Return to Transcripts main page
Joy Behar Page
Arrest Warrant for Lindsay Lohan; Babies After 40; Tea Party Pooper
Aired May 20, 2010 - 21:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
JOY BEHAR, HOST: Tonight on THE JOY BEHAR SHOW, will Lindsay Lohan come home knowing she could be facing time in prison or will she stay in Europe? I hear Roman Polanski is looking for a roommate.
Then Nicolas Cage says he`ll only eat an animal whose sex life he respects. Look, my only concern is chickens are not full of hormones. I don`t care if they do it in the missionary position.
When 47-year-old Kelly Preston announced she was pregnant it led to some obvious questions like why are older women all having babies lately. Is this a trend? And does this mean that Betty White is ovulating? That and more right now.
After losing her passport in France, Lindsay Lohan is flying home. Will she be arrested for violating probation?
Here now with the latest is Access Hollywood`s weekend co-host and correspondent, Tony Potts. Hi Tony.
TONY POTTS, WEEKEND CO-HOST & CORRESPONDENT, ACCESS HOLLYWOOD: Hi, Joy.
BEHAR: Ok. Lindsay had to be in court today for a 2007 DUI conviction and the judge wasn`t happy about her no-show and her stolen passport excuse. What did the judge do?
POTTS: Well, here`s the thing. The judge, Marsha Revel, this is why she was so pissed today because Lindsay made her wait for two hours on the previous engagement they had. So the judge cleared her docket at 8:30 in the morning. At 10:30 Lindsay waltzes in like it was a movie set so the judge was very upset and she just waiting for Lindsay to screw up one more time.
Of course, you know, Lindsay has. So the judge says, "Look, $100,000 bail. When you come back to California, you`re going to be arrested. Now if she does post bail, though, I`ll tell you this, she will now have to wear a scram anklet which monitors the alcohol content --
BEHAR: Really.
POTTS: Yes. And she will also have to go to counseling once a week and she`ll be subjected to at least one random drug test per week. So I think actually, Joy, somebody finally is being the mother or the parent that Lindsay needed.
BEHAR: Yes, that`s very good. I think that`s a good idea.
POTTS: Yes.
BEHAR: Keep her under house arrest.
POTTS: Yes.
BEHAR: Now, you know, but the French police are saying that she didn`t really report the stolen passport thing. They have no record of it. Is it just another made-up thing from Lindsay?
POTTS: Well, it sounds like it in one sense. I think if you`re in the throes of alcohol and whatever else she`s doing, I`m thinking any of this would be out of her mind. I`ve been to Cannes, I`ve lost my passport but not in quite the same way.
I have to tell you though, the D.A. today in court wanted to know -- they wanted an actual copy of her plane ticket back to see -- they didn`t believe that she actually really bought the ticket to come back in time for the court date. When that`s produced I think that will tell us a lot.
She does have a temporary passport. She`ll be flying back to L.A. tomorrow and she can be arrested. The L.A. County sheriffs told us she can be arrested when she comes into the airport. However, I would probably think her lawyers would then just have her there and then surrender her so it`s not quite the spectacle it may turn out to be.
BEHAR: Ok. Just finally now, her father, Michael, showed up in court today and spoke to the press. What did he say?
POTTS: Well, here`s the problem. Lindsay intimated in Cannes that, "Oh, my dad might have been behind this plot of stealing my passport." I talked to him today and he said, "Yes. I`ve got it in my pocket, sure."
He`s upset in one sense that he doesn`t want her to go to jail but he`s happy that something is actually moving forward. So whichever way, this is going to end badly one way or the other. I just hope it does not end tragically, Joy.
BEHAR: Yes, I hope so too. We hope the best for the girl.
POTTS: Absolutely.
BEHAR: All right. Thanks, Tony.
POTTS: You`re welcome Joy.
BEHAR: Ok.
Now to something more positive; John Travolta and Kelly Preston who`s combined ages are 103, are expecting a baby. More and more women are opting for babies after 40, apparently.
Here now to discuss the joys and challenges of parenting later in life are clinical psychologist and parenting expert Dr. Laura Markham; journalist and entrepreneur extraordinaire, Joan Lunden and program director of the NYU fertility center, Dr. Jamie Grifo. Hello you guys.
You know, Joan, you had children in your 30s. Then you had two sets of twins by surrogacy in your 50s. May I say that?
JOAN LUNDEN, JOURNALIST: Well, we started trying when we were -- when I was about 45, 46 years old and had about four rounds of in vitro. And then we turned to surrogacy.
BEHAR: I was talking about your age, do you mind?
LUNDEN: No. I have round two in my 50s. And, you know, I`ll tell you something. I went through a huge transformation and decided to take charge of my health when I was about 39 years old. I`ll bet you I`m healthier today. I bet you I added years to my life. But I really am more fit.
BEHAR: Well, you lost weight. I remember you lost a lot of weight.
LUNDEN: Yes, I lost a lot of weight. But I also just took charge of my health. I saw someone the other day, a woman who was at the store and she was probably, I don`t know, 32, 33, maybe she was 35. But she was struggling just to even be able to take this child out of the stroller. I thought you know what? I probably have a longer life expectancy than she does.
BEHAR: Right, well maybe.
LUNDEN: So it doesn`t really guarantee anything because you have your children in your 20s or your 30s.
BEHAR: Right. Are you planning anything for your 70s?
LUNDEN: No, no, no. I`m done. Done, done, done.
BEHAR: Let me talk to you, Dr. Laura. I was reading that you said a person should not have a baby before the age of 28. It so happens I was 28 when I got pregnant.
DR. LAURA MARKHAM, CLINICAL PSYCHOLOGIST: How did that work out for you?
BEHAR: It was great, it was great. It worked. I was a little more mature then than I was when I was 21, that`s for sure.
MARKHAM: People are really still children until they`re 28.
BEHAR: Why 28, though?
MARKHAM: Well, the thinking in the field of psychology is that adolescence lasts a little longer and in the old days people settled down and got married and started having babies when they were in their 20s. Nowadays, people put that off and the 30s are the nest-building stage. Actually parents are much better equipped to be good parents at that point.
BEHAR: In their 30s.
MARKHAM: They`re more patient, they`re more mature, they`re -- hopefully they have done some building of their careers and professions so that they can spend a little more time with their child. But I should add that what really matters when you raise a child is the relationship you build with that child.
BEHAR: Right.
MARKHAM: That`s really the only thing that matters. Everything draws from that.
BEHAR: The problem, though, doctor, you can address this, is that when you reach 39, 40, 42, you have like only a couple of eggs left, right? Then it becomes a problem. Just when you`ve matured enough to have a baby, nature turns on you.
DR. JAMIE GRIFO, NYU FERTILITY CENTER: Sociology and biology have diverged. We`re much more capable to be parents at an age when we`re much less capable of getting pregnant and that`s the problem.
At age 30 you`ve lost 88 percent of your eggs. When you reach age 40, you lost 97 percent of your eggs and that`s a female thing. Men keep making new sperm every 90 days so their fertility doesn`t change much. But women, there`s a dramatic change and that`s the problem. That`s where women have to be really smart about the decisions they make regarding their fertility.
The best thing is to avoid being an infertility patient. It`s not a great process to go through. The longer you wait, the more you risk the possibility that you`ll end up in an office like mine and have to be treated.
BEHAR: Yes, but there are many advantages, as you know, Joan, as Joan was just saying, to having them later.
(CROSSTALK)
LUNDEN: You have little babies.
GRIFO: I`ll be 55 this year. I have a 2 1/2-year-old and a 6-month- old.
BEHAR: Really. So when you`re 80, your kids will be how old? 25? 24, 23?
GRIFO: In that range. So?
BEHAR: That`s the part that we need to talk about here.
(CROSSTALK)
MARKHAM: What`s 80 like today? 80 is a little different than it used to be.
LUNDEN: My mom is 91 and going strong. But men have been getting divorced and remarried and having children in their 50s for decades.
GRIFO: We also have a cultural divide here. We don`t get upset when a 70-year-old guy has a baby. A 47-year-old woman has a baby and everyone`s like -- we`re on TV talking about it. Why is that?
BEHAR: Well, I mean, you know, there are actuary tables -- let`s talk turkey. If you`re going to have a 20-year-old when you`re 80, you probably won`t be living that much longer. So the child at 20 is a kid really still has to deal with the death of a parent at a young age. It`s not easy.
That`s an issue to deal with, isn`t it, Joan?
LUNDEN: But life expectancy, we were talking about it in the green room, for me at my age being fit is probably --
GRIFO: You`re probably 100.
(CROSSTALK)
LUNDEN: 100, 105; based on what`s happening today.
BEHAR: What are you saying, what do you mean?
LUNDEN: Good, I`ve got seven of them to take care of me.
MARKHAM: You know, these are hard decisions that you make about aging parents. I think we`ve all had to make decisions about our own parents that were tough. And so when you`re asking a child who`s 25 to make these decisions, that`s a lot to ask. So if you`re still going strong at 90, great.
LUNDEN: But there`s another issue, Joy, and that is just the fact that life has changed in this world, particularly in this country. While life expectancy is longer, you really have to look at the first part of life. Whereas for fertility, I know the 20s would be great. However, women don`t go to college to find a husband anymore. They go to college to be educated and start a career. Everything has shifted back ten years. You know, the number of women getting pregnant at age 35 has what, quadrupled in the last couple of decades?
(CROSSTALK)
BEHAR: Whereas they would have years ago gotten pregnant at 25.
LUNDEN: Yes. So we have to discuss reality here. It`s not -- these aren`t just decisions.
BEHAR: Let`s face it, Joan, women lose either way. If you don`t do it when you`re fertile, you have to do in vitro. If you do it when you`re fertile, your career suffers. Women always have to come up against these problems as you were saying before.
GRIFO: That`s true. It really is true.
LUNDEN: All right. So here`s an issue that I asked before. What about freezing eggs? Because for years and years we`ve been able to make embryos and freeze sperm, what about freezing eggs?
GRIFO: Well, it`s definitely an option. Women need to be very thoughtful about their fertility. And I think, you know, part of sex education, they should be talking about fertility and what happens with age so that women get a good education so they make good decisions along their life.
A lot of people end up in my office at 44 and say, "I tried two months, why aren`t I pregnant."
And they have no clue that they`re chance of getting pregnant is incredibly low and no one counseled them. Now, they think it out and people understand that there are options about how you decide to live your life. And yes, if you`re young and on a career track and you know you`re going to delay your child-bearing you can freeze your eggs and have a much better chance with your 30-year-old eggs when you`re 40 than you`re 40- year-old eggs --
BEHAR: Yes.
GRIFO: -- when you`re 40.
BEHAR: This whole thing though with in vitro is a little tricky. Look at this octomom and Kate Gosselin and these girls who -- they have so many kids that they can`t afford to raise.
GRIFO: Yes.
BEHAR: I mean, it`s a tricky situation --
GRIFO: Well, I mean those are outliers and there are things you can do to avoid those situations at one time and either of those cases. That`s not the norm and it rarely happens and those two cases are two examples of medicine gone awry and could -- could have been managed better with a different outcome.
BEHAR: But they didn`t have to have all those babies.
GRIFO: No they didn`t and but they`re --
BEHAR: Then there`s the moral issue of which ones to get rid of. There is that issue.
GRIFO: Well -- but you don`t even put them in that position, just put back to your embryos --
BEHAR: Yes.
GRIFO: -- you don`t -- don`t worry about or don`t use drugs that are a patient type stimulator has too many eggs, don`t -- don`t let them get pregnant in that cycle, cancel it --
BEHAR: Right.
GRIFO: -- avoid it.
BEHAR: Ok, thanks, everyone. A very interesting discussion.
And check out Joan Lunden`s new vetting line, Joan Lunden Home launched on QVC.
We`ll be back in a minute. Thank you.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Coming up a little later on THE JOY BEHAR SHOW, actor Nicolas Cages says he only eat animals who sex life he respects.
And Lisa and Laura Ling share their incredible story of Lisa`s rescue from a North Korean prison.
Now back to Joy.
BEHAR: Ok. With Rand Paul`s primary win in Kentucky, are his supporters Tea partying like its 1959. And will other GOPers be doing the same in November or should John Boehner wait a bit before buying noise makers and confetti?
With me now are Margaret Carlson, Bloomberg columnist and Washington editor of the "Week" magazine and Tina Brown, editor-in-chief of "The Daily Beast". You know those are two of my favorite reading matters, whatever you want to call them.
TINA BROWN, THE DAILY BEAST: Good, good on you.
BEHAR: I really do love both of them.
So now Rand Paul, let`s talk about Rand Paul. He`s under fire for saying he disagrees with part of the Civil Rights Act, that the government should not dictate the discrimination policy of a private business. He then said -- he took it back.
He said, "I unequivocally state that I will not support any efforts to repeal the Civil Rights Act of 1964." Ok, Margaret, should he say goodbye to being a senator?
MARGARET CARLSON, COLUMNIST, BLOOMBERG: well, you know, he`s -- you put away the champagne and the lamp shades pretty quickly on that one, although you just don`t know how rightward Kentucky is going to be. It`s very good to be unconventional this year, but unconventional went over to wacky in the case of Rand Paul.
He`s -- he`s misreading the law. You know, he will do it under the commerce clause if he could because Rand Paul would abolish the Department of Education, EPA. He would get rid of hurricane relief. He wouldn`t be cleaning up the oil spill. There`s almost nothing Rand Paul will have the federal government do except pass a Constitutional amendment to outlaw abortion in all cases.
But Jack Conway, his opponent, is a fairly blank slate but there`s no Republican I know who has come out in the defense of Rand Paul.
BEHAR: They have not come out to defend him. Well, they can`t really.
BROWN: I just think it`s just an astonishing comment right after his glorious success to go and sort incinerate himself with this -- this comment, you know, it just, I think he must have, he just suddenly unmasked himself as complete wing nut at that moment.
BEHAR: Do you think he`s not that bright?
BROWN: I just think that his wingnuttery just was plainly revealed in the morning after. And I just -- what I wonder is -- is -- is just whether this is going to happen time and again with these Tea Party guys.
BEHAR: Right.
BROWN: In the end, there`s a kind of -- there`s a great celebration, they win and there`s a kind of oh, my God.
BEHAR: But they had --
BROWN: You know, he is actually truly a crazy person, which is what happened.
CARLSON: By the way I think he took it back.
BEHAR: He did.
CARLSON: Joy.
BEHAR: He took it back.
CARLSON: But -- but remember his father, Ron Paul, is on the record as being in favor of abolishing the Civil Rights Act. So --
BEHAR: Really. See, I didn`t know that.
CARLSON: -- I think this is -- you know this is -- this is one of those gaffes which Michael Kinsley says as a politician --
BROWN: Right.
CARLSON: -- accidentally speaking the truth. Rand Paul pulled back because in this day and age it`s a terrible thing to say I mean, however you may believe it.
BROWN: It`s a flying sound bite that`s going to haunt him for the rest of his days.
BEHAR: Right. Democrat should have an easy time running against him.
BROWN: Yes, and you know what`s the matter with all of these guys who adore this kind of -- speak like this and then it`s about I misspoke, you know. I mean that I don`t get.
BEHAR: Yes, why don`t they say I lied in most cases, they never use the L word.
BROWN: I love it.
BEHAR: Republicans like him for his spending, he`s very -- he`s very cheap about spending our money, but he is a libertarian. It seems as though he`s driven by an ideology that`s very rigid, this guy. That he can`t really let in for something like the Civil Rights Act.
BROWN: Well, I think that this was supposedly -- this is really like his purism --
BEHAR: Yes.
BROWN: -- when he talked like that.
But I don`t think that in politics that works. I mean, you really have to understand how it sounds when you come out.
BEHAR: Right. Now look at this other guy, this other Tea Partier Mark Williams. He`s also in trouble. I had him on this show one time. He`s really out of control, I think.
In response to the plans for a mosque to be built near Ground Zero, he said, quote, "The monument would consist of a mosque for the worship of the terrorists` Monkey God."
Then he said - he apologized, but to Hindus. In other words, the mosque now became a Hindu temple.
(CROSSTALK)
BEHAR: He says in the course of the article, "I described the God worshipped my terrorists as a Monkey God, I was wrong and that was offensive. I owe an apology to millions of Hindus who worship Lord Hanuman, an actual monkey God."
What is going on? Are the -- are the patients running the asylum?
BROWN: Well, this is the thing. I mean, every time you give them excessive air time, they really do show that they are completely out of their minds. And surely this is going to matter when it really comes to the voting. In the end isn`t this a kind of upsurge of just angry, you know, acting out --
BEHAR: Yes.
BROWN: -- people are going through with the Tea Party.
BEHAR: Yes.
BROWN: When it really comes to November, I don`t think that everybody should be saying watch out for the Tea Party Movement.
BEHAR: But I think --
BROWN: I think by that time they`re going to be burned out with this kind of lunacy.
BEHAR: I hope so. And you know, I`m very confused by them because I talk to Tea Partiers on this show all the time. And this woman Amy Kramer was on the other day and she said that her faction in the Tea Party is not racist and they`re just about fiscal responsibility.
But this guy Mark Williams, who has called Obama an Indonesian Muslim turned welfare thug and racist-in-chief is part of her faction, so I don`t trust them at all now. I don`t trust any of them.
CARLSON: Joy, can I ask you a question?
BEHAR: Sure.
CARLSON: Will you have him back on your show or can you boycott having him on your show?
BEHAR: Rand? Well, I would like -- well, I would have him back. I believe in free speech. Let`s see what he has to say for himself.
CARLSON: I don`t think he`s important enough in the movement. I mean part of -- if you`re trying to find who speaks for the Tea Party Movement is a very difficult thing.
BEHAR: Right.
CARLSON: I don`t think he has that many followers.
BEHAR: Well, this maybe his jumping off point
Ok, you two stay there. We`ll be right back in a minute with more of these two.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
BEHAR: I`m back with "The Week`s" Margaret Carlson and "The Daily Beast`s" Tina Brown. Margaret, Maureen Dowd wrote an interesting piece -- well, both of you. She`s annoyed people refer to Elena Kagan as unmarried instead of single. Do you have a response to that?
CARLSON: Well, you know, when I read that I`m wondering what am I? I think if you`ve been married, you don`t get the label which Maureen describes as unappealing, the unmarried label as readily. But, you know, men don`t get these descriptions one way or the other.
BEHAR: That`s right. They`re always bachelors.
CARLSON: They`re eligible bachelors for their entire lives. It`s just one more piece of unfair discrimination as far as I`m concerned.
BROWN: You know what, I just think the whole Kagan uproar about is she gay, unmarried, all of this is just so wildly undignified that it makes me furious actually.
Here is this woman who is a smart, cerebral, academic woman with a great career. Why does she have to talk about the way she spends her private life in any sense. I just don`t see why it`s --
BEHAR: Well, it`s the "Wall Street Journal" started the whole thing with the photograph of her playing softball.
(CROSSTALK)
BROWN: It`s just undignified.
CARLSON: The way the press took of on it, I`ve written a word about it in defiance of this -- I don`t see how you can take a photo and use it as a pretext for this discussion about somebody.
BEHAR: It`s not fair really.
BROWN: It`s totally unfair. I also just feel that it`s kind taken the wind out of her sails. That`s what I don`t like. Here`s this woman who should be celebrating the fact that she`s reached a great pinnacle in her career. Let her be judged on her mind, instead of which she`s having to sort of be seedily boxed into a corner about what her sexuality might be.
CARLSON: Oh, yes. That`s such a good point.
BEHAR: But Sonia Sotomayor was single also, but they were so busy saying she was a wise Latina they forgot that she was an old maid.
CARLSON: But you know, Joy, they quickly dragged out old boyfriends and who she was engaged to. I mean this is -- this is so unfair. And as Tina points out, it takes a joyful moment at the pinnacle of what you can achieve as a lawyer and reduces it to something tawdry and unimportant and trivial.
BROWN: I just want to start asking the men in these confirmations how they -- what kind of erectile dysfunction medication they take.
CARLSON: I want your prescription. Give me your prescription drug list.
BEHAR: Yes, nobody asked Judge Alito if he can still get it up.
CARLSON: Exactly right. Please.
BROWN: Let`s just have that one out on the table.
BEHAR: Put it right out there. But she seems like she`s going to be confirmed pretty easily.
BROWN: Well, I hope so. I`m sure she`ll want to just get back down to her work and just be done with it, you know.
BEHAR: Tell me about "The Daily Beast" before we go because I read it every day. I read the cheap sheet.
BROWN: It is going very well. It is positively feral.
BEHAR: Really, that`s wonderful.
BROWN: We`re at five million unique visitors a month, over 50 million page views. We have writers of the caliber of Margaret Carlson on the site today writing a brilliant piece today about Arlen Specter.
We have a great following now and it`s very, very exciting. I love writing for it.
BEHAR: Right. It`s interesting that Specter, he couldn`t pull it off because he`s an opportunist. But Lieberman is still there.
BROWN: Yes, Lieberman is still there, alas. I`d like to se him knocked off his perch.
BEHAR: Alas. All right. Thank you very much, ladies. Always a pleasure to talk to you.
CARLSON: Goodbye.
BEHAR: Bye-bye, Margaret.
Next, Nicolas Cage says he only eats animals that have sex a certain way. Let that just sink in now, ok, and we`ll be back.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
BEHAR: Actor Nicolas Cage bases his diet on how animals have sex saying, quote, "I actually choose the way I eat according to the way animals have sex. I think fish are very dignified with sex. So are birds. But pigs not so much. So I don`t eat pig meat or things like that. I eat fish and fowl." You know, I wonder if he knows that pandas like bubble baths and orangutans enjoy cuddling and Barry White albums. Here to discuss this and more are comedian Jessica Kirson, Dan Peres editor and chief of "Details" magazine, and Stacy Kaiser, psychotherapist and the author of "How To Be A Grown-Up." Now, you know, you guys, he is serious about this, OK. He thinks that fish have dignified sex. I guess he would think that humans do not, right?
JESSICA KIRSON, COMEDIAN: How do fish have sex? I literally have no idea.
BEHAR: They don`t.
DAN PERES, EDITOR IN CHIEF, DETAILS MAGAZINE: I don`t think they do, I think they like spawn eggs.
BEHAR: They drop their eggs.
PERES: They drop their eggs and then they`re sort of fertilized after the fact.
BEHAR: The females lay their eggs and males carpet bomb the area. It`s like --
(CROSSTALK)
STACY KAISER, PSYCHOTHERAPIST: You know what it just shows to me that he has a complete lack of intimacy, no connection with a woman, no connection with a fish.
BEHAR: Ah ha.
KIRSON: He might have a connection with a pig.
PERES: But he won`t eat pig.
KIRSON: Oh, that`s right.
BEHAR: But he has a lot of money problems. Shouldn`t he concerned about his bank book.
PERES: This is my feeling. If you`re - if you`re in the press fairly consistently for owing millions of dollars, it is certainly over $10 million to the IRS, the way to get your name back in the press isn`t by talking about the mating habits of chickens or fish. You know, he should go to Haiti with Sean Penn or something like that.
BEHAR: Yes, that would be good.
PERES: You know, change it up a little bit.
KIRSON: Does he watch all these animals? I saw two pigs having sex once.
BEHAR: Did you really?
KIRSON: Yes, I was at the zoo. It`s a screw.
BEHAR: Is it gross?
KIRSON: It`s a screw.
PERES: Literally?
KIRSON: Yes, it goes like that, like a screw. And I stood there and watched it with like five children for an hour. I was like this.
BEHAR: You know what, you know what, Jessica, stop it. You`re arousing me right now. Now just FYI, we found this 1988 clip of Nicolas Cage while researching this story. Just look at this.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PERES: nice.
BEHAR: Now -
KIRSON: First of all, he looks like that all the time, even when he`s not eating a cockroach. When he`s talking, he`s like -- that`s what he looks like all the time.
BEHAR: Do you think though that he researched the sex life.
PERES: They have dignified sex, yes, they must.
BEHAR: Yes, I mean really, it`s a little bit disingenuous, don`t you think doctor.
KAISER: No, I think it`s actually really quite serious here. I think there`s two things going on that are bothering me.
BEHAR: What`s bothering you?
KAISER: First of all, I would like to get Nicolas Cage in my office.
BEHAR: I bet you would.
KAISER: Because there is something wrong. Most men are thinking about sex in a whole different way than sex with animals, so this is concerning to me.
BEHAR: Yes.
KAISER: But there`s a whole other piece of it which is he has all these problems. And I think rather than focusing on them, he`s focusing on the sex life of animals.
BEHAR: Right. So he`s obscuranting as my shrink use to say.
KAISER: Well said.
BEHAR: OK let`s move on. Jesse James is involved in a lawsuit and he is asking the judge not to allow any mention of his personal life or any of those pesky Nazi rumors. What he actually said was call me whatever you want, just don`t call me late for Hemla`s birthday.
KIRSON: What?
BEHAR: That is sick. So James doesn`t want to be called a Nazi or the most hated man in America. He`s kind of sensitive for a Nazi lover, isn`t he?
KIRSON: Yes, but I don`t want -
PERES: They`re sensitive.
BEHAR: Yes.
KIRSON: I don`t want to really be called fat but I am going to be, you know.
PERES: Not on this show.
KIRSON: Thank you, doctor -- oh, you`re not a doctor. Anyway, so the point is, is that I think he`s going to be called that no matter what because of the pictures. Everyone knows that and thinks that already. You can`t just like ask to not be called that now or be judged.
BEHAR: Exactly, there`s the picture again, you know, we show it all the time of him in this Nazi hat and the salute and the whole thing.
KAISER: I actually think you brought up a really good point. I think he doesn`t want to look at his life and doesn`t want us to do it either. He wants to create the story that he wants to tell.
BEHAR: But it`s not going to go away because he was married to Sandra Bullock, who is very famous. I mean she`s not in obscurity, she`s not with the William Morris office, you know what I mean?
KAISER: No, this is a guy who pretended that he wasn`t married, right? He pretended he wasn`t married and now he wants to pretend he`s not doing all this Nazi stuff.
BEHAR: Yes that`s right but I mean the scandal that he`s involved in now is about some kind of a clothing company, but who cares. All right let`s move on.
An article -- this one story is interesting to me. An article in "Details" magazine profiles Hollywood voice coach Bob Corf who`s been helping some actors sound less, quote unquote, "gay" so they can work more. OK, you know a little bit about this, Dan.
PERES: I do.
BEHAR: Oh tell me what happened there.
PERES: I think that this guy, this is not -- he doesn`t do this exclusively. He can teach someone to have a British accent or whatever the case is.
BEHAR: Yes, yes.
PERES: But he`s had people come to him fairly consistently over the years and certainly of late to help them get rid of the gay accent, if you will.
BEHAR: But isn`t that homophobic to say there`s a gay accent, really?
PERES: Homophobic of who?
BEHAR: Of anybody. Of, you.
PERES: Certainly not. Didn`t Jesse James say that? No, I think it`s -- people are coming to this guy to get more work, so they are -- they`re being sent to this guy by their managers and agents say, you know, you read gay. So this guy can help you, you know, work on your voice.
BEHAR: Even if you`re straight, you read gay.
PERES: Yes, some people are straight as well.
BEHAR: Really, they`re straight but they sound gay.
PERES: They sound gay.
BEHAR: How do they sound?
PERES: I couldn`t tell you.
BEHAR: I mean I think --
KIRSON: I have an opinion about this.
PERES: Charles Nelson Reilly.
BEHAR: Charles Nelson Reilly --
KIRSON: Excuse me, I feel that it`s really -- I don`t -- this is the thing. To say someone sounds gay is really ridiculous. And it is homophobic and it is perpetuating the homophobia in Hollywood. I mean you know the fact that people aren`t getting roles because they sound gay, it`s like when Margaret Cho had a show, I remember hearing that someone came in, a consultant, to make her less Asian -
BEHAR: Right.
KIRSON: I`m sorry, more Asian -
BEHAR: Oh more Asian.
KIRSON: And to be thinner but the story was about her life.
BEHAR: Yes.
KIRSON: Like the story is about her.
BEHAR: Right.
KIRSON: So she is who she is.
BEHAR: Yes.
KIRSON: It just reminds me of that a lot. It`s sad that if someone has that kind of --
BEHAR: Well, if they`re playing a very butch role. Doing like a John Wayne, you know, macho, they don`t want you to sound like Charles Nelson Reilly.
PERES: Yes, they don`t want that -
BEHAR: They don`t want that.
PERES: You know, right.
BEHAR: But when they want comedy, then they want that.
KIRSON: I wonder if he teaches people to sound more gay if they`re macho sounding. Did he say that?
PERES: No, but there`s a follow up story in that, obviously. Well done.
BEHAR: What do you think, doctor.
KAISER: You know, I think it`s telling people you can`t be who you are.
BEHAR: Yes, right.
KAISER: And I feel like there should be enough roles for people who seem more feminine and enough roles for people who seem more masculine. But I have to tell you one thing. And that is that if this guy is getting business, it means people are paying for it. And so --
BEHAR: They are but -
KAISER: Hollywood is in worse shape than we thought.
BEHAR: Probably they can get rid of their New York accent, southern accent, every regional accent.
PERES: Of course they do, yes -
BEHAR: But this one is a little bit tricky.
PERES: Well, look at the backlash of the "Newsweek" story which I know you spent time talking about -
BEHAR: Yes we did.
PERES: About Sean Hayes and his role on Broadway. You know the fact is that here`s a guy who for many years played a very openly gay, flamboyant character on "Will & Grace" -
BEHAR: That`s right.
PERES: You know but he was playing the stereotype is my point.
BEHAR: The stereotype, right, right.
PERES: So there are -- there are going to be -- so it is a difficult transition. It`s hard to look at a guy who we recognize as playing that kind of a character to then be in a romantic role with a woman. It`s just tough to buy that.
BEHAR: I know, but he`s a comedian. It`s a comedy thing he was doing.
KIRSON: it`s different for comedians.
BEHAR: It`s different if George Clooney were gay and then he`s kissing a woman.
PERES: Right.
BEHAR: I mean I don`t think that it`s the same thing for Sean whatever -- Hayes?
PERES: Hayes, yes.
BEHAR: I`m sorry, I`m bad on names. All right, do we have time for the octmom? We don`t have any time so we have to go. Thank you very much, doctor.
OK, up next -- I like calling her doctor. Laura and Lisa Ling will be here to tell me about Laura`s ordeal in a North Korean prison. And Clinton rescued her, remember? Oh yes, that was good.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
BEHAR: Who can ever forget the images of Laura Ling and Euna lee stepping onto American soil after being held captive by North Korea for 140 days. It was an emotional homecoming for the two journalists and their families. Take a look.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
LISA LING: Euna Lee and I were prisoners in North Korea. We feared that at any moment we could be sent to a hard labor camp. We are very grateful that we were granted amnesty by the government of North Korea and we are so happy to be home.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BEHAR: Here now to talk about that ordeal are Laura and Lisa Ling, sisters and authors of "Somewhere Inside, One Sister`s Captivity In North Korea And The Other`s Fight To Bring Her Home." welcome to the show, ladies. Hi, Lisa.
LISA LING, CO-AUTHOR, "SOMEWHERE INSIDE": Hi, Joy.
BEHAR: My old pal.
LING: Yes.
BEHAR: Laura, you`re quite pregnant, I see, huh?
LAURA LING, CO-AUTHOR, "SOMEWHERE INSIDE": Yes, I am, Joy.
LING: This dress is kind of deceptive because it has patterns on it.
BEHAR: Now, you came back to the United States in August. So if I do the math, it sounds like that homecoming was quite a lot of fun.
LING: Yes, yes, I guess when you`re separated from your husband for five months, what could I say.
BEHAR: Yes.
LING: It`s an amazing story, Joy, because Laura and her husband, Ian, had just started trying to have a baby right before she left for North Korea and there were moments when she never thought she would be able to have a baby ever because she thought she might not ever be able to get out of North Korea.
LING: We feel incredibly blessed.
BEHAR: You got lucky but you had some help. But did you think, Laura, that they were going to kill you? Did you think that?
LING: Well, Joy, in the very beginning I didn`t know. North Korea is such an unpredictable country that I did fear that I might not live to see another day. As time went on and I realized that we were being used as bargaining chips, of course I had hope that things would work out eventually.
BEHAR: Talk about that a little bit, the bargaining chip. Let me hear about that. How were you being used as bargaining chips. Remind us.
LING: Well, I mean I just -- obviously North Korea wanted a visit from president Clinton, and we feel so fortunate that he was willing to make that trip. And, you know, in the beginning my treatment was extremely harsh and as the investigation went on, I was treated humanely and I`m just fortunate that everything worked out.
BEHAR: Yes.
LING: It took a while. They were in captivity for close to five months, but the North Korean government had an objective. At a certain point, they wanted Bill Clinton to come to their country, but Laura had to really figure out exactly what they wanted. I mean the whole time. I really am so shocked and impressed by how she handled herself during that situation because she really had to essentially figure out this very complicated puzzle.
BEHAR: Right. Lisa, tell me your initial reaction when you first got that call that your sister was captured. Tell me what went through your head and what happened to you that day and your family.
LING: Well, I got the call at 2:30 in the morning the morning of March 17th. And I was utterly shocked because Laura`s intention was never to go into North Korea. They were reporting a story about defectors from North Korea and the trafficking that goes on on the border of North Korea and China, but there was never an intention to go to North Korea, so I was completely shocked by the news. And also I had been in North Korea a couple of years ago prior and I worked on a very critical documentary, so when I first heard Laura was abducted by North Korean border guards, one of my first thoughts was, oh my god, I hope they don`t connect her to me and what I did there.
BEHAR: Uh-huh, really. So that was scary for you. Very scary for the family. It must have been a terrible time for you. Just terrible. And you know Euna, I was reading in your book, and I found it a few months ago -- Laura, I`m sorry, that you were isolated from Euna lee. You were not --
LING: That`s right.
BEHAR: In the same place with her. I thought that you were in the same place and I thought at least they have each other.
LING: Right.
BEHAR: So that isolation alone must have been awful.
LING: We were together for six days, the first six days and then we were separated when we were transferred to the capital. Not only was I isolated in a room but in the most isolated country in the world.
BEHAR: Frightening. Did you connect with the guards in any way? Who did you talk to?
LING: I did, I tried to. I had two female guards with me at all times. At first they were very cold, very strict. And I really -- I craved human interaction, so I wanted to connect with them in some way and also I figured that would improve their treatment of me. And I did end up experiencing some connections with them. I taught them some yoga and some English. One of them was learning mandarin Chinese so I tried to teach her a few words as well. And that was very helpful for me in terms of just getting through.
LING: And, Joy, that was something that I was particularly proud of because in the very beginning Laura did experience some violence and it was violence that our families didn`t even know about until after she returned, but I was really just proud of the fact that she realized that unless she made a connection with her captors she might not be able to communicate what they wanted. Ultimately this story is about what happens when people story is what happens when people from different cultures, different countries that may consider one another enemies finally get face to face with one another.
BEHAR: Right. Right. Don`t go anywhere. We`ll be back with Laura and Lisa after the break with some more.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
BEHAR: I`m back with Laura and Lisa Ling, the authors of "Somewhere Inside." Laura, when I say the name, Bill Clinton, do you get a little bit of thrill? Because I do just by saying it.
LING: In our family, he`s the rescuer in chief.
BEHAR: It was the ultimate rescuer fantasy. Tell me about the day you saw him in North Korea.
LING: It was unreal. I felt like this was a guardian angel sent down to save us. And to think that the former leader over the free world had come halfway around the world to one of the most predictable places on earth, was just unbelievable, and my family and I are so grateful.
BEHAR: Right.
LING: And to him and to Vice President Gore, so critical behind the scenes to bring us home.
BEHAR: Well you work for Al Gore, right, Laura?
LING: I do, current TV, current. Vice President Gore is Current`s chairman.
BEHAR: And you were working for Gore at the time, so how could Clinton say no? He couldn`t. But I mean besides that, even if you didn`t work for Al Gore, I do think that he would have done the same thing. Because we were riveted to that story. And Lisa, I know during that time, you were not able to speak to anybody. Because we would have loved to have you on "The View" and talk about this whole thing and you couldn`t do it, right?
LING: It was incredibly sensitive. North Korea is the most isolated country in the world. And that government is so hyper sensitive to criticism and the idea of saving face is so important to the North Korean culture, so we had to be so careful about anything that we said publicly, so when we did decide to be public we had to craft and extremely meticulous message. But the Bill Clinton-Al Gore, it was just very complicated because initially we thought they might allow Vice President Gore to come and then at a certain point it became clear that it had to be President Clinton. I mean it was very, very complicated.
BEHAR: They just wanted Clinton, they wanted him right? That was it.
LING: That was it and --
BEHAR: You -- go ahead.
LING: Sorry, Joy.
BEHAR: No you.
LING: Well President Clinton conveyed to us on the plane ride home, he said that when he spoke with Kim Jong-Il, Kim Jong-Il said to him, you were the first person who called me when my father died. I`ve always remembered that and respected that and always wanted to meet you.
BEHAR: Wow! See, that personal touch is very remarkable, even international affairs. Now let me ask you two. You guys are always going to dangerous place, Lisa, yon, if I were your mother, I would chain you and your husband to your desk. You`re always going to dangerous places. Is it over now, now that you`ve been through this, Laura? Both of you?
LING: Well for me, I`m focusing on this right here y the baby, so I`m taking a little time to spend time with my family. But I, of course, want to continue raising awareness. We want to report on an extremely important story being ignored. Humanitarian crisis happening along the border with China and North Korea. I will take a little time to figure out when to use that voice.
BEHAR: And you, too, Laura, you going to stay home, too, now? Or what?
LING: No, no. I actually want to tell stories now more than ever.
LING: Get her to try to have a baby, Joy.
BEHAR: Yes, it`s time, Lisa.
LING: Not yet.
BEHAR: I`ll call you and nag you next week. All right, thank you for coming on the show. Their book is called "Somewhere Inside." Good night, everybody.
END
