The Bald and the Beautiful with Trixie and Katya
Bruce Vilanch's New Hyundai Has a Blind Spot with Trixie
Tue, 10 Dec 2024
If one were to print out all of Bruce Vilanch's writing, acting, and producing credits on a dot-matrix printer and lay that continuous piece of paper on the ground, it would encircle the world approximately one hundred and eighty seven times. From The Brady Bunch Variety Hour to the famously infamous Star Wars Holiday Special starring Bea Arthur and Harvey Korman to too many awards shows to count, two-time Emmy-Winner Bruce Vilanch is a walking, talking encyclopedia of Hollywood history. Come join us for an exceedingly charming chat with a true living legend. To pre-order Bruce's brand-new book, "It Seemed Like a Bad Idea at the Time," click HERE. Save on the perfect gift by visiting https://AuraFrames.com to get $35-off Aura’s best-selling Carver Mat frames by using promo code BALD at checkout. This deal is exclusive to listeners, so get yours now in time for the holidays! Terms and conditions apply. This episode is sponsored by BetterHelp. Give online therapy a try at https://BetterHelp.com/BALD and get on your way to being your best self! Need a website? Head to https://www.SquareSpace.com for a free trial, and when you’re ready to launch, go to https://www.SquareSpace.com/BALD to save 10% off your first purchase of a website or domain! Stop putting off those doctors appointments and go to https://Zocdoc.com/BALD to find and instantly book a top-rated doctor today! Follow Bruce: @BruceVilanch Follow Trixie: @TrixieMattel Follow Katya: @Katya_Zamo To watch the podcast on YouTube: http://bit.ly/TrixieKatyaYT Don’t forget to follow the podcast for free wherever you're listening or by using this link: http://bit.ly/baldandthebeautifulpodcast If you want to support the show, and get all the episodes ad-free go to: https://thebaldandthebeautiful.supercast.com If you like the show, telling a friend about it would be amazing! You can text, email, Tweet, or send this link to a friend: http://bit.ly/baldandthebeautifulpodcast To check out future Live Podcast Shows, go to: https://trixieandkatyalive.com To order your copy of our book, "Working Girls", go to: workinggirlsbook.com To check out the Trixie Motel in Palm Springs, CA: https://www.trixiemotel.com Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
Chapter 1: Who is Bruce Vilanch?
That's one person clapping, but that's 100% of the people in the room. But a ferocious clapper. A ferocious clapper. Big time. Today we have with us legendary comedy writer, comedy... Today we have with us legendary comedy writer, actor, singer. He's won Emmys for writing for the Academy Awards and was a judge on Drag Race. It is Bruce Valanche. Hello. Thank you.
Hello, my camera. This is you. This is me. This is a fabulous profile shot of me, which is amazing. I do kind of look like Alfred Hitchcock.
What do you think about this? You know, everybody hates our new set. We just painted it blue. What do you think?
It's not gay enough. You think? And it's very self-referential. So, I mean, as I suppose it should be. But why not? And these flowers are even, these are, oh, well, they're plastic. They're plastic, they are. They're not, you know, it's a gay touch, sort of. Yeah. But it's lovely. What's not to love? And you got, you know, color-coded pink and purple microphones. Isn't that nice?
They all look like, you know, I mean, horses when they're happy. Studs, at least.
Well, you're kind of like, you know, when we have Katya, she's worn wigs like your hair in her career, so it kind of feels like we have her wig today. She's worn a Bruce wig.
Yes.
Do people go as you for Halloween? Do what? Do people go as you for Halloween?
Oh, yeah, they do, actually. Yes. I mean, I wasn't... When I was living in West Hollywood at both Tender Queens, a restaurant there, and on Halloween would come and I'd be on my balcony and I would watch the Bruces go by. There was a period where there was... It was an easy thing for a fat guy to do, just put on a blonde wig and a T-shirt that said something obscene, and it was me.
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Chapter 2: What does Bruce think about Halloween costumes?
The eyewear also. The eyewear, the red glasses, yes. It's easy to find, that's true. I always wore glasses, but when I was on Hollywood Squares, I had different glasses every night, but then the prescription changed, and I would have to take a second mortgage to get them all. It happened that week on the show we had Sally Jessie Raphael.
I was just, we're so psychic.
Who was, you know, for those of you who are too young to remember, a talk show host who did a kind of Oprah sort of show in the daytime. And she had, she was blonde with red glasses. Right. We had the same lawyer, actually. So I said, I said, I have to get all these glasses changed. She said, she said, I said, she said, well, you can have red ones if you want. I said, no, but that's your brand.
And she said, I'm retiring. I said, oh, may I? So I took the red glasses and that's all I wear now.
I was listening to you talk and I was like, it's Sally Jessie. It really is. And so it's like crazy that you brought that up because I was like, it is kind of Sally Jessie. It's Sally Jessie if she shaved. It's also a little bit Ghostbusters. What do you want? Remember her in Ghostbusters? She has like fun glasses. No, actually. Remember their receptionist in Ghostbusters?
Oh, yeah. I want to say Carol Kane, but it wasn't Carol Kane. It was someone like that. She's so gorgeous. Like Annie Potts or somebody like that.
Yeah, like a character actress. Very pretty, though. A cute character actress, yes. Do you think that character actress means unattractive? Generally.
I hate that. Well, you know, it means it's old school and it's not leading lady. Right. It's a it's a supporting part. And it's it's so she's not the romantic interest in the picture. Right. So she's a character actor. She becomes and that it just it's bled down from the studio system. It's one of those things that remains.
I do think it can be probably kind of difficult for women to do comedy when, well, when they're excessively gorgeous. I feel like, don't you feel like entertainment loves like, you have to be like either like the hot slut and everything?
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Chapter 3: What is Bruce's new book about?
That's funny. I didn't know that. You get good attention. I'd never heard that, but, yeah, I mean, people who, you know, I mean, it's a traditional thing to do. You know, I mean, there's a word for it now. It's like, I don't know, not, I can't think of the word, but it's what people often do, just, you know, fake. It's just fake news. Right.
They plant stuff to draw attention to whatever the thing they want to have attention drawn to, and then the fake stuff kind of goes away, and Yeah. When did you start? I mean, you kind of also know all the drag queens. I do. Well, I started in Chicago when I was at the Chicago Tribune writing for the old school legendary drag queens who came through town.
Charles Pierce, Lynn Carter, Jim Bailey, Craig Russell. I wrote for all four of them at once at the same time, which was strange because if one didn't like the Mae West joke, I would give it to the other one who did the Mae West joke. That's just economical. I knew it worked. It was all personal taste.
And then it just kind of extended, although this whole new drag phenomenon came much later than that. I mean, there were certain people who broke through, like Jim Bailey was a Vegas headliner. Right. But mostly it was drag queens and drag bars, and it slowly crept in. RuPaul came along, and it transformed the whole thing.
My God, yeah. And I wrote for him, her, them. I think she says you can call me he or she or Kathie Lee as long as you call me. But I think Ru's approach to whatever you call her in drag is very inclusive. I don't think you can really offend RuPaul. I don't think you can offend RuPaul.
No, well, the brand is love. And if you're not going to love yourself, who else are you going to love? So, I mean, it's all framed in that. And from the very beginning, from the moment that he was noticed, in the first book, we talk about the ritual of getting into this character. And it is just all about love. So it comes from a different place. Drag was traditionally satirical.
Yeah, can I ask, I mean, I didn't find this in my research, but when did you meet RuPaul? Do you remember when that was?
Yeah, he was doing his VH1 show. Oh, the RuPaul show. The RuPaul show. And I met him and he came up to me and he said, Bruce Valanche, you're in mahogany. Yeah. 32 minutes in. Yeah. So I raced home and put the VHS in the tape. And 32 minutes in, and there I am. I thought, not for nothing is this guy RuPaul. Yeah. This guy's going to go places. Yeah. This is a precision instrument.
Well, he's obsessed with Diana Ross, as we all love it. Well, yeah, of course. You work with Diana so much, too. Well, I think, you know, a lot of black gay guys were obsessed with Dionne Warwick and Diana Ross because they were, and Diane Carroll, because they were glamorous musicians. old school glamour. And there wasn't much of that, you know, for black guys to emulate.
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Chapter 4: What challenges did Vanessa Williams face as Miss America?
Chapter 5: How did drag culture evolve over time?
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And that's also like with the Vanessa Williams of the world, who I think you also know too, right? I know Vanessa, yeah. I met Vanessa when she was Miss America. Oh my gosh. You know, I did a couple seasons of a show with her, so I knew that she knew you, and I texted her about it, but I think she's in the UK right now, so the time zone. Yeah, she's doing Devil Wears Prada, the musical.
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Chapter 6: What memorable experiences does Bruce share from his career?
Life to tape. Yeah. So we tried to keep it as close to the air date as possible so it was topical. Yeah. But basically, people were on good behavior most of the time. Right. Because if you weren't, there were like eight other people going, girl. Yeah. You know, girl, I mean, Roseanne was in a foul mood. Uh, and so she kind of, I think she still is. Oh, well, she's one of her 43, you know, people.
Chapter 7: What was it like working with the Brady Bunch?
And I've worked with her and I keep saying, I would say to her, would you please ask number 16 to start talking to number 32? Cause we're not getting any work done. Right. But I mean, she's, you know, she's, she's her own case study. I love her on a journey. She's her own case study. She's, you know, now she's a,
crazy trumper and you know yeah i mean i still love her but what other kind is there uh exactly exactly there you go that's why i can still still stand can i guess like a logistic thing so the way hollywood squares is like i mean we have a maybe a lot of young uh viewers who maybe have never seen it it's set up like a grid it's a tic-tac-toe board yeah and so you guys really couldn't i mean could you couldn't see each other under no we couldn't see each other once we were in our squares uh-huh uh but you know we there were monitors
that facing us so that we could see big like uh teleprompter monitors but um so that we could see what was happening we could see what the shot was right oh right and so we could we could we could see what other people were up to and all that as it as it went to that but It must have been fun being in it. And once there was cross-talking, they would be going back and forth.
And that was, of course, my favorite moment when I guess the YouTube thing that gets a lot of comment is, you fool, which was a woman was... She needed one square to get the win, and she could not get the right answer. And it started with Gilbert Gottfried, who, when she didn't agree with him, said, you fool. And it went on like that. Penn and Teller were on there.
This woman liked it about six times, and finally she won the thing. Thank God. And it's a very funny clip on YouTube.
watching because everybody kind of begins to lose it because it's so it's so insane it's like things you never expected would happen do these squares would ever come back it is coming back it is it's coming back in january on cbs with drew barrymore in the center square and nate burleson uh who if you don't know if you watch uh cbs mornings with gail king he's the black guy are you tony the white guy and nate burleson's the black guy are you gonna go back
I don't think so. Be a guest at least. I'd love to, but no one's called. This is an official casting call. That's right. If you're watching, I'm happy to go back.
Yeah.
Well, this is going to be one of those primetime hours, probably after like two FBI shows on CBS, like 10 o'clock on a Wednesday. But so it'll only be once a week, like Alec Baldwin doing a match game and name that tune with Jane Krasinski. So it's Jane Krasinski. I think I've made just Krakowski. I just made a child of her and Emily Blunt.
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