I remember being really busy at that time, and I
Speaker 1: flew up to Colonna, Canada, which is where my grandpa lived,
Speaker 1: and I did a solo trip and I got to
Speaker 1: hang out with him and my grandma and get to
Speaker 1: spend time with him before he passed. That was a
Speaker 1: really special trip, which once we talk about the movie,
Speaker 1: you'll realize why it's become such a full circle thing.
Speaker 3: Oh, I'm so excited.
Speaker 2: So your early solo music videos, they were directed by you,
Speaker 2: and they centered on crewman stories. At the time, did
Speaker 2: it feel like were you intentionally going in to take
Speaker 2: a risk or you were just saying, like, this is
Speaker 2: the only way I know how to do this.
Speaker 1: I mean, it's my life being in love with women
Speaker 1: navigating that I can't really remove that from myself. I
Speaker 1: didn't enter the industry thinking I was going to focus
Speaker 1: on my truth. To be honest, that was not an
Speaker 1: intentional thing. And then when I wrote Girls Like Girls
Speaker 1: in twenty I think fourteen and we released in twenty fifteen,
Speaker 1: that was the first time I was really open with
Speaker 1: myself with another writer to be like, hey, I remember
Speaker 1: she asked me like, what are you most afraid about
Speaker 1: to write about?
Speaker 4: And I was like crying, and I was.
Speaker 1: Like, I'm well, lesbian, I like girls, but I never
Speaker 1: write about it.
Speaker 4: She was like, why don't we write about it today?
Speaker 4: And I was like, that sounds so scary. That was
Speaker 4: the inception of Girls Like Girls.
Speaker 3: That is hitting something that's so real for so many people.
Speaker 2: Is that some people's response like they like to be disruptive,
Speaker 2: and some people just want to be and aren't drawn
Speaker 2: towards it. And it sounds like you kind of went
Speaker 2: through the evolution of all of those feelings and identities.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I think my authentic truth naturally was disruptive. Like
Speaker 1: when I finished the song and we did the music video.
Speaker 1: I was like, I really want to watch a video
Speaker 1: where you see two girls falling in love and they
Speaker 1: end up together, And like, I didn't really have a
Speaker 1: lot of access to that kind of representation. And I'm
Speaker 1: sure it was out there, but it wasn't easily accessible.
Speaker 1: And it really kind of threw me when I released
Speaker 1: the music video because I really didn't think people were
Speaker 1: going to watch it. Like I had nine thousand subscribers
Speaker 1: on YouTube, nobody knew who I was. Nobody wanted to
Speaker 1: premiere the music video. Everyone said it was risky or
Speaker 1: too Niche sure to this and to that, and then
Speaker 1: it found its community. It found millions and millions of
Speaker 1: people who felt the way I felt. I grew up
Speaker 1: in Los Angeles, which is a very liberal community and area,
Speaker 1: but I still had such a hard time finding my
Speaker 1: community and finding my people growing up in a predominantly
Speaker 1: white community, never being Asian enough, never being white enough.
Speaker 1: I didn't really have any queer friends, and if I did,
Speaker 1: I didn't know about it. And so this music video
Speaker 1: became kind of this message in a bottle to find
Speaker 1: this community of people across the globe that felt seen.
Speaker 4: That was not an intentional thing.
Speaker 1: My intentionality was to try to be honest and come out.
Speaker 2: Do you remember as it started to gain in popularity,
Speaker 2: like as I started to blow up, was there a
Speaker 2: moment or a couple of moments they were like, oh, oh.
Speaker 3: This is huge.
Speaker 1: Kept waiting for it to die down, like we're talking
Speaker 1: to hit five hundred thousand views that I was like,
Speaker 1: I'm going to be your I was like, oh my god,
Speaker 1: you know, like that's just for a perspective. And then
Speaker 1: I hit one million views. Then I hit two and
Speaker 1: then I was like, oh my gosh, maybe we'll hit
Speaker 1: three million, maybe we'll hit four million. Every week it
Speaker 1: would just go up a million million, and I just
Speaker 1: kept checking it. I kept waiting for it to almost
Speaker 1: like die, and it never did. It's literally one of
Speaker 1: those cheesy scenes that I probably acted out a million
Speaker 1: times in other movies and stuff. That is what was happening.
Speaker 1: And I was like, oh my gosh, this is going viral.
Speaker 1: It's weird to think of myself at that moment and
Speaker 1: to think about where I'm at now.
Speaker 4: It's been a really long journey.
Speaker 1: At that time, I wasn't confident enough to put myself
Speaker 1: in the music video because that was even more vulnerable.
Speaker 1: I had never written a song about a girl, and
Speaker 1: now I've directed eleven.
Speaker 4: Music videos about girls.
Speaker 1: I have multiple albums about women, and now I've directed
Speaker 1: a feature film that's going to be in theaters about
Speaker 1: this time in my life that I.
Speaker 4: Was so scared to share with the world.
Speaker 1: And now I'm so confident and proud to share that
Speaker 1: with the world.
Speaker 2: The thing that you were most nervous about, as you
Speaker 2: said to the songwriter that you were working with, like
Speaker 2: the thing is now actually the thing that you're most
Speaker 2: proud of. It sounds like like at first it had
Speaker 2: defined you in being scared, and like now it's to
Speaker 2: find you in a really positive way.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I was leading with fear, and now I'll lead
Speaker 4: with confidence and love for myself.
Speaker 2: Girls Like Girls was the beginning of a new era
Speaker 2: for Haley. Her debut album, Expectations, made twenty eighteen, the
Speaker 2: year everything seemed to land at once, and she wasn't
Speaker 2: the only one. Twenty eighteen became known as twenty gayteen,
Speaker 2: a stretch where queer artists were breaking into the mainstream
Speaker 2: and being celebrated out loud for exactly who they were,
Speaker 2: and Hailey was right at the front of it. Your
Speaker 2: debut album, Expectations, came out in twenty eighteen, the same
Speaker 2: year you won the Push Artists of the Year at
Speaker 2: the Tvvmas, and you've performed on stage with Taylor Swept
Speaker 2: for the first time.
Speaker 3: Do you now think like, now I'm going to get
Speaker 3: my instinct stage moment.
Speaker 1: Yeah, twenty eighteen, which we call twenty gayteen, was definitely
Speaker 1: one of the best years of my life and career
Speaker 1: for sure. It was the culmination of working towards my
Speaker 1: debut album. It was the first time I was signed
Speaker 1: to a record label and getting to direct all these
Speaker 1: music videos, and it really felt like my debut to
Speaker 1: the world in the most authentic way.
Speaker 4: So it was like the coolest thing.
Speaker 1: That award at the MTV Music Awards was voted by
Speaker 1: the fans.
Speaker 4: That was like so extra special. My fan base.
Speaker 1: I've been around, but I'm not like selling out arenas
Speaker 1: by any means, you know.
Speaker 4: I think at that time I was still up and coming.
Speaker 1: So it was a really really exciting time and I
Speaker 1: felt like everything was coming together for like my musical
Speaker 1: dres and aspirations.
Speaker 4: I think of twenty eighteen.
Speaker 1: As a really beautiful highlight and in my journey there
Speaker 1: were just a lot of amazing things that happened. I
Speaker 1: got to go on tour, I got to do a
Speaker 1: soul Out tour and the US and Europe, and got
Speaker 1: to perform with Taylor, which was so cool. I got
Speaker 1: to open for Panic at the disco. I felt really
Speaker 1: supported in the music industry at that moment in my journey.
Speaker 1: That was my first release with a major record label.
Speaker 1: But it was different from the Stunners and all that stuff.
Speaker 1: It's very like, oh, this.
Speaker 4: Is like I might become a musician. This is really cool.
Speaker 1: It's really hard to have kind of like financial and
Speaker 1: public success sync.
Speaker 3: Why is that.
Speaker 1: I don't think a lot of people know that artists
Speaker 1: are the CEO and boss. So you pay for everything.
Speaker 1: So when you go on tour, you're paying for the bus,
Speaker 1: you're paying for sixteen employees, you're paying for per diems,
Speaker 1: you're paying for literally everything. And as the industry has
Speaker 1: evolved into twenty twenty six, unless you're the top one percent,
Speaker 1: record labels are not paying for tour support and artists
Speaker 1: have to do it all themselves. I'm sure as you've seen,
Speaker 1: so many artists have had to cancel tours and downsize,
Speaker 1: and we're in a recession. There's a lot going on
Speaker 1: in the world. It's really hard to sustain. I remember
Speaker 1: when I was young, my parents were like, it's one
Speaker 1: thing to be an artist. It's another thing to be
Speaker 1: able to be an artist for a long time and
Speaker 1: to be able to create longevity and sustainability. I never
Speaker 1: really understood that until obviously being in the industry for
Speaker 1: I don't know how many years. It's been a lot
Speaker 1: of divs that have to happen to stay in the industry,
Speaker 1: that's for sure.
Speaker 3: Yeah, And what was your parents' experience with that? Well,
Speaker 3: both of.
Speaker 4: My parents were artists.
Speaker 1: My mom was a nice skating choreographer and still is,
Speaker 1: and my dad was a comedian, so they knew what
Speaker 1: it was like to make money and then to not
Speaker 1: have money for a long time and to not know
Speaker 1: when the next check was going to come. All in
Speaker 1: the sake of art. You know, when you're an artist,
Speaker 1: you have to express yourself.
Speaker 4: It's like part of who you are.
Speaker 2: How do you feel like it informed the way that
Speaker 2: you approach the business side.
Speaker 1: My dream was to be stable, like mentally stable, financially stable,
Speaker 1: everything stable. It definitely informed me that if I was
Speaker 1: going to pursue a career in music, that I needed
Speaker 1: to find a way to not be so vulnerable.
Speaker 4: You don't really have control when the next check comes.
Speaker 1: In twenty gay teen was amazing and it was a
Speaker 1: really beautiful moment in my music career. And then after
Speaker 1: that it all got really hard, got really hard. Labels
Speaker 1: weren't paying for music videos. I was working on my
Speaker 1: next album. Then there was the pandemic. Meanwhile, all during
Speaker 1: all of this, I had started the movie Journey in
Speaker 1: twenty sixteen, So my mind started getting a little distracted
Speaker 1: of like, I really want to direct this movie.
Speaker 4: How does one make a movie? How does a queer
Speaker 4: woman of color make a movie?
Speaker 3: How do you.
Speaker 4: Even do that?
Speaker 1: So I'm kind of taking that journey on as I'm
Speaker 1: navigating the music industry, the pandemic, all these things, And
Speaker 1: so the music side got less fun because it was
Speaker 1: really hard. I couldn't go on tour, I couldn't release
Speaker 1: an album. I didn't have the financing to do things.
Speaker 1: And once you do things, I got a certain level
Speaker 1: You creatively always want to continue, you don't want to
Speaker 1: go backwards. And for so long I had created art
Speaker 1: through favors, and you know, after ten years of doing that,
Speaker 1: you can't do that anymore. And so when that doesn't
Speaker 1: connect with the business side and the labels support and
Speaker 1: the finance of it all, it.
Speaker 4: Starts to get really, really hard.
Speaker 2: How did you respond when it started to get hard,
Speaker 2: Like did you start to scale down and do things
Speaker 2: like more quietly on your own or you just kind
Speaker 2: of left music and went into into movies.
Speaker 1: I'm going from one hardship to the next stardship. You know,
Speaker 1: I continue to write music. I'm too Sensitive for the
Speaker 1: Shit was an amazing EP that I was super proud
Speaker 1: of and tried to stay super creative, but I definitely
Speaker 1: started getting distracted and in wanting to direct this movie
Speaker 1: and get this movie made. That journey started to get closer.
Speaker 1: In twenty twenty, I thought I was going to shoot
Speaker 1: the movie. Then it didn't happen. Twenty twenty one, thought
Speaker 1: I was going to shoot the movie, didn't happen, and
Speaker 1: I started putting everything on pause because I was like,
Speaker 1: I'm going to go shoot this movie, and when I do,
Speaker 1: I'm going to be unavailable. So I couldn't really like
Speaker 1: plan things. And when you do music, you got to
Speaker 1: plan your tour like a year in advance at least.
Speaker 1: So it all started getting a little cloudy. I was
Speaker 1: craving creativity and I didn't know if the movie was
Speaker 1: ever going to get made. So I decided to write
Speaker 1: a book and write my dream version. This is another pivot, right,
Speaker 1: like the movie is not happening, the music is looking hard,
Speaker 1: and I started writing the Whying of of Girls Like Girls,
Speaker 1: which is like the dream version of the story. I
Speaker 1: started putting all my energy into that, where I was
Speaker 1: just like, if I die tomorrow, at least the story
Speaker 1: of Cooley and Sonya will live on and we'll reach
Speaker 1: a fourteen year old in Idaho or a thirty five
Speaker 1: year old navigating their identity.
Speaker 3: Writing a novel sounds extremely hard to me.
Speaker 4: Yeah, it's not none of this. None of it's easy.
Speaker 4: I definitely work harder, not smarter.
Speaker 2: But was that the thing that kept you going, like
Speaker 2: thinking about what the impact would be.
Speaker 4: I wasn't thinking about what the impact would be.
Speaker 1: I was just thinking about trying to make someone else's
Speaker 1: life easier. And it shouldn't be this hard to have
Speaker 1: representation and to share stories that are not heteronormative narratives.
Speaker 4: I watch videos of people going like, oh, it's Pride month.
Speaker 4: You know, what are your favorite queer movies for sapphag
Speaker 4: women and for them to be the lead and to
Speaker 4: be pee like, the list just gets so small. So
Speaker 4: that's always just been my drive is to be like,
Speaker 4: if I don't do this, who will. I felt like
Speaker 4: I couldn't give up.
Speaker 1: I wanted to give up a bajillion times, and if
Speaker 1: I would take pauses and walk away from it, but
Speaker 1: there was just something in me that was like I
Speaker 1: have to. It felt like my purpose had shifted. It
Speaker 1: went from oh, I want to be a performer like
Speaker 1: in sync to I want to tell stories and world
Speaker 1: build and I want to help people feel lighter and
Speaker 1: I want to help people's journeys. And so that's always
Speaker 1: been like my driving force in all of this.
Speaker 2: One of the things that I think is so remarkably
Speaker 2: thoughtful of the way that you designed the covers of
Speaker 2: your novels is that they're designed to be removable. Instead,
Speaker 2: if somebody's reading in a public space, they don't feel
Speaker 2: like it's safe for them to be reading reading your book,
Speaker 2: they can read it essentially anonymously.
Speaker 3: Is that something that you came up with yourself.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I was just thinking about my sixteen year old
Speaker 1: self and I wasn't confident in who I was.
Speaker 4: And I don't want the title girls Like Girls.
Speaker 1: To stop someone from being able to read about themselves
Speaker 1: or seeing themselves represented. If you're on the journey to
Speaker 1: have the cover saying girls Like Girls amazing, and if
Speaker 1: you're maybe not even safe to read it in a space,
Speaker 1: you can take the cover off and it can be
Speaker 1: a little more ominous.
Speaker 4: There was always like a moment back in.
Speaker 1: The day during twenty eighteen, more people instead of asking
Speaker 1: if people were queer, they'd be like, do you listen
Speaker 1: to Haley Kyoko?
Speaker 4: And so I became this psych symbol of outing. I
Speaker 4: have allies, I have ally supporters who I love. But
Speaker 4: I thought about that when I was finishing the book,
Speaker 4: and you know, I want people to feel safe to
Speaker 4: explore themselves and do it on their own time.
Speaker 2: Becoming a symbol for a whole community is one experience.
Speaker 2: Quietly sorting out your own heart is another. When we
Speaker 2: come back, we'll hear from Haley about her own journey
Speaker 2: of self acceptance and how she ended up with her
Speaker 2: fiancee Becca be Right.
Speaker 3: Back.
Speaker 2: It's kind of a heavy weight almost to say, like
Speaker 2: I'm out and then like yourself, like navigate your own
Speaker 2: dating life and like navigate your own even like in
Speaker 2: your own family relationships and like friendship relationships, Like how
Speaker 2: did you navigate all of that personally?
Speaker 3: For yourself?
Speaker 1: I did it very hidden. I didn't share. I think
Speaker 1: I came out a couple of times to my parents.
Speaker 1: I told a couple of friends, but up until my
Speaker 1: early twenties, it was definitely in the closet for sure.
Speaker 1: So it was a very silent experience. And that's why
Speaker 1: when you watch Girls Like Girls the movie, it's like
Speaker 1: a lot of it is not even through dialogue, it's
Speaker 1: just through the glance, the touch, because a lot of
Speaker 1: my experience was like in my brain.
Speaker 4: And also who wasn't like.
Speaker 2: Spoken about Yeah, post girls Like Girls, I mean you
Speaker 2: must have had girls throwing themselves to you. But how
Speaker 2: did you start to choose who you wanted to go
Speaker 2: out with and how you wanted to initiate those relationships?
Speaker 1: Well, people were not throwing themselves on me. Let's just
Speaker 1: get the record straight. I present confident, but I'm very
Speaker 1: shy and I will not make the first move.
Speaker 3: Okay.
Speaker 1: The only reason why I'm engaged. Congratulations, thank you is
Speaker 1: because back I made.
Speaker 4: The first move.
Speaker 3: Okay, she did well.
Speaker 1: I never got to go to prom with my crush.
Speaker 1: I think I'm wanted my first date in my twenties.
Speaker 1: Like a lot of queer people talk about how our adolescens,
Speaker 1: our teen experience becomes in our twenties, it's very delayed
Speaker 1: because we are not either safe or have the ability to.
Speaker 4: Explore ourselves in that way.
Speaker 1: So I had a very delayed experience, and you realize
Speaker 1: that you have to love yourself first before you can
Speaker 1: love anyone else, right, And what's been so beautiful about
Speaker 1: this journey is Girls Like Girls. The movie captures this
Speaker 1: time in my life that really set the tone for
Speaker 1: the next ten years of my experience where I really
Speaker 1: struggled with self love, self worth, identity, not feeling just
Speaker 1: seen and worthy, and whether you're queer or not, whoever
Speaker 1: you love.
Speaker 4: Every person has that one memory and moment we.
Speaker 1: Are so scared to find out if they like you
Speaker 1: back or not, or you're like, are we getting married
Speaker 1: or not? Are we going to be in a committed
Speaker 1: relationship or now, Like everyone's had that breaking point where
Speaker 1: I was like, enough is enough?
Speaker 4: I need to know the answer.
Speaker 1: Even though it's so specific to my experience, it's so universal.
Speaker 4: So this movie really captures that for me.
Speaker 1: And it's really cool to be engaged in in a loving,
Speaker 1: healthy relationship to know that it can happen, and you
Speaker 1: can go through the love triangles and the hardship and
Speaker 1: the toxic relationships, and you can work on yourself and
Speaker 1: do therapy and ride in your journal and find a
Speaker 1: person who does value you and who makes the first
Speaker 1: move and makes you not question your worth as a
Speaker 1: woman or a person. And everyone deserves to feel that way.
Speaker 3: Okay, so how did you and Becca meet and what
Speaker 3: was her first move?
Speaker 1: I met her talking about twenty eighteen. I met her
Speaker 1: at My Expectations album release party, and she was trying
Speaker 1: to hug me up with her younger sister because she
Speaker 1: was from the Bachelor and hadn't dated women, but she had,
Speaker 1: you know, a core sister, and so she was trying
Speaker 1: to like cook me up with her.
Speaker 4: And I was obviously interested in Becca.
Speaker 1: And then so she set up like drinks a couple
Speaker 1: days later, and the sister had to bail and so
Speaker 1: Becca went instead. So then We had a date for
Speaker 1: like six hours, a date in my eyes, you know,
Speaker 1: and then the next day Becca kissed me, so that
Speaker 1: would be considered the first move.
Speaker 3: I would consider that the first move.
Speaker 1: Yes, she kissed me, and then I left for tour.
Speaker 1: We did long distance for a while, and I actually
Speaker 1: wrote my second book, or There's Room for Us, inspired
Speaker 1: by Our mEq, because Our Meiq was so interesting and
Speaker 1: unique and it's like set in like the eighteen hundreds
Speaker 1: and stuff, because I'm like obsessed with pride and prejudice
Speaker 1: and all, you know, little women, all those books, and
Speaker 1: so it's.
Speaker 4: Really fun to tell our story like through the lens
Speaker 4: of like if you could be queer in the eighteen hundreds.
Speaker 3: And there for sure were like they're for sure people
Speaker 3: who were.
Speaker 1: Yeah, but like in the real world, you can't have
Speaker 1: a happy ending in the eighteen hundreds as a lesbian.
Speaker 1: And so when I was writing that book, which was
Speaker 1: my second book, I was like, I need to alter
Speaker 1: reality because I need a hopeful ending. So I basically
Speaker 1: wrote it where you can be gay, but women aren't equal,
Speaker 1: which duh, we still aren't equal. So two gay men
Speaker 1: can inherit Land and continue the family line but two
Speaker 1: women can't. So there's still societal pressure for someone in
Speaker 1: the family to marry a man or to have a son.
Speaker 4: And that was a really interesting to explore too. But anyways,
Speaker 4: a lot of relevant. I'm always trying to.
Speaker 1: Find ways to bring my life into a fantasy land.
Speaker 3: Well I think it's been quite successful. When are you
Speaker 3: getting married?
Speaker 1: We're hoping to start planning after the movie Craze. You
Speaker 1: just never know, like with a movie, once it's released,
Speaker 1: if you're going to continue working on the movie, if
Speaker 1: it's going to go overseas, if there's international plans. So
Speaker 1: we're just kind of like on pause until we figure
Speaker 1: out what the rest of the year looks like and
Speaker 1: then we'll go into to planning back as the best.
Speaker 1: And it's been really special to have a partner throughout
Speaker 1: this process. We've been together for eight years and this
Speaker 1: process has been ten years, so she's almost been She
Speaker 1: was like, what are we going to talk about now
Speaker 1: once the movie's over? That's like literally, I was like,
Speaker 1: this has been my whole personality, my whole life.
Speaker 4: So that's been really special.
Speaker 1: As you know, it's just like you have your highs
Speaker 1: and lows and to get to go to the finish
Speaker 1: line with her and release this film and get to
Speaker 1: give this film to everyone, like this is my gift
Speaker 1: to the community, and it's not mine anymore, it's theirs.
Speaker 2: Yeah, do you think of post wedding? Have you guys
Speaker 2: talked about having kids? It's something you want to do,
Speaker 2: not want to do.
Speaker 1: We enjoy being ants currently. We love that life and
Speaker 1: that's kind of where we're at right now. So we
Speaker 1: love traveling and being ants and also you know, doing
Speaker 1: what we do.
Speaker 4: So we'll see. But right now it's movie and then
Speaker 4: a wedding.
Speaker 3: Fair enough, I have three kids and that life sounds delightful.
Speaker 2: It took high school heartbreak, ten years of hard work,
Speaker 2: and a number one best selling novel to finally help
Speaker 2: realize Haley's vision for a girl's like girls film, but
Speaker 2: she was finally able to make her movie and an
Speaker 2: album to go with it.
Speaker 3: Okay, so let's get.
Speaker 2: To the film you thought it was he made in
Speaker 2: twenty nineteen, you thought he made in twenty twenty.
Speaker 4: This has been fun. I'm going to memory Lane with
Speaker 4: you for real. We are tracking.
Speaker 2: Along the mountainside and we're making We really cover a
Speaker 2: lot of ground in this show. But how did you
Speaker 2: know that this time was different. You're like, yes, we're
Speaker 2: making the film.
Speaker 4: Well when you.
Speaker 1: Get the green light, so essentially you do all these
Speaker 1: pitches and depending on if a studio wants to distribute it,
Speaker 1: our producers they go, yeah, we want to make this,
Speaker 1: and then it's like okay, cool, and then they go
Speaker 1: all right, go budget it out and figure it out.
Speaker 4: Okay.
Speaker 1: So this was in like twenty twenty, so we budgeted
Speaker 1: this movie out for like multiple different areas all over Canada,
Speaker 1: upstate New York, and you're essentially trying to make the
Speaker 1: budget work for the script and the story, but you
Speaker 1: don't have the money yet because you don't have the
Speaker 1: green light, they.
Speaker 4: Give you their blessing to go figure it out. Essentially,
Speaker 4: this is where the Colona piece comes back in.
Speaker 1: So then I release the book in twenty twenty three
Speaker 1: that becomes a number one New York Times bestseller. That
Speaker 1: starts creating the hype and the studios. You know, I
Speaker 1: guess you're right, there is a demand. I get the
Speaker 1: green light at the end of that year.
Speaker 4: Like, go, actually, go shoot it. We'll pay for it.
Speaker 1: And I get a call from my producer and as
Speaker 1: the director. The movie set in Oregon, but you don't
Speaker 1: get to choose where you're shooting the movie because tax
Speaker 1: write offs all these things, like everything has to kind
Speaker 1: of play. And so they called me and they're like, hey,
Speaker 1: we're going to shoot this movie in Cologna, Canada.
Speaker 4: Have you heard of it? And I'm like, what are
Speaker 4: you talking about? Have I heard of it?
Speaker 1: My grandpa and my grandma have a house there and
Speaker 1: you sedtill live there and I hadn't been there since
Speaker 1: my grandpa had passed, So talk about.
Speaker 4: A universal alignment.
Speaker 1: It was like I had full body chills and I
Speaker 1: was like, Okay, I think this movie's actually going to
Speaker 1: get me, because.
Speaker 4: You cannot make that stuff up.
Speaker 1: This whole journey for me too has been embracing my
Speaker 1: Japanese side, and to shoot this movie four streets down
Speaker 1: from my grandparents' house on.
Speaker 4: My Japanese side was very emotional.
Speaker 1: And my grandpa was so important to me and to
Speaker 1: the point where I had to band named Heaiti in
Speaker 1: high school.
Speaker 4: So that was pretty wild.
Speaker 1: And I do think that that was the moment where
Speaker 1: I went, I don't know who's going to see this movie.
Speaker 1: I don't know if it's going to get distributed. But
Speaker 1: I'm making this movie and I'm supposed to be where
Speaker 1: I am.
Speaker 2: Okay, So what else do we need to know about
Speaker 2: the movie.
Speaker 1: Well, it's a great film school Girls Like Girls. It
Speaker 1: comes out June nineteenth in theaters. When I finished the film, well, firstly,
Speaker 1: the two leads are incredible. Colie's played by Maya da
Speaker 1: Costa and fun fact, she's actually was the first audition
Speaker 1: tape I ever watched out of four thousand submissions that
Speaker 1: came in. And then Mara molloy, who plays Sonia, she
Speaker 1: actually auditioned for Koli and I brought her back to
Speaker 1: audition for Sonia because she just was like she just
Speaker 1: had that essence of like I'm going to break any
Speaker 1: for anybody's heart, and I was like, that's the vibe
Speaker 1: we're going for for Sonia. And so again going back
Speaker 1: to that Velma Dinkley conversation about how I didn't think
Speaker 1: I'd be the lead. I didn't think that the studio
Speaker 1: would approve two Asian leads because that wasn't an intentional plan.
Speaker 1: It just ended up happening that way, and it was
Speaker 1: such amazing surprise that they approved the girls and supported
Speaker 1: my decision to move forward with the two girls, and
Speaker 1: that was also a pleasant surprise and just a reminder
Speaker 1: of like you just never know.
Speaker 4: And I remember talking to my ram.
Speaker 1: She was like, I didn't think I was going to
Speaker 1: get the role because the other girl was Asian, and
Speaker 1: we both thought the same thing, and I was like, Wow,
Speaker 1: we're really holding ourselves back here, Like we got to
Speaker 1: start changing this narrative because we deserve.
Speaker 4: To be in the front, to be seen.
Speaker 1: And that's what this whole film is about, is representation
Speaker 1: and being able to see yourself in a film and
Speaker 1: know that your story is important on a major scale.
Speaker 4: It's not a story that should be hidden. It's a
Speaker 4: story that so many people have experienced and are still experiencing.
Speaker 1: Whether you're sixteen or forty five or sixty five. You know,
Speaker 1: we all have had that young love, like when you're
Speaker 1: sixteen seventeen and fall in love with someone and it
Speaker 1: feels like life or death and you're like, I'm gonna
Speaker 1: marry this person, and this is the one. You know
Speaker 1: what the film is said in rural Oregon, it's summer,
Speaker 1: it's nostalgia. And then when I finished the film, I
Speaker 1: wanted to have a soundtrack for the movie, and they
Speaker 1: don't do soundtracks for movies this size, and so I
Speaker 1: ended up just going to the studio and writing the album.
Speaker 2: They're like, I'll have to just do it all and
Speaker 2: true form doing it all.
Speaker 1: Yeah, And so yeah, I finished the movie one in
Speaker 1: the studio, pitched the idea a ton of artists and
Speaker 1: got a bunch of incredible career artists to collaborate and
Speaker 1: come together and write songs inspired by the scenes.
Speaker 4: And ten songs.
Speaker 1: Off of the album aren't even in the movie. They're
Speaker 1: just like bonus. So you can essentially go watch the movie.
Speaker 4: Come home, listen to the album, and be able to
Speaker 4: connect the dots.
Speaker 3: Yeah, connect all over again in a different way.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 2: So what is something that at the time you saw
Speaker 2: as maybe a low point for you, but now you
Speaker 2: see it as having really launched you to the success
Speaker 2: you are today.
Speaker 1: I mean, I think about that heartbreak I had in
Speaker 1: high school and I had this like platonic relationship with
Speaker 1: this girl and we would say all of juice to
Speaker 1: each other and the knee caressing and all this stuff,
Speaker 1: and it was really heartbreaking for me. And to know
Speaker 1: that that was such a catalyst to lean me to
Speaker 1: my directorial debut over twenty years later is pretty It's
Speaker 1: pretty insane when you think about it.
Speaker 3: Yeah, did you think she has any idea?
Speaker 4: I don't think she cares. That's very her.
Speaker 1: So I think I'm grateful for that experience and I
Speaker 1: have empathy for that person because I think society also too,
Speaker 1: was really holding her back from being her true self.
Speaker 1: I don't know if she is at this time, but
Speaker 1: it's wild to look back at a traumatic moment in
Speaker 1: your life and to turn it into something to hopefully
Speaker 1: help others feel sick and validated and heard.
Speaker 3: Did you actually have a conversation or you just sort
Speaker 3: of like floated apart.
Speaker 1: Well, there's a scene in the movie where Coley goes
Speaker 1: to grab her jean jacket from Sonya, and that scene
Speaker 1: is pretty borderline verbatim a scene that I experience in
Speaker 1: my life, and it was that moment that everyone has
Speaker 1: where it's like, I need to know the answer.
Speaker 4: She's about to leave town. I need to know.
Speaker 1: And sometimes it leads in being together, and sometimes it
Speaker 1: leads in just being absolutely shattered.
Speaker 3: And then twenty years later to a beautiful film.
Speaker 4: And then you make it into your directory yeah, the upside.
Speaker 3: Yeah, do you think you'll pivot again?
Speaker 4: I do feel like I found my thing.
Speaker 1: I love directing, I love storytelling, I love world building.
Speaker 1: I would love to just continue to do this for
Speaker 1: the rest of my life. I'm sure pivots will come
Speaker 1: down the road, but I really do feel like all
Speaker 1: of the pivots have actually led to this landing in
Speaker 1: this moment, and I think I'm okay with not pivoting
Speaker 1: for a while and actually just embracing. I think it's
Speaker 1: a really cool feeling when you finally figure out what
Speaker 1: you want to do, and it takes sometimes a lifetime,
Speaker 1: and so to be able to identify that finally through
Speaker 1: the music and the acting and the fake business cards
Speaker 1: and all these moments, to know that directing was actually
Speaker 1: where I was headed is like a really beautiful feeling.
Speaker 1: And when I made the movie, as hard as it
Speaker 1: was to make, it was the easiest thing in the
Speaker 1: sense of it felt like home. I was like, Oh,
Speaker 1: this is what I'm good at, this is what I
Speaker 1: can do, and I want to be a vehicle and
Speaker 1: a voice and a space for my community to be
Speaker 1: able to go see tens or hundreds of films and
Speaker 1: TV shows, and to be able to read ten plus
Speaker 1: queer books and universes and all of these things like
Speaker 1: we deserve.
Speaker 4: We're all so different and unique.
Speaker 1: There's so many stories to be told, and it shouldn't
Speaker 1: take ten years for our stories to be told.
Speaker 3: Is there anything that we haven't talked about that we should?
Speaker 4: No, I feel like we really just we went through
Speaker 4: my entire life gave we.
Speaker 2: Really cover a lot of ground. Well, thank you so much, Haley,
Speaker 2: It's been so great having you. This is just the beginning,
Speaker 2: I know.
Speaker 4: Oh, thank you so much. Yes to pivots and beyond.
Speaker 2: There's a moment in our conversation where Haley describes the
Speaker 2: whole shift in her life in one line. She used
Speaker 2: to lead with fear. Now she leads with confidence and
Speaker 2: with a love for herself. And I think that's at
Speaker 2: the core of what she's built in her art. The
Speaker 2: exact thing she was most terrified to write about in
Speaker 2: her twenties, being a girl who likes girls, is the
Speaker 2: thing that she's now put into a song, eleven music videos,
Speaker 2: two best selling books, and a movie she directed. The
Speaker 2: fear didn't vanish, She just walked straight at it and
Speaker 2: created something other people could finally find when they need
Speaker 2: it most. The Girls Like Girls film and album are out.
Speaker 2: Now go see the thing she spent ten years and
Speaker 2: her entire heart making happy pride. Pivoters. See you next week.
Speaker 2: Thanks for listening to she Pivots. If you like this episode,
Speaker 2: follow the show so you never miss a pivot story
Speaker 2: and share it with one woman in your life who
Speaker 2: might need to hear it. To learn more about our
Speaker 2: guests and join our community, follow us on Instagram at
Speaker 2: she pivots the podcast our Subscribe to our substack for
Speaker 2: exclusive content and behind the scenes conversations. You can also
Speaker 2: find us at shepivotspod dot com. This episode was produced
Speaker 2: and edited by Paige Davis Janatt, with sound editing and
Speaker 2: mixing by Nina Pollock. Logistics and planning by Emastopic and
Speaker 2: Kendall Crupkin. Research by Christine Dickison. She Pivots is proud
Speaker 2: to be a part of the iHeart Podcast Network.
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