by Andy Cohen
TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 4, 2014
Two phone interviews with people who hadn’t read the book. The lady from the Philadelphia Inquirer just wanted to pitch The Real Housewives of Philadelphia. So that’ll be a boring piece. The radio interview was all about trying to set me up with the gay guy from the radio show who seemed from his Twitter profile pic to be wearing a paisley scarf—not promising. I am terrified no one will come to the signings next week. The 92nd Street Y is almost sold out—nine hundred people—but who knows who will actually turn up. I had a real crisis in my head today about that. Speaking of signings, we are pretaping some shows for next week so I can take selfies at these signings for four hours (or one, depending on whether anyone shows) in New Jersey and Long Island. Today we taped Dick Cavett and Megan Mullally. The energy was a little off. You just don’t want to cut off Dick Cavett, and it was one time I wished our format had room to just chat without me shoving another game down everyone’s throats. He told some good stories, and I read him a bit from the Warhol diaries about him seeming a little gay on Letterman in 1985 but that he killed on the show. He seemed a little pissed at first but I guess it was okay. Did an interview for the Los Angeles Times’s website—they won’t cover me in the actual paper but perhaps are not fatigued enough by me to forbid coverage of me online—and then went to the Palm where I sat with a reporter from the Associated Press for an hour until Amanda came and we had a fast dinner before The Last Ship. I realized that not only had I forgotten to take my makeup off, I hadn’t stopped home to get money or my wallet. So Amanda had to give me twenty bucks for a cab at the restaurant and pay for dinner. I was like the queen of England. Loved The Last Ship—Joe Mantello directed it (beautifully) and all the music is by Sting and it’s like Billy Elliot without the gay and with better music. That being said, I was trying to figure out which of the shipbuilders is gay—someone has to be, it’s Broadway, plus they’re all essentially clogging bears with beards and bellies so it looks either very butch or like Sunday night at the Eagle. We went backstage and ran into Gloria Estefan who is in town working on her musical On Your Feet! She said it’s more about resilience than dancing and I don’t know what that means. I like her. We encountered Sting backstage and the photographer asked to take a picture of the three of us and I just felt bad for the two of them that they were being sullied by my stink in that music-legend pic. I was about to leave when a bearded fellow from the cast breathlessly appeared, saying he’d heard I was here and had to come tell me that he and his boyfriend love me. I told him I was trying to figure out who in the cast was gay and that I had pegged this guy in a track jacket in the bar scene. He said nope, he’s the only gay guy in the whole show. When I got home I saw a new guy in the elevator—tenth floor, big ass, sexuality in question—and watched an old episode of Concentration to see if I wanted to host it but the game seemed so boring. I couldn’t concentrate!
WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 5, 2014
Asked Surfin about the guy with the big ass but he didn’t have a lot of information. The day was absolutely nuts and I was sick as a dog and in a foul mood. I cancelled the Ninj as a result and did phone interviews all morning—blessedly, with reporters who had actually read the book, which I found incredibly gratifying. My Today show pre-interview made me dubious about my ability to get the book’s point across in the three minutes allotted. Had another meeting about game-show possibilities with Jimmy Fallon’s production company people. We are narrowing in on Match Game and Concentration—both have issues, though. I am worried I would get physically bored hosting Concentration, like checking my phone while I was up there hosting the show. That’s no good. And I’m worried Match Game is only nostalgia. Went down to the show to pretape Naomi Judd and Rob Riggle. I went into Naomi’s dressing room and she said in her kind of country deadpan drawl, “I’m not afraid of you, Andy Cohen. I raised Wynonna Judd and Ashley Judd.” I love it when the Judds mention other Judds! She said she only came to see Wacha, so we had the doorbell ring at the top of the show and he ran in, at which point she dumped out a bag of treats and toys she had brought him and I went apoplectic because he’s on a diet but was slurping up a mountain of Judd dog treats with abandon. To make matters worse, one of the toys was a squeaky one so during Plead the Fifth you could hear “squeak squeak squeak.” She told me during a commercial break that I seem lonely and she wanted to give me her “private line.” Then on the after show she asked where I was spending Thanksgiving (that’s how she says it, real country) and I said with my family and she said that sometimes the family we make is the most important, not our blood family. Here is exactly how the conversation went:
NAOMI: I worry about you.
ANDY: You do?
NAOMI: I dunno. I just get an intuition sometimes.… You’re too good to be alone.
ANDY: Thank you. You think I’m a sad guy, don’t you?
NAOMI: (closes her eyes) I just think you are so stinkin’ sensitive …
ANDY: Uh-huh.
NAOMI: (eyes still closed) And I think you are hypervigilant.
ANDY: Uh-huh.
NAOMI: And I think you’re … (opens eyes directly into her camera, smiling) Well, I don’t want to analyze you on TV, but—
ANDY: I have no problem with it.
NAOMI: HAHAHAHA! Okay. You have your blood relatives (glances around her for reassurance), you know, that you’re born with. I personally think that the stork was drunk and dropped me at the wrong house. You know, that kind of thing. So, what we’ve done, um, we have created our family of choice.
ANDY: Yes … yes. Right. So are you saying you would be like an auntie to me?
NAOMI: (possibly paraphrasing Golden Girls theme song) I would be your confidante and your friend.
Was Naomi Judd trying to turn me against my family? She said so many weird things, like that she and Ashley went to DC for Ashley to get “vetted” to be a senator (wha???) and they realized everyone in DC is legally insane and so they held each other in the hotel-room bed at night and sobbed. Um.
After the show I had a demo from the Microsoft white-glove team to show me the attributes of the Surface. They want Wacha at the shoot tomorrow and I begged them to leave him out of it. Now I see why Patsy Ramsey killed JonBenét (wait, did she?)—she got sick of having to lug her around to perform. If I didn’t already feel like shit the rest of the night would’ve made me sick: I had a haircut and a photo shoot, shot a mock episode of WWHL with Lisa Edelstein in character from Girlfriends’ Guide to Divorce, then did an Access Hollywood interview, voice-over for a RHONJ Secrets Revealed episode, and then the live show, with the stars of Hot in Cleveland minus Betty White—we had a cardboard version of her behind the bar. Wacha knocked over Wendie Malick’s champagne but she loved it. Got to bed at one forty-five. Did I mention I’m sick?
THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 6, 2014
You want the day of your book party to be like your wedding day, essentially doing spa activities til the magic hour, but I had a 6:00 a.m. wake-up call to shoot the Microsoft spot on Long Island, where I wondered all day if I’d make it back in time for the party. Once again, Liza was spot on about the weather; it rained like a bitch all day. The first shot was me and Wacha watching the Westminster Kennel Club dog show and he was just wild and out of nowhere a dog wrangler appeared with a huge bag of treats and cheese and liver, which made him a ravenous wolf and made me an insane bear. A couple hours of him jumping on and off the couch actually yielded what I am sure will be a really cute spot. And sometime after we finished shooting I realized that even though I still have a cough I am feeling better, I think, which made me forget how tired and cranky I was and just made me anxious for my book party tonight. I had a solid twenty minutes at home to shit/shower/shave and refresh for the party, which like the last one was at Anderson and Benjamin’s house and included people from every facet of my life (college/Bravo/Holt/gays/high school/CBS/randoms but no family—parents coming next week), which sounds fun until you are the only one at the party who knows everyone and y
ou feel codependent about not paying enough attention to each person. The second most talked about person at the party was also the only Housewife there: NeNe Leakes, who happened to be in town and came. I snapped a selfie with her and Monica Lewinsky, which was all I needed to make me extremely happy. When worlds collide! Monica at a party is always the most talked about and stops even the most jaded people in their tracks. Willie Geist arrived breathless because he’d walked in with her (Willie is not jaded, BTW). She looks very pretty. I introduced her to Erin Moriarty, who said I was her intern back in the day, and Monica said, “I was an intern too!” You go, girl! The last people at the party were Mark and Kelly, Jeanne and Fred, Padma, Anderson and Ben, and we all slid down the fireman’s pole.
FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 7, 2014
6:30 a.m. wakeup. Jessica Seinfeld posted an Instagram saying the stuffed monkey at AC’s (they have lots of taxidermy) was giving my book side-eye because I wrote about Jerry’s mom’s shiva. So that not only made me paranoid that I crossed a line writing about the food at the shiva but made me wonder (for the hundredth time) what else was in the book that could piss off my friends and acquaintances. Had a pit in my stomach all day about it while I shot the Microsoft stuff for twelve hours. Dinner at the Consueloses’ and got home and talked to Lynn, who terrified me about the Sunday Morning piece that airs in two days. Somehow Erin was being very cautious with me at the party and kept saying she hoped it was okay. I hung up thinking the piece was going to be all about what a starfucker I am. Isn’t publishing a book supposed to be fun? Well, it’s not.
SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 8, 2014
Very mellow, quiet day. John Hill came by. Sandy said my book is kind of boring if you’re not reading about yourself. Dinner with Jamie and Liza. They were telling each other things they already know about each other, like what drugs they’ve done and stuff. Watched Olive Kitteridge on HBO. The book was a hundred times better.
SUNDAY, NOVEMBER 9, 2014
Woke up early to walk Wacha before CBS Sunday Morning aired. Checked Amazon and the book was number 540 (can anyone stop me from obsessively checking?). I watched the whole piece standing up and let out a big sigh at the end. It was great. My only problems were that it seemed like I worked at CBS News for one minute (it was ten years) and that the Housewives clips were all insane—drink toss, table flip, limo fight. Oh, and I looked sweaty. I am so relieved. Lunch with Hickey, Jeffrey, and Scott Wittman. Went to New Jersey for Michael Rourke’s dad’s viewing. I didn’t view. Barry invited me to the Philippines for Christmas; I have no plans and want to go. NeNe was on fire on the live show but I was horrible. Went to the apartment of the Italian guy who I had the mellow date with to watch the premiere of The Comeback. It was all gay guys I didn’t know and it was kinda weird because I was on the episode. Book was number 155 on Amazon when I went to bed. So it begins.
MONDAY, NOVEMBER 10, 2014
Book was number 55 when I woke up! Of course checking the number was the first thing I did. On the Today show Anjelica Huston and I went back to back plugging our books. They did a tease with us both and it came off a shot of Al nuzzling Matt’s ear and Savannah kind of prodded me to do that to Anjelica, which I did and immediately regretted. I am a monkey. (With a wig on.) Savannah interviewed me and she’s as sweet as pie and I think it went well. From there I had phone interviews, then went back to my real job and did a pretape in the afternoon with Kenya and Sherri Shepherd which was all sorts of wrong. We played a game with NeNe last night called Silk du Soleil where I showed her people and she said who she would save and who she would drop. We showed Wendy Williams and she said she’d drop her. So I hear from CAA that Wendy and her manager-husband are furious at me for “dissing Wendy” and now don’t want to do the Judge Judy-type show I was going to produce for Joan Rivers that we’d reformatted for Lifetime starring Wendy. Wendy is perfect for the show and I really want to be in business with her. Are they so thin-skinned that a game of Silk du Soleil could kill the deal? Hopefully they’ll be over it in a couple days and we’ll get it back on track.
Backstage at The Colbert Report I was really nervous running through the questions with Emily (thank God my very old friend produced my segment so she could brief me hard), but also the problem is he doesn’t really ask questions. He just says things like, “You’re as shallow as a kiddie pool.” I almost always travel solo but finally had a (motley) posse in the greenroom—Aunt Sheila and Robert, Daryn, Ryan, Emily, Tommy, and Charlotte. Colbert came in before the show to say hi to me and remind me that he is playing a loud, dumb character, which is their warm-up to make you even more scared. I was pacing backstage but the truth is that it was a funny segment. My show was Tom and Ariana from Vanderpump Rules and they were jet-lagged or something and Tom couldn’t get his sentences together and I was mugging to the camera and people thought I was either a genius or very rude. Or both. Jon Jay from the Cardinals was behind the bar and his wife told me my whole tweet thing with the girlfriend of Seth Maness was a massive scandal within the Cardinals. I love it. I was so excited about doing Howard Stern in the morning that I couldn’t fall asleep.
TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 11, 2014
Publication day! I woke up like it was Christmas morning—at five-thirty, after four hours’ sleep—kissing Wacha as he wondered WTF was going on. Took a pic of the sunrise, and you know you’re feeling zen when you do that. I am such a Howard fan, and just being lucky enough to be interviewed by my broadcasting role model is a win for me. It felt so natural and so great sitting across from him; I took it all in. But he reawakened all my fears when he said the Seinfelds would be pissed I wrote about their kid’s bat mitzvah and Madonna would hate that I said she was singing to her own music at my Christmas party. I turned it around and explained myself. We talked about weed, molly, poo, me being a power top, what makes me a great houseguest, Eric the Actor, baseball players’ asses, Joan, Wacha, John Mayer—everything except the Housewives, which I loved.
Got to Kelly right before the show and Michael came into her dressing room as I was telling her about Howard. I’d just seen pictures of Strahan with washboard abs and told him I wanted to punch him. I did twice and maybe it was weird; Kelly told me to stop. She sold the fuck out of my book. I need to send her something. Then I was on the radio with Seacrest, and I realized I was going to have to own everything that’s in the book so I told him about how I write that he always says “you’re crushing it.” He liked that. Or pretended to. While I was on the phone with Seacrest a hot window-washer dude appeared outside and I secretly took his pic. The book was in the twenties on Amazon at midday and I think Holt was freaking out that it wasn’t higher because they started giving me media-training tips that were kind of contradictory, like to lose the Warhol reference. I pointed out I’m going on Morning Joe and Imus in the Morning and I would think they would like that. I was at my breaking point. Got off the phone and napped for half an hour. When I woke up I opened the window and offered the hot window washers a beer, which I know would lead to us having a successful three-way marriage. Then tried to get them to pose for a pic, which they didn’t love. Took their pic anyway, the second of the day. Radar Online picked up me saying I love molly on Howard Stern, so I am sure I will be media trained one more time before the week is up. And Fox Sports picked up me talking about Anthony Recker’s ass. So now Anthony Recker knows how I feel about his ass.
Schlepped two hours to Huntington, on Long Island, where I signed 450 books. During the Q and A there were a few precocious kids—one wanted to be a reality star and I said to go to school instead; the other looked like the bee girl from that Blind Melon video and asked if I keep up with the Kardashians. She and her mother thought it was a hilarious question. A lady raised her hand and asked if I ever want to do a “real” late night show. Nice. They all had glitter cases on their phones. This one lady said, “I’m the pipe cleaner lady!” and handed me a bag of pipe-cleaner cocktail rings and some glasses that said “mazel” in pipe cleaner. I took them with me. Another lady ha
d the most gorgeous kid ever, who I picked up to discover a terribly poopy diaper. Ooh. It was 90 percent women, some couples, and some really sweet misty-eyed gay guys. I got two numbers. Neither will I use. At the end of the line was a dude who introduced himself as Big Fat Joe and he had a big fat son named Joseph. I loved them. Went to bed and the book was number 8 on Amazon. Wacha’s in Brooklyn, and I needed a hug from him so bad after this day. Sherman said he and Tico are having a blast. I asked who Tico is and it turns out he’s Trey Anastasio’s dog. Another famous dog friend for the Wach-star!
WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 12, 2014
Radio interviews first thing in the morning. John Hill came over and told me about his great Tinder date last night, then said he likes normal-looking guys and I was like um, didn’t we date for three years? Taped The Meredith Vieira Show; they had Doritos in the greenroom (I guess they paid attention to the book) and I gorged on them. Ryan got sick watching me suck the flavor off and asked if that’s what I do. So I guess my own Bravo publicist didn’t read my book in which I detail sucking the flavor off Doritos? The scuttlebutt backstage was that Streisand had been there the day before and wanted all the orange removed from the set. Any trace of orange had to be gone. But she asked for cantaloupe and cheddar cheese in the greenroom. Both orange! What does it mean? Meredith had me rat out Barbara Walters for yelling at me. All day there have been stories about the book on Radar, first saying that Theresa Caputo is called out in my new book for “fishing,” then it was that Naomi Campbell told me to fire Kenya at the Met Ball. You never know what’s going to get pickup. Wacha is still in Brooklyn living it up with Tico Anastasio and I am starting to get jealous. Literally.