This transcript was automatically generated and might contain errors.

[0:01] Ben Rimalower: Welcome to Cast Offs with Ben and Daniel. Today's guest is Downtown Diva Bridget Everett.

[0:06] Daniel Nolen: Hey y'all.

[0:43] Ben Rimalower: Bridget's balls to the walls, Alt Cabaret has been shaking up the scene since her one woman show At Least It's Pink, co-created with Kenny Melman and Michael Patrick King, helped put Ars Nova on the map in 2006. More recently, she went from Manhattan Media Darling to Out and Out Star, amassing devoted fans from Patti LuPone to Amy Schumer, both of whom put her in their own shows. Besides being a fixture on Comedy Central's Inside Amy Schumer, Bridget has guested on Girls, Two Broke Girls, Lady Dynamite, Camping, Difficult People, Another Period, and At Home with Amy Sedaris, to name but a few. She's made the rounds of all the major talk shows, and she's a movie star, having appeared in Fun Mom Dinner, Little Evil, Trainwreck, and as Barb in the award-winning Baby Cakes. I love Baby Cakes. Bridget is gonna chat with us about Prince's's seminal album Purple Rain.

[1:35] Daniel Nolen: Purple Rain is actually the soundtrack to the 1984 rock musical film of the same name. I love that Bridget chose that. I mean, Prince's exemplifies the blend of rock, pop, and soul that I associate with Bridget.

[1:48] Ben Rimalower: You know, when I wrote this line, "Prince exemplifies the blend of rock, pop, and soul that I associate with Bridget," it felt so natural, and I mean it. And somehow reading it, it just feels like maybe it's just bad writing. It just sounds so forced.

[2:02] Daniel Nolen: Give it another shot. But this time, act like, you know.

[2:06] Ben Rimalower: Um, British.

[2:08] Daniel Nolen: Yeah, yeah. Try with an accent.

[2:10] Ben Rimalower: Prince exemplifies the blend.

[2:13] Daniel Nolen: The blend of rock, pop, and soul.

[2:16] Ben Rimalower: That I associate.

[2:18] Daniel Nolen: That's not good. No good content.

[2:21] Ben Rimalower: Should I do it something more uh, do it as a, as a, as an old Jewish woman?

[2:25] Daniel Nolen: Oh, now you're in my wheelhouse.

[2:28] Ben Rimalower: I love that Bridget shows that. Prince exemplifies the blend of rock, pop, and soul that I associate with Bridget.

[2:43] Daniel Nolen: I think we've created a character. You hear my glass clinking the ice. What's that Virginia Woolf part? She's like, "Give me another drink."

[2:56] Ben Rimalower: Uh, okay. Let's play a game.

[3:00] Daniel Nolen: Go on.

[3:01] Ben Rimalower: I love games. Which character in Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?

[3:04] Daniel Nolen: Oh, okay. I'm I.

[3:06] Ben Rimalower: Okay. No, I knew this was the game was. I mean, obviously, you are Martha.

[3:11] Daniel Nolen: Thank you. That's all I needed.

[3:12] Ben Rimalower: Well, I was trying to think if you're which character in Designing Women am I?

[3:18] Daniel Nolen: Delta.

[3:19] Ben Rimalower: You knew that without having to think.

[3:22] Daniel Nolen: Yeah. You've thought about this before.

[3:24] Ben Rimalower: So why don't you say what character I am? Golden Girls.

[3:28] Daniel Nolen: Well, the problem with Golden Girls, like I know who I think I am, and I feel like I think you are you are 100% who I think you are, which is Sophia Petrillo.

[3:36] Ben Rimalower: Ah, I really feel that I'm a Dorothy.

[3:38] Daniel Nolen: You are not a Dorothy.

[3:39] Ben Rimalower: I mean, everyone thinks they're a Dorothy.

[3:41] Daniel Nolen: Yeah, you think you're a Dorothy.

[3:42] Ben Rimalower: I don't. I think I'm the dumb one.

[3:46] Daniel Nolen: I think I'm a Dorothy with a rose.

[3:48] Ben Rimalower: Obviously I know Rose's name.

[3:50] Daniel Nolen: With a rose rising.

[3:52] Ben Rimalower: No, you don't get to do that.

[3:53] Daniel Nolen: Yeah. You're you're and then I'm a Sophia with a million dollar bill.

[3:58] Ben Rimalower: Sure. You're a Sophia because you're always cracking jokes. You're not dry. You're not dry like Dorothy. You're very like, but um like Sophia, you know?

[4:08] Daniel Nolen: I feel that I am super dry like Dorothy.

[4:10] Ben Rimalower: You're absolutely not.

[4:11] Daniel Nolen: I'm super dry.

[4:13] Ben Rimalower: You are Barbra Streisand, wet.

[4:18] Daniel Nolen: Alright. Enough is enough.

[4:20] Ben Rimalower: Now you think you're a wet with a who riser?

[4:23] Daniel Nolen: I think I'm a Dorothy when I'm in my little corner in my own little chair.

[4:27] Ben Rimalower: Exactly. I think I'm a rose when I'm with the world.

[4:31] Daniel Nolen: So it is a razor.

[4:38] Ben Rimalower: But not rose.

[4:42] Daniel Nolen: Okay, which character am I on Sex and the City?

[4:44] Ben Rimalower: Yeah, I like the skin. Uh Samantha, but only in personality.

[4:50] Daniel Nolen: Not in action.

[4:53] Ben Rimalower: I mean, no offense.

[4:55] Daniel Nolen: Oh, and I was a I used to have uh three Friday nights on a Tuesday.

[5:03] Ben Rimalower: I'm definitely a Charlotte.

[5:05] Daniel Nolen: You think I'm a Charlotte?

[5:06] Ben Rimalower: Yeah, you're definitely a Charlotte.

[5:08] Daniel Nolen: I'm not like as I mean, I've never been in a relationship.

[5:11] Ben Rimalower: Like Charlotte's much more like romantic and...

[5:11] Daniel Nolen: Well, everyone's in relationships.

[5:17] Ben Rimalower: I feel like I'm so including Carrie.

[5:17] Daniel Nolen: But yeah, but Carrie's in dysfunctional relationships, which Charlotte's are dysfunctional too, and you're definitely Charlotte.

[5:23] Daniel Nolen: What if there's just a spin-off called Charlotte's Web?

[5:27] Ben Rimalower: Charlotte's Web.

[5:29] Daniel Nolen: But I think back to you. I mean, I really believe that we're all just people.

[5:36] Ben Rimalower: Certainly not the same. And it's so wonderful to be here during the gay games.

[5:50] Bridget Everett: By the way, I have been out of the closet since 1991, and I've lived in New York City since 1999, and I've never once seen or heard of the gay games.

[5:58] Ben Rimalower: No, it is a real thing. There, my best friend Jess lives in Cleveland, and they hosted them four years ago. But it's like a very niche thing because it's like gay athletes who like go to this weird thing.

[6:09] Daniel Nolen: Like great Jewish sports legends. The leaflet from Airplane, anyone.

[6:13] Bridget Everett: It's like the millennials.

[6:14] Daniel Nolen: I love it. I haven't seen it so long.

[6:16] Bridget Everett: This is what they say, then they pretend.

[6:17] Daniel Nolen: It's never like, no, I don't know that.

[6:19] Bridget Everett: Stop saying they.

[6:20] Daniel Nolen: Who's they?

[6:20] Bridget Everett: You and all your little friends.

[6:22] Daniel Nolen: Millennials.

[6:29] Ben Rimalower: Well, we could not be more excited to have Bridget Everett here with us.

[6:33] Daniel Nolen: Goddess Bridget Everett.

[6:35] Bridget Everett: Oh, well, you're in my home. I better be here.

[6:38] Ben Rimalower: Your beautiful, beautiful, gorgeous Upper West Side.

[6:40] Bridget Everett: Your gracious home.

[6:43] Ben Rimalower: Top floor, honey.

[6:44] Bridget Everett: Penthouse.

[6:46] Ben Rimalower: I was like, I don't see a 16 on the elevator.

[6:48] Bridget Everett: Oh, yeah, we're going all the way up.

[6:51] Ben Rimalower: All the way. I'm so mad that my legal address isn't now like PH, you know, like the penthouse isn't part of my address.

[6:58] Bridget Everett: It's like 16. It makes me so upset.

[7:01] Ben Rimalower: You can tell people.

[7:02] Bridget Everett: I didn't know that. I thought you were just like so classy and subtle that you were like 16, because like you don't like to say.

[7:08] Ben Rimalower: No, I try like when I like order something, I like tried to put PH like into the address, and they're like, uh, we do not recognize that address. You know how like they were like, oh, I worked this hard, I got here, and I'm still just a number.

[7:20] Bridget Everett: You're the great, the greatest number.

[7:24] Ben Rimalower: Well, um, we're very psyched to talk to you. I was oh, I was starting to tell you, I was so excited that you said Prince's because I love Prince's. I mean, I grew up with Prince's, you know, in my era.

[7:34] Bridget Everett: Um, but I didn't know, I didn't associate you with Prince's. I mean, I guess I would have assumed that you liked Prince's, but I didn't know that that was like a special thing for you.

[7:44] Ben Rimalower: And going back and listening to the original Purple Rain soundtrack, I was like, oh my god, like this is so Bridget. It's so good, you know. Like the thing, well, there's a lot of stuff that I love about Prince's. He's like one of the first handful of albums I had. I had like the original Madonna album. I had, you know, it's like when Bruce Springsteen, Wham, uh, Thriller, like all that, you know, because I'm 47, so that was like sort of the heyday of like pop music.

[8:09] Bridget Everett: Yeah, you know, I think maybe people every all, you know, think that their generation is the heyday of pop music, but I feel like that was the, you know, with like MTV and all that stuff. Prince really is a little bit of everything, you know.

[8:22] Ben Rimalower: I love Michael Jackson. It's a little complicated right now. I thought about Michael Jackson. I was like, you know what, I don't want to get into that. Like it's everything, you know.

[8:29] Bridget Everett: Um, love the sinner, hate the sin. No, that's not even it. What would it be? What it would be, you know, like when you love the artists, but you hate what they've done.

[8:36] Ben Rimalower: Yeah, yeah. Um, but Prince's is just like he's like one of the only people that I can always put on my iPod, and I will never like fast forward it. It always puts me in a good mood.

[8:46] Bridget Everett: Yeah. He's like, I think he was such a hardcore showman that he died because of it. Because you know, he like he always had to do those like leg drops or whatever, you know.

[8:54] Ben Rimalower: I'm like, and so he's like taking medication for like his the pain in his legs.

[8:59] Bridget Everett: Yeah, basically, you know, and like what a way to go. You just die for your art.

[9:04] Ben Rimalower: But I never saw him. Did you see him?

[9:07] Bridget Everett: Oh, yeah, I saw him. He just like fucking magical. I remember I went with my friend Mike Jackson, um, who plays um guitar in my band The Tender Moments.

[9:15] Ben Rimalower: Oh, yes.

[9:16] Bridget Everett: And um, I was like, okay, I don't care what he does, as long as he sings The Beautiful Ones from Purple Rain, and like, and he opened the show at Madison Square Garden with The Beautiful Ones.

[9:33] Bridget Everett: The beauty wall stay good. You live in the beach. Paint a perfect picture. Bring to light a lot.

[9:54] Bridget Everett: Like, who opens a fucking show, a rock and roll show with a beautiful ballad and a fucking ballerina, like dance, you know, like it was gorgeous. Like, you have to be Prince's to not come out and just do like a crushing like, you know, everybody usually like does an up tempo to get the audience going.

[10:11] Ben Rimalower: He didn't give a fuck. He's just like, I'm Prince's, and I'll show up. I'm gonna do the splits later. I'm gonna smile and be charming, and he didn't really do a lot of stage banter because he doesn't need to.

[10:21] Bridget Everett: I don't know. You know, he's everything because he plays, he's I don't know. I like a real, I like a showgirl.

[10:27] Ben Rimalower: Yeah, you know, absolutely I like somebody that can turn up obviously while I love Patti LuPone and Freddie Mercury, just anybody that like dazzles Tina Turner, yeah.

[10:37] Bridget Everett: You know, but you know, I didn't, I didn't, I guess I sort of knew that about Prince's, but I wish I'd thought about it and gone to see him.

[10:43] Ben Rimalower: Yeah, um, but I mean it makes sense listening to the music. But so okay, when you were a kid, yeah, um, and you got did you get that album in did you buy it with your own money?

[10:54] Bridget Everett: Like I bought it with my own money, Sam Goody or whatever. In the record store. I don't remember, you know, an independent record store in Manhattan, Kansas. I can't remember what it was called, because like Sam Goody and those places wouldn't even come to Manhattan, Kansas yet.

[11:05] Ben Rimalower: It was we didn't have a mall yet, you know.

[11:07] Bridget Everett: So you bought it. Um so it's curated by like the person that owns it.

[11:11] Ben Rimalower: Yeah, and like there was you know, I grew up in a college town, but also like in Manhattan, Kansas, so like a small college town.

[11:17] Bridget Everett: So um it wasn't like when I talked to my friend Champagne Jerry slash Neil Medlin, like he's like, I grew up on like Bikini Kill. I found like I went to some like college record store and I found like a Bikini album that like formed my, you know, my youth and my art and my mind, and like and I'm like, well, they didn't have that word.

[11:37] Ben Rimalower: I don't know. They probably did, but you know, I just bought what was in the window and what looking and sounded good and what was on MTV.

[11:43] Bridget Everett: And I mean, were you one of the cool kids? Like, I imagine you like in like in junior high being the girl that knew the coolest music and like saw the concerts and was like just kind of like a tastemaker in that lunchroom kind of atmosphere.

[11:58] Ben Rimalower: In some ways, like I was popular as like homecoming queen or whatever, but whatever. It's not cool to be homecoming queen.

[12:06] Bridget Everett: It is if it's you, but I always I kind of feel like in retrospect that I was like friends with everybody but friends with no one, you know what I mean?

[12:13] Ben Rimalower: Like I had a lot of I just was friends with a lot of different groups of people because I was in show choir and in choir and on the swim team and did sports, and my older brother and you know, my brothers and sisters were all real popular, and um how many siblings do you have?

[12:29] Bridget Everett: I mean, I guess a six. Bridget, Brock, Brian, Brick, Brad, Britain is ridiculous. Did they introduce you to music?

[12:33] Ben Rimalower: I mean, did you look up to the bigger?

[12:36] Bridget Everett: Yeah, everybody like because everybody had their own bedroom, so there would be a different sort of soundtrack coming from each room, which was really cool.

[12:44] Ben Rimalower: Okay, well, just go through it. What were the soundtracks?

[12:46] Bridget Everett: Oh, my brother Brian, who was um next to me on one side, he would listen to like Styx and like REO Speedwagon and stuff like that.

[12:55] Bridget Everett: And my brother Brock was across the hall, and he loved to barge. So I would listen.

[12:59] Ben Rimalower: All this love is waiting for you.

[13:02] Bridget Everett: And all this is waiting for you, my baby.

[13:22] Bridget Everett: So I love that too. And then my uh oldest brother was into like Bread and like you know the soft hits of the 70s.

[13:30] Ben Rimalower: If a picture paints a thousand words, then why can't I paint you?

[13:39] Bridget Everett: The words will never show the you I've gone to know.

[13:49] Bridget Everett: And my oldest, my one of my older sisters, two of my sisters were really into Barry Manilow.

[13:55] Ben Rimalower: And ready to take the shit again.

[14:19] Bridget Everett: And my mom was into Barry Manilow and Barbara Streisand, which is what your shirt is today. And to give you another perspective. Yeah, and of course, and Bette Midler for everybody. So we um it was a real hodgepodge. And then since my mom was a music teacher, we all grew up taking piano lessons and things, so we would sit by the piano and like sing and drink around the piano and you know play like Lionel Richie or whatever songbook we had. Did everybody like respect each other's music, or was there like um there's no rivalry? It was just like, you know, like one time I remember I took my brother Brad's Bread tape. I brought Bread because I was like, Bridget brought Brad's Bread. Yeah, I did. I brought Brad's Bread tape up into my room and he flipped as shit. He was like not happy about it. But um, you know, it wasn't it wasn't like you you didn't respect other people's music choices, you just wanted to keep yours for yourself.

[15:13] Daniel Nolen: And so what and did I mean, so was the really the current pop of that moment, the Prince's and the Madonna, was that what you introduced to the house, or were they also listening to the brother?

[15:22] Bridget Everett: Well, my brothers and sisters were older, so most of them were gone at that point. Um but everybody sort of found the music of their generation kind of stuck with it, and I'm kind of the same way, but I do love all those, like when I I like to listen to my brothers Brock and Brian, and we're on a text thread, and we always text like do you remember this song from like the 70s or the 80s, you know, and um we really stay connected through music. Like that's that's like uh a way that my family communicates.

[15:51] Bridget Everett: And it's it's safe.

[15:53] Daniel Nolen: Yeah, yeah.

[15:54] Daniel Nolen: And are any of them working in music besides you?

[15:58] Bridget Everett: Um, no. My brother Brock, like, he's sort of like uh a party monkey or something. That's not the right word, but like you know, play rock play. Like they'll go to parties and they put out a keyboard and he can play anything by ear. Oh wow and so he does music like for fun, but he's not like um he's not making a living like I am. A handsome living house living. But he um but you know, I love even like when I go home and visit my mom, my last time my brother and I were there, I had to get up really early for a flight, and my brother got up with me and he just sat at the piano and was playing like Manilow, you know, while I was getting ready and I was up getting ready in my mom's room and it's just like um it's a really lovely element in our family.

[16:47] Daniel Nolen: Yeah.

[16:47] Bridget Everett: And uh when we get together we all still sing and stuff. But Prince's isn't like Prince's is more mine.

[16:52] Daniel Nolen: Yeah.

[16:55] Bridget Everett: I love it. But I but this particular album has been through it's been there for me in so many different like ways in my life. You know, like when I had broken up with some guy or some no, that's not even what happened. I wouldn't even call it that. Like some guy that I was dating started dating another friend of mine after we'd sort of broke it up and they sat and they parked in front of my house. Like she like brought him there, or he brought her there to be like, oh my god, like try like I'm trying to get over her word, Bridget and I are done. But then they like sat there, looked up in my window and then like made out. I'm like in the car, like watching it was a it's it's a fucked up thing. But my friend Stephanie would come over and we would listen to um Purple Rain literally like over and over again.

[17:45] Bridget Everett: Purple Rain.

[18:06] Bridget Everett: And at that time, like somebody had to get up from the bed, go over, lift up the needle, put it back. But I loved it, not just because the song is beautiful, but it's like eight minutes long. So you didn't have to get a graphic three minutes. But I love all that because it's just there's like you know, it's so beautiful and and uh and powerful, and then it goes on for so long, you can sort of like unwind from your emotions, and then you start it again, and you get all ramped up, and then you go through you go through a whole sort of a cycle of um rejection.

[18:40] Daniel Nolen: Totally, yeah.

[18:41] Daniel Nolen: And so did you when was the first time you saw Prince's in concert?

[18:45] Bridget Everett: I didn't see him until like 20, 15 or 20 years ago.

[18:49] Daniel Nolen: Oh wow, okay.

[18:50] Bridget Everett: Yeah, because when I grew up, like, if you wanted to see a concert, I grew up in Manhattan, nobody came to Manhattan except for Motley Crue.

[18:57] Daniel Nolen: Kansas City.

[18:58] Bridget Everett: Yeah. So you'd have to drive like two hours.

[19:00] Daniel Nolen: Oh wow, yeah.

[19:01] Bridget Everett: And we did go one time, my friend Andrew and I did with my brother, um, to um he so I could go see Michael Jackson when I was like a sophomore or something in high school, and um, and he was supposed to like he got so tired that he couldn't drive us back, so we were like, you know, 16 driving on the I 70.

[19:20] Daniel Nolen: Um, yeah, who cares?

[19:22] Daniel Nolen: Nobody cares, Bridget.

[19:23] Bridget Everett: Shut up, Bridget.

[19:25] Daniel Nolen: No, we we love we love underage uh driving.

[19:28] Daniel Nolen: Um Kansas you can drive when you're 14.

[19:30] Bridget Everett: Are you serious? Is it still that way?

[19:32] Bridget Everett: I probably because of farms and shit like that, so you can drive to school and to work.

[19:36] Daniel Nolen: Well, I've been to the same thing.

[19:38] Daniel Nolen: A lot of kids grew up.

[19:39] Daniel Nolen: It was 16, but a lot of kids grew up driving on the farm, and that's how I learned to drive out my dad's land and stuff.

[19:44] Bridget Everett: So yeah, I had my first car when I was 14.

[19:47] Daniel Nolen: And wow, what was your first car?

[19:49] Bridget Everett: A Chevette. Yes.

[19:51] Daniel Nolen: Did your family have did your family have like money?

[19:54] Bridget Everett: No. We acted like we did, and then my parents got divorced, and we the financial records became um uncovered, and we realized that we've been living a lie and it got real dark real fast.

[20:05] Daniel Nolen: Wow, oh my god.

[20:07] Daniel Nolen: How old were you when your parents split up?

[20:09] Bridget Everett: And was that what did music become kind of a refuge for you in that time?

[20:13] Bridget Everett: Oh, for sure. Yeah, music is always like it's a refuge, it's a way I communicate, it's a way that I feel safest, I feel most connected. And I really do think that that is because the way I was raised. Because like when my parents were getting divorced and it was like a nasty divorce. I think most of them are, or many of them are. Um we would spend a lot of time listening to like just Barry Manilow or Bette Midler or Barbara Streisand or Neil Diamond, like with my mom, and she would just sort of gently weep and get shit faced on Scotch. And we never really talked about what was happening.

[20:51] Bridget Everett: Yeah, we just experienced the sadness in silence through music.

[20:56] Daniel Nolen: Yeah.

[20:56] Bridget Everett: Um, which maybe is weird, but no, it's almost like therapeutic, you know.

[21:01] Daniel Nolen: Yeah.

[21:01] Daniel Nolen: Well, it's easier than talking about it, more comfortable.

[21:04] Bridget Everett: Yeah, yeah. You realize that.

[21:06] Bridget Everett: Very quickly when you moved to New York and all your fucking actor and artist friends are like, Well, we need to talk about this. Like, no, we don't. Let's just put on an album and cry.

[21:14] Daniel Nolen: I mean, I think someone like Bette, that's what she does so well is that she really makes you feel what a song is about.

[21:20] Bridget Everett: Making the run.

[21:30] Daniel Nolen: Total strangers.

[21:49] Bridget Everett: I feel like you do that too when you're performing.

[21:51] Daniel Nolen: Yeah.

[21:51] Daniel Nolen: And your voice is just so um, it communicates so much just with your voice, you know.

[21:57] Bridget Everett: And I think that that's so powerful.

[22:00] Bridget Everett: Well, it's good in a ballad, especially something like that, because you know, it feels so expressive. It feels it, you know, it's not like it's my problem sometimes with like opera because like sometimes the voices feel interchangeable, and I don't I don't feel like I'm getting a story from their well, I feel that way about any genre, really.

[22:17] Bridget Everett: Like, and that's like you know, so much of it's about just like vocal masturbation and runs and stuff. Like we were watching, uh, my friend sent me this clip from uh Rascal Flatts, who, you know, congratulations, they're a very successful country band. But like you can literally just you know see him, he's just like tracking his vocal like listening, yeah. Listening's vocal run, and I'm like, and which is there is an audience for that, and there's and and God bless them. Sure, you know.

[22:41] Bridget Everett: Um, but like when I go to like a Broadway show, a lot of the reason I don't like to spend a lot of money on Broadway anymore, is because it's all put it in the snout and shout, and it's like this really belty.

[22:42] Daniel Nolen: Put it in the snout and shout.

[22:55] Bridget Everett: Bark and bark style.

[22:56] Daniel Nolen: Totally, totally.

[22:57] Bridget Everett: But you know what I mean? And I think that's why like I respond, I know that you love Patti. I think I don't I'm sure you're a Patti fan too. But like there's something that's like in the gut about it.

[23:16] Daniel Nolen: Everything's gonna be bright life and lollipop.

[23:21] Bridget Everett: Everything's having a rose for me and pretty much so, yeah. And um, and I feel like Prince's is that way, you know, just to bring it back to him, but like, but you know, like when it's all just about like the placement of your voice or or how you're singing, not what you're singing. I'm I'm turned off.

[23:50] Bridget Everett: But you know, if you're singing a ballad, right, you know, the challenge is to keep that going, right? Because you have to hold these long notes and like what are you communicating while you're holding one note? But it's the opposite problem, you know, with like opening numbers, you know, and a lot of the Prince's stuff that's not ballads.

[24:11] Bridget Everett: Yeah, like where you know you're if you're singing like all these words and it's like really fast and it's like a dancing beat or whatever, you know, ha it's like you know, sometimes it's just technically I imagine just to get it out, let alone have like a story or a feeling behind it.

[24:26] Daniel Nolen: Yeah, but you can tell, like you can, you know, Prince's like does things with a vocal line that are you know that are imaginative and interesting, but they come from a place that's a real place, a real place.

[24:38] Bridget Everett: It's emotion, and you feel the music moving through him.

[24:41] Daniel Nolen: Well, that's what the first thing I thought when I put on Purple Rain yesterday was what's what's the first song let not let's get lost. What's it called?

[24:46] Bridget Everett: Let's the first song on the album.

[24:50] Daniel Nolen: Oh, I don't remember the track order.

[24:53] Bridget Everett: It's such an opening number.

[24:57] Daniel Nolen: That's what it's like.

[24:58] Bridget Everett: Oh, that's so crazy.

[24:58] Daniel Nolen: It's what did you call it?

[25:00] Bridget Everett: Let's get lost.

[25:01] Daniel Nolen: Oh my god.

[25:03] Bridget Everett: But it feels exactly like a Bridget Everett's one. Like I can imagine you opening with that number, you know.

[25:08] Bridget Everett: I think I wanted to at some point, but somebody else sings it, maybe like Sandra Bernhardt or something. I don't know.

[25:13] Daniel Nolen: Somebody like somebody.

[25:14] Bridget Everett: So she says little red corvette.

[25:16] Daniel Nolen: A little red corvette, yeah, yeah.

[25:17] Bridget Everett: But um, you know, even like you know, Darling Nicky, you know, do you know did you know the album at all?

[25:25] Daniel Nolen: Very.

[25:25] Bridget Everett: Oh, I think yeah.

[25:26] Daniel Nolen: Okay, so Darling Nicky, like I remember this guy in middle school auditioned for uh a variety show singing Darling Nicky, and I grew up in Manhattan, Kansas, and it is a conservative red state.

[25:38] Bridget Everett: And Darling Nikki is like, I met her in a hotel lobby, masturbating with a magazine.

[25:38] Bridget Everett: I met her in a hotel lobby, masturbating with the magazine. She said, How'd you like to waste some time and I could not resist one that's all little Nikki ground? Or you know, like it's very sexual, and he dressed up as Prince's and he was like, you know, like fucking like it was like if you saw that on a TV show, you wouldn't believe it. Like he came out and he full-on did fucking Prince's in 19, what would that be like 86 or something or 85?

[26:23] Daniel Nolen: I can't remember what year it was.

[26:24] Bridget Everett: How old was are you in middle school? Who gives a fuck? But um 85.

[26:28] Daniel Nolen: Um and he was like, he was like thriving, he was like writhing on the stage singing that fucking song, and it was I was like I'm always was wild, you know.

[26:40] Bridget Everett: Like I had and a lot of you know, there weren't a lot wild people.

[26:44] Bridget Everett: I mean, there were wild people, like we would go to you know, people get shit faced to go to the lake, but like, but like physically and sexually, like a lot of people were having sex, but they weren't free-spirited in that way.

[26:54] Bridget Everett: And I've always felt very free-spirited. So seeing that, and then like it just seemed Prince's like reflects something that I've I uh identified with just the sexuality of it was so cool.

[27:06] Daniel Nolen: Yeah, and what about like the way like because he had uh he used to make headlines in that era for the way he dressed and having like feminine qualities.

[27:14] Bridget Everett: I always thought he was gay, and then like you know, I was I think I was surprised when I would think about him years later that that was not part of the narrative about him.

[27:22] Daniel Nolen: Yeah, but um, was that like something that you um did was that did that feel like a dangerous thing or like a rebellious element of him to be no?

[27:33] Bridget Everett: I mean, I in some ways it did because like all my friends from school, a lot of my friends from school were really into like hair metal and like shit like that. Um, but even those guys dressed kind of femme, you know, but nobody called them right gay because they're all grabbing their crotch and you know, you know, singing about teenage girls, you know, fucking them on the hood of a car, you know.

[27:54] Bridget Everett: And Prince's was just like direct about like sex and and you know, Madonna, everybody, everything was really sexual, but it's always been that way, you know, like James Brown and Little Richard.

[28:04] Bridget Everett: Yeah. I saw this fucking fantastic documentary that changed the whole way that I performed. Um, I think it's called That the Good Times Roll, and it's it I didn't really have the appreciation for Little Richard that I should have, but like, you know, it just like he's driving in the back of a limo.

[28:22] Bridget Everett: You have to see it. They're interviewing him. There has to be a clip of it somewhere, so you don't have to watch the whole thing. But and uh they're like, whatever you do, you know, we're going there. These girls are crazy for you. Just don't go to the edge of the stage. Just don't just, you know, they're like, he's like, okay, is that what you want me to do? You know, and he gets to the venue, and he's fucking in the front, the girls are passing out, you know, he rips off his shirt, starts throwing shit at the audience, and I was like, but obviously I I like a little um scandal on the stage. When did that become like part of your performances?

[29:00] Bridget Everett: Um as soon as I started doing karaoke, like in in the in the 90s living in Arizona. I wasn't I was studied opera, speaking of opera. Did you go to school in Arizona?

[29:09] Bridget Everett: Oh, to Arizona State, and like I wanted to learn how to sing and I wanted a scholarship, and they gave me one because I wanted to get out of Kansas, but um, but I wasn't really getting any opportunity to express myself in the way I wanted to, so I just go to karaoke bars and I would like rip open my shirt and just go wild, and like people really liked it. And then when I moved to New York, I started doing that more and more and more, and and you just sort of find your way. But um, I like danger. I like, you know, like do you ever see um Playboy After Dark, Tina Turner?

[29:43] Daniel Nolen: Yeah.

[29:43] Bridget Everett: Um, just like she's so visceral. She's so sexual and so like grounded and just fucking. If you haven't seen her, I think the one that I think Scott Whitman showed me her on Playboy After Dark, which is in Hugh Hefner's Living Room, is like a really cool vibe, and she's just in there just sweating in her backup dancers, and it's just so meaty and fucking. And every time I see something like that, I just want to fucking get up and rip my heart out and fucking smash it on the walls and do something like that. You know, did you were did you feel that way as a kid already about performing?

[30:16] Bridget Everett: Yeah.

[30:18] Bridget Everett: Yeah, I just I liked anything that was big and wild. Always. Did like the training you got like in school for like opera or whatever, did that feel at all relevant to the stuff you were doing in karaoke or yeah, because like I have like a big voice, and when I was studying operatically, like what you know, when you're s I guess that's where I learned to put it in your snout and shout thing, like there's like a Broadway, like sort of pinny sort of pingy thing.

[30:43] Daniel Nolen: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

[30:44] Bridget Everett: And then the and the um, yeah, and the mask, yeah. And with um opera, I mean it's about that too, but it's more of like a cavity, like you feel in your whole body. And so when you feel that sort of reverberation going through your body and you hear the sound, like how powerful it is, it's uh it's it's very thrilling, you know. So I love that. I love that element of it, but I I didn't want to like be wearing fucking turtlenecks and not drinking and not, you know. I wanted to have a life because in order to sing that way to have a clear tone, I would have had to be really disciplined, and I didn't want that. I just found a kind of singing that suited my lifestyle.

[31:23] Daniel Nolen: Yeah, and so how did what did you come to New York right after school?

[31:27] Bridget Everett: No, I stayed there for a couple years in Arizona, Arizona, singing like at um spring training games, like the national anthem and doing karaoke. And I probably could have stayed there for the rest of my life, but like there was some shit going on with like the MLK holiday, like they voted to not have like if I'm remember remembering correctly, they didn't want to have like a holiday for Martin Luther King, and I was like, I think this state is not for me. Like, you know, like it feels a little wound tight, yeah. Racist and was New York the the only place that you w would have thought of or was like that.

[32:04] Bridget Everett: No, and I still don't want to live in LA. I l I like to go to LA like when I'm getting paid.

[32:08] Daniel Nolen: Yeah.

[32:09] Bridget Everett: I don't have a driver's license, I like it because people drive me around. Um, I'd love to get like a Spanish house and make it modern on the inside. Like I love the fantasy of LA. But I just can't take all those those bros out there.

[32:24] Daniel Nolen: Yeah.

[32:24] Bridget Everett: I'm a s I I I love New York, you know. I just there's there's nothing like it. And by living here, like now I'm you know, now I'm friends with like Patti LuPone. You know what I mean? Like I'm friends with like people that I admire and then inspire me. And like if I got if you're hanging out in LA, like who am I gonna meet like Patty, or who am I gonna meet right, you know, like there's something not to drop her name while I keep bringing her up, but but you know, she's been at it for a long time. And and I didn't always have an appreciation of Broadway voices, but I've always loved and respected her guts and her music.

[33:02] Daniel Nolen: Sure, yeah, well, she has what you're talking about, yeah.

[33:04] Bridget Everett: She's uh really just letting it all out.

[33:07] Daniel Nolen: Yeah, and she she cares about the details. You know, like I've sung with her a couple times and like she really is like, Well, what is this what does this mean? Like, what am I saying right here? And and I'm sure a lot of people do that, but but and Patty has like such a solid technique that she can just apply the emotion and her and her voice takes care of itself. But when I again like when I go see a Broadway show, like I saw one the other day, and I was um you can see that there's some people that are technique driven, and then there are people that are performance-driven, right?

[33:41] Bridget Everett: Yeah, and and uh but those people I think are just you know not artists or they're lesser artists. I mean they're well and they're also singing like a really difficult vocal track and they have to get through H. So I respect it.

[33:52] Daniel Nolen: No, but I don't I don't respect it because Oh sure! Because they they could put their you're not asking them to hurt themselves, if anything, I mean your patty example and everything you just said about that, you know, like the cavity, and um you know, the point of the technique is to allow you to fly, not to come as a substitute for it, right? You know, I mean, you know, we we talked to Mary Testa for this podcast, you know, and and we love her, and she loves you by the way.

[34:18] Bridget Everett: I love Mary, she's she's another one, she's like but Mary's also was very explicit about how much her technique saved her, and she relies on that. I mean, it's not as a substitute for guts and heart, it's to enable them to you know, yeah, and the people that don't have guts and heart, it's not because they have technique, it's just because they don't have guts and heart.

[34:37] Daniel Nolen: I think I think there's a lot of truth to what you're saying, and you see that in like a lot of pop music, yeah.

[34:43] Bridget Everett: And it's like but it's a different gig. I mean, you know, it is a different gig, and it just it's sad because on Broadway we know that actually that's part of the gig, yeah, and because these are machines and these shows that keep running, and who I mean, I think sometimes with these big hit musicals that run for years, they'll put somebody in over somebody else because they fit the costumes of the one that played the part before.

[35:05] Daniel Nolen: Yeah, 100%.

[35:06] Bridget Everett: I mean, it's a business, but the quality control is not focused on necessarily the same art that yeah might be at the beginning of the show.

[35:15] Daniel Nolen: Yeah you know but I mean it you're such a great success story now you know and you're this is that right and not only for how high your success is but also how special and unique I mean you've completely paved this path that's nobody else is on I mean you know in this world between all these different genres I think what you said is so uh powerful especially to me because I try to do it's like you said I tried to take a path that fit my lifestyle you know but that's we can look back now you know and not that you're looking back I mean obviously there's so many places that you can go and will go you know but but you couldn't have predicted at all the specific road that your career has done.

[35:59] Bridget Everett: So what did when you moved to New York from Arizona you know what did you hope for or what were you planning on or what was the idea well I didn't have any plan I didn't really know anyone I just and it took me too long like I had a lot of self-doubt and then I just would sing in like and then I just got to point where like if some I went to go see the life do you remember on that and um I sat in the front row I got like a TKTS thing or whatever and I was so blown away by Lillias White I think she's like she like opened my eyes for the And I waited for her afterwards.

[37:12] Daniel Nolen: Oh my god, I love this story.

[37:14] Bridget Everett: And I I was wearing my sh I had these like I remember exactly what I was wearing. I had these sh these black sandals on those like sort of platform sandals, plastic platform sandals from old navy, um a little skirt that I got in at the gap, and this black and white striped shirt that I got in the thrift store. And I stood out there and I had a like a little sort of cute little bob tight little bob, and I said I waited for her, and like I I was by myself, and she came out and I was just like overcome. I was like, oh my god, I I love you. And she sat there and she talked to me, like she I was nobody. And she's like, just remember this, always tell them whatever they ask you to do, say you can do it and figure it out. And I started thinking, like, okay, like because like when I was at home or when I was at karaoke, like I felt like the best singer in the world, or like, you know, not the best singer in the world, but like I felt like um restaurant quality.

[38:10] Bridget Everett: Yeah, right. No, I felt like um I felt really powerful, you know, but I couldn't, but I didn't, but only when I was singing and never had that belief in myself. And so I just started like, and so if I ever got an audition, I would get, you know, I'd end up in the bathroom, like shitting my pants and you know, and all that sort of stuff, and just never, and I still struggle with confidence, not on the stage, not in the moment, but like having to prove myself.

[38:35] Daniel Nolen: Yeah.

[38:35] Bridget Everett: Um, is a real struggle for me. But listening to her and just like the thing of like knowing that somebody who I'd just seen on Broadway, just being like, you just figure it out. You know what I mean? Like because you think that everybody on Broadway, everybody in show business has it all figured out, they have the tools, they've gone to Carnegie Mall and they've done the you know, they and I didn't take I've never been to acting school. I you know, I I studied voice, but I didn't know how to be like a rock singer or whatever, you know, and you just and eventually I just learned you just have to fucking figure it out. And so it it's taken some time, but but you know, like people like Bet, like she had to, she's there's nobody like her, right? Like she had to be truly unique, yeah.

[39:14] Bridget Everett: Truly unique, and like and seeing like her old bathhouse like tapes, you know, when she was with Barry, so like two of my favorites together, um and a lot of that I didn't actually see until like further I was further along. Um I just didn't know where to see the clips or whatever, but but seeing how she's taken that and given her, you know, created a thing. I was just like, I have to do the same thing, like and you have.

[39:40] Bridget Everett: I I yeah, I mean, you know, I'm almost six feet tall, I'm a big woman, I'm not like there's not a lot of physical types like me, there's not a lot of like people that do the exact same thing as me, so you just have to figure it out, and like, and the best way to do that is just to keep showing up night after night, whether it's Joe's pub or some club, and just like Murray Hill says, every gig counts, yeah, and people started seeing me and figuring out ways to use me, but it took a very long time.

[40:08] Daniel Nolen: But I mean, how did you meet Murray Hill and and Neil and and you know Mike Jackson and whoever? I mean, how did you find your your people and you know, because you are such um it's not only that your career has forged new ground, but you've also been part of this kind of like coming together of this like scene downtown thing that's you know happened in the last 10 or 15 years or whatever, you know.

[40:34] Bridget Everett: Well almost you got here before that was really. I mean, there was Kiki and Herb weren't famous when you moved to the city.

[40:39] Bridget Everett: Well, they were pretty, they were big, and like my friend Zach took me to see Kiki and Herb show, and I was like, oh my god, this is fucking great.

[40:53] Bridget Everett: Maybe I'm just like your father too. Maybe I'm just like my mother. Just like never satisfied. My mother's game!

[41:05] Bridget Everett: One of Christ. And I and Earl Dax, who's like, you know, this sort of uh downtown, I think he's moved since I think he lives in Philly now or something, I'm not sure. But um, but he introduced me to Murray Hill on the street in Williamsburg, and I met Murray and I was like, oh my god, that's that's Murray Hill. Like I knew who Murray was. And then I think Earl's like, oh, you know, Bridget is a singer. Ah, you're a kid, all right. And then I did one of Murray's shows at Mo Pickens many years ago, which is since closed, and like I sang this song I used to do called Canhole, which is original songs.

[41:40] Bridget Everett: Yeah, like you know, and that was in At least it's pink, right? And I just started and like and Murray, like I just did what I did at karaoke bars. I just went wild, I had fun, I fucking and Murray started booking me in more of a show's, you know, and it just was a slow growth from there. I just would meet people. I met Sweetie, who's a a very um influential drag queen for me and a friend, and like she started putting me in shows, and people just started putting me in there. So I would go on weight tables, I'd be there till 11, and then I'd be on stage in some club at midnight.

[42:15] Bridget Everett: Um John John Battles, who's a DJ, was my roommate. He put me, he had me do the show and uh at the Ritz in Midtown on Sunday nights, and I did some real crazy shit there.

[42:24] Daniel Nolen: What what kind of shit did you do?

[42:26] Bridget Everett: Oh, I fucking I think I used to take a razor and like shave off part of my pussy when I was that I mean I was wild.

[42:36] Bridget Everett: I was wild. Um, but it was fun, you know. And well, that's the kind of thing as an audience member that you long for to see and you could tell people like, guess what I saw at the Ritz last night? And you can do it at the Ritz, you know, yeah. Now, like, I mean, I perform mostly at Joe's Pub, and that's enough for me. I'm I enjoy it, you know. I've gotten a lot of that wild stuff out of me, and like sort of there's a more of a balance now, but but that's why I love the gay club so much because you could do it and were encouraged to do it, and you weren't gonna get in trouble for it. You know, now you feel like there's somebody everybody's fucking taping everything you do, the wrong person gets in the wrong person's hands, and they're gonna fucking wage war on you.

And you know, I just want to continue doing what I'm doing, right? You know, okay, so just going back though, even before that, like how did like talking about Zach Schaefer, right? It's like that's like Bridget's best friend, and he's an actor. Um did you you didn't know him before you moved to New York though?

[43:37] Bridget Everett: No, I didn't. I came to I'd been working at this resort in Maine called Quisasana, it's still there, it's like a sort of like a dirty dancing style resort. And a lot of the the there were a lot of people from Carnegie Mellon there, and so I dated uh this guy from Carnegie Mellon. We used to call him Can of Corn because he had these like um big fat fingers. I was like, all right, well my friend, my friend Scott Withers, uh from Arizona that I know, trapped me in the walk in one day, and he's like, all right, tell me, what's he got? A can of corn down there? Yes.

[44:09] Bridget Everett: So you were working there as like a waiter.

[44:13] Bridget Everett: I was working there as like a waiter, but you'd sing in shows at night. You know, you wait tables during the day and singing shows at night. And so when I moved to New York. That was like your summer.

[44:20] Daniel Nolen: Oh, that's before you moved to New York?

[44:22] Bridget Everett: Oh, yeah, I did it like for seven summers while I was living in Arizona. Oh, because you know, so fucking hot. Right. And I auditioned in Arizona, and they're like, oh, you know, you're cute, you can sing, you know. That place has like a nationwide casting call for their like it does. Wow. Because the artistic director used to live in Arizona, and they would go around to all the conservatories and a lot of music schools, and you met I met a lot of really fancy, you know, people that are doing really well now that passed through Quisasana. But I was like a a mainstay there for many summers because I was just sort of gliding through life and I loved going there. And um anyway, so I met this guy one summer, Can of Corn, and uh he lived at Carnegie Mellon, and so when I moved here, uh my friend um Mike McKecron, who's um since passed away, but he he went to Carnegie Mellon and he's like, Oh, my friend Zach is having a party.

I was like, Do you think Can of Corn will be there? And he's like, Maybe. So I went to go to try to find Can of Corn. Um, because we had I hadn't we stopped seeing each other or whatever. Uh huh. And I I wanted to I wanted to get a little more that corn. I want to get a little more deck corn. I'd still take a little of that corn if I got there. If you're listening, Can of Corn. If you're listening.

[45:36] Bridget Everett: Oh, oh he was such a sweetheart. Um but uh Can of Corn was not there, but Zach was there, and we sort of fell in friend love. And we've been friends ever since. He's one of the very first people I ever met in New York. Oh. And he changed my life because he took me to Kiki and Herb and introduced me to Sweetie and all these like downtown things that I knew nothing about. I remember walking just a few blocks from here and him grabbing my arm's like, have you seen Kiki and Herb? I was like, he's like, I'm taking you. You are gonna love it. And I was and I did. And you know.

[46:04] Daniel Nolen: Was that at Fez?

[46:05] Bridget Everett: It was at Fez, yeah.

[46:07] Bridget Everett: Yeah. And that's like they did some real wild shit too. So of course I like every Sunday night we would get there early, we'd be the first people online because there wasn't reserved seating, so I could sit up front, and I would hope that uh Kiki would like you know address us or say something to us or crawl us, and because they used to do this cover, lick my legs, and I'd be like, I'll lick your leg. Um so yeah, I was like, oh man, I'm home. This is it.

[46:33] Daniel Nolen: Well now you have those people in your show. I remember when I saw you, I guess it was a couple years ago. There's that you called him Patton Oswald.

[46:40] Bridget Everett: And he sits in the front, he was there so like I think I saw you twice, and he was there both times.

[46:44] Bridget Everett: He comes to most of my shows.

[46:50] Bridget Everett: Yeah, I used to do this uh to me, he's like one of those uh you know Russian nesting dolls, is that what they're called? He's like the tiny one inside of the Patton Oswald nest Russian nesting dolls, but um, but you know, I used to do this thing where I would sit on someone's face, but before I did they would we do the airplane and they would lift me up. And he's probably like I don't know, five, three, four or something like that. And he lifted me up every time, and I'm telling you, I would get some big motherfuckers up there, some big macho men. Um, and they couldn't do it. So he's a little spark plug.

[47:25] Daniel Nolen: Yeah, yeah. I mean, okay, well, how has that been? I mean, I kind of watched it happen in real time, but from the outside, uh, like you, you know, the energy and electricity around you started to like grow and spread, you know, and and um and now it's on the decline. But I mean it's it's amazing to watch this thing where you know you were like a best kept secret, and then our hit parade and you were doing your own thing, and then all of a sudden it was like you know, you're the show, and everybody's going to see you, and you're all of a sudden, you know, not all of a sudden because it happens in your life slowly over time and days. Like 20 years or something, but you know, but it's um, but it's such a dramatic um transformation to you, um, and still doing so much of what you've always done that's that's you, you know.

How how has that I mean have you just like did you go through a period of just like pinching yourself or being scared it was gonna like not last or I still feel like you know, I was just on the phone with my agent. I have an agent now, you know what I mean? I call my agent and I was like, I'm looking at my calendar for the rest of the year, and I was like, you know, this is you know, I get nervous. That's like that Joan Rivers documentary. She's like she looks like yeah, and I'm the same way. Um because you wanna you want to be working, and luckily I have Joe's Pub, so I can do as many shows as they'll let me in as I want to, you know.

[48:51] Bridget Everett: But but you know, I kind of resented for a long time being a best kept secret, and then when I started to because I was like, if these people love me so much, why can't they figure out a way to to use me? You know what I mean? Like who are these people? Just like producers and stuff. Like a bunch of like Hollywood people would come to my shows or whatever, and I remember like like Scott Whitman came to, he used to come to my shows, and he was like, he wanted me to be in some off Broadway show. And I was like, who is this guy? But he followed through. He put me in a show and Jackie. Du Box Jackie, which was down at La Mama, and like it was something different, and then we've since worked together and done other things, and we'll work together in the future.

And like he's somebody that like put his money where his mouth is, and so did Amy Schumer and Michael Patrick King and some other people I've worked with. But but you know, you sort of not that anybody owes me anything by coming into a show, but you know, I just kept I would I felt like I would go on stage, I would light the fucking place on fire, and then go home and check my email for my restaurant schedule. You know what I mean? And it just like I remember the day I think it was our hit parade when you announced that you had quit your waiting TV. It was Rock Autumn. Yeah, I remember that too. And like it was it was magical. It was magical. But I've waited a long time, and I and I think that there are probably um most people, most of my friends are happy for me, you know, because they're my friends, but I think you know it's everybody's hustling, yeah.

[50:20] Bridget Everett: And a lot of my peers, you know, I I think there's some people may not understand it or may resent it a little bit, and you're just like, well, you know, that's your problem. Like, I've worked really hard to get where I am, and and I only want you know, I'm constantly like talking about you know, pitching my friends from the downtown world for TV shows, or have you looked at this person? Or because I think there's so many talented people, and it just and my friend Michael told me he's like, it's not gonna happen for everybody, Bridget, you know, like well, sure, but you don't know which ones it is and which ones you can do. You don't, but like seeing like Cola Skull is success, or or you know, I'm just you know, I'm trying to think of like I'm I'm blanking, but you know, like when you see somebody else that's in the same community and you see them thrive, or like Bianca Del Rio, or you see like people um excelling, it's so exciting because I feel like there's room for totally more of us to have the opportunity.

[51:14] Daniel Nolen: Well, and it's so short-sighted for people to not get that because also it's not um, I mean, I remember when like I well to spill tea a little bit, but like I had like a really bad experience working with Justin Sayer, uh a couple of shows of his that I directed, unfortunately, back to back. So we went from after being friends and loving each other for years, we went to working together and despising each other, and that experience ended and we were straight into rehearsal for the next thing.

[51:45] Bridget Everett: Oh fuck, which was the worst possible. I mean, it's like where maybe healing would happen and everybody would be okay, instead you'd like mix scar tissue, you know. And um, and so then there was like a little bit of a rivalry, and I was having some success with patty issues, and I remember hearing that Justin was um like kind of like bitter about it, yeah, you know, and I was sort of like ha ha ha ha, you know. Then a year or two later, Justin was writing to Broke Girls and having these TV deals, and I was like still doing patty issues, and like so, you know, I just that was such a learning experience for me to be on like to have that ball go back and forth so many times because it was just like you just are not on the same track as anybody else, and you can't you're right, you don't know who what the next thing is gonna be, you know, and you might skip three steps and be, you know, and it's it's um and especially in this um field, you know, if we were all auditioning to play Alphaba in Wicked on Hobby, yeah, that's a measurable thing that we're all doing the same thing and how well or not well are we doing.

Well, I was on Broadway, you were only on the tour, you were the understudy, you know, that is comparable. But all these fucking like downtown freaks doing such weird individual things that only they could possibly have done.

[53:08] Bridget Everett: Yeah, there's it's really one has nothing to do with the other. One has nothing to do with the other, and and sometimes like you know, you have to also think like if you want your stuff to be seen by a wider audience, you have to think like how to how that's gonna affect your show or how that's gonna affect your content. Like, I don't, I'm not worried about being like selling out arenas and doing shit like that. I'm happy where I am, I'm happy, and I know that some people want more for themselves, but then they still do like totally weird shit. I'm like, if you want a lot of people to like what you're doing, then homogenize it or you know, make the change. But otherwise be happy in what you're doing and be grateful that you get to do it and um and just keep trying to be better and be good so they can't ignore you, you know.

[53:54] Daniel Nolen: I mean that that's something that I think is really graceful, if that's the right word, in your work. Because, you know, it seems to me that you are, you know, very clear in terms of what you really want to do, what the connection you have with an audience seems to be a truth. It's like a North Star for you, and you don't I don't see you as somebody that has to spend a lot of time figuring out do I want to soften this or or market this, you know.

[54:25] Bridget Everett: I think that the the calling for you of what you do with an audience is drives you and then the those other details are not getting in your way, right?

[54:34] Bridget Everett: You know, so and I I don't and I I don't think I would know how to be more commercial or you know I mean I it's it's like I think like we only I'm suspicious of anybody that is able to really calibrate that because I don't think we necessarily are I mean your voice is most um effective when it's doing whatever it is that you really have to say you know and that has an audience that it has and it doesn't the rest.

[55:03] Bridget Everett: I do think that like whenever you're you know being yourself and you're being true to who you are, you're gonna fly the highest, you know. Like I remember like when I was first trying to like write songs, I never really considered myself a songwriter because I didn't think that they were like smart enough or whatever. And then I started writing songs about shit that makes me laugh, like tits and like stupid and dick songs, and you know what? It makes me laugh. And if it makes me laugh, maybe it's gonna make somebody else laugh. And like, and I know that like you know, can hole like the song about like anal sex, it's so dumb, but that's the joy of it. You know what I mean?

[55:44] Bridget Everett: But it's brilliant dumb. I mean, it's what it's at New York magazine, like low low. I always want to be in that bottom right hand corner. You own that. That's why I want to be. We actually have a segment on the show that we do um called the Susan Johnson Hour.

[55:59] Daniel Nolen: Okay.

[55:59] Bridget Everett: Um Susan Johnson was this great Broadway belter and most happy fella. Um, actually, your voice you could totally see that you're a part of the stuff. I did I did um a version of uh we did most happy fella at Quisasana, my main thing, and I did the UMF.

[56:10] Bridget Everett: Yeah, that's Susan Johnson.

[56:11] Daniel Nolen: Yeah, yeah, all right, cool.

[56:12] Bridget Everett: I should have known that. I'm aware of it. But that's a when we're broadway, he's that's when we do dick jokes on our job. But one of our things is we were naming dick and balls after different girl groups. And it works with almost anything. Dinah Ross and the Supremes, whatever. But our favorite one was Bridget Everett and the Tender Gomez. What an honor.

[56:43] Bridget Everett: You know, we got to finally be have jokes about dicks and sex, and you know, the standards got loosened where people could, you know, the kind of comedy that a lot of people really like.

[56:53] Daniel Nolen: Yeah, but it was a little bit of like a boys' club, you know.

[56:56] Bridget Everett: I live for South Park, but it was like I remember like when I was younger feeling, because I wasn't part of that boys' club, I was with the girls, like, oh, so they why do they get a monopoly on like that kind of like edgy, funny, like a dumb humor? That's not just a guy thing.

[57:11] Daniel Nolen: Right.

[57:13] Bridget Everett: And you were such a force that came along and was a girl thing. I mean, you are well that's why I did it at first. You know, like it was like I was always so frustrated that like I would be the one that would get in trouble at swim practice for like snapping people's swimsuits or whatever. You know what I mean? Like, and the guys didn't they didn't get so I always like that's made me mad. And so like it's sort of like uh uh of my way of expressing my feminism, you know, to be like, well, women can be powerful and sexually aggressive, and there's nothing wrong with it, you know, and like and now there's a lot of people that are there's a lot of full-figured women that are like out, you know, they're doing really well that show their body, and they're they have millions of Instagram followers, and I'm happy for them. It wasn't all it hasn't always been easy to be that person on stage.

[58:05] Daniel Nolen: Like you talk about how you whatever insecurities you've had in different areas of your life that on stage singing, you always felt confident.

[58:11] Bridget Everett: Yeah, but does that include like in your body? Like, have you you're so confident in your body on stage? Have you always felt that way in sex or in walk—I mean walking down the street shopping for clothes? Like, was that you know, is that had was that did what am I trying to say? Like, how did you get that way on stage?

[58:33] Bridget Everett: Yeah, because I feel like it's uh like on stage, I feel so in command. I feel like this is the way that I want to be seen, like it's powerful and sexy. But in on the streets, I there's a reality that like there it's different, you know. Like men generally like a different, you know. My friend one time told me, he's like, ah, Bridget, maybe I think about lightening your laugh a little bit if you want to get yourself a man. Because I laugh like Herman Munster in your laugh, and um you know, but I've always been bigger and so you know, tall, even like when I was younger and had a real slam and body, I just didn't feel secure about it because I wasn't like a you know the petite little cheerleader or whatever.

But it's undeniable the feeling inside of me when I'm on stage, like even as I've gotten older and gained weight and things sag and they're not the way they are. I just I feel like it's a body, they're tits, they're suiting me. This feel this is my own, so love it, and people do when they're in the audience, and the uh and and it's meant to sort of hopefully let them take themselves a little less seriously and like be so hard on themselves.

[59:49] Daniel Nolen: You know, does it help you? Are you able to get that into your out your offstage life?

[59:55] Bridget Everett: Yeah, I probably had reverse body dysmorphia for a long time. I was like, oh I fucking good. You know, maybe maybe not totally honest about like some body changes, you know. Like, I mean, really for me, I just I've been going to the gym lately. I have this trainer, and it's more about having the energy because you know you get older, you put on weight, you know, you don't feel as good. And I want to feel on stage, I was starting to get like tired, and I'd be like, you know, yeah, but there's no if you know if I ever have the dream of being on Broadway or whatever, and I want to do eight shows a week, I gotta do I gotta fucking I gotta I gotta do something about it. So I'm working on that, but um yeah, I don't know if I answered your question.

[1:00:34] Daniel Nolen: I mean, so yeah, well, do do talking, I'm grabbing stuff, I'm listening. You have the reverse dysmorphia.

[1:00:39] Bridget Everett: Yeah.

[1:00:40] Daniel Nolen: Um, like, do you do you feel you're able to have that bridget like um just like confidence in your offstage life?

[1:00:51] Bridget Everett: I mean do you do you feel not right now, not these days, you know. Like, I feel like there's there's like something that like you give it all, you you I give so much of it on stage that sometimes it feels like I deplete the resource at home.

[1:01:08] Daniel Nolen: Yeah.

[1:01:09] Bridget Everett: Um but and I'm like one of the only people I know that does I've done thousands of shows at this point, and I think I've only gotten laid after one.

[1:01:20] Daniel Nolen: Really?

[1:01:21] Bridget Everett: But I think people are probably intimidated because it's it's uh a bit of it can it could maybe it's a whirlwind for some people. It's like I think Alan Feldman called me like Hurricane Bridget and I think that's a really good description. You know like it's a hurricane and like um but you know I'm at home I'm a gentle little girl and I got poppy my Pomeranian and we'd love to share some tender moments with someone I mean like are you like on like dating apps and stuff like no I thought like I'm not I'm not I don't consider myself famous but I feel like I'm known enough that I don't want to be on an app and like have somebody just have like a curiosity like I'm a curiosity for someone that would really hurt my tender little heart um but I have a lot of friends who are very famous and that have done apps and met people and been in relationships so I should really just get over it.

[1:02:13] Daniel Nolen: Yeah well also isn't there one for famous people Raya I mean kind of but they wouldn't let me on like they like oh for like six months and then I finally said something and I think like and either like Amy called them out or you know and I and all of a sudden like the next day I had in my email welcome to Raya like fuck you like if the if the approval board at Raya won't accept me do you think I'm gonna fucking put myself through the humiliation of just getting swiped left on all day long no thank you.

[1:02:43] Bridget Everett: It's so mean um well you brought up Broadway so is there a Broadway role um that exists that you would that you would want to play right now no I mean you're someone who I truly feel like you there needs to be a show built around you a role written for you.

[1:03:00] Bridget Everett: Yeah, I would do that. There's actually there's something that I I've been uh interested in like doing that's like really outside the box and would take a lot of work um that would be like a departure, like one of those things, and I might do something like that, like a play like um that I've talked about with a couple people.

[1:03:22] Daniel Nolen: Um like an original play?

[1:03:24] Bridget Everett: No, like a classic.

[1:03:25] Daniel Nolen: Wow.

[1:03:26] Bridget Everett: Like I there's I was talking to somebody about doing like Move for the Misbegotten, and I was thinking like it would like that's too challenging for me. But now I feel like I'd like to take on a challenge like that. I feel like a lot more confident about acting and yeah, how has that been going from all the concert stuff um to all these like movies and and TV things where you're doing all this acting and you're only as good as your last at bat. So if I'm like if I've had a great show, I walk into like whatever uh movie or TV show, and I'm feeling confident. And if I had a shitty show or a shitty audition, then I take that into like the energy. I can't shake it.

[1:04:05] Daniel Nolen: Um that's good.

[1:04:06] Bridget Everett: But I just cage a schedule, like, you know, Joe's pub the night before he started.

[1:04:11] Daniel Nolen: I know, right?

[1:04:12] Bridget Everett: But I just did a movie um uh with the stars Alice and Janny. It's called um Oh yeah, I saw Breaking News and You Becoming amazing, a bunch of people in there.

[1:04:22] Daniel Nolen: There's a lot of people.

[1:04:24] Bridget Everett: Um Juliet Lewis, Wanda Sykes, I can't remember. Um Tate Taylor directed it, he directed um The Help and um a bunch of other shit, Ma and stuff. And the way that they do it, like Allison and Tate called me and they're like, We're just so happy you're coming down. They like made me feel like I was like doing them a favor or something. So like when I came into it, I felt a lot more confident, and we all stayed at his house, and we would all like have cocktails every night after we'd rap, and like and it just felt like a family, so the pressure was off. And Allison Janny, by the way, is just she's I learned so much from just getting to like do a couple scenes with her.

[1:05:02] Daniel Nolen: You just did you know her already?

[1:05:04] Bridget Everett: No, I mean I I know about her, I know everybody loved her, and she she was better than anybody that described her, which was great already.

[1:05:12] Daniel Nolen: Yeah.

[1:05:13] Bridget Everett: Well, you must have loved her in that uh eye ton, yeah.

[1:05:16] Bridget Everett: Oh yeah, I really love her and everything because I feel like she's got that thing that I really respond to, like that sort of like you slice them over open and the nerves are all gonna be around the surface. Do you know what I mean?

[1:05:26] Daniel Nolen: Yeah.

[1:05:26] Bridget Everett: Like she's like she's and I just saw um I want to see the prom musical the other day. And um my f our friend, I'm sure you guys know Brooks, Ashnankus.

[1:05:36] Daniel Nolen: Yeah, the greatest.

[1:05:37] Bridget Everett: Um I don't I don't see the other show, so I don't know like who won the Tony or whatever, but he was fucking robbed because he has that thing where he's just like he can be so big and wild and wonderful, but make it believable. And then like they have these like tiny little tender moments in a lot of musical, which is normally where I roll my eyes, I'm like, oh okay. Yeah, but he they're so effective from him because he's just he's like uh he's there's a vulnerability and a nerve like just rides on the surface about him. And and I feel that way about Patty too, you know, she's like strong and whatever, but you feel she feels I just can't keep saying the same shit. I even think my I got this Ruth Bader Ginsburg pillow right there.

[1:06:17] Daniel Nolen: She feels well, okay. So we have a game that we play uh with our guests.

[1:06:21] Bridget Everett: Okay, so got her fuck it.

[1:06:23] Daniel Nolen: Like well, it's like that.

[1:06:25] Bridget Everett: You can play that too.

[1:06:26] Daniel Nolen: Uh it's called Dolly Concert Kill.

[1:06:28] Bridget Everett: Okay.

[1:06:28] Daniel Nolen: And we'll give you three performers.

[1:06:30] Bridget Everett: Okay.

[1:06:31] Daniel Nolen: And you choose one you want to see as Dolly Levi and Hello Dolly.

[1:06:34] Bridget Everett: Okay.

[1:06:35] Daniel Nolen: One you want to see in a in a peak career concert, and one that you want to kill.

[1:06:40] Bridget Everett: Okay.

[1:06:41] Daniel Nolen: This is very true to you. This is a wonderful video. So I mean we have to do it. So it's with Dolly, Concert or Kill.

[1:06:47] Bridget Everett: Yeah, yeah.

[1:06:47] Daniel Nolen: Okay.

[1:06:48] Bridget Everett: So I think Patty.

[1:06:50] Daniel Nolen: And um can Alice and Jenny say that?

[1:06:52] Bridget Everett: Yeah.

[1:06:52] Daniel Nolen: Well, I we'll find out.

[1:06:54] Bridget Everett: Alice and Jenny.

[1:06:55] Daniel Nolen: Um, and then uh uh oh, Wanda Sykes.

[1:07:00] Bridget Everett: Yeah, great choice.

[1:07:02] Daniel Nolen: Oh, god damn it.

[1:07:05] Bridget Everett: Well, I want to see Peak Concert Patty.

[1:07:08] Daniel Nolen: Uh-huh.

[1:07:10] Bridget Everett: Um, live at Lemouche or whatever you call it.

[1:07:12] Daniel Nolen: Is that right?

[1:07:13] Bridget Everett: Yes.

[1:07:14] Daniel Nolen: Um I want to see Wanda as Dolly.

[1:07:20] Bridget Everett: She'd be so good.

[1:07:21] Daniel Nolen: Because I feel like I really actually feel like that'd be kind of wonderful.

[1:07:25] Bridget Everett: Genius.

[1:07:27] Daniel Nolen: Oh my god, I need it.

[1:07:28] Bridget Everett: I'm only gonna kill Allison because my back is against the wall and I have no choice, and I love her so much, and and uh, and I'm gonna send her $100 bill.

[1:07:38] Daniel Nolen: I know.

[1:07:39] Bridget Everett: Genius.

[1:07:41] Daniel Nolen: Um what should do we we could ask you to plug stuff, but it's gonna be like September, October is there anything. Do you have more Joe's pub dates coming?

[1:07:47] Bridget Everett: Yeah, I'll be a Joe's Pub. I got a couple things coming out on Netflix.

[1:07:53] Daniel Nolen: Oh, what's on Netflix?

[1:07:56] Bridget Everett: By the way, baby cakes, Bridget's movie.

[1:07:59] Daniel Nolen: Patty cakes.

[1:08:00] Bridget Everett: Patty cakes.

[1:08:02] Daniel Nolen: I'm so good.

[1:08:03] Bridget Everett: I can't stop thinking about it.

[1:08:05] Daniel Nolen: Oh my god.

[1:08:06] Bridget Everett: And baby cake twice.

[1:08:08] Daniel Nolen: Yeah, I loved it so much.

[1:08:11] Bridget Everett: Yeah, you can walk uh baby cakes, uh, actually called Patty Cakes. Um I'm gonna be, I have some small parts. I'm doing I'm in this uh limited series on Netflix called Unbelievable. I'm in um another thing with Paul Rudd, which is called Um Living with Yourself, I think. I'm in that, and then AJ and the Queen with RuPaul.

[1:08:30] Daniel Nolen: Oh, I didn't know you're in that.

[1:08:31] Bridget Everett: I'm in a little bit of just like you know, guest spots.

[1:08:34] Daniel Nolen: Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[1:08:35] Bridget Everett: Give us like a rue, a roo, yeah.

[1:08:39] Daniel Nolen: Yeah, I did yeah.

[1:08:41] Bridget Everett: And we would play like dirty charades with RuPaul's that in uh the trailer between like between takes.

[1:08:47] Daniel Nolen: It was What is Dirty Charades?

[1:08:50] Bridget Everett: Uh it's like it's like pun-based. It's like that game he loves. It's like, you know, yeah, it's like uh Georgia O'Quiff. I mean, that's that's like a movie title or a song title. So this is something I guess he's known for.

[1:09:03] Daniel Nolen: Yeah, yeah.

[1:09:04] Bridget Everett: Like saving Ryan's private.

[1:09:06] Daniel Nolen: Yeah, exactly.

[1:09:06] Bridget Everett: Yeah. It was just, it was like, you're sitting there and just like, oh my god, uh, you know, because I love RuPaul so much, and then you should be a guest on Dragon.

[1:09:13] Daniel Nolen: Yeah.

[1:09:14] Bridget Everett: Um yeah, we're getting there. Uh also, and I had to say everybody needs to watch comedians in cars getting coffee. Um Jerry Signal's Netflix show. Bridget is on it with all the greats, Eddie Murphy, yeah, Martin Shore. And then all of a sudden you have your podcast with Amy Schumer, right?

[1:09:32] Bridget Everett: Yeah, three. Three girls, one key. I don't know. I'm just out there trying to stay alive.

[1:09:38] Daniel Nolen: And then, yeah.

[1:09:40] Bridget Everett: Well, you're doing a beautiful job.

[1:09:42] Daniel Nolen: And follow Poppy Louise on Instagram.

[1:09:44] Bridget Everett: That's my pomeradia. She's really.

[1:09:48] Bridget Everett: She's over on the couch. She's she's over it. That's her spot.

[1:09:51] Daniel Nolen: Um, well, thank you, Bridget.

[1:09:53] Bridget Everett: Thank you, Bridget. We love you.

[1:09:56] Daniel Nolen: Thanks for listening to Ben Remiller's Broken Records on Broadway World. For more episodes, visit Broadway World, iTunes, Stitcher, or wherever podcasts do be. Come back next week for a Strange loops playwright, composer, and lyricist Michael R. Jackson. Coming in to chat about Tori Amos's Under the Pew. Other upcoming guests include Broadway star Telly Leong, legendary columnist Michael Musto, and cabaret goddess Natalie Douglas.

[1:10:23] Daniel Nolen: This episode was edited by me, Daniel Nolen. Thanks to Emmy winning composer and lyricist Lance Horn for the Broken Records theme song. Follow us both, Ben Rimelauer and Daniel Nolen on all y'all's socials. That's Ben Rimmelauer, B-E-N-R-I-M, A-L-O-W-E-R. And that's Nolan with an E, not Nolan with an A. That's Nolan with an A, isn't it?