Rosie O'Donnell: Re-Famous

00:07
You're so dressed up.

00:09
I'm not dressed up. This is Canadian plaid, Rosie. You got like a full

00:14
face of makeup, honey. Like you've been you've been at something, some a big event or something.

00:19
I have not been at a big event, you are the big goddamn event. You're my event. I never get out. Look behind me. I'm in the damn trees. I don't go anywhere, except for Iceland. I go to Iceland, and you see the

00:34
Northern Lights. The

00:36
Northern Lights, and we zoom back and forth, and people are like, where are you going to live? What's happening? And I'm like, we're living. We are, we are members of planet Earth. So we're just trailing it forth.

00:47
You're doing it just because you're married doesn't mean you have to reside in the same exact place. People do it all the time.

00:54
It's so different, and I think that's the key to success.

00:57
I do too, because sometimes it gets hard when someone is there all the time, and you're like, "I'd really like to be alone and work on my music or something, you know. Well,

01:07
the funny thing is, is that we both travel so much, and we knew this when we met. We met at an event, an international event in Iceland. It was a writers' retreat, so I knew from the get-go that she was doing interesting things. She's in Poland right now, speaking to like 6000 people at this big economic AI gender-based violence forum, and I'm so proud of her. I'm like, are you like nervous? She's like, no, this is my field of expertise, and she's like, it's all the manosphere. She said, I was at two panels yesterday, all comprised of a bunch of white guys,

01:42
it's not a comforting feeling. I bet

01:45
she said it's just disappointing. So she's bringing the queer feminism kick-ass energy, and she's all dressed in red today. So I'm sure she's cutting quite a swath through the sea of suits. Anyway, Rosie O'Donnell, this year I would be remiss not to give you, you know, some kind of an intro. Although that is just so unnecessary, Rosie O'Donnell.

02:10
Yeah, I don't even need one. Just let's go. You know, let's just just go.

02:14
Listen, you are having. I'm going to say a renaissance, and I would

02:20
say you're right.

02:21
It's not like you ever went away because you were there like a burr under the skin of the right wing for the last decade. You have been a fearless advocate for equality, for gender-based rights, for the LGBTQ plus community, democracy at whole. Tell me what it feels like to be so embraced, so beloved again. You were away from the states for a while, and it is fucking rosy all day long right now.

02:50
You know, it was very strange, Jan, because I was with Clay, who's now 13, and we got off the plane from Ireland in JFK, and there were paparazzi and people with movie posters to sign, I was like, "Did I walk through a time portal or something? Is it 30 years ago? Like, what's happening? You know, but I think a lot of it has to do with the American public being so fed up with him that they're just adoring of anyone who stands up to him, and that I've been doing that for two decades. You know, people are going. You know, we we're sorry. I'm like, you don't have to say you're sorry. I have a great life and have had it in this wonderful country that has a lot of problems, but affords people the opportunity to live the American dream. At least it used to, and I don't know that that's doing that right now. It's it's not possible, and you know. So I feel it's my obligation to speak out, and everyone who has a platform, I feel, should be doing that before we turn into a fascist nation.

03:54
Well, turn into is kind of an ironic term. It's it's halfway there, but you, it's just been exhilarating watching you to see a woman of a certain age. Hate to even bring that up, but 64. You and me both-we're five days apart. We're both Aries, March people.

04:13
There you go. There you go. Walking

04:15
into your power. Speak to that. You have less shits to give,

04:19
right? And you know, living here in Ireland for two years has been amazing. I mean, you don't have the constant barrage of his nonsense, his incivility, his lack of decency, his really compromised, mediocre brain. And when you're there, and I was there for three months this summer to see my grandson and my other kids, my big kids, and also to work a little bit, I felt the difference. You know, I felt the difference in the country, and I felt the things that you get to when you're past menopause and you don't really care anymore. Like you don't. Like I'm not. I'm not. There's no one going. I wonder what Rosie O'Donnell feels about this administration. There's nobody wondering that, you know. I say what I feel and and what I think, and and I let the chips fall where they may. And you know, some people, I'm a horrible person and and a threat to democracy, as our president said. And to other people, you know, I'm a folk hero, and the truth lies somewhere in between, you know. And I think if you take the good press, you have to take the bad press. So it's best to just appreciate the love and and move on and through it and in gratitude. And and and that sounds very Oprah quoteish, but that's the truth, you know.

05:37
There is such a shift though, in how people are lining up behind you, and Jimmy Kimmel is a perfect example of you stepping into late night television, which you know has been attacked vehemently for the entire Trump administration, both both terms, and he he would just like it all to go away. You stepping into that position, fucking singing, like just saying, "I know you're watching, you orange buffoon. It was so goddamn funny, and now the talk is Rosie O'Donnell needs her own show. Talk about the the Kimmel experience. Was it nerve wracking? Were you like, "I don't want to do that, or were you like, "Yes, I'll do it. Well,

06:20
I was surprised because I had never been on his show, and at the beginning of our, you know, kind of getting to know each other, it was Howard Stern who sort of brought us all together at a party because he and I had a bumpy start, to say the least. And you know, Jimmy was on the Man Show, and he was around all those bros, and and I think like Howard, he had sort of a change in in his essence, brought on I think by the illness of his son, and it kind of cracked him wide open. Now maybe I didn't know him enough to know he was always this way, but I would see him crying on TV and talking about people who can't afford the same surgery that his son got, and so humane and and so connected to his feelings and emotions, which is not always the truth. You know, it's not always the case for celebrities or for men in general. I think you know. And so, what he did was pretty shocking. He actually announced my being on the show before he got it cleared by the ABC people. So my publicist called me at like 10 to four, LA time, and said, "Would you want to guest host Kimmel for a week? And I was like, "Are you sure they want me? I've never even been a guest on that show. Are you sure? They said yes. They're positive. I asked them twice. I made sure. I said I totally would, you know. And then when I heard it wasn't until after I was already booked when I heard that he had risked that stuck his neck out for me, I really wanted to deliver, and I made an active choice to approach Trump the way that I did, and not aggressively like a pit bull, which scares some people, you know. Yeah, I didn't have my glasses on on purpose. I had contacts in, and I think it reminded people. Oh, remember, we like her. She's smart and she's nice, and she gives people hope, and and she's a good person. And we have forgotten

08:19
humor is magic. Humor is something that unites people. Sarah Burke, over to you because I always get in here and I don't let anyone ask questions. Sarah, go.

08:30
Your your show that actually brought you overseas, common knowledge. Love the concept of it, and and that's you being on stage, not under the control of like a giant television corporation situation, but something you created yourself. So talk about starting common knowledge, where it began, and how it felt being on stage in that way in your home country.

08:51
Well, I moved to Ireland, and I didn't know anyone. I had two cousins who lived in Northern Ireland, and we're living in Dublin, so that's about you know a three-hour trek. So I was lonely. And when my kid went to school, I had from seven to three alone. And so I thought, well, what am I going to do? So of course, I start with crafts. I craft for a couple of months and just get very into a lot of different kinds of crafts. And then I started thinking how much I noticed the people in Dublin who looked like my family members, like there'd be an old woman at 90 years old at the Tesco feeling the fruit, and I looked and I said, "That's my mother's face. And had she not died at 39, this is what I would be living with-you know, an elderly mother and trying to help her through the end, as as all good children should, you know. And everywhere I looked, I saw my dad in the cardigans and the little Irish wool cap that that he wore at at the pubs. And you know, I was very blown away by being forced to face myself and. My family of origin, like little 13-year-old kids, I'd look at them. I go, "That's me. That's my face and my body. On you know, genetically, I felt connected in a way, and so it brought up many memories of my mother. And although I tried 10 years ago to write a show about my mother and her death and and the effect it had on on me. I never was able to perform the one that I wrote with Dick Scanlon, who is a wonderful playwright. I did that with him 10 years ago, and every time we tried to do it on stage, I would just cry. So I wasn't ready, you know. I wasn't ready to do it. Then when I got here, I started, and I did mostly stuff about Clay because I was working on a show before I came over to Ireland that was called Raising Clay about being the parent of an autistic child, and it was really all about that. and And the title Common Knowledge comes from Clay always saying to me when you know they know something that I don't. They'll roll their eyes a little bit and go, "Come on, mom, it's common knowledge. You know, like I was watching Jeopardy with them, which I don't do anymore because it makes me feel inferior. But I was watching Jeopardy, and they said, "What is the deepest point of the earth ever recorded? And she looks up and goes, "What is the Mariana Trench? And I'm like, how? What is the Mariana Trench? Number one, and she said, Oh, it's the deepest part of the earth ever recorded. And she said, Come on, Mom, it's common knowledge. And I was like, Is she dissing me? I go, What's common knowledge? It's things everybody should know, but not everyone does. And then she smiled. I was like, You little runt, you know. So then she told me three different things. I said, "Can you tell me some more things that are common knowledge? And she rattled them off like she was in college at some thesis she was presenting, you know. And and I couldn't believe it. I really couldn't believe it. And she said things like, "Do you know that Cleopatra lived closer to the advent of the iPhone than she did to the completion of the pyramids of Giza, like common knowledge, and I'm like, it's like a little professor. She has that thing that some autistic children or adults have called little professor syndrome, where she memorizes facts that are interesting to her, does a deep dive on them, and then learns everything she can about the subject, and sometimes I have no idea that she's even been looking at it, you know. And she'll hit me with, you know, flamingos can drink boiling hot water without hurting their interior organs, and I go like, and sure enough, it's true. They they were originally on volcanoes, and they got used to the water being that hot, and it developed like you know over generations, so that now you're talking Jan language.

12:45
Yeah, this is shit we need to

12:46
know.

12:47
Yeah,

12:48
talk to my kid. Talk to my kid. The

12:50
common knowledge people, I think it's the same like the common sense people as well. That you're supposed to have it, but yet you don't. Caitlyn Green, questions for our wonderful guest.

13:02
Well, I'm wondering if you have advice for people who are fellow, as you describe yourself, like highly sensitive people, because it's a really strange time to be a sensitive person. I am one, and I have a hard time balancing how much I should consume in terms of the news to stay informed and to stay engaged, and then when I should turn off so that I don't internally combust, and I feel like a lot of people saw you take on Trump and then have this amazing comeback, and you seem like you know you described like a bit of a folk hero to many because they see you as really strong. But I love that it's counterbalanced by you saying that you're actually very, very sensitive.

13:42
Yeah, so sensitive that my father didn't know what to do with me when I was crying watching the news because Vietnam was Saigon was falling and my mother had been sick and I'm watching this and and I saw an older woman fall out of the screen and I started to cry and then his answer was you're not allowed to watch the news anymore. Go upstairs. You're not allowed to watch TV. Yeah, then that could go away.

14:05
Exactly. Thanks, Dad. That's like an Irish way to deal with it, but it's not very effective therapeutically. So, you know, and I saw this great documentary that Alanis Morissette did called "Highly Sensitive Person, and and I really related to some of it. And you know, my therapist has been saying that, and oh, you're an empath. I'm like, I'm just wired for. I like search for the people who are in harm's way, and then try to help them. I search for the underdogs. I, you know, I used to have a boat in Miami when we lived there, and every time we went out, I would get somebody who was stalled, or you know their jet ski broke, or they were a windsurfer and they left go of their thing, and and I'd put them in the boat and take them to my house and what am I doing? You know, it's like not one person's job to save the world, but that's the impulse that I have. In fact, I really thought when my mother was sick. That if Johnny Carson told everyone who loved him to send $5, they'd get enough money so that my mother could get the medicine or his mother, whoever was sick. So I knew there was power, kind of, in fame for social good, and I was very disappointed when I found out that not all other other people feel that way, like I feel the way I believe Paul Paul Newman felt when he made those camps for kids dying of cancer, and you know, like I I feel like the world is too much for me sometimes, and that's why I knew when he got elected again illegally, I believe, but when he got elected again. I had to leave the country because I knew my psyche couldn't take it, and I have five children, including an autistic 13-year-old, and I need to be in tip-top shape in order to handle all that comes with that. And I knew I didn't do well last time that he was in. I was overeating, drinking too much, smoking a lot of pot, I was just you know not in a good place, and so I've come to Ireland and I took all the American news channels off my TV feed, so I don't even get to see them unless I search them out on YouTube, which I don't. But when I was home for the summer, those three months, I felt bombarded by it, by him, and when I came home, I did something I haven't done for a long time. I couldn't stop posting. You know, fuck you, you liar. You, you know, I. It was like I was back in the net again. I was in the spider's web, and I don't want to be in the spider's web. I want to help people learn not to be afraid, and that we have power in numbers, and that together we can hopefully stop this, you know, avalanche that has started. And if we don't stop it now, and if he gets away with closing the elections, which you know he's trying to do, we're doomed. And I don't like to say that. I don't like to feel that, but I'm a realist as well as a highly sensitive person.

17:04
You were talking about empathy earlier, and just being an empath. Like guys like Charlie Kirk, and and of course the the extreme far right, they seem to think that empathy is like being woke, like literally. And I heard Wanda Sykes talking about it. Like being woke is is caring about people, is giving a shit about your your country, caring about you know new Americans coming in, caring about unhoused people. So it's so bizarre how that's been presented. When we know culturally, we know from history that empathy and the whole idea of survival of the friendliest is a real thing that working together is a real thing. Whether you have opposite ideas about politics, there is a middle ground, and we see it in disaster, where it suddenly becomes a nonpartisan thing, where someone that would never even look at their neighbor-they've lived beside him for 15 years-but when these terrible things happen, they're like I'm friends with a gay couple. These guys that have lived four houses down-they're great guys. So I think we're seeing that now. His approval rating is as low as it's ever been. Does low

18:15
for any president ever? And that gives me hope, ever. And that gives me even even Nixon, and that gives me hope. You know, it really does. And I could just tell from walking the streets of of New York when I was there. You know, cab drivers stopping and rolling down their window. We love you, Rosie. We hate him too. We'll get him out, Row. I'm like, okay, you know, and I love that the people feel empowered, and they have to feel empowered because fear is a tool of fascism, and we have to give up fear. We have to know that this is a mediocre man who is disabled in in a significant way right now, and it's almost elder abuse to have him still running this country.

19:01
Well, we up in Canada. We're we're experiencing his diabolical, maniacal behavior on a daily basis. The tariffs are at all time; they're the worst. Yeah, 50% in Canada

19:14
are allies for years, and he wants to saddle up next to Putin. You know, it's it's unbelievable, and the fact that no one is doing anything like that-he cut down all those cherry blossoms that were a gift,

19:30
right? From a right that he did that, and if any other person did it, they would be arrested. But he's not arrested, and he started breaking ground on his Arc de Triomphe bullshit that covers the cemetery, so people can't see it in the middle of Washington D.C. Everything that he touched should be deleted and erased as soon as he's done, and that's going to be soon because he does not look well, and the country is really sick of him.

19:57
Well, I think his new hair. Really helps to, you know, reinvent. I don't know what the

20:03
hell. I think he just one day bought a bottle of stuff. You know, had somebody go get a bottle of something and threw the whole thing on. Somebody told me who's a hairdresser that the number that his other hair was a nine, and that he mistakenly grabbed the six because the six is brown and the nine is like platinumish, you know. I think he grabbed the 666. That's what he fucking

20:28
grabbed.

20:28
Yeah, well, that's what he probably has tattooed on his ass. But you know, both my parents had dementia.

20:34
Both my parents had dementia, Alzheimer's, and he is like worst they ever were.

20:40
Yes, he's in the throes of it. He doesn't. He's not able to decipher reality from fantasy. He thinks his lies are truths, and I think that's serious dementia and delusional thinking. You know, he's he's not able. He's not able to fulfill his job responsibilities, and I believe he never was.

21:08
Jan sort of touched on aging, and you know, your return to TV has come at a time where you know your body and your mind is in a completely different place. How is it having an audience in whatever way right now, when you know you are now a 64-year-old person, like I loved the interview with Gene Smart and talking hacks, and like even putting yourself in the shoes of the character when you were interviewing her. How did how did all of it feel?

21:33
You know, I loved it. I I love that show. I'm I'm heartbroken that it's over, but I also am very proud of the production company knowing it was five seasons and setting it up for exactly what happened. What a beautiful ride they took us all on! But I actually miss it. I really miss it. But you know, I it's not lost on me that we don't get to see a lot of 64-year-old women on TV. We don't get to see a lot of them. They're not, you know, heralded and and and held in high esteem in our country, the way we treat elderly people, especially women, is an abomination in many ways. And you know, so sad to think. Excuse me, Gloria Steinem died with less rights than she fought for her whole life. You know that she had to go in the midst of this bullshit, and it's you know it's so sad to me. It really is. But as far as you know, getting older, I think it's a privilege. I'm not one of those women who thinks, oh, this is a bad thing. My mother died at 39, 39 years old. That's my age

22:36
right now. Oh my! Right.

22:38
So imagine, and you have five little kids, and and so every year that I live, it's like bonus, you know, like on those video games at the arcade, you get an extra lap, you know. That's what I feel like. Oh, I get an extra lap. Look at that, you know. So I I am not, you know, worried about aging. I mean, I'm worried about it physically. I am trying to walk more and be more physical, but I'm not worried about it intellectually or vanity-wise. Even though I did have a lower facelift in January of of last year, so I had two very prominent lines here that because I had lost so much weight from Monjaro and lost about. But you also had hard

23:21
stuff too. Like you knew that you you needed to turn your your your health around.

23:25
Yeah, and so you know I I did that, and and I had to wrestle with myself to do that as a feminist, which I had read a lot about Jane Fonda's finally saying that she was going to have one or did have one because she you know for years said I would never do it. I was, I would never do it, but then I was in Ireland, and people were like, "Oh, Rosie, what's the matter, love? You sad? What's up, darling? And and I'm like, "No, no, I'm not sad. It's just my face. I'm happy here. I like it here. I'm feeling good. Oh, you look so sad, love. I'll buy your paint. Come on in. I'll buy your paint.

23:59
I I just feel like whatever we can do to make ourselves feel better, but I think there is that line where the public can get really cruel about it. But because you were so open about it, I think you gave a lot of women the courage to go. You know what? I would like to fix my teeth. You know what? I do want to do something about my tummy. You know, and it's permission to feel okay and to not. My God, we have to stop caring about what other people think about

24:29
us. It was mostly what my daughter would think because she's 13, and she said to me, "I can't believe you would ruin your legacy like this. And I was like, "What? Wow! And she said, "There are little girls who look up to you, and what does it say that you give in to the male society that forces women to to do this to themselves? And so it made me not do it for three months. I was already to do it, and then I canceled it. And I was like, I can't have. She said, if you do it, I will never be able to look at you the same way again, and it broke my heart. And then you know I went and did it because I really worked on it with my therapist. And feminism is not what you can't do; it's you can decide what you do, and that's you know what it's about. And so the funny thing is, I when I had it done, I came home 10 days later, and they never noticed my kid, never noticed. And the other day I was talking about it on an interview, and she interrupted and said, "And I'm the one who told you not to do it, member, because she doesn't think I did it.

25:31
Well, you raised quite the kid, so you're completely responsible.

25:35
This is a gift from the from the gods. This kid, she is something else. Yeah,

25:40
watching you sort of like behind the desk as someone who grew up watching the Rosie O'Donnell show, it was very comforting to see you there, and I think obviously a lot of people would like to see you do that again and hope that that happens in some capacity. But I'm also curious about movies for you because you were also in movies that I think for millennial women were kind of like cultural infrastructure. Now and then was one of those formative movies that I must have seen 100 times. Sleepless in Seattle, A League of Their Own. These are things that you know there are. I always think of acting careers and go, you know, yeah, there are Academy Awards, but if you're in that movie that someone's watched 400 times that they turn on when they have the flu, like that to me is better than any Academy Award. So, would you ever be interested in doing some like a project like that again in some capacity? Because you really so perfectly straddle the line between emotional but comedic, and I just I love it so much.

26:32
Well, thank you so much. I would love to do more movies. You know, when I was a young actress, the ones I looked up to are Geraldine Page, Colleen Dewhurst. I remember thinking, like, as a young 20-year-old actress trying to get into movies, when I'm 60 in my 60s, I'm going to have a career again. It's going to be that, like you know, Geraldine Page did some of her best work, even though she won early on too. But as she was aging, and so I would love to be, you know, in a movie, I'm I'm open for every opportunity that I get to try and see, and you know, and they're talking now about possibly doing my own show. I don't know how it would work in today's market where the government has control over who gets to be on what channel, and that's frightening. And we would have to set it up in a way that we don't have FCC regulations, and the only way to do that, I believe, is YouTube, and to have a company that's possibly not American produce it and then do it on YouTube so that people can watch it. People are like, you have to do late night. I'm like people don't watch TV at the time that that it airs anyway. You could put it on at noon in the morning, and people will watch it when they want, when they get home, when they have time. Like I get, I get up and I watch Kimmel at six in the morning when I get up to take her to school, and I get that. That's the time I watch it. It's like breakfast TV for me, you know.

28:01
Well, streamers too have opened up a lot of things. I mean, Chelsea Handler has had a lot of success with doing those specials, Letterman's interviews, you know, that were available for streaming. I I think no matter what you choose, I don't think it's if I think it's when, and I think you are going to be so surprised at the support that you get, there's something to be said about your legacy that continues on exactly what you said as you're getting older. That people really are looking for nostalgia, they're looking for comfort, and they're looking for hopefulness. And whether you assigned those things to yourself is something that has inhabited your body, and it for me it's comforting to watch. I mean, I did your show in the '90s, and I to this day I have a little card from you sitting in my library, and it just-it's almost like yeah, I did that. Like I just when I think of you, I think of strength, I think of tenacity, steadfastness, and you've done so many things. You used to kill me when you said, "Hello, I'm I'm Rosie O'Donnell, star of the Flintstones. Fuck, I would laugh. That movie, I you know you you never know was that a really great movie or a really terrible movie? But whatever it is, every time it's goddamn on, I watch it.

29:18
Exactly, and you know I did that joke because Roseanne Barr was on SNL, and she was playing me, and Madonna was the musical guest. So they did a skit where she and and Madonna were, and she had a backwards hat on and a sweatshirt, and she said, "Look at it's me, Rosie O'Donnell, star of Flintstones. That was the whole running joke of the SNL skit, and I thought it was so funny. So I just say that because it amuses me, you know. You sent us a voice

29:46
note of that after you came on the show last time, and we died when we had. Yeah, that's that's the

29:52
only. You know, it it just I do things to just make me laugh. But I think with what you were saying before about what people want, I agree. It's nostalgic. I agree. It's sort of a wholesomeness, but mostly it's authenticity, because we have been fed so many lies, and you know people have presented images that are not the truth. And Supreme Court nominees lie during their interviews about you know being settled law already abortion and they just lie until you know the lying and and mainstream media doesn't call them out and how are we ever going to move forward if they don't you know we need the fourth estate to be pressuring all the the levels of government we need the time, right? And and they failed us. They have failed us. And once CBS said they would pay, you know, for that 60 minutes interview, whatever. Or once ABC said they would pay because Stephanopoulos called him what he is, rapist. That's what he is. And you know, once you pay the guys in the village from the mob who own there's no

31:05
turning back.

31:06
Correct. Once you pay once, you are theirs, and that's what happens. And that's why they thought, well, CBS paid us once. Let's get rid of Colbert. Oh, ABC paid us once. Let's get rid of Jimmy Kimmel. Well, you can't just decide that, King Tut. You can't. Yeah, you know.

31:25
Listen, we're not going to let you go from this podcast without talking about the stuff that you've done for the Epstein survivors.

31:32
Oh yeah.

31:33
It has been Helen Reddy would be hugging you and cheering you on. You and I, same era. Helen Reddy was one of my heroes growing up, and songs that I sung to all the time. So I share that passion with you. But to see those survivors standing there in white, hand in hand, and you singing with them, it actually made me really emotional. What has happened with these files? How they've been buried, you know? Do you start a war? Is it that how bad you want to get away with it? That oh yes, because Iran,

32:06
what he did, and what's in there, and what you can read now as it's touring the country. It is currently in Dallas, I believe, the Epstein Files Library that is bookmobile that is going around for free. You can come in, pick one of the millions of evidence pieces of evidence and read what he has done. He has the right to be terrified because he will be in prison for the rest of his life, as he should. This is not somebody who did just a little bit of insider trading, and you know maybe cheated. No, no. This is a man who crossed the moral line that is uncrossable to sexually abuse and traffic children. I'm sorry, but if anyone in the world says it's okay with them, they need to go get help. They need to go get help because I see people. You know, I don't care that he's a pedo. He's my president. I'm like you are out of your goddamn mind. I know, and I have to think that 33 is is half of people who are not intellectually capable of understanding what's happening.

33:12
Well, apparently, some of them, a lot of them, can't even. They have a very low degree of literacy. Like it's people that Caitlin and in a podcast the other day said that they'd been you know radicalized by their iPads and just sitting there and and reading this bullshit. But what you did, how what was the response from from the survivors to have that positive light shone on them? We believe you, we support you, and we're going to bring this motherfucker down. So that's just well, you know what happened,

33:42
Jan. I haven't told anyone this, but this is what happened. My idea was to do Donny Boy the first night, and right before the 4o'clock time that we started, the network called and said we don't want you to do it. Now I had five minutes to prepare a different monolog for an ending to the monolog. Five minutes. So I said, "Everybody get out. And they're like, "We don't know. They won't tell us why. Well, the next day we found out why because ABC sued the federal government for interfering with their network business, right? For saying you have to fire this one, who can and can't be on what you can and can't say, they file it now. I the next day when I woke up, I went. Now I understand. Had they said to me, "There's something coming down corporately tomorrow, and we would prefer you waited, I just would have waited without being so. What's happening? What's happening? You know. Yeah. And then my idea for the last night was to do the Epstein reveal, and they said that they were certain that could not happen, and so I said, "Well, then I'm going to do it myself and just put it out on our. So I've been talking to this woman, Laura, who's with Survivors Sisters. Sister survivors, soul sisters. It's on my. It's on the yes

35:04
video if you want to see it. And I called her and said, "How many can we get here in three days? And she said eight. And there were eight. And one of the women, her child, had lice, and she couldn't leave because of that. She had to deal with that. So there were eight women out of 12,000 women, now not all of them are named. Some are anonymous because they're afraid, and I don't blame them. Right? They're afraid. But these eight women were a cross section, and we met. And I told them a little about my history, and I told them why it means so much to me and to the human race, and why this is of vital importance, and it's an epidemic in our country and in the world. And I thank them for trusting me. And then we shot it. We just shot it in in a few hours, two hours. We shot the whole thing, and and then people said, "Where's the rest of it? We want to see the documentary. I'm like, "It wasn't a documentary. It was something we just did in three minutes. But now I'm talking to some people that I will do a segment on each of those women and up close and personal, and will tell each of their stories, eight of them. Now, whether that's in one full documentary to be released on a streaming service, or whether it's something we put on YouTube, or if I just release it on my social media and the women's social media, the Epstein survivors, the Trump Epstein survivors. Yeah, if they all put it on there, 12,000 people and people pass it on and pass it on. You know, I was hoping that women would all dress in white, get together with the people in their neighborhood who were survivors of child sex abuse, which there are many-one in three women, one in four or five boys in America. So I was hoping they would all do it, you know, sing it and do it, and we would get all of these things. But I've heard from them. They are very thankful. They said no famous person has called to stand beside them beside me, which again I found shocking. It's a reoccurring theme

37:12
with you to stand up to toe the line and to put your. I just think

37:17
you know when there's such gross injustice, it it calls to me, and I feel like you know I I have to use my voice if I don't have the ability with all the privilege that I have in this world that this country has given me by loving me and supporting me. What good of a person am I? Like what kind of a person am I if I don't do that? And I think it's very shocking, you know. I see these people whose goal is to be a billionaire, and when I first started making money, I told my money guy, "If I'm ever on a richest person list, you're fired, right? Because I'm not. I'm not doing that. I don't want to do that. I can't live with myself. I'm paid too much. I have too much. I opened foundation, you know that we've been open for 30 years now, and we've served all of the poorest kids in New York City, starting in the fifth grade, with a 12 week theater program in the school through the Department of Education, and you know I'm very proud of the work that we've done, and now as I'm faced with my life at this point, I'd like to do that kind of push towards autism acceptance, towards understanding what life is like for someone who is born with a different operating system than the one we're all used to, and how different the world is for them. You know, so that's what I'd like to focus on as the you know third chapter of my life, the final chapters. Right? You're lucky if you get to live as long as Gloria Steinem, 92. My God, you're lucky. You know, my mother died at 39, as I've said, and that's my kind of measuring stick. You know, it must have been

39:02
weird the year that you turned 39, and and and that dial flipped over to 40, and you're like, Jesus, I'm older than my mom. Well, I just thought

39:10
I made it. I made it. Yes. Make it. You know, I made it through.

39:22
One little happy thing, and I know this has been unbelievably informative, and we could talk to you for 48 days consecutively, and we're going to hit you up again. We need to touch base with you, like every six months. Your love of Barbra Streisand is infectious, and Tom Cruise was also a very funny gag on the show for a great many years, but I want you to tell me about staying with Barbra Streisand and doing. I believe you slept overnight at her house.

39:54
No, she slept at my house, but I wasn't there. I wasn't there. I was in New York doing the. Show my show. We're doing the view. Doing the view, and she was in Florida, and the hotel was under construction, and she couldn't sleep. So somebody called me and said, "Barbara wants to know if you know anyone who has room for eight people to stay at at their house because she's on tour, as you know. And I was like, "Are you kidding? Are you kidding? I have a perfect house in Miami. Of course, she can have it. And then I called up my cleaning lady and her mother who lived there, and I'm like, everything, flowers in every room, yellow roses, go, go, go, you know. And then I would call her from the set and in the commercials. I'm like, what's she doing? Where is she? Is she okay? Okay, make sure that we have the food that she likes. Make sure, okay, make sure the pool is at the right temperature. Like I just would do anything in in the world for her, and and I don't, you know, I don't bother her. Which is, I don't call her. Like I don't. I'm not insisting. Like we bother

40:52
you? Yeah. No, no, honey. But you're my

40:55
friend. You know. I mean, I'm I'm friendly with her, and she's been so loving to me. But I never want to be that annoying, you know. Hi, Barbara. It's Rosie again. Needy Rosie who thinks you're her mother, you know, right? But I just adore her, and if it wasn't for her, I would never have become an entertainer.

41:14
But you met her on your show, yes. So that first meeting, you were visibly upset, like no, I didn't think

41:22
I'd be able to get through it. I didn't because my mother loved her so much that when she walked through the curtain, it felt like my mother was coming out to see me. And then I looked and saw my siblings sitting in the front row, and I was like, "This is heavy, you know, this is intense. And she was so kind because she wrote me before and said, "Sometimes it's better, Rosie, if we don't meet our idols. Everything could change after I come on the show. And I said to her, "There's nothing in the world that you could ever do or say that would change the amount of love and respect that I have for you. And it's the truth. And with Dolly Parton's passing, I really had to come to. I was going to ask

42:01
you about her.

42:02
Yeah, I mean, listen, she was the best, and and literally an Earth angel, and somebody who has done so much for gay rights in a community that wasn't accepting, and in some ways still isn't, but in in the South, and and she was pure love, and I was lucky to get to open for her, and I was lucky to get to know her on my show and in the way that I I was. And but it did make me think of Barbara and what's going to happen to me when that day comes for her because she's 20 years a month and a day and three days older than me, so I always know who's counting. She is exactly, but my time on Earth, you know, has been totally with her in it. Could you have

42:52
fathomed what has happened to your life as a kid? You know, being raised by your dad, who probably did the best he could, and your you know your your siblings. I mean, it's weird when life and fantasy and this dreamscape kind of collide. And one thing about you is that your your gratitude is always overflowing. I don't think you ever take it for granted, and that's why I love seeing you in the place that you are now. You're you're surrounded with love and appreciation, and people are looking up to you to guide almost their moral compass. Like how we have forgotten how to be human, and I do see people looking at you for I need like women in particular. Like we need to do more. We need to stand up for each other. There's so many women propping up the patriarchy.

43:44
Oh my God! It's so horrible the amount of women who voted for him, and you know, as he took away all of our rights, as he took away our bodily autonomy. I mean, it is unbelievable what these women have fallen into. But you know, look at that Fox News sued for so many millions of dollars for lying, which they do every day, and presenting a distorted GOP perspective on the world, and people still listen to them, and I think that's how people are indoctrinated to not care, you know, about each other. And what do you think about this thing that happened with Pink? Did you hear?

44:24
Yeah, I I think you know her sending basically what happened to everyone that's listening is that Ed Sheeran had Mclemore open for him, and and the speech was beautiful. I've seen the transcript of it, and he just went up, and I wanted to open the show for you know Ed Sheeran because I want to stand here on this stage, and and I want to say free Palestine. I'm just paraphrasing here, but he also went on to say free the Congo, free the Sudan, you know, free the Ukraine. He he really spoke to all the groups that are being oppressed right now and sort of in these illegal wars. And Pink wrote him an open letter on the World Wide Web and said, "Ed Sheeran, you need to refund everybody their money for you know letting him support the people of Gaza and and Palestine. The backlash has been swift. It has been severe, and it's not going over well, but I've I've been incredibly disappointed because I really do like Pink, and I'm like, well,

45:26
and to think of her, you know, activism, and she's been so honest and so great for women and for strength of women, and you know how she does her shows and her career and where she came from and magical come, and then you know, dear mr. President, she wrote that, and you know, it seems so out of character that I first didn't believe it when I heard it. I thought, no, this is going to be a lie. When they're going to come up and say that this was not true, but you know, I I really wish I knew her better. I mean, that to call her and go, hey, what was what's your take?

46:00
Like, what's your take? Tell me what your take is on this because I don't understand how people with big hearts could feel that way. I don't understand how you can look at that and say that's not a genocide. I don't know how that's possible.

46:16
I am still dumbfounded by it. I unfollowed. I know it seems trite. She's got 11 point 4 million people, and I just thought, in my own little way, I just don't want her in my feed. And that's why you're allowed.

46:32
You're allowed to respond the way they do. You know.

46:37
Well, when 10 million people unfollow Rosie, it's impactful, and that's that's my vote. I've cast my vote, and I'm not going to stop listening to her music. She's part of my rotations, and and I'm trying to separate the art from the artist. We talk about that on the show, but I've said ridiculous things, but I've never said ridiculous things that involve the annihilation of a group of people, and then we have Annie Lennox. Then we have Annie Lennox. Yes,

47:06
exactly. That has stepped

47:08
out when nobody, nobody would. She was getting death threats. She was like, no, no, no, no, no. I'm standing on this line because it was so. It's always so heated. Annie Lennox, pink. You know, you you weigh out these ethical warriors, and and Pink has, I think, lost the plot. So that's my thoughts. How about you?

47:29
Yeah, yeah, I feel similar ways. I I just wish I knew her well enough to, you know, call her up when when Roseanne Barr had that horrible racist thing that she said. I called her up right away and said, "Go to the hospital now. You've made a very big mistake, and from what I know about you, this is not who you are and what you are. And let's go see if you're unbalanced right now, because I don't think this is you, you know. And I mean, turns out I was wrong, because look at what's what's become of that woman who fought so hard to be groundbreaking on television with social issues, and how did that woman become MAGA? Like I don't understand that. It doesn't make sense to me. So part of it doesn't make sense to me about what's happened now with Pink, and I would love if she would do an interview or explain at least. Well, you know, I mean, it's different with Boy George did it. I I don't, I can't think of like a song that he wrote, although I'll adore about someone dying of AIDS. That was pretty intense. Yeah, but I don't see him socially out there. You know, in in like any Annie Lennox way, or even in a pink way. Dear mr. President, I don't. I don't think of him as that. And but this one, I was to say I was not disappointed. is is a lie. But I'd like to hear it from her mouth. I hope she does an interview.

48:52
Yeah, I hope she does address it, and I think she will. I think there's a lot of triage going on right now, and and probably trying to mitigate the fallout of this because it has been, like I said, very swift and and really really huge. I've seen it on all the major news outlets about you know what she said and you know Mclemore is standing firm. He said, "I didn't. I I'm sorry. I'm not supporting this. I'm just simply not. Listen, we have kept you for the almost an hour. You are so gracious. I'm going to hand it over to Caitlin. What did you to

49:22
to take care of yourself? How does Rosie take care of Rosie? Well, you know, I start with trying to get enough sleep. Yeah, I

49:31
try to ingest art in any way, shape, or form because it inspires me. I like to watch, you know, speeches and read a lot of books. And in fact, I just wrote read a beautiful book by Nikita Hand, who's the Irish woman from Dublin who was viciously raped by Conor McGregor and sued him in civil court. And she has a new book coming out in in a few months, a few weeks actually, that I will be there at her book. Launch as she asked me to do that, and you know I I like to help and be inspired by other people doing good things, and when someone's doing something awful, I I try to bring everyone's attention to that as well, and you know hopefully in in between there I find a balance, and that's largely having to do with my children. You know, I am first and foremost most a mother, and it's what matters most to me. Like when I left my show, it was because I had children, and I wanted to be at their softball games and to see their birthday candles at the at the school on the you know when I would be filming, and that's what grounds me. And now I have a new grandson, so that's even more thrilling. Congratulations! That's amazing. Thank you. My son Blake had and his wife Teresa had a little baby boy.

50:52
That's amazing. Well, you're always inspiring and you kick ass, and we're very happy to call you friend and coming on our little show, we appreciate it so much, and and we're going to be sure. Not only did I

51:05
want to do it for you, I wanted to do it for Canada and apologize to them on behalf of the sane Americans because it's very scary and frightening what he's doing to Canada. And some of us know Canada has been an ally and a supporter and help the United States for for so many years, and don't listen to their ripping us off. He's ripping us off to the tune of billions of dollars every day, and so are his sons. And he does it in broad daylight, and it's a sin. And I hope it's remedied soon.

51:34
It will be. We do love you guys, and we, you know, so many Canadians miss going to their border towns, you know, certainly in Ontario, along the you know, the upstate New York, and and all these little towns in America that are suffering, and God knows we do miss American bourbon. I don't drink, but you know, my friends are telling me, Jesus Christ, can I not get a bottle of fucking Kentucky bourbon? And and Canada has just went, no, we're not selling it. But you know what? We've been friends for a long, long time, and there's so many good people in the United States. There's assholes in Canada too. Don't don't ever think that there isn't. MAGA is here, and it infiltrates rural communities and and young disenfranchised guys that that seem to think he is the the the bro to end all bros, which is mind-boggling. The guy's probably got a colostomy bag, and they say he stinks. They say when he comes, he smells.

52:28
Well, he doesn't have a colostomy bag. He's wearing adult diapers, and he is constantly pooping himself. And you can see with people when they turn their their body has a physical reaction to it, you know. And he thinks we don't know. He thinks we don't know what he did with all those kids and why he redacted the files. He thinks we don't know that he's stealing all this money, that we don't see it, that we're too dumb to understand exactly what he's done, and we're not. We're not.

52:55
I just want to stay alive to see this end. I I don't know about you, Rosie, but I wake up every morning and I fucking grab my phone and I'm just-is he gone? God damn it! No, it's Dolly. Jesus, wrong 80-year-old. What is happening?

53:08
Exactly, exactly. Yeah, I said we said Donny, not Dolly. Exactly.

53:15
We love you.

53:16
Thank you, thank you all. Steady

53:18
on, and and we're there, and we are cheering you on and keep kicking ass. Let's get you back on television.

53:23
Send me a little email and I'll do it whenever you need me, babe. Just let me know.

53:29
Rosie O'Donnell, without she can go by one name, Rosie. Thank you so much. Thank you. We love you and everybody. Just keep keep fighting the good fight. We will get there. This is the Jan Arden podcast. Caitlin Green, Sarah Burke. We'll see you next time. Tootly do.