Youre Making Things Up Again Donald Randy Rainbow
On the book jacket of Randy Rainbow's just-published memoir Playing with Myself, there are rapturous quotes virtually the viral video sensation and social media star from an array of the boldest of bold names, everyone from Patti LuPone to Carol Burnett.
"Bright…. As good as anyone writing lyrics today," reads one attributed to Stephen Sondheim.
"He was ofttimes far likewise generous with his praise," Rainbow shares with Metro Weekly about the late, nifty Broadway legend, who Rainbow became obsessed with as a budding gay kid growing up in S Florida with big, Broadway-sized dreams.
Rainbow got to know Sondheim a dozen or so years ago, before Rainbow'south career every bit an entertainer, best known for his piece of work in creating musical parodies, took off.
"He would say things to me like, 'Randy, your lyrics are just right on the money every single time. How do y'all exercise it?' And he was sincere well-nigh that. He was really complimentary about my lyric-writing. And every bit usual, I didn't know what to do, because it made me uncomfortable. So I deflected with comedy every time. And I would always answer, 'Steve, you wouldn't empathise.'"
As the anecdote makes obviously, Randy Rainbow is leading a fascinating and expert-humored creative life in the spotlight these days. But equally he reveals in his illuminating, engaging, and well-crafted new memoir, his life has been pretty darn fascinating all along. His female parent helped inspire his passion for Broadway, in part hoping that he might realize a dream as an entertainer she once had yet never pursued.
"Before I was built-in, in her younger days, she would pray every night to the Lord above that she would wake up as Bernadette Peters," Rainbow says. "My mother never did plow into Bernadette Peters or even really pursue a career in musical theater. But she did give birth to me, which I judge says something about the power of prayer."
In contempo years, Rainbow has gotten the run a risk to work with Peters, recording at her home studio a duet that appears on his 2019 full-length studio album, A Little Brains, A Little Talent. He's gotten to know her well enough to even call Peters a friend. His mother (and No. 1 fan), on the other hand, well, she's however waiting to then much equally meet Peters.
"She hasn't met Bernadette Peters yet but she certainly volition," Rainbow says. "I've likewise become friendly with the great Ballad Burnett, and Ballad has been gracious plenty to invite me and my female parent to nourish when she receives the Stephen Sondheim Award next calendar month." That accolade, presented by Virginia'due south Signature Theatre, volition be bestowed to Burnett on Monday, May 16, at a Black Tie Gala at the Italian Embassy. Rainbow is currently in discussions with organizers at Signature near what function he might play and whether or not he'll perform.
"We're working out what I'm going to do," he says. "We might prove a video. I might say a few words, I'chiliad non certain. It's in the centre of this crazy tour. Then I'one thousand not certain how much I'll have fourth dimension to ready. But whatever they desire me to do, I mean, I'll do anything for Carol."
Information technology was 2016 when many people, peculiarly the politically engaged, start started to clue into Randy Rainbow, the persona. His breakthrough was parodying the first Presidential Debate between Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump, in which he seized on Trump's use of the word "braggadocious," turning it into a clever parody of "Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious" from Mary Poppins. Four years and millions upon millions of views and followers later, he upped the ante with the politically-themed video, "If Donald Got Fired," featuring none other than Patti LuPone — or equally he puts it in 1 chapter of his book, "Patti 'Fucking' LuPone."
"That needed to be a special video," he says. "I felt I needed to bring in the big guns and really make a splash. And it just so happened around that time, Patti LuPone reached out to me and said she wanted to collaborate on something. I said, 'I'll get going on a script.'"
The script had LuPone popping in during footage from the fence, with Rainbow pretending to be the debate moderator, to rally support for Joe Biden. "Whenever gay men are in crunch, I but materialize," Rainbow scripted her to say in the video. He also had her use a certain expletive discussion. "Information technology's not that difficult to go Patti LuPone to say 'fuck,' I'g pleased to study," he laughs.
Over the next couple of weeks, Rainbow is travelling effectually the country to both promote his new book and perform his live stage show. He says the video parody he posted earlier this month will likely be the last one until he returns home to New York. And what a politically themed trivial gay gem the video simply titled "Gay!" is.
"I wanted to just gay information technology up," he says. "There's a lot of discussion nearly that 'Don't Say Gay' bill. I but took the opportunity to be equally gay every bit I perhaps could." Amid the many hilarious similes he concocts to describe just how gay he is, arguably the standout is "as gay every bit a drag queen'southward brassiere."
"I'm very proud of that one," he says. "Kickoff of all, I love the word 'brassiere.' Who says brassiere anymore? It'southward like it'southward 1952. Comedically, information technology's a perfect word. And it sounds actually gay. I honey it."
METRO WEEKLY: I similar how at the very starting time of your new memoir, y'all get right to it, addressing the fact that, yes, this is your real name. You've had to deal with that question your whole life, and especially with your career.
RANDY RAINBOW: Yeah. I do start the book by dispelling the rumors and speculation most my proper noun, considering of course, people think information technology's similar the corniest stage name ever, just I would not have done that to myself. In that location's even a motion picture of my nascence certificate for all the birthers out there demanding receipts.
MW: Is there a significance to your first name, or do you lot know why your parents named you that?
RAINBOW: I don't think so. Honestly I think maybe they were going for the alliteration. I know my middle name Stewart, was my begetter'southward father, and they wanted to give me the option because they knew, obviously, that it was a cruel trick that they were playing on me from the offset to name me Randy Rainbow. I call back they said, "Well, we'll give him Stewart every bit a middle proper noun." I don't know, I guess Stewart Rainbow would accept been taken more seriously every bit an accountant or a lawyer or something. But I practice know that Randi, with an I, would have been the name if I were born a daughter. I was destined to be Randy.
MW: And destined to be Rainbow — and thus gay as well, I suppose.
RAINBOW: Exactly right. Good thing. What the hell would I do otherwise?
MW: When was it that yous landed on the idea to exercise the video montages? Were you a big YouTube user to brainstorm with?
RAINBOW: I moved to New York at the historic period of 22, and I was actually the youngest 22-year-onetime on the planet — I was really younger than my age. I had a lot of growing up to do. I was scared of my ain shadow. I had no cocky-confidence, or I was just growing into my self-confidence, so I didn't really have a direction. I knew that I was a performer, I had done it my whole life. I have been on the stage since I was half-dozen, only merely wasn't ready to offset pounding the pavement when I moved to New York. I just had to abound upward a little chip, and then I worked odd jobs.
Long story short, the ham in me realized that I did still want to perform, and thanks to this new invention of YouTube and social media, which I was figuring out a decade or more ago, I realized that I could create a vehicle for myself. It was really more or less an audition tape that I was creating. My goal — or my evil program — was to put myself on camera and evidence people that I could perform and that I was funny, and I had a prissy voice, and I was castable.
I thought I would exist plucked and just placed in existing projects, that casting directors would run into it and say, "He'south got some skill. Let's audition him for things. Let's put him in shows." And so information technology turned out that what I was doing worked, and I had to keep producing content for myself, which is terrific. But I originally assumed that I would hopefully wind up in existing shows, and it'southward certainly something I would nonetheless love to practise. I hateful, King George in Hamilton? Let'south go, what are nosotros waiting for?
MW: I guess your timing was pretty fortuitous, in terms of the rise of YouTube and the whole miracle of social media.
RAINBOW: I'm the oldest millennial by definition. I just make the cut off every bit a millennial, so that's fortunate. I had i foot in the social media age. I was still immature plenty to be experimenting and playing effectually with formats and things like that. So I was able to use social media to my reward. I'grand very grateful for that.
MW: You talk in the book virtually having a videocassette recorder as a kid and knowing what a VHS is.
RAINBOW: I know, I actually appointment myself in this book.
MW: You couldn't do what you do now, or not as easily anyhow, using that old technology.
RAINBOW: No, I mean, I tried to exercise it. Equally a child locking myself in my room and making these, essentially, TikTok videos on my handheld camcorder that I had gotten for a birthday nowadays. I would hold the Catechism camcorder selfie-style, and just record music videos that I would copy from MTV — dorsum when MTV played music videos — and just do shot-by-shot production, which is what TikTok is now. I was very ahead of my time, is the bespeak.
MW: Growing up, were y'all encouraged in your creative pursuits and Hollywood and Broadway dreams?
RAINBOW: I come up from a showbiz-positive family unit. Anybody was really into the performing arts. My father was a musician and a vocaliser, and my mother'due south father and brothers were also musicians. She had a love of musical theater. I joke that she was trying to raise the gayest child on Long Island by putting me to sleep with the cast albums of Broadway musicals. Although information technology's not really a joke. I mean, look what happened. She succeeded. So yeah, I was never discouraged.
MW: I presume she's proud of you, her just child.
RAINBOW: Extremely, yes. She'southward very proud. She'south my number one fan. Absolutely.
MW: What inspired you to write the new memoir?
RAINBOW: I've been approached to write books for years, and they were unremarkably novelty books, comedy books. They wanted me to write joke books about Donald Trump, or politicians that would be the subjects of my satire. And I approximate I hung around long enough that a publisher finally approached me wanting to know more nigh my personal story and how I came to exercise what I exercise and be who I am. I saw information technology as a great opportunity to really introduce myself to those fans.
And so many people have been so generous with their gratitude to me through the years. They come to my shows, and they write to me online and say, "Cheers. Thank you for getting me through the Trump years. Thank yous for getting me through the pandemic with laughter and music," and through their ain personal struggles. And they're so generous in sharing their ain personal stories, I realized they don't really know me. They actually know this two-dimensional persona, which again, is role of me, but not the whole matter. And so, I saw this every bit an opportunity to really finally introduce myself to those people.
And same goes for the people who detest me. When I get trolled on the cyberspace, when I get trolled on social media, the first thing that pops in my head is, "They're talking essentially about a scripted cartoon caricature of me. They don't fifty-fifty know me." So read the book, get to know who you're talking almost, and then you lot can actually hate me.
MW: How does information technology feel not only to be meeting the various celebrities that y'all've idolized and admired since you lot were a kid, but in many cases existence able to call them friends?
RAINBOW: It's amazing. For me, the virtually thrilling part of this whole ride that I've been on is coming together my idols. And I talk most them a lot in my volume. At that place's no shortage of celebrity name dropping, and information technology'southward non costless. I'm just trying to illustrate that these crazy, insane dreams, these childhood dreams that I never even dared to dream, are at present coming true.
Patti LuPone is coming over to collaborate on videos with me. I got to befriend Stephen Sondheim and go to know him for 16 years. Rosie O'Donnell and I shared a marquee. And Kathy Griffin will be moderating my book tour stop in Fifty.A. This stuff is crazy. I tin't believe it's happening.
MW: Tell me more about how you linked up with Sondheim, how that came nearly.
RAINBOW: It was really serendipitous, I gauge you'd call it, because I met him before whatever of this career stuff started taking off for me. Equally fate would accept it, I was working at a Broadway production role as a receptionist, in 2004 to 2006, effectually that time, and one of the friends that I made there, who was an assistant to a big producer, happened to be Stephen's then-partner and later husband. And then he introduced me, showtime at a Tony Awards subsequently-party. I got to dogsit for him and accept cocktail hours at his townhouse here in Manhattan, and information technology was incredible.
And then, as I came into myself and career things started happening, he became 1 of my biggest supporters. He was in the front row when I played The Beacon here in New York for the outset time, sitting next to my female parent. And my mother said he didn't stop laughing and was clapping the loudest. So it's crazy. For someone who had such an touch on me creatively, growing up, to be able to say that he was a friend and to have gotten the opportunity to tell him how much he meant to me, that's the greatest thing you could wish for.
MW: A lot of people turn to comedy, and to this line of work in general, as an escape, or as a coping mechanism. To some extent, that seems truthful for you, but it also seems to run deeper than that.
RAINBOW: It was e'er a part of my life. I come from a funny family. I mean, not to be stereotypical, non to use tropes or anything, simply a New York Jewish family was very funny — I don't know if that'southward breaking news, just my female parent and my grandmother, Irene, who is a recurring character throughout this volume — she's no longer with u.s.a., but is a phonation in my caput — she really imparted her comedy philosophy to me, which was to laugh at everything.
She was extremely negative. She was a pessimist by nature, just she had this magical way of immediately turning all of her negative energy into sense of humor, and her rants and her diatribes virtually things that she was quite angry almost were hilarious, which I know was therapeutic for her, and too provided entertainment for the listener. And I caught on from a young historic period and information technology eventually turned into what I am able to do professionally now.
MW: Did she live long enough to see yous in this calorie-free?
RAINBOW: When I was first starting out, I got a writing gig for HX, a gay rag in Manhattan, and I got to interview Liza. My grandmother was effectually for that stage of my career. And at that time, it was exciting that I would have cover stories with Liza Minnelli and casts of Broadway shows. Not knocking gay rags, but at the time this little gay magazine popped up in bars and bathrooms. I would go home for Thanksgiving, and my grandmother would laissez passer out copies of these magazines to our friends and family. "Did you come across my grandson, the published author?" Meanwhile, in that location was a picture of a leather daddy in a cock sock on the embrace. And all those ads in the dorsum. My grandmother didn't intendance. She was very proud.
And then she saw the beginning of information technology. My beginning kind of viral video was in 2010 when I was pretending to date Mel Gibson. And she lived long enough to come across me having a romantic relationship with Mel Gibson, I'g proud to say. And she was very tickled past it. She had my mother set up an cyberspace connexion in her chamber, and almost of my views came from her at that time.
MW: If yous don't mind, walk me through how you came up with the whole concept of pretending to date Mel Gibson.
RAINBOW: I just started experimenting. I was working at an accounting house as a receptionist. And believe it or not, I stuck out like a sore pollex. I did not belong in that accounting firm and they knew information technology. And I took every opportunity to escape in whatever way. I had a computer at my desk, and I started blogging and working on my comedy material.
YouTube was becoming a thing, and one day I decided, let me experiment with putting myself on camera and do some YouTube videos. I was writing a weblog, and I said, let me put some of these blog posts in monologue form and deliver them — the performer in me was kind of itching to get out. So one day, a couple of them got a picayune fleck of attention. And this Mel Gibson news bankrupt dorsum in 2010, his horrible rants that were leaked of him screaming at his ex-girlfriend. And I just got an idea to use the sound. That was kind of an important moment, because it's what I wound up doing and I'thousand still doing to this day. Anybody was talking well-nigh this, simply I said, 'If I'chiliad going to practice it, I want to find some angle that not everyone is taking.'
Everyone was enraged or shocked or appalled. I hateful, really, the things that he was saying were shocking and appalling, merely who cares? Everyone was sharing the aforementioned opinion. I said, "What tin I bring to the table that'southward a little unique?" And since his rants were in large role homophobic and anti-Semitic, I said, "Well, I'm a gay Jew. Why don't I pretend I'm dating him?" And that sort of was the birth of this shtick of Forrest Gumping myself into the headlines.
MW: Yous found a gimmick.
RAINBOW: You got to get a gimmick, as Sondheim said.
MW: Aye, and y'all collaborated with Josh Gad and Sean Hayes in a cover of that song from Gypsy for your 2019 anthology.
RAINBOW: Thank you for an album plug! I love it! Yeah. That was so fun to do.
MW: A Footling Brains, A Little Talent featured a number of collaborations with large-named artists. Which, I think it bears noting, were all real. They weren't the equivalent of so much of your video work, where y'all insert yourself into recorded footage.
RAINBOW: Oh, my god. Did somebody think that I stole sound of Josh Gad and Sean Hayes doing a duet of that song and but inserted myself?
MW: Actually, that idea popped to mind while listening to your duet with Bernadette Peters. It was pretty clear past the terminate it was recorded with you, but I did wonder if yous had given whatever idea to using previously recorded cloth to mode a kind of virtual duet the way Natalie Cole did way dorsum when with her deceased begetter.
RAINBOW: That's and then funny that y'all would even think that. No, that was the actual me and bodily Bernadette Peters actually singing in an actual studio. In fact, I got to become to her flat for an entire calendar week at her asking — no arguments from me — to rehearse that. One of the most thrilling experiences of my life. No, when you do an album, you lot tin can't get away with some of the sound kind of riffing that you practice in YouTube satire.
MW: On that album, you wrote a new vocal with Marc Shaiman called "Randy Rainbow for President" and one with Alan Menken called "Pink Glasses." What was it like collaborating with those ii legendary composers?
RAINBOW: Over again, I don't know whose life this is that I'one thousand living. Marc and I had worked together. He wrote the title track on my Christmas anthology a couple of years ago. So this was our second project together. And then, Alan had sent me an email: "Equally your main go-to composer, I just wanted to give y'all a virtual hug for all of the videos that you have done" — because I've ripped him off more times than y'all can imagine.
But he also said, "If you ever want to create something original, give me a call." So, I certainly took him up on that offer. He wrote all those Disney classics that inspired me and got me through my childhood, bluntly. So to be able to write a song with him — and the song is also kind of very personal, because I make it a story about my grandmother, and how she imparted this philosophy of, "Look through your pinkish spectacles, or rose-colored glasses, however you want to say it, to see life how you want to come across information technology." Then it was very, very exciting and also emotional on many levels to write that with him.
MW: I accept it that you're currently in your 40th twelvemonth of life.
RAINBOW: How cartel yous!
MW: Well, as a 49-yr-old, I think I'yard allowed.
RAINBOW: I judge, but we're however going to lie and whoever is transcribing this is meant to say I'm 32, thank you.
MW: Information technology's just a number, correct?
RAINBOW: I guess it is. I but turned 40 terminal year. My mother and I both went through this, going into a new decade of life in the midst of a pandemic, beingness locked in our homes essentially, which is very cruel. It'southward a horrible way to do information technology because you lot're already going through an existential crisis as it is, and and then to turn 40, or in her instance 70, nosotros were both kind of freaking out a little scrap. But you know, it'south a number. And so whatsoever. I think I've settled into it a little fleck.
It'due south also dainty that the world is crumbling around me, but professionally speaking, things are going pretty well for me. And so, I'1000 grateful that that's the case. I call up if I were still backside the reception desk turning 40 — no shade to receptionists, if that'due south what y'all want to do, but that was not where I belonged. So, I'g grateful that I've come up into myself at this time and things are aligning.
MW: Early on in the volume you lot reveal your lifelong adoration and devotion to Barbra Streisand. I couldn't help simply wonder if you had gotten the risk to run into or talk to her nonetheless.
RAINBOW: Well, I did run across her briefly later ane of her concerts, I recall in 2016. I got sort of similar a 2-2nd audience with her. Merely since then, she actually saw my parody that I did [concluding year] called "Marjorie Taylor Greene" to the tune of "Evergreen," and she liked information technology so much that she had her team call me and ask if I would produce a video to assistance promote her new album, Release Me two [which came out last summer]. And her A&R guy and her manager came upwardly with the idea of me singing a parody of "I'1000 The Greatest Star," and they asked me if I would exercise it. They didn't accept to convince me! And I'm happy to say that she was very happy with it and sent me a little gift box with some swag from the album, and personally signed a notation that is being framed equally nosotros speak.
MW: So she hasn't invited y'all to her firm or to her studio yet?
RAINBOW: No, and how rude of you to bring that upwardly! No, I have not yet been invited properly. Damn information technology! I accept non had the full Barbra experience that I need, but I'm on my way, damn information technology!
MW: Do you take a favorite social media platform? Practice you achieve more people on one over the others?
RAINBOW: I mean, it changes all the time. Information technology used to be that Facebook was my kind of motherboard and that was where I got my nearly views. A lot of people are abandoning transport on Facebook, though — it goes in and out.
Now I'm seeing Twitter has kind of initially the most number of views, and YouTube is getting more than views than Facebook does, which didn't used to be the example. Information technology's very difficult to keep upwardly in this day and historic period, particularly if y'all're not 16 years sometime, because y'all've spent years edifice this audience. And I'm like, "I accept a million followers hither, finally." And and so they're like, "Oh, yes, we're not doing that anymore. We're doing this now." Only it's similar, "Wait, I have a million followers." "No. Go here where you take six followers." Information technology'south a never-catastrophe story.
MW: So yous take to be on every platform.
RAINBOW: I do. I just finally caved and started TikToking, which I'yard glad I did. I'thousand having fun with information technology. I broke 100,000 followers on Tiktok in my first month, then information technology's going well. And with my terminal two videos, actually with my spoof chosen "Gurl, You're a Karen," that was my first million views on TikTok. I feel like a teenager again.
I don't do Snapchat, I guess maybe I should. Listen, I have to have a life, too. I take to live.
MW: For TikTok, are you creating distinct, original content?
RAINBOW: A little bit. I'thousand posting my parody videos to TikTok likewise, simply I'm also taking the opportunity of using that every bit a way to be kind of more than casual. Coincidental Randy, but talking to the camera. And I don't know, I might use it for shorter versions of my longer-class spoofs and parody videos, simply I'll say I'm however figuring it all out.
MW: So I guess if I want to see Casual Randy, I'll have to become and starting time a TikTok account.
RAINBOW: Yeah, right. I'm usually merely in a muumuu, hair in curlers, no makeup. And that's where y'all can see the real me.
MW: Practice you lot wear a lot of makeup, in general? Even when non in drag?
RAINBOW: Listen, I'chiliad the director and producer of these videos, and so I know how to light myself. People see me in person and sometimes they're like, "Oh, you're non all fabricated up." "Oh, you look like a existent person." I don't wear tons of makeup, but yes, I ever wear makeup. Frankly, I don't leave the business firm anymore without a little bit of foundation. I think we've reached a place thankfully where makeup is becoming genderless and a lot of guys and people of all genders are wearing makeup, and I enjoy experimenting with it. So aye, even when I'g going to the gym, I'll put on a little foundation. And certainly, I'll dress up if I'm doing any kind of drag for my videos, I'll include lipstick and things like that and do it up a piffling bit.
MW: This feels like the point in the interview where you plug your new proprietary line of makeup or foundation, or what-have-yous.
RAINBOW: We're working on it. I'yard really getting fix, hopefully soon, to release my new line of nail polishes, which will exist bachelor soon on www.randyrainbow.com, and at my tours. So I'd honey to do that, I'd love to do more of that. I hear from people all the time, when I do elevate in my videos to back myself upwardly, the number one question I get is, "What is that shade of lipstick? I must have it." So I'd honey to accept my own line of lipstick.
MW: In the CBS Sunday Forenoon contour of you earlier this month, although they didn't make whatever mention of information technology, I noticed yous had painted your fingernails pinkish.
RAINBOW: Yeah, I think I had blue in the kickoff [visit] and and then pink when they came again. Information technology's becoming normalized a little bit, at to the lowest degree for people in the entertainment industry. Auto Gun Kelly has a whole line of smash polishes, I believe. It's fun. I mean, if I can paint my nails a fun color, why not do that? Life is short. Article of clothing the smash polish. Have fun. Things get tiresome. Especially during the pandemic, I actually started experimenting with makeup and nail polish and stuff like that. Because I was sitting around looking at myself in the mirror for a year. And I'1000 like, "I'm fucking bored looking at yous! And then let'due south encounter how we can play around a picayune bit."
MW: The CBS Sunday Morning piece besides hinted near a possible Broadway testify in the works. Is that true?
RAINBOW: I am actively discussing it. I've been touring my Pink Glasses Bout effectually the land and will be touring through this year, dates to be appear. I would love to bring that to a Broadway phase. It'll come every bit no surprise to people that that'due south certainly on my bucket list. And I've been approached by producers who have interest in working with me on something similar that. Only we're but kind of in the preliminary stages of discussing how we can brand it happen.
MW: How would y'all characterize your alive show?
RAINBOW: Information technology's really a concert feel. It's me in concert. So in that location's a large screen behind me with projections, kind of backing myself up. And it'south a little stand up upwards. Information technology's some of my greatest hits that people know from social media. It'southward evolved to where I talk a little bit about my personal story and how I came to exercise this — some of the origin stuff that I talk about in the volume, I at present talk nigh on stage. And I'm accompanied past a four-piece band of fabulous Broadway musicians. And information technology'southward Randy In Concert. And we exercise a Q&A, and audition interactive stuff. Those are some of my favorite parts of information technology.
MW: I know your video parody work didn't first out being political at all. That really didn't happen until the rise of Trump in 2016. Yet before reading your volume in which you say otherwise, I nevertheless had you pegged every bit somewhat of a political junkie or addict.
RAINBOW: Like anybody, I think we've all get more aware of those topics. In the first chapter of the book, I come out and dispel the myth that I am hired past the DNC or Nancy Pelosi or some political figure to push a political agenda. I kind of only followed the billowy brawl of what the hot topics were to make my content.
And in 2016, it comes every bit no surprise to anyone that people started talking nigh nothing only politics. And we kind of nonetheless are, that'southward become the celebrity gossip, nigh. Only none of my work is really politically motivated. It's politically themed, and I have opinions about all of this stuff, in that location's no getting around that. Simply anybody is talking about these things, and I'k just post-obit suit.
MW: Have you heard or gotten feedback from whatever of the politicians you've parodied?
RAINBOW: Marjorie Taylor Greene has not reached out and invited me to brunch, I'grand sorry to say. No, I haven't heard from any of them. When Trump was in office, people would ask me if I e'er heard from him. Offset of all, no. That would take been peachy publicity. I wish that I had. He didn't even block me on Twitter when he was allowed to use Twitter, damn it! Simply no. I did hear from some whistleblowers within the White Firm that I did have fans in his administration. I'm bold they meant Melania.
MW: Speaking of, have y'all joined TRUTH Social?
RAINBOW: Oh, my God, I have non. Do you think they would let me on TRUTH Social? I probably should endeavour, but to run across what happens. I would have to accept an alias or something, so they wouldn't recognize me.
MW: On a long list I made noting many of the people you have either parodied or featured in some way in your videos, I come up to J.Lo, from your simulated American Idol audition record.
RAINBOW: Oh, yep. You lot are digging into my vault, into my archives. No, never heard from J.Lo.
That American Idol spoof was i of the first videos I did of its kind, when I greenscreened myself into a scenario like that. I did hear from Nigel Lythgoe, one of the creators of American Idol, who took me to breakfast one day and said he wanted to make me a star, and that they were all fans of mine over at American Idol. Unfortunately, the project he had in mind for me was shelved. And I had to keep chugging away, and zip really took off for me until about six years later. It's amazing, this social media thing. It allows yous to achieve people you lot never imagined you would.
MW: Tin can you give whatsoever more insight into what that was or might have been, the project with Nigel?
RAINBOW: Information technology was in the very developmental stage, but if I recollect information technology correctly, it was some sort of Broadway reality show where they would follow people at diverse stages of their careers. And I would sort of be the, I guess, Ryan Seacrest glue that held information technology all together. That's how it was kind of pitched to me, and I signed the contracts. Just information technology didn't take off. Damn it!
MW: Yous've also made mention of Anderson Cooper from fourth dimension to time. Have you ever heard from or met him?
RAINBOW: I take not nevertheless heard from Anderson Cooper. But he is one of my guest moderators on a terminate on this book tour. I'one thousand happy to say that in the adjacent couple of weeks, he will be interviewing me for his CNN Plus show, where he will probable ask me to marry him, and you'll never hear from me once again.
MW How is your dating life? Are you seeing anyone?
RAINBOW: I recall that's all we accept fourth dimension for.
Information technology's very depressing. In that location's nothing to study. It'south that stock answer: I've been very focused on career. It's my own fault. I haven't really been putting myself out there enough. Although I'grand starting to do that more now. Considering I exercise want to get back on the saddle again and start dating. It's difficult. I'm wildly famous now. Everybody knows me. And yous take to exist kind of careful. Of course, I similar that too, though. My friends are like, "You lot have to be careful at present, because at that place are so many starfuckers out there." To which I say, "You mean there are people out there who retrieve I'yard a star and will want to fuck me because of it? Sign me up! Bring information technology on."
MW:"Don't hate me because I'yard famous."
RAINBOW: Come on, that's all I want.
MW: Is it true you're developing a podcast?
RAINBOW: Yes! Sean Hayes, who has been an inspiration to me my whole life, is producing a podcast for me with his production company, Hazy Mills Prods, which of course is behind Sean's podcast SmartLess, which is the biggest podcast on Earth now.
And they are producing the Randy Rainbow podcast, which we've started working on now and will be coming out, hopefully, at the get-go of May. It'due south going to be a mix of some sketch comedy, some musical elements, and I'm also getting to interview some incredible friends and celebrities that I've never fifty-fifty gotten the opportunity to meet before. Simply and then far, information technology'due south all friends. We've got Titus Burgess. We've got Josh Gad. We have Sean Hayes, Jon Cryer, Carol Burnett. Information technology's going to be a lot of fun. Harvey Fierstein just did it the other day. And those are just some of the names.
MW: Speaking of a Jewish ham.
RAINBOW: Harvey Fierstein, oh, my God! He's been so supportive of me. And actually, just a couple of months agone when I played Ridgefield, Connecticut, which is his hometown, he picked me up at the theater before the show and took me to dinner with Alan Menken. So that's a dream come true, but he's been so and so kind, and he is good for a quote. In fact, I quote him at the cease of a chapter in my book, and when information technology came time to do the audiobook, which I narrate, I had to learn to do a Harvey Fierstein impression, which if I do say, I'thou actually quite skillful at.
MW: Now I have to go and check out the audio version.
RAINBOW: If for no other reason.
MW: What else is on the horizon for you?
RAINBOW: Well, I've decided to go with the menstruation, considering that's ultimately what I've been doing this terminal decade. And it worked out for me. I effort not to make too many specific plans. I'yard excited virtually this volume. I call up that that will hopefully lead to some fun, new projects, be it a TV prove or a theater piece or something like that. Or another volume, I don't know. I'thou just kind of strapping in and ready for the ride.
I'm excited for the podcast. I will go along doing my satire on social media and across. And I love my bout. I love being able to accept these opportunities to travel the country and encounter people and perform. It's all been a dream come true. So, I ain't stopping someday soon.
"Playing with Myself" by Randy Rainbow ($28.99) is available in hardback, download, or audiobook from St. Martin'due south Press. Visit https://us.macmillan.com.
For more information on Randy Rainbow'due south tour stops, visit www.randyrainbow.com.
For more on Signature Theatre's 2022 Sondheim Honour Gala and to purchase tickets, visit www.SigTheatre.org/Support/SondheimGala.
Follow Randy Rainbow on Twitter at @randyrainbow and on TikTok at @randyrainbowofficial.
Source: https://www.metroweekly.com/2022/05/qa-randy-rainbow-on-his-life-amazing-career-and-grandmother/