Idina Menzel

Welcome, welcome, welcome to Armchair Expert. I'm Dan Rather and I'm joined by Monica Maus.

How much restraint are you gonna have?

I just got a little case of the giggles.

Church giggles?

Church giggles, yeah. An old friend is here today. One of the most amazing singers I've ever heard in my life. Biggest chills I've ever had induced by singing.

Yes, she's incredible.

She's a beast. And who is that incredible singer, Monica?

Idina Menzel.

Oh, Idina. We love Idina.

She was really, really fun. I've met her a little bit in passing, but we've never had a real conversation. So I expected, I don't know why, a little bit more buttoned up, but she was super fun and cool.

And chill and down to earth.

Yep, loved her.

I love her. She has many great albums. Here, Still I Can't Be, Still, I Stand, Holiday Wishes. She has a new album out now called Drama Queen, which has a ton of really cool disco inspired music. It's really fantastic.

Proud Mouse, ding, ding, ding.

A nod to Monica Maus. Please enjoy Idina Menzel.

He's an armchair expert.

He's an armchair expert.

He's an armchair expert.

Well, we had mutual friends a long, long time ago. We had mutual friends. Bye, everybody.

Bye, baby. Bye, Nelty. Oh, Wobby, Wobby. Oh, Wobby, Wob gets a hug.

Great day for everyone. We had mutual friends, so I would see them at parties and stuff, but I didn't really know them. And then I booked an episode of House of Lies, a role as her assistant. She was like, I know you, and we chatted that day. And then I said, I also babysit, because that's really how I was making money at the time.

How was that for you?

Do tell.

She's an incredible boss, I will say.

I'm sure she's boss lady.

I know, but she's a good boss. One of our earliest fights, Dax, and I's earliest fight.

Oh yeah, one of like 7,000.. That's why we started this together. My hobby was finding Monica in the house and starting an argument with her, because we both love to debate things.

Debate is different than fighting.

They start as debates, and then they turn.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Whereas I was at the point where I wouldn't really even debate with him anymore. I was like, you know what? I don't want to dance. I'm not here for this.

She'd already done enough. One of our first fights was. he referred to me as the nanny on somebody else's podcast. And I listened, and he was telling a story. No, I'm sorry, babysitter.

And I've been trying to get her to do mushrooms. I think that was the whole point of the thing.

And I said, you know, she never refers to me as the babysitter or nanny or any sort of in the help position. She's always like, this is my friend. Or then she started calling me her external hard drive, but she would never even say, this is my assistant. That's the truth. But it meant so much.

That's easy to sympathize with. Do you want to hear my rebuttal? Yes. Okay. I'm on a show.

She needs to serve the material.

And then my own vanity was I didn't want to say nanny, because I still felt like we got shamed if people knew we had a nanny.

What about, I have a nanny, but now Walker's 14, and neither of them like the way that sounds.

So he's now uncle.

Which he is. He's a family member, but he's too cool to be nanny. Yeah. So go ahead. I'm sorry.

May I recommend it? Or force them on him? Because ultimately we did convince her to do it and she appreciated the experience.

I'm sure. With your kids around?

They were in charge.

No, I was part of the babysitting experience.

No, it was much later. after she left the role as caregiver. Right. She got bumped up on shrooms. Yeah.

I had requested to do shrooms for my 40th birthday.

I did them for my 50th. Are we allowed? We're both going to talk about, you. never think twice about the things you say that aren't, well, we can't talk about the thing that we're in together.

We're comedians. How can we just, we could be making this up.

So often I say things, and they have to be like, earmuffs. You know what I mean? Oh, to your kids. For our brand. For what Kristen and I, the thing we can't talk about.

No, we're not here to talk about the brand.

The big elephant in the room that we cannot talk about today.

Exactly. But the point being is that sometimes I don't have the sensibility of a, how old are we? 14, 15, with very skinny arms and a little bit of boobage.

Right.

And I'm a 52 year old woman that has a life with a hot husband and I like to talk about things. And I don't like to talk about alcohol or drugs, you know.

I think it's more important that you're, that we're real. Authentic. Yeah.

But it's also important that we make that money that we can send and leave to our children. I agree. I like that.

That's honest. I love the honesty. Yes.

I get that. You don't want to kill the golden goose.

I've only said one thing that got me in trouble on a press tour.

Say it again.

I was referring to some of the early works of the brand.

Oh yeah, yeah.

I said publicly that when we read Sleeping Beauty or Snow White, I just politely add, and then he kisses her to wake her up. But obviously no one should ever kiss you when you're sleeping, unless you consent. Because I thought that was an important part of the story.

Yeah. Let's be honest. The only Ben Shapiro didn't like it and he wrote a little thing about it. But I don't think anyone at Disney was upset.

But I would also, people would ask me all the time, does your son love that you sing? And I'd say, no, he doesn't really want me to sing ever right now. Oh, when you sing that song that I'm trying not to talk about. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And I say, no, he hates the song.

But it's the truth.

So then you'll see, there was a fine line between, when we talked about it, Kristen, and then I'd be like, my son loves it. He just loves it.

Oh, wait.

I have said the same thing.

The only boy in his class who still sings it proudly on top of his desk.

I've said the same thing, that my girls don't like it when I sing. Or maybe I wasn't referring to a specific song. One time. I was referring to the, perhaps, inequality or marginalization of some of the writing and or voice actors in early works. And I was told, you know what?

Let's not talk about the early works.

And I was like, but don't we learn from the early works? Don't we have to be able to see where we've come from?

So here's where I might diverge. And this is the funny thing about our current life is that all four of us were on the same page, we're on the same page, same page. I can see some merit in, hey, every time you bring up this new property that is empowering, you're not obligated to drudge through all the misfires from the past.

If I were bringing it up in every single interview, of course. I think I was telling a very specific story about how this wasn't that.

I also think it's okay to, even if it wasn't every single one, if that is meaningful to you of I'm very happy to be a part of a thing that's evolved, then you should totally be able to say that.

Yeah. I guess I end up.

We hate Disney.

No, I love Disney. It's provided so much, so much happiness.

I said it.

I love Disneyland and the Disney world.

I also just want to say, to clarify, it's not like it's coming from any specific credo. It's just a sweet publicist that's with us. That's trying to maintain the integrity of the interview and of her or his job position as well. So it's like, oh, steer away from that. I'll tell you this, though.

So it was a while ago. A year is a very long time.

And she was like, we called you from a store, didn't we? And then I remembered there was one time we were in a store shopping for jeans for them or something. For some reason, I had been explaining the plot line of Wicked to them. It's a confusing plot line.

Can be.

And backstory and ancillary characters. And I was getting all tangled up.

Especially if you just done shrooms the night before. Oh, man.

With your best friend slash, maybe sometimes a babysitter.

So I said, hold on, hold on.

They were getting angry at me that I didn't know the plot line correctly. And we had been listening to the music and they were like, but what does that mean when she says that? So I FaceTimed Adina and we all sat down in the middle of the store and Adina attempted to clarify the plot.

I did pretty good, right?

You did do pretty good.

It's kind of hard when I just jump in after how many years. Right. I was like, wait.

So when you finally got to Oz and you broke it down, it was very helpful. And Delta's like, so thanks for doing that.

Do you still get asked tons of questions about Wicked?

Yeah. Not plots.

That's a rare occurrence where someone wants the nitty gritties of the second act. Well, here's something that's funny, from my point of view. that happened is that I don't know how long did you do that show? 15 months, maybe?

Yeah. And a year and a half. And then I went to the West End and did it.

Before you did that, in the second to last show of the run.

Do you think this is funny?

Not to you at all, as is never the case when someone eats shit. But you had a scary accident. I did. Second to last show?

Yeah.

You're thinking you're out there for a couple of victory laps, I gotta imagine, right? You've already won the Tony at this point for it.

Many months already. Final weekend, family's in town, they're gonna throw me a farewell party, everything. And it was emotional, because that was a very transformative time in my career, in my life, everything. Yeah, there's this place on the stage where, towards the end of the show, Elphaba the Wicked Witch, quote unquote, melts behind a scrim in theater talk. that's like a sheet.

It's a sheet that they call a shim, yeah.

A scrim. I think it's a scrim. Yeah. And every night I'd have to stand on this sort of two by two square on the floor, which actually was a floor that would descend. It was like a little elevator thing.

But they would go down. You wouldn't scream, I'm melting!

No. You added that for the listener. Okay, perfect, perfect.

That's good, it is an audio show. Yes, yes. I appreciate that.

Yeah.

You know, usually the floor would go down like five feet. So I'd go down, down, down, down, down. Some crew guy would be there to welcome me and make sure I was safe. And it was on automation, so like a computerized thing that triggers it to go down. That night, somebody was subbing out.

Oh, no!

You know, so it was already down, so it was an empty hole is what I'm saying. Oh, my gosh! And it's dark, you can't see. So I just stepped into it. And I fell, but I fell, I hit the side, my ribs on the side.

I'm reconstituting!

I'm solidifying! Talk about a plot twist!

You know what unmelted is?

No.

Frozen. Oh, my gosh, wow, wow, wow.

So then they pulled me out. I really thought I had punctured my lungs or something. Because they say when you break your ribs, you can. Because I really was having a hard time breathing. And so all the crew guys, I'd known them for so long.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

So, laying there, I'm in full green makeup, in my act two dress. I found out later. at the time, this is 20 years ago, it was worth like $18,000.. I'll tell you why I found that out. So I'm laying on the ground.

Were you underneath the stage at this point? No, no, they were on stage. Oh, and I'm right.

I melted.

You were on stage. They paused the show.

Yes, they paused the show.

They paused the show. Okay, I didn't get that.

And is there a doctor in the house?

Yeah. Everyone's around me. Joby, my best friend, kind of like Monica, my dresser from every show I've ever done, and then who became my assistant. She was there. The doctor came up.

From the audience.

From the audience.

So we don't really know that he's a doctor or she's a doctor.

It could be anyone. It could be a podiatrist.

Come meet Idina Menzel.

I'll just say I'm a doctor. Oh, it could be.

Idina, it'd be me. I don't know. It's like, okay, there aren't any doctors, but I know a pretty good deal about this stuff.

And it's Bono. I might as well go help Bono tonight. Long story short, all I was concerned about, I remember, was the fact that they were going to wheel me out in a gurney, and there were going to be paparazzi fans out there and see me in green makeup, with my wig kind of like... And the expensive dress, which then I asked. when we got to the hotel, to the hospital.

Yeah, whatever. You're, like, dying.

And then I felt like we were at the Red Tent or something, where all the women came around with a bowl of Neutrogena and water so they could try to get the green off of me as the morphine was going into my body.

You're in the ER in full-dram makeup.

I'm in the ER, waiting to be taken into x-rays.

By the way, someone's there because they've consumed too many drugs. That's standard in an ER.

Oh, yeah, someone else. It's standard.

New York City.

Yeah, of course.

12, 13 people in the waiting room were having too much. They watched a monster go by. Literally, somebody was like, I got to see someone. I think I'm dead. Oh, my God.

Well, and the stupid jokes everyone made, including my father, who was in town, so he came and was like, oh, you're not looking too good, honey. Really? Thank you, Daddy. Then the other thing is my ex, you know, is Taye Diggs. He was in a movie at the time, so nobody could find him.

Oh, my God, his handsomeness.

Ladies, if you could just finish up with me, I will make sure that you get to meet my husband.

You were like, ladies, I get it, but after 12 years, you'll get past it. Let's get these x-rays going.

Then they finally got me out of the dress, found that I had just broken one rib, and the doctor gave us instructions for what to do when we get home, and the perc said, or the vicodin, I don't remember what it was, and then she said to just get her dressed, and you can bring her home, and I was like, get dressed and what? I came here in a fucking witch's costume. I had no clothes, so they put me in scrubs.

Wow, a little bit of green.

It doesn't come off unless you really do a good steamy shower with a proper cleanser. To tie it all together, then the next day, I could barely move, and then the director, producer all said, look, we really want to send you off and have some closure. Can you get to the theater? We want to at least bring you out for the curtain call, and we wanted to say something to you. I was like, I'll try.

He thought, you know what, she should definitely look like Tony Soprano for the end of this Wicked thing.

So that's how I came out. My lovely cover came out of the show in the last two minutes, at the exact time where I had fallen. And so, just when she's supposed to come back alive, remember, now I'm descending and it's like I melted and everyone thinks I'm dead. But at the end, you find out she's not dead. She ran away with her scarecrow lover.

Spoiler alert. If you're thinking about going back to 2003 and seeing Wicked.

That's the plot. That's it.

That's what had you and Delta so confused.

She graciously allowed me to steal the end of her show to come back on stage in my red tracksuit. The place goes crazy. I can't even sing because you can't project. You can't do any sound.

Although you're pretty bumped up on perks. You can do more than you should.

This is what I sound like. So, at the end, you go, because I knew you. And I couldn't sing it. So I was like, because I knew you.

Was that Phantom of the Opera?

How is that? Phantom of the Opera?

I've never seen it, but isn't there a phantom? No, isn't the guy like...

He doesn't know anything about musicals.

I don't know a lot about musicals.

But presumably the phantom sings in a deep voice. He does.

You should have heard the last fact check, when I was saying something about Frida Kahlo. And he said, oh, isn't that the person who sings? Don't Cry For Me, Argentina?

Oh, my God. Evita?

I was confusing my Selma Hayek.

Yeah. Selma Hayek. We took like six minutes for you to try to figure it out when I was like...

Selma Hayek was not in Evita.

She was in Frida.

Okay. Frida, yeah.

Oh, Madonna was? Madonna.

You're confusing.

Don't cry for me. Glenn Close on Broadway, right?

Very confused. Glenn Close on Broadway? Wasn't she? No. Patti LuPone.

Oh, sorry, Patti LuPone. No. Oh, my God.

Oh my God, Preston. Cut that out.

You know what that was like? Someone going like, yeah, no, the three guards were the bulls. Yeah. Michael Jordan. That's how deep nerd it got.

What are you talking?

Scottie Pippen. No. Jordan was.

Sorry, sister.

Anyway, did the red track suit, came out, was lovely, gave me flowers. They said all these beautiful things. I went to the closing party. they threw for me. I sat in a banquette as people came up to me and I don't remember any of that.

Again, very Tony Soprano style. Just sit and have them approach and ask for favors.

And then apparently this red track suit became a thing because just a couple nights ago, I had my release party for my disco album. I have out called Drama Queen. And instead of me having to perform at it, it was out in a Brooklyn gay club called $3 Bill. We had all these drag queens perform my stuff. Fun.

Yeah.

Deep cut. No.

Oh my God, maybe I'll go as you for Halloween.

But people don't know what that is.

It's a deep cut, but if they know, they know.

So inside.

Red track suit, Percocet.

A little bit of green.

I'll break one of your ribs for you. Tiny.

Yeah, exactly. Oh, my God, it's the story.

That's a story. But you got an enormously long standing ovation. I have to imagine that's the most comfortable you've ever been on stage in a track suit on Percocet.

Yeah. I wish I could sing those notes and be high all the time. It lowers your voice. But it doesn't happen.

You can still sing all the notes.

I can sing all the notes. Of course. Not like right now.

Yesterday, you pulled it out of your butt.

I had just finished going to the bathroom, by the way. I literally waited until I peed and then I was sitting there.

Well, you killed it.

I was doing Spelling Bee on New York Times, the game that I'm obsessed with now, and then I said, Oh, right, Kristen's badgering me to make an audio message for a three year old. So I did that and I had to make sure the flusher had stopped jingling.

But it sounded so good.

Yeah, but it was low. It was happy birthday. It was down there.

Yeah, but it was so beautiful. And then Groff responds with, great job, Idina. What the fuck?

Like, why are you making us all look bad?

Because I needed audio recordings for Yorma Tacoma's Little Girl.

And I thought you said sing happy birthday.

You, me, and Jonathan sang. Josh didn't sing.

What did Josh do?

He did go, summer.

He said, I'm Olaf and I like warm hugs. And I heard it's your birthday and everyone's talking about it. And I hope you have a great birthday and also a great ending to my favorite season. Summer.

That's good. That's great.

That's my Josh. That's good.

Wait, we have two singers in the room, so I want to address happy birthday, because now that's a ding, ding, ding. Kristen has a lot of opinions about happy birthday, and I wonder if you have the same opinions.

Oh, God, what?

Is it a triggering song for you? Let's start there.

Not that song. There's many triggering songs.

I have so much beef with happy birthday.

It happened yesterday. Why? Literally yesterday.

It's not the song, okay?

It's not the notes or the libretto. Cut that out when I snort.

We're going to turn it up.

Here's my problem with happy birthday. The people singing it. And let me get specific. Everybody starts it way too high. So you start here.

Happy birthday to you.

Happy birthday. You're fucked.

Do you know what I'm saying?

If you're the person that starts the happy birthday, you've fucked everybody.

There's no right key for everybody.

No, but you still have to start. I think an alto version of it is great.

Good for everyone.

Can I interject and just say, that's a bit of a red herring.

The real problem that you find is insufferable. Does he have Klossy whipped cream on his mustache?

It's everywhere. It's on my shirt. It looks like I went down on a donkey.

You've already started too high.

Okay. Here is the official tempo and the official key.

Happy birthday to you. Happy birthday to you. Happy birthday, dear Idina. Happy birthday to you. Otherwise, you're in no man's land and you go, happy birthday to you.

Oh, my God. You're my sun and my stars. The setting sun, the rising moon. You're everything. You're like an alcoholic parent who's about to tip.

Because of Kristen. Yeah. You're so codependent. I mean, I don't know if you're codependent. I'm projecting my own stuff.

I fight it. No, I do. But we sang it to my sister yesterday, the whole family, on a video. And us three are fine with happy birthday to you.

Is she rolling her eyes? And in the back, you hear,

she's just four beats ahead of us. And I know it's driving her crazy. And it's definitely driving me crazy because we're in no man's land, as you pointed out.

We started in no man's land. That's what you don't understand.

I find it helpful. The version you sang sounds aggressive and like you're in a hurry and you don't want to relish in my birthday. Let's beat it with she's soul.

Not if everyone's singing together.

It sounds weird when it's just her. There's going to be people slowing it down.

if we're in a big group. So the tempo will naturally get slower. I'm accounting for that. Then let me ask you this. Do you think that it's okay if I'm not rushing everybody?

Okay, you're ready.

Happy birthday to you.

Happy birthday.

No, no, no.

Oh, you think that's an improvement? I think that giving you a beat might help.

Oh, you wanted us to go to the beat, or we were trying to show how off-putting it is?

I wanted you to naturally go to the beat, because I know that's what your molecule is like to do. Oh, yeah.

The question is, though, do you have strong convictions about happy birthday? I don't. You're pretty loose about it?

I just let people be free, especially if they're not singers. Don't make them uncomfortable. You're like the easiest person in the world. I don't even try to sing harmony at the end because I don't want to show off.

That's not fair. Everyone wants you to show off.

That's when you know you're world-class and brilliant is like you're self-conscious, that you're so fucking good.

Right. I don't want to blast everybody here.

Same thing with karaoke.

It's not your place.

I don't do it. I have a microphone all the time, unless you give me a couple drinks.

Yeah, I think that's generous. Unless you desperately want to do it and you're robbing yourself of the pleasure of it. I never really want to.

I just get so conflicted because I'm like, please sing, and then I don't want to be a bitch about it. But I really never want to sing unless I'm in my zone.

Yes, you've prepared and you've done everything mentally you want to do.

Maybe it's the perfectionist too. I just don't want it to come off bad, especially in this day and age, to be caught coming off badly.

Correct me if I'm wrong. I've now known you for 10 years. You guys did that movie 10 years ago. On the spectrum of introvert, extrovert, you're not very extroverted, are you?

You're saying no.

No, no, no.

But I go on stage and I'm very big and I take lots of risks and I'm not introverted on stage.

I know.

I am funnier on stage than I am in my real life. I have my alter ego. Right.

But there's many people like you. in their performance or in their art, they're extremely, you have to be extroverted to act or to sing or to do anything. But then, when they're not doing that, they feel much more comfortable, just being a little more quiet. I think that's pretty darn common in our business.

I'm also just tired of myself.

You are.

I'm just exhausted of my own self, my own neuroses, my own voice, both inner saboteur and singing voice. Yeah.

I feel like you feel a little extroverted today.

Well, I'm not. Today. you're popping off. But that's what I'm saying. It's not like one thing's more authentic than the other.

No, it doesn't mean you're not being authentic.

I'm also very comfortable in here.

You can be both things. I wanted to come up so I could say hi to you and also to make you feel comfortable, because it's not like you've spent a ton of alone time with Dax and Monica.

But I would have found that for myself.

Okay, well, then, I'm going to let you. No, no, no.

No, I mean, seriously.

Hold on, no. I just wanted to compliment her for a little bit. But I wanted you guys for one question together, because you must acknowledge that you two share one of the rarest and weirdest, most specific and unique experiences, which is to be the two princesses in this unnamed musical. For it to be such a global experience, you two are it. Like, you can look at each other and go like, mm-hmm, it's weird when you drive down the road on Halloween and 80% of the people you see out there are dressed like you.

Yes.

Well, 90% of the costumes were Elsa.

Which I love.

Kristen was just looking at old videos of the girls and there's one where Delta and I are role-playing. We're playing that movie and she's like, I'm Elsa. I'm Elsa.

I'm Elsa. And then Monica's frozen. Yeah. And Delta's doing this thing where she's going up to her face very, very close and putting her hands out on Monica's cheeks, just about to kiss her, and then she pulls away. Oh, the anticipation.

How did that make you feel?

I'm used to it and it does not bother me in the slightest, because I fancy myself a team player, and I mean that genuinely. I don't know if you remember these texts, but for two years in a row, when my oldest was really little, she wanted to be Elsa and everybody did. I said, great. That's perfect. I'll be Anna.

This was for Halloween.

Yes, for Halloween. It was very, very important to her. So, for two years in a row, I dressed as Elsa. Which was just a brain scramble.

Oh, my gosh. But I don't mind it.

I still have my Elsa dress upstairs.

I see lots of Annas out there. By the way, I wanted to call her Anna for a long time because I'm an East Coast, Long Island girl. It's still uncomfortable for me to say Anna. I don't say aunt Kara. like my sister.

I'd rather date Anna. She sounds like way more fun. Right? You're like, where are you at, girl? You're singing in a wear?

So serious.

She's very cordial.

Yeah, we all let it go. Yes. So, join us now at lunch.

Just get over it.

But the experience that you had to have had, and I wanted to see if you guys could commiserate on it, and I've been able to observe it most of the times it happens, which is we're somewhere in public, we're at a restaurant, and you can see them from across the room. You know it's coming. You got a parent, usually mom. She's got a kid or two with her, and she's bringing those kids over to meet, not Kristen, to meet Anna.

It's traumatizing.

They introduce the children to Kristen. This is Princess Anna, and the parents assume they're going to be so excited about this, but the kids are so confused. Totally. They're like, no, no, Princess Anna's a cartoon character. Does this happen to you nonstop?

Yeah. I think it's good intentioned, but they don't realize how messy it is. I find there's like an age limit of when they can understand it, and it's about seven, and if it's prior to seven, the kid's bullshit detector is going to go off because their brains are going to start to malfunction and look at their parent and go, she's telling me this person is a cartoon, and this person is not a cartoon.

In my case, there's like a brunette, older lady.

Looks completely different.

With lots of lines on her face, and a little Botox in her face. That doesn't look like Elsa.

Have you had bad experiences with that, or how do you handle it? Because I know how I handle it, but I would love to know how you handle it.

When they start crying, I just... You just walk away.

I just say, I know, honey. I'm a scary old lady.

It's okay, Mom. You can take her away now. Nice to meet you. You know what I've done? This is cool of me, I think.

Oh, that's very nice.

And do they then connect?

They do a little smile. I'm saying they, like. it's been a million kids. It's like maybe one or two. Recently I've done that, yeah.

If you dare.

Well, you have a shared bond. It's like the Marvel universe. Only they will understand that, and you guys are the only ones that will understand this.

I would take any day of the week, the weirdness that parents give us around their kids for like. what a superpower it is. It's like you've got this huge squirt gun of joy that you're able to just fire, like yesterday when there was a friend's kid, and I just texted all three of you like, hey, take 10 seconds and say happy birthday. And we all did it, because we all do it every time.

Right, I get these requests all the time. Can you make a video for my kid? or bar mitzvah, Mazel Tov video, or we're getting married or whatever. So, but when Kristen does it for the last how many years, she always says, just an audio. And I go, is that all you want?

Also, I ain't trying to pull this for teenagers.

Do you know what I'm saying?

Teenagers are privileged, we know this.

All of them, every single one. But if it's a two, three, four, five-year-old kid, I'm always down. Do you remember when, I probably shouldn't say that, that's really bad.

Well, now you must.

Monica can cut it.

You can tell me.

There's no way to know what merch it was. I needed some stuff signed from you guys. And I thought it would be so much easier if I just did it. And so I nailed it. Instead of sending it to you guys and having everyone have to forward it, like you send it to Josh and I send it to Jonathan.

Well, I signed a few things on you.

I forgot about doing that.

You did, yeah, for you. But not, I don't think, like, charity.

Not for charity.

But they used to have stamps. Yeah, that's what you mean, a stamp.

But they don't give us stamps.

They're out of all these stamps. You can always tell,

like when you get a letter from someone. that's a stamp.

Though I also noticed this, to brag a little bit, like Julie Andrews wrote me a thank you for being on her children's show once, and it was a full-on stationary in her loopy big handwriting.

That's a frame holder.

Like a real thank you letter that we don't even write anymore because we email. Did you frame that? I did.

Okay, wonderful.

Julie Andrews, a letter from all the U2 guys from the Oscars that year, because they were nominated the same year.

As the Travolta. Yes.

The big year.

And so does the letter. Just a little, like, we love being in the same category. It was just so cool. Bono is the one man I've always wanted to duet with. that's never happened.

Oh my God, I think Kristen can make this happen, because he's been trying to bang her for about eight years now.

He has not been trying to.

Oh, he hasn't?

No. Oh. We work together. You know, he sent me a couple birthday things.

When did you work together?

We have done the Red show on Jimmy Kimmel a couple years in a row. They put together this big show to raise money for Red and for some reason I was the only person that consistently came like four or five years in a row. So I ended up kind of knowing how.

I want to do it.

So, just like I was conducting, Happy Birthday.

This is exactly how we can make this happen, because we got it all dialed in over at Kimmel.

I would do it. We should love him so much.

Well, I was just going to say, I'm so grateful for you to come up and share this.

This is very cringey, but I like being inextricably attached.

Oh, what could be cringey about that?

To this lady for the rest of our lives. Yes. When we're 90 and we're like singing our songs an octave or two lower, and we sound like we smoke Lucky Strikes. Yes. No one will hire us, but we're in Vegas and we're singing it, honey.

We've got to do it.

I see you guys on the deck of an aircraft carrier where they wheel you out in the wheelchairs and the soldiers salute you and stuff.

I've actually already thought this through and I've pitched this to you once before. When we get very old and we really want to retire with a send-off, I'm thinking we develop a musical version of whatever happened to Baby Jane.

Oh, yes. I know. I've thought of this recently.

And then we just do it on Broadway for however many months our old bones will let us.

But we don't have to be old for that. We could start writing it now.

Sure, but I think we have to be older, no?

Right, but how old were they? You always think people are-.

That's a great point.

I'm older than you, though. Listen. I've got 10 years on you.

Look it up for me, Rob, so I don't step in it, but remember Cocoon.

Yeah.

Wilford Brimley was like 52,.

playing a retired grandpa. How old did you think they were? They're not.

They were like 40..

Yes.

That's upsetting.

Maybe 50.. It seemed like they were in an old age retirement complex.

Well, they were all living together.

If we were in the 80s, you two would be playing great grandmas on TV right now.

I'm so excited for that. How old was he?

He was about 50.. 50.. Wilford Brimley and Cocoon. Remember, he's an old timer over the hill.

Yeah.

I love you.

I will be there. Love you.

Thank you for making this introvert more comfortable.

Okay, love you. Love you.

Love you.

All right, now let's talk about her.

Oh, yeah.

What a bitch.

What a bitch. I can't believe you got through that.

I don't know how you deal with her.

We're stuck with her, right? You and I both. Yeah.

And me. That's right. And you two.

Yeah.

You could leave. You do have the option to leave.

Well.

She's permanently stuck with this franchise.

That's true.

You know what I'm saying? Wow.

I didn't know the freedom I had.

Yeah, you have autonomy. still. We don't have. We've lost our autonomy.

Wait, but you dropped two things that we definitely have to hit on. You said neuroses and you said codependence.

Oh, gosh.

We got to get into those things.

Two very Jewish things to talk about.

Those are big old things.

Can we start at the beginning? This will be a fun reverse order, but that's okay. This show's very skeddywumpus. Can we start in Long Island? Sure.

What?

I think that's spectacular. Yeah. Is that true?

Yeah, totally true.

Okay, he would go to what? Department stores and stuff?

Kmart, Target, JCPenney. He always tells people, that's what helped put me through college were the buyers from those stores. And it wasn't his own company. It was a salesman.

Wow.

And was it like linen ones?

It was everything. It was Feeties. Oh. Or Beautiful. There's a fancy name for it, and I'm forgetting now.

Is it fair to guess that you were very well appointed with pajamas?

Drawers were just spilling over with pajamas.

Wow, what a niche.

Yeah, but I would have really rather had an extra pair of Jordache or Sassoon jeans.

Yes. Jordache has come up on here a few times. He has? Yeah. Funny.

He needed to befriend a daughter or son of the Jordache empire and trade. Yes. I got a ton of jammies over here. I'm trying to get rid.

Unload. Nothing.

But mom was a therapist?

Not always. She had never gone to college. So she went to college and got her degree. Another thing with the age is because I always think they're- They were so old. I think she was only in her early 30s.

So she was like, it's now my time to create the life I dreamed about.

Yeah. Although he always supported her in that way. He actually used to type her papers when she went back to school. Yeah. He was always very supportive of her in that way.

My mom was pressured into not breastfeeding with my brother and I. It was like the movement at that time.

Attachment issues between us sort of hurt because of that. She thinks I'm a nail biter because I didn't have the sucking.

And you're recreating now, for the rest of your life, this lost period of sucking.

My oral fixations.

Maybe that works for me too, because I have a horrendous oral fixation. I was a smoker and a gum chewer, and now I dip. You know, you name it. I got mints all the time. So maybe she's right.

Maybe she's right.

And then grandma and grandpa are from Russia.

Yes, except my dad just did a thing and he says now there's Poland. But I'm told that's all the same, and one and sort of everyone, especially the Jewish people, were always...

Traipsing around the whole area. Were they uniquely foreign, though when you would go over there? Did you feel their foreignness?

Maybe my grandfather, Max, a little bit more. Nobody had an accent or anything like that. Oh, they didn't? No. The Bronx just beat it out of them.

Yeah, too dangerous to have an accent in the Bronx.

Yeah.

Get called out.

Yeah. And then my mom's side, my grandpa Nat, who was her father, another Russian Jew. I only had him around until I was six, and then he died. And I have like the fondest memories of him. He was really an integral part of my singing and being creative.

Because he just would encourage you, and he loved seeing that.

Encouraged me, storyteller, loved to put on shows. I just remember it when I was six, or I was four or five, you know. And I remember him having a heart attack, being in the hospital. I remember my sister, actually three years younger than me, was born and got whooping cough. And she and my mom had whooping cough.