Billy Eichner, Vol. II

28:12Thank you.

28:18So he encouraged you throughout, and all the way up until his last days. He saw a lot before the show sold to Fuse, before Billy on the Street became a TV show. But he was at Creation Nation often, right? Yeah, my live show that I did, many in this audience are familiar with it, or worked on it, which is the live show I did in New York, mostly, which is where I developed the Billy on the Street persona and where the first Billy on the Street style videos were shown before YouTube even started. This was 2004. I made the first Billy on the Street. It was a very long time ago and we made it to project onto a screen in this cabaret space.

28:55You know, like I said, I had no idea what would happen. And he did come to, my dad came to every single show. Every single show. And I'm on stage ranting and raving about gay anal sex. And this is in 2004. The comedy world is not very gay friendly at that point. I mean, it's not perfect now, but it's gotten way better. And if the audience laughed, he loved it. And he was smart. He was a New Yorker, and he loved show business. And he got it. Yeah. Yes. Do you remember when you were performing in those shows? was like, you got some early validation from some notable celebrities, actors. Like, who meant a lot to you that showed up at Creation Nation that kind of touted you?

29:41A lot of people, but Joan Rivers was probably the most important. The first job I got on TV was a pilot that was gonna be on Bravo. In 2006, it was a talk show pilot. It was like a Joan Rivers version of The View. And it was supposed to be, instead of Barbara Walters and four different types of women, it was going to be Joan Rivers and four different types of gay men. Sure. And it was called Joan Rivers Straight Talk. Ha ha. 2006. That was good for 2006. And it was me and I was on the panel. Right. And Andy Cohen before he had his own show. And two other guys, LZ Granderson and Preston Conrad and Joan.

30:23Amazing. And the pilot didn't get picked up, but Joan started to come to Creation Nation, which was the live show. and she became like a real mentor to me before anyone knew who I was. And she was just unbelievably encouraging. Does anything she said to you, I mean, she was a true mentor. Does anything stick in your... People used to ask me if Joan Rivers was my grandmother because she was so supportive. They thought we must be related. Joan would, she asked me to put my Billy on the Street videos, the very early ones, on a DVD. And she would go around to all the, when she went to do a talk show, a late night talk show, Letterman and Kimmel and Fallon, she would go up to the showrunner before the show and say, you need to know who this guy is.

31:07Watch this DVD. Right. I mean, that's crazy. No one does that in show business. You know, that is very rare. And I tell the story in the book about how I think it was 2009 and I was very frustrated because I could not get a job and I was getting great press and everyone was like, oh, you're so great. You're this and you're that. But I couldn't get a job. My dad used to say, you know, if you're just a genius, why can't you get three lines on law and order? But he wasn't insulting. He was just being practical. He was confused. He was like, I don't understand. Why is the New York Times saying this and this about you?

31:40That's so great, but then no one hires you, right? And so I didn't have health insurance. It was rough. And so I emailed Joan and said, I don't know what to do. I really am considering quitting the business because I don't understand like the disconnect between people saying I'm talented and unique but not being able to get a paying job you know and Joan said you know come meet me after my stand-up show and I met her me and my best friend Heath of 30 years who's here tonight my best friend since high school I took him with me and we went to have dinner with Joan and she told she just gave me the most amazing pep talk of all time and it literally this is I know this sounds dramatic it's why I continued you know I really was about to quit and my dad although very very very encouraging like beyond belief.

32:28I was in my early 30s at this point and it's starting to get scary and he's starting to get scared for me and then I called him and I said dad Joan says I need to stick with it a few more years and my dad was older he was from Joan's generation so Joan was very important to him and she was from New York and she's Jewish you know like there was a lot of overlap and he knew she really loved me that it wasn't disingenuous and he said well that's what jones says you got to do it and i did and a year or two later at billy on the street became a tv show it is crazy yeah i mean true true story i mean you alluded to this like the timeline people don't realize i think like you get this you know it pops and like creation nation gets some buzz the times writes this amazing article but it's like five or six years later before you times wrote about me this crazy amazing article about me in the show and my best friend Robin Taylor who did the show with me who's also here and that was 2005 and then and I got I finally got an agent I went from no agent to like Brian Lord from CAA in the audience and signing me I was like what I just wanted to do an off-Broadway play right you know and then all of a sudden people were thinking like people were saying like oh you're gonna be on TV in six months and I was like TV I never even thought about TV right now once they said it my gears started turning but like but okay so that all happens 2005 and by 2009 there's nothing I've been dropped by two agents I've been dropped by two managers there's nothing right but I what well there was something and it was called the internet YouTube came along and then you could share videos on Facebook and I just kept at it for some reason that I still don't know.

34:18Well, I know why, but thinking back now, I'm like, God, I had nothing. Where did this confidence come from? And well, it came from my parents. I was going to say, I think we all know now. Yeah. Yeah. More Happy Sad Confused coming up.

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35:35So let's talk a little bit about the character. Billy on the street and how it developed I mean was it fully formed at the start did it take a little while to kind of like Hone in on what was working for these wasn't fully formed, but it was pretty close. Yeah. Yeah What was the germ of the idea? What did you the idea was we were doing my live show and I was playing My live show was like a live late-night talk show But on stage because no one was putting me on TV was my version of Conan or Letterman But it was more theatrical because I wasn't from the comedy world I was a theater kid who knew I had some skills for comedy and was just trying to find a way to break through.

36:11But because of that, Creation Nation was somewhere between a sketch comedy show and a play. So it would be a bunch of sketches about satirizing pop culture and my obsession with pop culture. But Robin Taylor played my sidekick. His character was in the closet and I was very out. And we alluded to a potential relationship that we might have off camera, which he didn't want to talk about and which I did. And that storyline was like woven throughout the sketches about pop culture. That's one thing that's happening. And then sort of propelled by my anger about that situation. It's weird. Robin and I used to sit just like this in stools just like this.

36:51And sort of propelled by the anger of that, my character. I didn't say my name was Billy Eichner. My name was Billy Willing. I created an alter ego because it wasn't me. William Willing. And then we shortened it to Billy Willing. Okay, because he was willing, blah, blah, blah, who cares? So, and then over the course of the night, my character would get increasingly angry about pop culture. I would start out pretty normal. And then midway through the show, I would do a monthly movie review or a review of a Broadway show or something, right? And it would start out relatively normal, like a little snarky, but like not over the top, but it would grow.

37:31and it would become like a 12 to 14 minute rant that by the end I was like having a stroke I hated whatever I was talking about so much that clearly something else was going on with me right and it was it was like a satire of criticism about people who take pop culture too seriously which was me as a kid Billy on the street is like my id it's like me as a 12 year old in the in the body of a six foot three man. And over the course of this rant, I would get like just disproportionately, irrationally worked up and angry. And Robin would have to come over and comfort me and I was crying. And the audience, and the audience loved it.

38:16They were like falling out of their chairs, right? And I kind of like, my goal was to make a very cynical New York audience. Mostly, it was like a combination of comedy fans and theater people, right? There were songs in the show. We had a band. I would write songs, like these silly satirical songs, and I would sing them. I used to say it was like a variety show, but I'm the only act, right? And there was kind of an emotional arc to the show, you know, even though there was no plot necessarily, but there was like an arc emotionally. Okay, so then I'm doing the rants, and everyone's liking me getting angry about pop culture.

38:54And then I say to Jamie, our good friend who was directing the show, I have an idea. What if we go out into the street and I do this guy, but I force other people to deal with him? Right? You know, because I'm a New Yorker, so I know how New Yorkers walk down the street. Like, there's hundreds of people around, but you have blinders on, you're kind of ignoring them, right? Everyone's just getting to where they need to go. And I said, I am going to break that rule, and I am going to stop them and force them to talk to me about the Oscars. Right? Or about some pop culture topic that my character finds like, you know, incredibly important.

39:28Yeah, the more specific the better. Like the very... Yeah, exactly. And so we went out to shoot it, not knowing. We're theater people, like we didn't know about film and cameras. This was long before iPhones. We had to actually go to Radio Shack and get a camera. We kept borrowing cameras from friends of ours who had like camcorders and we would always lose them. We were constantly losing our friends' cameras. Because we were like in our 20s. We were like a mess. But, and then we made the video. We went to Washington Square Park. I remember vividly. Robin is in the first few videos with me. And I'm like making circles around Washington Square Park.

40:05Jamie's following me. And I am working up the nerve to go up to someone. Because that does not come naturally to me either. Or it didn't. Now it does. But it didn't 22 years ago. But then we did it. We put that first video together. Jamie like edited it and we worked on it together we didn't know how it was gonna go and we projected it onto a screen and from the first time we showed it even in that raw form the audience fucking loved it and I stood backstage hearing the laughter and I thought oh shit I'm gonna have to keep doing this

40:43yeah it resonates on a thousand levels but I did some man on the street interviews way back when for of all things Joan Rivers radio show at WOR a thousand years ago it takes a certain kind of temperament to go up to strangers let alone it's an insane thing in your character it's insane it is insane now I can do it now you know now I could do it in my sleep but um but then jumping ahead you obviously I mean this is jumping way ahead but like then to add celebrities into the mix and to be in these crazy contexts where like talk about full circle, you're talking to Madonna in character, meeting Madonna as Billy on the street.

41:21Right. What's that do to your head? What's that like for you, for little kid Billy? Well, you know, I'm a bit of a Madonna fan, Josh. I've heard. I've heard. There's a chapter in my book called Madonna Louise Veronica Ciccone. Right. It's her full name. It's not just like fangirling out on her, though. although there is some, I think, very sophisticated analysis of her career. But it really is about, what it really is about is, again, my parents learning to understand me by watching me love Madonna. That's what that's about. And there's kind of a through line in the book. I'll get back to what you're talking about.

42:00But there's kind of a through line in the book about, like, even when you have parents that support you and love you and understand you, which I was lucky enough to do, they were not in the performing arts. They were not creative types. They loved show business from afar. And like, my God, they loved a Broadway show more than anything. But they weren't actors. They weren't performers. And I realized looking back, I think the artists we love as kids, they help raise us too, in a way. In the way that our parents can't, you know? And so Madonna did that for me. She filled in certain blanks, you know?

42:32And I just loved her so much and still do. And so, to make a long story short, it's all in the book, but yeah, so Billy on the Street becomes a TV show in late 2011, and then Conan, the Conan O 'Brien show, they were kind of early adopters, and Conan's show becomes the first major talk show I'm ever a guest on, and I go, and I just, you know, I'm on the couch, and that was fun, and no one knows who I am, and it was early 2012. And then they call me the next day and they say, hey, we have crazy access to the Super Bowl. We have like press passes. And do you want to go and do like a Billy on the Street style segment at the Super Bowl?

43:13They said, we can get you on the field.

43:18And I said, I mean, no one knew who I was. I was like, well, yeah, of course, Conan O 'Brien. I'm going to say yes to that. But I got off the phone and I thought, what the hell am I going to do at the Super Bowl? Like I don't follow football, you know, I'm not a sports guy. And then I remembered the halftime show that year was Madonna. And so I know. But and so I call Conan's team and I say, OK, here's my angle. I am going to the Super Bowl, but I only care about Madonna. I only care about the halftime show. And I run around Indianapolis, which is where the Super Bowl was. And I'm only asking people if they're excited about Madonna.

43:56Right. and re-watch the clip I did it's amazing to watch the football players just want to talk about and then at the end I'm on the field and the New York Giants win the Super Bowl that's amazing and I am running onto the field and I am shouting like the Giants just won but Madonna was amazing and I'm like Vogue motherfucker and I run onto the field and I literally go up to the Giants who just won and their families are on the field and they're crying and there's confetti and the trophy's there. Spike Lee is there because he likes the Giants, I guess. And I go up to the players and I say, you know, great game, man.

44:38And no one knows who I am. So they think I work for ESPN or something. And then I follow it up with, did you see Madonna? And they look at you, have to go watch it. I'm telling you. It's perfect. And I wouldn't say that about everything I've ever done. But like, And they look at me so bewildered and they're just like, no, I was in the locker room. And then, so that video did very well. And then Madonna's team finds out about the video. And we get connected. And, you know, there's a longer story in the book, but I end up ambushing Madonna when she's rehearsing at Yankee Stadium. She couldn't be on the street with me, but Yankee Stadium was outside.

45:24And so I thought, okay, that'll work. And they say, okay, so Madonna knows you're coming, but she doesn't know what you're going to say. And you will improvise the way you do on the street. And I said, okay. And so we go with my camera crew, and we do it. I mean, you can see it. It's on YouTube or something. But I had this moment where, okay, it's like, it's Madonna. And I'm like, how is this happening? I don't understand, right? My parents and I went to watch her masturbate at the Blonde Ambition tour. Like, they bought me the sex book. You know, there's so many amazing Madonna stories. So it was, but I had a moment with myself at Yankee Stadium.

46:03I remember before I like went out was my moment to like go out and ambush her. And I thought, you have to stay in character. You cannot be Billy Eichner who loves Madonna. And Billy on the street gets mad at everyone. So you have to get mad at Madonna. Otherwise you're betraying yourself. I have a lot of artistic integrity. And I did, and she was great. She was shouting at me, and Rocco was there. He was a baby. Yeah, it was wild. Is she an acquaintance now? Do you have a personal relationship with Madonna? No, no, no, no. I leave Madonna alone. Madonna's busy. I know her team, but by the way, I was such a Madonna fan that her publicist of many years is no longer her publicist.

46:43Liz Rosenberg. I read about Liz Rosenberg on page six when I was a kid. Just getting to email with Liz Rosenberg. I was starstruck, right, by her publicist. And you, okay, so jumping ahead, the time is flying by, but this is all amazing. The residual effect of Billy on the street is a beautiful and challenging one. I mean, it makes such an impact, and you alluded to this, it's like it's followed you. It will always follow you to a degree, and I'm sure you've kind of reconciled that to a degree. But talk to me a little bit about, like, is it part of your day-to-day nowadays even like do people run up to you expecting you to scream at them do they scream at you like what's the sometimes people will come up to me and say will you shout at me right which is so funny because that's not a thing people want someone to do to them usually but um no i mean people are well social media i mean the show ended up having this like second third life i don't even know anymore like it's just been out there so long TikTok came along.

47:44A friend of mine said, you know how viral you are on TikTok? This was like four years ago. And I said, I'm not on TikTok. What are you talking about? And they said, Billy on the Street is all over TikTok. And I had no idea. Fans were posting clips and then I got on TikTok. But like, yeah, it's crazy. It has sustained in a very unexpected way. It's one of those things that you cannot plan for. So now that there's a bit of distance and you've kind of like proven yourself in other areas, is there more willingness to kind of go back every now and then? I mean, the last time you did it was for the campaign with Will Ferrell.

48:16For Kamala. That helped. We all tried in our own way. We tried. We tried. Wish more people had tried. But where are you at in terms of that character and its place in your career going forward? Well, I am at a place where for a while I was like, I can never do it. I have to draw a line in the sand. But people love it. And if you look under the internet, which can be so snarky, including about me, but under Billy on the Street videos, that's a different thing. It's just people, the people who get it. Not everyone gets it, but the people who get it, it's their favorite thing. and they are always at please do more.

49:02Please bring the show back. The world is so awful. Please do this. And I am very touched by that and I want to like honor that. You know, that's a very rare thing. It does not give me as an actor the creative satisfaction anymore because I've been doing it for so long. And it's not aligned with who I really wanted to be as an artist because it's not acting in the traditional sense. You know, I'm very proud of it. I created it. but like for me, I want to have a more eclectic career. But now, you know, what I'm always trying to sort of figure out is like, okay, I can do both, you know, like, you know, my therapist would want me to say that.

49:43She was like, you can do everything. And so it's never going to be, I'm never going to do like half hour episodes of Billy on the Street again, but we're always kind of talking about what it could look like. And I don't know what the answer to that is, but never say never, I don't know. We should bring up Bros, which obviously is very important to you and to so many. I mean, it made an impact, and I know, yeah. Oh, thank you. Thank you. And I know last time you were on the podcast, we talked about it. I mean, it's a complicated conversation because you have such pride in it, and those that saw it loved it, and luckily it does have this shelf life, this residual life, but at the time, it didn't do the box office that you wanted, even though the critics did respond, I think.

50:27Have you come around and can you appreciate more the place that Bros sits in pop culture today? Yeah, I'm going to go back in the closet, obviously. I think that would be good. So you're cool. You're good. I'm good. I'm totally good. No, no, no. I'll say this about the book, which was really nice, is that Bros is complicated. like the big the big all of it the making of it the everything about it was complicated it is not something easily summed up in some like clickbaity soundbite or a tweet or like a headline on instagram where no one reads the article they just like read the four words that i said they were taken out of context for like clickbaity reasons and so um but what the book did is give me the space to properly talk about it right in all of its complexity like the good bad and the ugly and I do you know and I am very proud of it and I know what my intentions were with that movie and I think people certain people got it certain people didn't that's fine but what I'm happy about is that the book gave me the opportunity and the space and time for me to be thoughtful about it to be articulate about it and to say exactly how I feel about it you know without it being interrupted by kind of bad faith takes.

51:50But like the finished product is, you don't feel it was compromised in any way. You are proud of what it was. You made the movie you wanted to make. Yeah, especially because we made that movie R-rated gay comedy with a major studio. Yeah, I mean, anything I've done, I will look back and say like, oh, I would tweak that, I would tweak that. I mean, that's par for the course. But no, I mean, it was important to me that if I was going to have that opportunity, I mean, there were a few things that were important to me. I wanted my gay friends, or at least, you know, there's a big generation gap in the gay community, right?

52:21I'm not going to get into all of that right now. But like, but you know, I can only write from my experience and my generation, you know, and I, not that I speak from my generation of gay people, I don't. Social media, calm down. Okay? I can already see the comments. But I can only speak from my experience and my vantage point. And what I wanted was for my gay friends to see that movie and think, okay, like he didn't sell us out. Like he's telling our story. Like this is honest and it's complicated and it's layered and it's not Billy on the Street. It has depth and it has thought. And I wanted to have a gay character at the center of a gay story that was not in the closet.

53:07I did not want the storytelling to hinge on being in the closet. I think we get a lot of that. and I wanted a character that led with his intellect, right, and not with his body, and I just wanted it to be honest, and we did that, you know? We did that, and I think it's a smart, funny, heartwarming movie, and I'm proud of it. As you should be, absolutely.

53:35But next time I will play a tortured, beautiful, closeted hockey player. I've learned my lesson Did Bros walk so He Did Rivalry could run? No, I don't think so No Did you like He Did Rivalry? I enjoyed He Did Rivalry I mean, I'm gay, I like those guys fun It's a good show But very different You know what's funny? Yeah, it's funny The first thing I said to Nick Stoller Who directed Bros and we co-wrote it before I even knew what the movie was going to be about, I said, I have no idea what this movie is going to be about, but the characters are not going to be in the closet. It's not about that.

54:18But people like when the characters are in the closet. I don't know if you want to reveal what you're working on in terms of writing, but I remember when we were talking way back when, there was a Christmas movie, there was the Paul Lin biopic for a while. Yes, there's a Paul Lin biopic. I'm still working on it. I had a hard time. I did a ton of research on Paul Lind during COVID and talked to Bruce Valanche for hours and hours, who wrote for Paul Lind on Hollywood Squares. Bruce Valanche's legendary comedy writer, Bruce Valanche. His first job in Hollywood was writing Paul Lind Zingers on Hollywood Squares.

54:51And I did a ton of research on Paul. And then it took me a minute to like find my angle. And then last year, I thought of my angle. And so I'm still working on that. There's a Christmas project, which has evolved from its original version and is now something much crazier that but words very very early so I don't want to talk about it but there is a serious Christmas thing and yeah I don't know I'm always writing and thinking about things I think that's a good note to end on I just want to say I mean I think you've gotten a sense from the conversation tonight this really encapsulates what this book is, which is obviously...

55:32I forgot there was a book! A ton of fun stories, but at the end of the day, it is a beautiful and moving tribute to your parents. I know they'd be very proud of you, and we're all thrilled that you shared your night with us tonight. Billy on Billy comes out as we tape this, I think just like 48 hours, so spread the good word, enjoy your audiobook, and give it up one more time for Billy Eichner. Thank you, Josh. Thank you, guys. Thank you. Thank you.

55:59And so ends another edition of Happy, Sad, Confused. Remember to review, rate, and subscribe to this show on iTunes or wherever you get your podcasts. I'm a big podcast person. I'm Daisy Ridley, and I definitely wasn't pushed to do this by Josh.

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