Tonya Mosley

And in many instances over those years, you over-indexed on an audience under 35.

And one of the

One of the things that you write about in the book is as you are receiving these messages from Paramount that you were too black, that you needed to have different type of guests on and you were competing against this growing late night ecosystem.

It eventually broke through on air.

There's a moment on the show when activists from Queer Nation heckle you during your monologue and they yell, why don't you have any gay guests on your show?

And at first, you answer politely.

You say, like, I have a lot of gay guests.

Maybe they just aren't out.

Maybe you just don't know their orientation.

But then they continue to push, and then you become more agitated, and then something in you just snaps.

And I want to play a clip from it.

Let's listen.

My guest is talk show host, actor, and author Arsenio Hall.

We'll continue our conversation after a short break.

I'm Tanya Mosley, and this is Fresh Air Weekend.

You know, you mentioned about holding a guest's hand and something that kept coming up in the book were guests who were nervous in ways that surprised me.

You tell the story of Maya Angelou coming to your dressing room before the show.

She needed like two shots of Crown Royale just to walk out there.

And Patti LaBelle, yeah, the night you introduced Prince, she was gripping your hand so hard.

I mean, that stuck out to me because it comes up so often in the book.