Fresh Air - Best Of: Connie Chung / Demi Moore

Episode Date: September 21, 2024

Pioneering television journalist Connie Chung gives us a behind-the-scenes look at what it took for her to climb to the top in the male-dominated field of TV news. Her new memoir is Connie. Also, we talk with Demi Moore about her new horror film The Substance, in which she plays an aging actress who loses her job hosting a workout show because her boss thinks she's too old and not hot enough. John Powers reviews the new documentary ¡Casa Bonita Mi Amor!Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoicesNPR Privacy Policy

Support for this podcast and the following message come from the NPR Wine Club, which has generated over $1.75 million to support NPR programming. Whether buying a few bottles or joining the club, you can learn more at nprwineclub.org slash podcast. Must be 21 or older to purchase. From WHYY in Philadelphia, I'm Tanya Mosley with Fresh Air Weekend. Today, pioneering television journalist Connie Chung. She's written a new memoir that gives us a behind-the-scenes look at what it was like for her to climb to the top in the male-dominated field of TV news. Also, Demi Moore. In the new horror film The Substance, she plays an aging actress who loses her job hosting a workout show because her boss thinks she's too old and not hot enough. She takes the drastic step of injecting herself

with a substance that will temporarily make her younger and hotter. Moore says once she hit 40, Hollywood executives and others were sometimes not sure what to make of her. Like I looked too young to be what they saw as women my age and not young enough to be in these others. And John Powers reviews the new movie Casa Bonita Mi Amor. That's coming up on Fresh Air Weekend. This message comes from WISE, the app for doing things in other currencies. Send, spend, or receive money internationally and always get the real-time mid-market exchange rate with no hidden fees.

Download the WISE app today or visit WISE.com. T's and C's apply. It's a high-stakes election year, so it's not enough to just follow along. You need to understand what's happening so you are fully informed come November. Every weekday on the NPR Politics Podcast, our political reporters break down important stories and backstories from the campaign trail so you understand why it matters to you. Listen to the NPR Politics Podcast wherever you get your podcasts. One year ago, the event that changed a region. Heavily armed Palestinian militants in Gaza flew across the border.

The October 7th Hamas attacks on Israel. Israeli ground troops have entered northern Gaza. How the war unfolded and where it could be headed. Pagers carried by Hezbollah members began exploding in cars. Listen to a special episode of the podcast State of the World from NPR. This message comes from the Kresge Foundation. Established 100 years ago, the Kresge Foundation works to expand equity and opportunity in cities across America. A century of impact, a future of opportunity. More at Kresge.org.

This is Fresh Air Weekend. I'm Tanya Mosley. Say the name Connie Chung to anyone around during the peak of TV news, and really you don't have to say much else. When Chung appeared on television in the 70s, it was the first time many Americans had seen an Asian woman not only reporting the news, but setting the national conversation with her interviews with heads of state and controversial figures. She covered Capitol Hill, the White House, the Pentagon, and the State Department.

And in 1991, she was the first journalist to get a sit-down interview with Magic Johnson, just a month after he announced his HIV status. Connie Chung has written a new memoir that chronicles her expansive career starting in local television news. She's worked for ABC, both NBC and MSNBC, CNN and CBS, where she got her start and later became the first woman to co-anchor the CBS Evening News with Dan Rather and the second woman in the history of television news to anchor an evening newscast. Connie Chung, welcome to Fresh Air. Oh, I'm so happy to be with you, Tanya Mosley. in the history of television news to anchor an evening newscast. Connie Chung, welcome to Fresh Air.

Oh, I'm so happy to be with you, Tanya Mosley. You are a shero in our business, and I really appreciate your having me. Well, this is a pleasure and an honor, Connie. And it's also surreal because I had a chance to go back and watch elements of your career and so much of your journalism forecasted where we are today. Journalism really, as we know, is a continuing conversation. But in particular, your 1990 interview with Donald Trump. It's been making the rounds online for several years now. And I actually want to start off our conversation by playing a clip. Again, this is 1990, and you interviewed Trump for a show that you were hosting. It was called Saturday Night with Connie Chung on CBS.

And in this clip, you asked Trump about his motivation for being so boastful about how rich he is when most millionaires are pretty private. Let's listen. What Donald Trump does, of course, is make a lot of money and make sure everybody knows it. A yacht, a mansion, a bigger mansion, an airline, two casinos, a bigger casino. That is really incredible. There's nothing like it. There's nothing like this place. By now, his possessions are more familiar to us than what we have hanging in our own closets. His buildings? Well, you know which ones they are.

I sell very great condominiums in New York. I have the best casinos in the world. They aren't that great. They're the best. Come on. Maybe if you can try and answer this question without giving me the normal spiel. That was my guest today, Connie Chung, interviewing presidential candidate Donald Trump on her Saturday show back in 1990

on CBS. We heard you there, Connie, saying to him, what did you say? You said, I mean, they're not that great. What do you remember most about that interview? Because at the time, you actually asked your executive producer, I think, why are we wasting our time interviewing this guy? I'll set the stage. Otherwise, I'm going to get myself in such trouble, Tanya. So I was doing this program called Saturday Night with Connie Chung, and I was the only correspondent because we had another format prior to that, and it really was excoriated. It tanked. So I had to then go out on stories every week to fill an hour program. I was traveling all over the country and the world and everything. I was

pretty darn exhausted. Then the executive producer comes to me and says, we have an interview with Donald Trump. At the time, he had not planned to run for president by any means. He was a mogul. He was actually a very, he was a tabloid king because he was always in the New York tabloids. And that was his, that period of his claim to fame. So I went, I don't want to, I don't want to. Why are we whining? Oh, boy, did I whine. Well, you did mince words. I mean, after your interview aired,

Trump did what we've seen him do to many reporters over the years, and he dug into you, because you dug into him. Well, guilty as charged, I did. And he went on the Joan Rivers show, and at the time she had a talk show. And he said that I was—he used all those words that he is—want to use with some female journalists. He called you a lightweight. Yeah. Uh-huh. And I can't remember the exact words, but that I was basically stupid and didn't ask good questions and all of that. So I would see him.

My husband is a crazy golfer. You know my husband, Mari Povich, who's been determining the paternity of every child in America. You are the father. You are not the father. Well, in addition to that, my husband is a very good golfer as well. I would see Donald Trump at celebrity golf tournaments in which my husband was playing. And he ghosted me, essentially. It was as if I were invisible. I wasn't there. Maury would say, you know, Connie, and I was just invisible.

You started in the early 70s. And in many instances, you were the only woman among these guys. In particular, you write about being on the road covering the 1972 presidential campaign. You were traveling essentially with the press corps of all men. And you realized that being funny was a way to disarm or diffuse. But did it ever feel dangerous? No. No, it wasn't dangerous. It was just fraught with sexism. And, I mean, I think they all saw me as this unusual little toy.

They almost seemed to you like a delight, like almost a novelty. Yes. Kind of tinged with fetish behavior, but that was until you started to scoop them. Well, they were surprised when I came up with a story that they didn't have. It was a little competition, you know, and I love the competition. So I just developed this sense of humor. And what I did was I tried to get them before they got me. Like what? An example?

Well, if they were going to throw a sexist remark at me, I used to – I've come up with this phrase, and it's rather raw, but if you will, I used to say that when I could see the sperm swimming in the whites of their eyes, I knew that I had to lob one at them because they were about to lob one at me. And I hope the NPR audience is not offended. But I had this propensity to be much too bawdy. And it was antithetical to what I look like. I look like a lotus blossom. And they were appalled that I had the audacity to use a bad word. But at the same time, they found it very comical. You were like being like one of the boys.

You were laughing along with these sexual jokes and such. But I also wonder, in hindsight, especially during the Me Too era, if you see it with different eyes. Oh, one could never do that today. I don't recommend it by any means. But at the time, I just had to find a way. And I did it unconsciously. It wasn't a plan. It's just that I had no go-to defense. I had no armor or ability to—I had no—I wasn't—I was not bulletproof, and I couldn't—I couldn't come up with how I could battle them. I would work hard and I would try hard and I succeeded professionally. But I just couldn't battle the boys club. Right. I mean, there's this story that you tell about being a goody two shoes.

Is it Timothy Krause? He wrote in his book, The Boys on the Bus, which is about covering the 72 presidential campaign mine. And she always was back by midnight, reciting a final 60-second radio spot into her Sony or absorbing one last press release before getting a good night's sleep. And the next morning, he noted, you would be up and at them with the other reporters, all guys, and they were staving off a hangover. But the thing about it was they would always scoop you even still. You were in your room doing all of that hard work, and they were at the bar getting to know the sources. You got it. And when I realized that, and I did, because I would call the assignment editor in Washington, the overnight assignment editor, and I'd say, what broke overnight?

Or what's on the front page of the New York Times, Washington Post, Boston Globe, L.A. Times, whatever. Whatever he had access to or whatever was released early enough. And I realized that they were getting stories. And it suddenly dawned on me, they were saucing up the campaign manager and everyone who worked for the candidate and letting them spill the beans. So I said, end of staying in my room. I'm going down to the bar. And I did. I could drink when I was in college. I learned how to, you know, take a few down and still stay sane. I wasn't driving anywhere. I was just walking back to my room. And therein lies a great way to learn how to be a reporter. Right. You had to get in there. You had to play that game.

Exactly. The only place I couldn't enter where the men were, obviously, was the men's room. And they got stories there. I couldn't infiltrate the men's room. Let's take a short break. If you're just joining us, my guest is Connie Chung. We'll continue our conversation after a short break. I'm Tanya Mosley, and this is Fresh Air Weekend. If you're black or brown or a person of color, you know that stories about race in the news can sometimes feel like they're made for a different audience. At Code Switch, we're not about that. We're interested in how race and identity shape your world in real and sometimes funny ways.

Come work it out with us together on the Code Switch podcast from NPR. This Hispanic Heritage Month, Code Switch sits down with Mexican-Cuban-American journalist and author Paula Ramos to discuss the rise of U.S. Latinos to the far right. It's a small but growing shift in American politics. Paula Ramos thinks she knows what's behind it. Listen on the Code Switch podcast from NPR. Do you feel like there's more on your to-do list than you can accomplish? Or maybe the world's problems feel extra heavy these days. We can't eliminate stress, but we can manage it.

It's almost like I have a new operating system now. Like I tend to live more in this light. Stress Less, a quest to reclaim your calm. A new series from NPR's Life Kit podcast. Connie, you've mentioned your husband, Maury Povich. You all have been married for nearly 40 years. You got married late, 38 years old. No matter how much it seems to be common knowledge, because even for a time you guys had a show

together, there's always somebody in the room that surprised you two are a couple. And it's surprising, I think, because your personas are so different, your public personas. But as you write in this book, you all seem to be the perfect match. When did you realize that? I'm still wondering how come we are the perfect match. You know, because we are so different. But the public personas belie what is really behind our door. And the reason why I say that is because he, although he does this,

has been determining the paternity of every child in America and utters these words, you are the father and you are not the father. Do you joke with him about that at home? I just get the feeling. Yeah, I tease him. But also he says, I'm just a trashy talk show host. So he's a very down-to-earth, realistic guy. What belies his public persona is that he is very much a voracious reader.

He's a political buff. He's a history buff, he could run circles around these pseudo-intellectuals who do interviews with important people. And I always say that to him, why don't you do a serious talk show? And he says, and I said, you're so smart, and people don't know how smart you are. And he says, as long as you know that, I'm fine. And I thought, oh my goodness, what a guy. You mentioned being fired from the CBS Evening News, but it was the day that you were named co-anchor with Dan Rather. You call it the best day of your professional life. It was May 14, 1993. And it was a huge deal because Barbara Walters was the only other woman to ever anchor an evening news program. But this relationship that you had with Dan Rather, how would you On the surface, it was very superficially normal-ish.

I mean, we seemed as if we were both professional and doing our jobs. But it was pretty clear to me that he didn't want me there. I don't blame him totally because he had owned Walter Cronkite's chair for many years and had to move over a few inches to make room for me. I became the first co-anchor at CBS. And he really, I think they must have held a gun to his head because I can't imagine that he would have done it voluntarily. So there I was. And I do believe that had I been an animal, had I been a plant. He would not have wanted me to share.

He would not have wanted anyone to share that seat with him. It was not his cup of tea. Well, there were so many rules back then with male and female anchor pairings, one being that men had the upper hand on who even spoke first. Yes. Jane Pauley had to endure that when she was co-anchoring with men. And you found that out when you were filling in for her on the Today Show. Yeah, could not say good morning and could not say goodbye. Bryant Gumbel had to say it first. That's right.

And she fought it. And she acknowledged that she lost. And I didn't know that at the time. I thought, how could she acquiesce to this kind of ridiculous rule? And so I tried. and I lost too. So I was, you know, hoping that I could set a new term for my substitution period when I was substituting for her during her pregnancies. You know, Kanya, I kind of teased everyone up in the intro talking about how you named names in the book, and I won't give it all away, but did I read it right that former President Jimmy Carter might have hit on you? It wasn't the classic hit. It was just darn creepy. I was sitting next to him at Black Tie Dinner,

and he pressed his knee against my knee, and then he looked at me and smiled, a big smile. And he had just given that interview to Playboy magazine, in which he said, and forgive me if this quote is a little bit off, but he said, he has lusted in his heart. And I thought to myself, I saw the look. You saw that lust in the eyes. I saw that look.

And it was just pretty darn creepy. How did you handle situations like that? Because for sure, though, presidential candidate George McGovern made a move on you. He did. He just tried to kiss me, and I stepped back, and he stepped back. So it's not as if this was any overt action. It was a move. And as grown up and as experienced, I tried to be—I would always be shocked at these events. I really was. I mean, as experienced as I was, I was terribly naive at the same time.

So when something like these things would happen with presidential candidates or former presidents, I would literally be very surprised and shocked because they weren't going way overboard. It's just, where did they get the idea that they could do this? The audacity. I know that you talk with a lot of young folks who are television correspondents and reporters and anchors, and you watch the news now. Do you see a difference? Do you see a change in that dynamic? What do you notice when you watch TV news today? I really appreciate the investigative reporting in television news and alt print everywhere.

Anytime I see an investigative report, I'm impressed. What I don't like, of course, is if I see opinion. And there's a lot of that. I would really like the news to swing back to objective, honest, credible, straight news. And I know a lot of people, you know, people I just run into want facts. That's all they want. Do you miss it? Only when I see, when I'm watching an interview on television, I want to throw my shoe at it.

If somebody isn't asking the question, the next question that I would ask, you know, doesn't do a follow-up. It's very strange. I miss that, the interviews and being able to dig deeper. But I also miss the joy of going after a story that's worthy. And I know it sounds really old-fashioned, but it's the, if I can change a government wrong or change an attitude regarding social ills or whatever, something like that,

I think it's so gratifying. And I know a lot of my friends still feel that way as well. And they get to do it sometimes. But sometimes the ball is rolling over them. And they're just lucky to be still in the business. And I'm happy for them because I'm looking in from the outside. Connie Chung, thank you so much for this conversation.

Tanya, I think you did the best interview that I've done on this, that I've ever done, seriously. You're a hottie, not only as you, I've seen in pictures, but you're a really, really good interviewer, too. Well, this was such a pleasure, Connie. Thank you, Tonya. You were great. I mean, seriously.

Journalist Connie Chung. She's written a new memoir about her life and career in television news. It's titled, Connie, A Memoir. The new documentary Casa Bonita Mi Amor follows the creators of South Park, Trey Parker and Matt Stone, as they work to save an extravagant Mexican-themed restaurant that they loved growing up in Colorado. Our critic-at-large John Power says that the movie is filled with pleasure and the imaginative delights of Americana. Maybe because most of us come from somewhere else, Americans just love replicas of foreign places. William Randolph Hearst's faux-European castle in San Simeon, Paris, Las Vegas, with its half-sized Eiffel Tower and mini-Louvre, or the mock alpine village you find in, of all places, Helen, Georgia. Creating a giddy

atmosphere that Umberto Eco dubbed hyper-reality, such crazily ambitious simulacra fill nearly everyone with childish delight. This includes Trey Parker and Matt Stone of South Park and the Book of Mormon fame. Although notorious for their cynical humor, both harbor a profound affection for one of the places they adored as kids, Casa Bonita, a 50,000-square-foot attraction in a Lakewood, Colorado strip mall that has been dubbed the Disneyland of Mexican restaurants. It's an Anglo businessman's fantastical riff on an old Mexican village, one decked out with Old West outlaws, volcanoes, cliff divers, and even a gorilla that runs through caverns studded with stalactites.

More than half a century after opening in 1974, complete with TV ads featuring Ricardo Montalban, this once spectacular crowd puller had fallen on such desperate times that it was doomed to close. Then it was bought out of bankruptcy, as is, by Stone and Parker, who vowed to save the beloved Colorado landmark and return it to its former glory. Their battle to do so is the subject of the enjoyable new documentary Casa Bonita Mi Amor. Directed by Arthur Bradford and produced by MTV Documentary Films, the movie is a treat, weaving together great archival footage, excerpts from South Park, and Elvis's movie, Fun in Acapulco, plus countless scenes of Parker

and Stone's amused horror when they hear the latest reason why their labor of love is becoming a money pit. After a zippy capsule history of Casa Bonita, with its Pepto-Bismol pink facade and blue fountain out front, the movie returns to the present to show everything it takes to recreate a mecca whose true meaning lay in the feelings it once induced. Because the original Casa Bonita was legendary for lousy food, they bring on an executive chef, Dana Rodriguez, who's been nominated for James Beard Awards. She takes Parker to Oaxaca so he can soak up the atmosphere and get inspired. Yet wondrous inspiration bumps into unwondrous reality.

Turns out that their new property is a dilapidated death trap in which everything, electricity, plumbing, air conditioning, must be redone. A renovation originally budgeted at $6 million suddenly balloons to a new estimate of $20 million plus. Here Parker, the keener of the two on the project, talks about its cost and why he wants to go ahead. Any savvy business person would say, get out now, you know, but I'm not savvy. And it was just like, that's not the point. It's trying to save something. It's trying to restore something and bring it back. And also, it starts from a personal place. I was like, this was my childhood, right? And I want it for my daughter. I want it for her grandkids.

I want it for my friend's kids. Matt's always been the money guy in our partnership. I was like, so what are we going to do? And Matt said kind of like, I don't know. I was like, oh, you don't know. So that means there's a chance. Now, as Caso Benita Mia Moore chronicles the high price of nostalgia, it also offers an offhand glimpse at one of pop culture's signature creative teams.

It doesn't take long to spot the differences between the two longtime friends. Parker is clearly the dreamy creative one, stone the shrewd whetstone on which he sharpens his ideas. What you may find surprising is the secret sentimentality of guys whose comedy takes such pride in finding nothing sacred. Parker, in particular, betrays a sweetness in his romantic attachment to the innocent pleasures of childhood. He's also a perfectionist. We see his artistic process, fussing over and tweaking every creative detail of the project. As their crew desperately races to have everything perfect by opening day, spending even more millions along the way, it becomes clear that Parker and Stone are chasing

a ghost, or maybe a paradox. The original Casa Bonita was a 70s inauthentic version of 19th century Mexico. But to capture its magic, this new version can't be the same Casa Bonita that Parker remembers so fondly. Just as Indiana Jones movies had to use top-drawer talent to emulate cheap old movie serials, so their restaurant has to meet today's expectations. Tastier food, sharper entertainment. Or visitors won't find it as thrilling as the original. To feel the same, it has to be different. By the time Casa Bonita finally reopens, there is a happy ending. Parker and Stone have done something that could hardly

be more quintessentially American. They spent a fortune to make a copy of a Mexican-themed restaurant that's actually better than the original. John Powers reviewed Casa Bonita Mi Amor, now playing in select theaters. Coming up, we'll hear my conversation with Demi Moore. She's starring in the new body horror film The Substance, which uses the trappings of the horror genre to critique Hollywood and the industries cashing in on people's search for the fountain of youth. I'm Tanya Mosley, and this is Fresh Air Weekend. like how do I safely jump out of a moving vehicle? How do I dangerously jump out of a moving vehicle? We can't help you, but we will find someone who can. Listen to the How to Do Everything podcast from NPR.

As we're all navigating a divisive election, no matter what happens, the question remains, how the heck are we going to move forward together? So in this season of the StoryCorps podcast from NPR, stories from people who made a choice to confront the conflicts in their own lives head on. And in sharing stories from the bravest among us, maybe we can take their lead

and find some hope for the rest of us. Get the StoryCorps podcast wherever you listen. Read about the impact of women in music with NPR's new book, How Women Made Music, a revolutionary history from NPR Music. This stunning anthology offers original writing and illustrations, interviews and photos. And the audiobook includes 52 years worth of interview excerpts with more than 60 legendary artists. Visit npr.org slash howwomenmademusic to order now.

I recently saw a new horror film that momentarily left me speechless. It's called The Substance, and my guest today, Demi Moore, who stars in the film, describes it as the picture of Dorian Gray meets Death Becomes Her with a Jane Fonda workout in it. It's about an aging actress who decides to use a black market drug to create a younger, better version of herself. Younger, more beautiful, more perfect. One single injection unlocks your DNA, starting a new cellular division that will release another version of yourself. This is The Substance. Moore stars as Elizabeth Sparkle, an actress who clings to her last vestiges of fame by hosting an aerobic show. When her unscrupulous boss, played by Dennis

Quaid, sets out to replace her with someone younger and hotter, on her 50th birthday no less, Moore's character decides to inject herself with a substance, a mysterious fluid that allows her to, at least temporarily, be a younger version of herself. What plays out for Moore's character is a grotesque and gory battle between the older and younger versions of herself. Demi Moore rose to fame in the 80s for her roles in movies like St. Elmo's Fire, and throughout the 90s she starred in a series of blockbuster hits, including Ghost, A Few Good Men, and Decent Proposal, Disclosure, Striptease, and G.I. Jane. During that period, Moore became one of the highest-paid actresses in Hollywood. And Demi Moore joins us now. Welcome to Fresh Air.

Thank you. Thank you for having me. Demi, you are not this character, Elizabeth Sparkle, but I really can't imagine anyone else but you playing her because of your relationship with the Hollywood machine. I need to know, when you read this script, was it also clear to you that you were perfect for this role? I mean, I guess I don't think of myself from that objective point of view. I looked at this, I don't know if I was more perfect than someone else, but I definitely felt that I had a body of experience that really could be brought to it and that I felt like I related to it in that very human way. And so I felt like there was something that would be so deeply resonant for others.

I have to say this is one of the most graphic body horror films that I've ever seen. And when I saw it in the theater, it was with a bunch of reporters. There was just a lot of gasping and oohing and awing and also laughing. Yes. Thank goodness. Yes. We see you and your co-star, Margaret Qualley, who plays the younger version of you, fully nude. Nudity is nothing new to you. There are close-ups of you and Margaret. Were there intimacy coordinators on set to help you guys navigate, or how were you able to embody those characters? There are moments when you and Margaret are actually on top of each other,

like on the floor. I mean, like, yeah, we can get pretty graphic. We didn't have anything like that. And, you know, we spent some time really spelling it out before we started shooting. And then we kind of worked something in that kind of came for me in another film, which was Indecent Proposal, where I had worked it out in my deal so that I could be more free on the day to not be like, well, you have this much nipple showing, you have this much. To me, I find that so much more, that puts you so much more in your head. And so my, you know, encouragement and suggestion is to be able to have an agreement where we know what the director is wanting, what they're looking to get.

But that once it's edited together, that there is an opportunity to have a say in how if there is anything that's too much. So by being given some participation and collaboration and allowed for a sense of protection and safety. And so in the end, neither of us asked for anything to be changed. Yeah, that's great. But in truth, I'm so grateful to Margaret because, you know, we really looked out for each other. I heard you guys had like kind of a laughing attack or just laughed at a moment when you guys were both on the floor together naked. I mean, you know, as she was like having to like

drop unconsciously on top of me with her full weight and, you know, and we're we're like on a cold, hard tile floor for hours and hours. And Margaret at one point said, thank God we like each other. This could be really awkward. And it did. I mean, like really like I adore her. I think her performance is amazing. And throughout all of it, like we've enjoyed doing press, which isn't always the easiest part, but having each other even for that has been so wonderful. There's a lot of nudity. I can't help but think about your relationship with your body because you've said for years that even at the height of your career in the 90s when you were seen as a sex symbol, you never really loved your body. So what kind

of conversations did you and the director have about how far you'd go in this film and why it was actually needed to tell the story? Well, I think one, the nudity in this is not sexualized. It's really about introspection. And I think it, again, was a way of illustrating a depth of vulnerability because it's the emotional vulnerability that in many respects was much harder. Say more about that because a lot of this acting, I mean, there's not a lot of dialogue. Exactly. Yeah. And if you really think about it, most of the film, I'm alone. And I think a lot of the nudity was really also about those moments that we have alone. And, you know, the bareness of it as opposed to it really being about being nude. I want to talk a little bit about your career.

When did it become clear to you that you wanted to act? I think I made a real conscious decision after spending time with the young actress Nastassja Kinski, where we were, you know, two teenagers living in an apartment building, both with our single mothers. And I was so taken, not just with her external beauty, but she had this embodied, comfortable way. I didn't know what it was. You know, I'm 15 years old. Whatever it was she had, I just wanted it. And so she was pursuing being an actor. And because she's German and she spoke English quite beautifully, but she didn't feel confident in reading it. So she asked me to sit and read scripts aloud to her. And so as we did that, combined with this feeling of how do I get what she had, what this thing was within her that exuded, and she then left to go back to Europe to make the film Tess with Roman Polanski.

And I just made a decision. I had no idea how it it worked what to do could I even do it I had never acted it's not like I acted in school and so I just set out to figure it out. You played around with music for a little bit also modeling? I mean, modeling definitely, because I figured out very early on that I was starting my, you know, to pursue acting, but I wasn't 18, but I wasn't a child actor. And so I figured out, oh, well, they would rather hire somebody who is of legal age to play 14, 13. And so, because I moved out on my own at 16, I just quickly assessed that I could possibly make a living modeling, but I lied about my age. So there was no conflict. You lied to be older.

Yes. Just so that there would be no question about whether I was legal to work. Right. Well, it worked out for you, right? Yeah. But wow, what fortitude you had at a young age to make those decisions. Which I can say, I can look at today and look at certain things that happened earlier in my life and see how all of those things, and not all the things that were of nurturing or guidance and encouragement, but the things that were my challenges, the things that were painful that were happening for me, that allowed me to have the determination, the fortitude, the courage to take the kind of risk that it took to step into a world I had not a clue of. And while I may have attended the school, fake it till you make it, the university of, I don't think I could have even done any of that without the challenges that I had as a kid. Well, one of the big challenges was the relationship with your mother. And you write about this in the book, but something pretty terrible happened to you that shaped you significantly

when you were 15. Are you okay with talking about it? Sure. Yeah. It was an encounter with a man. I was 15. Um, that was in his 50s that, um, for the majority of my adult life, I would say, you know, up until 15, maybe a little bit more years ago, I always blamed myself for that. I had put myself in that position and this man trapped me and essentially raped me and left me me with this horrific question when I started to resist even being around him because he had befriended my mother. And that essential question when he was being even more hateful was, how does it feel to be whored by your mother for 500 bucks? Because you felt like your mom knew what his intentions were and essentially sold you to him. I think that it was a question that I couldn't even explore. It was almost as if I today don't believe that there was an actual transaction that occurred, meaning it was not transparent. I think that my mother had asked to borrow money. And in doing so, he positioned

himself to be in this apartment when I came home from school by myself. But being left with that question was one that I just compartmentalized. I blamed myself. I shut the door. And two days after my 16th birthday, I moved out. And I think there was a part of me that just started running. Because I think in my teenage mind, I think I couldn't wrap myself around that being the truth. Or if that was the truth, the level of shame around that would mean that everything would be over. Like, what life would I have? So I don't even think I could entertain the idea.

You couldn't even really look at it or face it. Nope, not at all. 15 years ago, you said, is when you started to really look at it. Nope, not at all. 15 years ago, you said is when you started to really look at it. Yeah, I mean, maybe a little earlier, but around there, I think I'd never really... I think because I've always been extremely responsible. I've been on my own for so long. There's no other way. And it's what's really given me, in some ways, a lot of freedom to move forward in life is that I took the blame and responsibility for everything in a way, you know, that didn't allow me to entertain the idea that his actions, in fact, were that of rape. Was your mother still alive when you came to this realization of what had happened to you? She wasn't.

How would you describe your relationship with your mother after you ran? For those years, for many years you were estranged. I think, you know, it was, I think what's interesting, you know, is even after that, you know, I've, I even as a very young girl, I felt more like I was the mother to the mother. And there was a certain fragility that my mother had, and only much later in her life was she diagnosed as being bipolar. It wasn't really as known. And so I think a lot of her life, you know, she was trying to manage aspects of mental illness that also, I think, grew within her because of undealt-with trauma that she had, I think, at her core, never having really felt loved. And so my relationship with her, it was strange for a certain last part, but I never gave up because I don't think you do. Even children who are abused, I think you still hold out the hope. And there was a part of me that felt very responsible for her. How did you come to that awareness? Because I think you actually say in the book, there's this time when you become a mother where you can sometimes see your mother in a new light.

I think, you know, I also went and took care of my mother the last three and a half months of her life. And that was after being quite estranged for many years. And I went not with having any expectations or anger or any. I really did have a lot of acceptance of her for who she was. I didn't expect her to be any different. I didn't really expect her to be mothering to me in the classic traditional sense of it. Last question. Many people are saying this is kind of the role of a lifetime for you. Like you are fully formed. You are in your moment. This is a culmination of your work. Do you see it that way? What does this moment mean for you? I wouldn't want to see it in terms of it being the culmination, but perhaps the launching of a new

next chapter, like that it's the beginning. It feels the beginning because I also feel that I am in, look, I've never been where I am exactly in this moment. This is all new too. And I'm also more autonomous. My children are grown. I have the most independence that I've ever had. And so it's just this wonderful new time of exploration and discovery. I have no expectations of where it should go. I just want to stay present to where I am and be open to the possibilities. Thank you for your wisdom, Demi. I wish you the best. And this was a pleasure. Thank you. Thea Chaloner, Susan Yakundi, Joel Woffram, Monique Nazareth, and Anna Bauman. Our digital media producers are Molly C.V. Nesper and Sabrina Siewert. With Terry Gross, I'm Tanya Mosley.

Who's claiming power this election? What's happening in battleground states? And why do we still have the Electoral College? All this month, the ThruLine podcast is asking big questions about our democracy and going back in time to answer them. Listen now to the ThruLine podcast from NPR. How does the brain process memories? Why is AI a solution and a problem for our climate? What is leadership in 2025 and beyond? The TED Radio Hour explores the biggest questions and the most complicated ideas

of our time with the world's greatest thinkers. Listen now to the TED Radio Hour from NPR.