David Furnish: My Childhood Best Friend

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Hi everybody, and welcome to another episode of senior bitches, where we celebrate incredible women and some dudes, too over 50, who are changing the landscape around conventional aging. Now today I'm going to do something I've not done before. I'm recording the podcast. New No, that's a joke. We are going to replay an episode I recorded a while back with my childhood bestie, David furnish. We met at the Bayview Country Club, golf and tennis. Two awkward teenagers, tall and gawky was me. He was meticulous and very closeted, and we fell in love with each other and laughed our way through very challenging summers. We were the quintessential outsiders. He started the pool snack bar. He petitioned all those wealthy bitches at the club to get the momentum, and he started it from scratch. He was always an entrepreneur, and this was the Harbinger to running rocket entertainment, the global company he now owns with his husband, Elton John. I wanted to replay this episode for a couple of reasons. First, it's Oscar week in Los Angeles, and they're doing the Elton John viewing party, where they raise a shitload of money for the foundation. This year is super, super important, because the present administration just cut the US aid budget, and part of that was essential funding for HIV AIDS, plus Elton is nominated for his incredible song with Brandi Carlile. Don't even get me started. It's so brilliant. I cry every time I hear it. Who believes in angels. The album is coming out in April, and it is absolutely spectacular. I just wanted to celebrate 2/8 grade buddies in the world plotting their past who reconnect almost 45 years later. And we do not miss a beat. We even remember our childhood phone numbers. So please listen and maybe share it with your best friend or someone you haven't seen in a while. Connect and conjure up some good healing vibes. And if you're lucky enough to have a rotary phone, dial that baby up and talk to someone you miss. So here you go. My conversation with David furnish, please enjoy it

1:58  
is an honor to be your first male senior bitch, when we meet,

2:01  
we always default back into our childhood as being outsiders, and we remember every single nuance, right? Yeah, like we go into major, major detail. So I want to ask you, what did we recognize in each other? And by the way, I remember my childhood phone number 416-962-1643, that's how much detail I remember. But what was the connection? I just was so drawn to you when we were younger. Well,

2:25  
I just like to say 416-499-0345, I knew also. I also the same. I knew detail. I loved your rebellious spirit, because the tennis club was a bit of a conformist kind of place, and I remember you being refreshingly honest and so bloody funny. You had the most amazing sense of humor, and we just endlessly laughed and sent things up. You were self deprecating. You had a wicked forehand. And you know, you looked really fabulous in like those little short white tennis dresses that all the ladies used to wear with the frilly knickers underneath them. Oh yeah, yeah. Great. On you.

3:07  
Well, thank you. On you too. And it was just funny, like your energy, I just knew that we were both just a little left of center, like we were both outside of that really conservative, oppressive

3:20  
and it wasn't, and it was a bit hierarchical. There were kids who came from, you know, more prominent families, or whose parents, you know, took the tennis pro on lavish holidays or or, you know, drinking rounds at the pub. And there was very much the in kids, the favorite kids, the richer kids, the better tennis players. And I just didn't fit into any of that, and didn't really want to fit into it, like it was not like we felt like we were missing out you. And I just used to kind of stand back and be like, look at them.

3:50  
That's weird. We were, yeah, even then at 14, and, you know, you were like, honestly, when I ran into on Rodeo Drive, I just want to drop that. I said hi, and you went, you know, I was relegated to the back courts when we were at Bayview Country Club like you launched Ray

4:06  
into it. And I still carry such trauma, and my sons are learning tennis now. They're 10 and 12, and they're magnificent players, and I still have this wonky forehand grip that no one ever took the time to correct for me, and it was a bad habit that is unfortunately still with me. And I want to go out and have a nice, friendly game of tennis with my kids, and unfortunately, I can only hit like a really powerful top spin forehand because of my grip is so far over. So my poor sons are like, back on the baseline, and I'm just no fun to play with them, like, Papa, we're not going to play with you anymore because you can't hit the ball properly. Oh, my God. Talk about childhood trauma. It's heartbreaking. So yes, I do still carry it with me. And it was, it was prejudice, and it was, you know, elitism at its finest. You know, this is like, Oh, you can go over on court six with the bucket of balls with the other kids and, you know, play doubles or. Something.

5:00  
And the funny thing too is that you were relegated to the back court. And I remember that Bayview Country Club had this big tennis tournament, and I auditioned for ball girl, and because I was fast, I got to be the net ball girl, which is the primo spot. David, I don't know you knew that you were quite tall, like

5:17  
I remember, you had really very long, shapely legs. You were very statuesque, I think amongst all the other girls in the Bayview tennis section, your husband. No, you weren't. You were a flower that had not opened and bloomed yet. You had your hair, curly brown hair, and you had it pulled back into a ponytail, and you didn't wear any makeup. But you were again, I mean, I just felt so safe with you. I think that also that thing where you know, when you're a burgeoning gay man and you're sort of in the closet and you have these feelings, and you know you're different from everyone else, and you haven't quite figured it out, but you don't feel comfortable and safe with everybody. I really did feel completely comfortable and safe with you. We just connected. It was just so funny. And I'm sure you're going to come on to how we ultimately rebelled. That in itself, was like, break the mold, break some rules, screw everybody, take this stuffy Country Club up, yeah,

6:12  
and shove it somewhere. But the thing that I was going to say about the ball girl thing, so I get the ball girl thing, and I'm at the net, and I'm like, finally the guys are going to notice me, and the tennis pros were over in the corner with some of the hotter guys, and they walked over, and this is what they said to me, you can't be in that ball girl. And I'm like, why? And they said, You're not pretty enough. What? Yes, and then I got relegated to the back court, probably where you were. And I remember thinking at that moment, I didn't know that I wasn't pretty enough. In my mind, I always thought when I looked in the mirror and had a brush and I was singing, that somebody would see beauty, but that screwed me up so badly, and I was like, Oh, I'm not pretty enough. And that was kind of the feeling, I think we both got there, you're just not quite good enough, right? It was traumatic.

6:56  
That upsets me to hear that, and horribly offensive that someone would actually say that to, you know, a beautiful young girl. It's just, no, I know you're asking the questions, but you had a younger sister who was a little bit more closer to the cool group than you and I were,

7:14  
and I'm glad that's in the past. You know that that was definitely a period of my life. But boy, did it set a template moving forward. So my question to you, because I'm doing the interview, my friend, no, no, you can. You can ask me anything. I love your mind. So you kind of answered that, do you carry that 14 year old boy around with you? You must, and what is your relationship like with that person? Um, it took

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me a lot of many years and a lot of therapy to get me to like that 14 year old person. It took me a long time because I did have a feeling that, you know, I just wasn't cool enough or athletic enough, or rich enough, or, you know, all the the parameters in which people were judged and and measured in. You know, when you're when you're when you're 14 and 15, but I just kept trying to make my own I if I couldn't succeed in one, one thing, I would put my energies into something else, like if, if I wasn't going to be given, if I wasn't going to be appreciated or or given opportunities in one part of my life, I found another place to direct my energies and to get that response. And I think that's one of the key things that drove you and I together. And I also think it's this things that drove my my 1415, year old entrepreneurialism within this environment, I just decided I'm not getting accepted here. I'm going to go over here and make my mark somewhere else.

8:46  
Which, yeah, which leads me to the fact that this was a big move all our listeners that he did at 15 or 16. David ran the pool snack

8:56  
there wasn't a pool snack bar, but I remember with my friend Chris, we went around the club with a petition, and we got so many signatures on this petition that we presented it to the board of directors of the club and said, Your members want a pool snack bar. And they were like, really? We said, Yes, look at all these signatures. And then we said, and we're the perfect people turning for you. And I look back on that now and I can't believe I had that confidence. It warms my heart. To this day, my brothers still go to the to the Bayview Country Club, and I always poke my head nostalgically through the window at the poolside area, and it's the like this big, permanent thing now, like we had a second hand cooler in the back of the lifeguards office with like, half melted ice creams in it. And then we ran up and down the stairs with these plastic, you know, rubber line trays, bringing up drinks and food on on paper plates. Now it's this, like barbecue and buffet and hot and cold running cappuccino. And it's, it's turned into this empire. I look back. Know, I think, Wow. It all started with me at 15,

10:02  
I know. And you ran it. I sort of look at it as a precursor to rocket entertainment. That's what I look at it at. And you ran a tight, tight ship. I remember you with your little tray, and it was so hot, there was no coverage. And I used to see you interact with those ladies who were wasted midday. By the way, I can imagine the atrocities that happened to you at the pool snack bar. There

10:23  
was a lot of, I mean, I could meet to a lot of those people that were by that pool after Timmy, you know, gin and fresca is in the sun. I got my bum pinched a lot. I got hands rubbed up and down my my legs into the bottom of my shorts.

10:38  
I remember your white shorts, by the way, yeah,

10:41  
it was so inappropriate. One of the poolside ladies gave me this nickname peaches, and I said, she said, Because you have an ass, that's like two perfectly round, firm peaches. And at that point, I was, I was the least sexualized person in the world. I didn't think of myself in a sexual way at all whatsoever. And this desperate housewife was clearly, you know, fantasizing about my fruit. And to be honest, you a lot of it just went right, right over, right over my head, because I just wasn't in a position to even remotely think of myself like that. I was unbelievably self conscious about having to that was the only downside to the poolside snack surface was I had to walk around and bear my legs.

11:23  
I have such a visual of you running around in your Chris shorts, kind of frantically, you know, navigating like the whole pool snack bar. And I was so impressed. And I think plus you tossed me some free stuff, I think you might have along the way, I might have got to do ice cream sandwiches and stuff from the cooler, from the melting cooler. Okay, I have one word for you. Get ready, and I'm going to leave this to you one word, Bambi

11:49  
Bambi Linden. In those days, it was Mrs. Linden. Um, no. Bambi Linden was this spectacularly glamorous woman. I'd never seen anybody like her in my it like that in my life, I had a sort of girlfriend, and I say that in inverted commas, with a lovely girl called Lisa, and Bambi was Lisa's mother, and I used to go around to Lisa's house, and it was so unbelievably glamorous with a leopard Skin table cloth and a bronze sculpture of Michelangelo's David coming right up to the middle of the coffee table where the television was. So we used to watch the TV between David's legs, not that wanted to see the screen. And Bambi was the most curvaceous woman I had ever seen in my life. She was absolutely she just rocked a bikini like nobody I ever knew in my life. So remember

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at night? Yes, she'd go to Becker's in her bikini to buy milk

12:50  
and come out with a jug of 2% Yeah, remember those plastic jugs with the red handles, sling it into the Cadillac Seville, and then we would drive back to steel Valley Road listening to the soundtrack from Greece, because that was the summer. That was the summer of Greece. Yeah, and we sing along to summer loving and yes, yes, yes. And vampy knew the words to every song I heard before the Canadian Prime Minister married the infamous Margaret Trudeau when he was a bachelor Prime Minister that Bambi was the hostess at his parties. He used to, she used to come in with a tray, you know, in in heels and look after all the VIP guests. That's amazing pedigree. I

13:36  
think seeing that was really beneficial for us, because I think in our mind, we land locked like, oh yeah, we can do that at some point. We can be like that, like it

13:43  
really was, for me, a major cultural high point. So

13:46  
we think Bambi and send her lots of love. So with all these great characters, we actually wanted to write like a series about the baby Country Club. But can you talk about we should actually do it? We actually entered the mail

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doubles, boys doubles. And David tell

14:03  
us what happened.

14:04  
Okay, so at that point in time, and this was in the era of, you know, Billie Jean King and Bobby Briggs, battle of the sexes, the trailblazers, you know, I didn't just stop at the snack bar. We went to the tennis office, and we went to the to the tennis head, and we said, there should be Junior mixed doubles, where you and I loved playing tennis together, and we actually were really well matched, because you had a fantastic forehand and I had a fantastic two handed backhand. We said, you should have mixed doubles. And they were like, no, no, no. There's no, no Junior mixed doubles. There were senior mixed doubles. It was forbidden. And you and I said, Fuck it, we're going to enter the boys doubles. Yes, and we did. Yes,

14:52  
we did. I'm sort of thinking we might have won the whole damn thing.

14:56  
Well, we raised a lot of eyebrows. Yes, they're all. Lot of eyebrows raised, yeah. And I also remember that the next year after that, they introduced Junior mixed doubles, because you and I showed him how it was done. We

15:11  
were trailblazers, and Did anybody ever appreciate us then? Or were we just like a big pain in the ass? I don't think anyone took us seriously to this day. It resonates with me so much, and it's over 40 years ago. You know? It was just so powerful and so comforting. They were great summers. So always a trailblazer, always a connection with us. So I'm going to fast forward to that dinner that we had in at Craigs in LA a couple of years ago. It did not feel like 40 years had passed, and it was really sweet, because we're in the bank at laughing our asses off and, oh my God, our sense of humor is so twisted. And your husband called, and he was, he was doing his Las Vegas residency, and it was really cute, because he went, I'd like you to meet Mary Jo. You know, I'm having dinner, and Elton, please meet Mary Jo. And it was so sweet. And he was like, just had stepped off on stage. And it was such a proud moment for both of us, because I got to meet your husband, and you know, this incredible relationship and partnership you have, and it was just so sweet. And

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then you came to Vegas, when we had, we were, we were ending the run at Caesars, and we had a big dinner for everybody in the in the Chinese restaurant. And you came, and you brought your daughter out and got to meet you in person, because he heard me talk about all the crazy fun things that you and I did.

16:18  
He was adorable. And so he it was, I think, his last shows. So there was five of us at the table. I think Tony was there. Your your set guy? And he said to me, I want to talk politics with you. David's told me, that'll be fun. And so we sat down at this table. And I think it was like you and Lola, because Lola was a buffet person. She hit the trail right away to go get food, and you got up to go get food. So I was left alone with your husband, Elton, who was so charming and lovely. This was like one of my questions for you. Came back from the buffet, which was adorable, and you had loaded up all the stuff that he loves, and you put it down in front of him, and you went, love. Here you go. Here you go, sweetie, you know. And you were so tender and nurturing with him and authentic. It was so profound for me, because obviously, you've been in a relationship with him for many, many years, and that type of nurturing partnership like Did that come with age with him? How do you have a nurturing, mature relationship? This I'm taking notes for okay, I'm here on this one.

17:16  
Well, I think I'm lucky, because I came from a nurturing home. So I saw the joy and the comfort that my parents gave to each other because they had a very nurturing relationship. I don't know. Elton breaks my heart. He breaks my heart. He has such a kind soul, and, you know, he has a lot on his plate, but he loves what he does, but he came from a really, really toxic, broken home, and he unquestionably carries trauma from that experience, and it explains his anger from time to time when he's overtired and when he feels threatened, the the the six year old boy locked in the room in his house is the only child when his parents Were fighting non stop and it was quite violent. His vulnerability always, always breaks my heart. And I just love when, when I can do things for him, not in a not in a co dependent or a, you know, kind of servile way. It's, it's just genuine love and mutual respect. When we come together, we really come together, but we also give each other room to respect each other's independence, so we don't live in each other's pockets. And a lot of times in my relationship in those days, albums on the road. And so we were apart. So so when we were together, we always both made an effort to really make the most of it. But then also I'm so grateful. And Alton had to learn this lesson, you know, being who he is in early relationships. He would just take people on the road with them, and he would take away their identity, and he would take away who they were. And he never asked me to do that. He knew that was a dead end street, and you touched on it from my 1415, year old days. You know, I've always had an entrepreneurial spirit, and I love working, and I take great pride in what I do. And I had a successful career before I met Elton, and it would have been wrong for him to change me to to like, fundamentally, say, Hey, you don't need to work. Come on the road with me. Just it would have taken my soul. And so I'm grateful for that. And I guess at Caesars, and he's done a big show, and he's worked very, very hard, and we're at this big celebratory moment where he's, you know, closing off a big run, and it's like, of course, I'm going to bring him his food, like, you know, I'm, I love him, and I enjoy doing it. And it's so sweet that you you observe that, because that's just something that brings us both great joy. He does it to me too. He's also very nurturing. I want to point out so you were sitting with Tony, Tony King, you clearly remember him. He's a very, very special man. He has just written his memoirs, and it's a wonderful book called The taste maker. And Tony. Through his entire life, has worked for the following people. Maybe they're good, okay? The Beatles, yeah. Elton, John Lennon as a solo artist, and then the Rolling Stones. And then came back to work with us. And Tony started as a as a gay man in the music business in Britain in the 60s, and has lived the most extraordinary life of joy and loss and sorrow. And his memoirs are wonderful. He's a brilliant rapporteur, Tony. I hope you got some good stories out of him, because he's he's so great. Oh, the taste maker. It's Tony king. He's in his 80s now, and he's so proud of it. And it was a big moment for him to he said for years that I'm never writing a book. I'm taking my secrets to the great and it's not one of those dishy mean books. It's actually really beautiful anecdotes that give you an insight into that very, very special world. And the best part of it because he has some crazy stories, and he says, Look, people trusted me and took me into their confidence, so I'm not going to spill those stories, but the things he does reveal are really, really beautiful. He

21:02  
was an incredible dinner companion, and so fascinating. But you know, you and I talk our politics, and you know, we have strong opinions and lots of energy around that. And he came up to me and he said, Oh, David, told me about you. You're gonna, you know, sit beside me. So there was only five of us at the table, but he was incredible to talk to, and it was just a magical evening. And another thing I noticed too, that you and Elton were so beautiful to Lola, you know, you were so engaged with her and talking to her. And it was like, oh my god, I could do this every night. I could hang around these guys every night. Listen, I

21:31  
was so, I was so excited and happy to meet your daughter. I haven't met your son yet. I would love to meet him in LA and I'd love you to meet my boys too. I'd love

21:40  
to. I'd absolutely love to. And, you know, to circle back to our initial point, talking about the nurturing and connection. I remember one evening speaking to you, were talking to me a bit about Elton's past and his family and everything, and the look on your face and the compassion you had for him, was what you said, My heart breaks for him. There was such love there. So I love being around that. Yeah,

21:59  
and it's about empathy, like relationships don't succeed with that empathy. And we seem to live in a world now where there seems to be a lot of galloping narcissism happening in certain people. It's certainly happening with certain politicians. But, you know, it's really important in a relationship. You know, of course, you have to put your needs first. You always have to do that. But, you know, bringing empathy to a relationship and thinking about things from your partner's perspective in terms of, you know, what have they just been dealing with, or how much sleep have they had, or what have, you know, what, what's going on with them, if you just apply that, you know, in times where you sail into, you know, choppier waters, which you have to in every relationship, you have to have conflict, you have to have disagreement. But, you know, it's, it's just, it's just an awareness and an empathy for thinking, you know, how is this going to land with them, you know, in general, and where they are at that particular moment, I remember my mum said to me, because my parents had a really great marriage, and I said to her, What's your secret to success? And she said, you can say a million nice things to somebody, and she said, But you say one nasty thing. And she said, that's the one thing they remember, and you can't take it back once you've said it. And she said, I'm not advocating for not saying difficult things. But she said, before I say something difficult, I think long and hard before I say it, because I can take it back. You have to say those things in a relationship. You have to drive into conflict if you want to get things resolved. But sometimes people just, you know, when we're tired or we're not at our best, they just kind of let loose and it it sticks, and you can never take it back. I know

23:39  
it's hard, and you have to do it all with vulnerability on both sides. And if you're vulnerable, you're open. And that's a whole other discussion, the importance of vulnerability. So back to the aging thing. So you moved to London, and as you said, I mean, you were the youngest account executive at your advertising firm. I mean, literally, you've been running the world probably since you were three. So you get into this relationship with a very public figure, and you're young and super hard, and you were, you still are, I wonder about that. What was that like for you to age in the public eye, like we get to do it in private? I mean, that was, well, that must have been quite an indoctrination,

24:14  
yeah. I mean, it's been easier with Elton, because he leaves Elton on stage. So he doesn't bring celebrity home. We don't revere celebrity in our household or in our family. We're just too interested in other things. We're too interested in music and film and art and culture and photography and, you know, ending AIDS and and, you know, all those kinds of things are just so much more interesting to us. I don't think about, um, being in the public I don't really think of myself as a public figure. I know, I know that's not strictly the case, but I certainly have a lot of profile because my relationship with album, I remember some very good advice a friend gave me very early on in the relationship, because he knew I had bitten off a very. Very big piece of cake in this relationship. And he said his nickname for me is Princey, because he says, I'm the prince i have the luckiest life in the world. And he says, Princey. He said, here's the reality. He said, the people that know you the least will judge you the most. And those are really, really true words, and they're always going to be when you're in the public eye, there's always going to people, unfortunately, that don't know you very well at all and want to think the nasty stuff. I bet he's an asshole. I bet he's self centered. I bet he's mean. I bet he's spoiled. I bet he's it's like you just have to, you can't do anything about that, and you could drive yourself crazy worrying and thinking about it and it, there's just, there's just no point. You just have to know what, know where. It's important that you're your most authentic self in your life. With those people and their feedback and their opinions are the ones that matter the most. You just can't think about all that other stuff, and I I have such a benign presence on social media, but I don't know how some of these people, these influencers, reveal so much, so much personal stuff and live their lives through social media and share it with millions and millions of people, and the mostly negative crap that comes back, I don't

26:22  
get it at all. And, I mean, like, I've had, I've had a bit of a spell with, you know, my D list, well, maybe F list, well, maybe G list, celebrity sort of interaction. And I, you know, over the course of two decades, and, you know, I was kind of made jokes about it. I was like, oh, you know, they said this, or they said that. And then it's only recently, right, because of the public nature of like, getting put in these situations, that I was, like, it really sucks. Like, I don't like it. It's not healthy. It's like, your life. It's exactly what you said, like that people perceive you to be, the people who know you the last perceive you to be this way. There's no connection with that. And for a little bit it's disorienting, because it's something's being projected that's so not you, and it's not even worth fixing it or saying anything about it, but it does kind of psychologically take a bit to balance it right.

27:10  
Yeah. I mean, the advice I give everybody, my husband, included, is, for God's sakes, don't read the comments. It's like, do not seek sustenance there.

27:20  
You know, social media does set that up because you've got the buffer right, like you can just be as heinous as you want to be, and nobody can trace it back to you. Of course,

27:27  
not surprisingly, particularly young women who are so objectified on social media, like the emphasis on all of the wrong things, your skin, your hair, your body, your clothes, your you know, whatever depression is at an all time high, these girls are put under such a toxic microscope. It's also a big problem in the celebrity world, because they don't do that to men now. They don't talk about men on a red carpet the way they talk about women. And I honestly don't know how some of these people have the courage to, like, get dressed and get out the door and like, be exposed to that

28:02  
I don't even enjoy even watching red carpets anymore, because it's, I don't even like the energy of it is so bizarre, because everybody is so, you know, primed up and trying to look perfect and be perfect. Like the individuality is kind of mind you, there are some really cool things coming up. I have to admit, I love some of these people that are coming up. They just have a totally different, you know, perspective, and don't really seem to care about the commentary, like, I do. Love that confidence,

28:26  
but also you don't. You don't dare walk down a red carpet without somebody who's like, completely vetted you checked you over. I had the funniest thing. I went to the LACMA benefit, and I pulled up him from the car, and Kim Kardashian was waiting by the side of the road, and I jumped out and said, Hey, how's it going? She said, I'm waiting for my sister. And Kylie Jenner got out, and I watched them walk from the car to the red carpet, like to the photo pit area, and they had three people following them, fixing their hair, touching their makeup up and adjusting their dresses as they were walking from their car just to get them to stand on that little mark where you get your photo taken. And I was like, Oh my God, who would want to live like that? Like, you know, look in front of the mirror before you leave the house. Yeah, look great. Jump in the car. And that should be it, but it's just this whole kind of insane and I know it's their business, and I know it's worth a lot of money to them. It's

29:22  
fraught with all sorts of bad things, because you see these people literally have like a light and a camera crew and like, four bodyguards and stylists walking around them, and then they put this image on social media, and people are like, I can what I could never achieve. That like, it's just there's no humanity in it. There's no fun about it. It presents

29:41  
an ideal that is unachievable to the average person. It ultimately makes so many people feel less than, I mean, a bit like it's court six, it's court six, it's court six.

29:54  
And I'm not pretty enough to be a ball girl all of you. I'll show you a ball girl. I'll show you what I can do.

29:59  
Yeah. And mixed doubles get out of the office. So the

30:02  
other thing too, I wanted to ask you, I briefly dated a billionaire years ago, and we went on his yacht and did this whole thing. It was super fun, but I remember going on the private plane, and he was, he's Canadian, and he took my hands and he was like, I'm so excited. And I said, Well, I'm excited too. And he said, You know what? This never gets old. I'm a kid from Kelowna, BC, and every time I step on the private plane, I'm like, this is like, lifestyles of the rich and famous. And there's not one day that goes by that I don't look around and go, Wow. And I'm wondering, do you have those moments? Are you ever like, oh, always,

30:37  
yeah. I call them pinch me moments. Yeah. I just sort of sit and I think, I can't believe this is my life. I, you know, I can't believe I never take it for granted. I never want to get blase about any of it. I could never have imagined any trillion years when I was on court six that my snack bar running, the snack bar, that my life, you know, could turn out the way that it has, and it's the stuff of, you know, fairy tales or fantasy films or whatever. It's also, most importantly, it's our home. It's our safe haven. It's a wonderful, beautiful place to raise our kids we have, and there's nothing better than opening it up to share with your friends and people that that you love. When should

31:23  
I come? Like, I just give me like a window. So I'm Canadian. I don't want to be pushy, but don't give me the room without an en suite. Okay, good, but

31:32  
we have noisy plumbing like any any English country house, so forget it. That's it.

31:37  
I'm not coming. So I keep going back to this 14 year old boy because I think he's magical, and I'm so invested in him. And I think about all the charities you do, of course, the Elton John AIDS Foundation, and you guys have raised, I think, over 600 million. I don't know if I have the right figure. And I was also reading your hits interview that you did for pride, and I didn't, so the infection rate is going up. And you made the correlation between this cultural prejudice that is just seeping up everywhere against, you know, LGBTQ and this homophobia that it prevents people from getting their meds, it prevents people from seeing a doctor. That how can this be happening?

32:10  
It's so depressing because it's othering people, and it's stigmatizing them, and it's stigmatizing communities, and because of the history of HIV AIDS, when it started as a gay disease that went on to infect 70 million people, because we are all connected by our common humanity, there's still this hangover association that you know it's a gay disease, and it still is disproportionately affecting LGBTQ plus people globally and in America, you will fall off your chair when you Hear the statistic, but 50% of gay black men in America will contract HIV in their lifetime, which is unbelievable, considering the science is so good. We have antiretroviral medicines that prevent you from contracting AIDS if you're negative and if you are HIV positive, you take one pill a day, and it keeps your viral level so low that you do not go on to developing aids, you live a full life and you don't pass the virus onto anybody else. So treatment is prevention, so we just need to get people tested, and we need to get them on the medications, and there could be no new infections. And the trouble is, when this heinous legislation gets put into places where it demonizes and it others. People from from diverse communities like the LGBTQ plus community, it stops people from, I don't want to have anything to do with the gay disease. I'm terrified of getting an AIDS test. I don't want to be seen picking up my medication regularly, because you have to pick it up. You have to have one pill a day. And I certainly don't go out and talk about it, because someone might think I'm, you know, one of that, that group of people, and in parts of the world where, like Uganda, where it's now criminalized, they'll put you in jail or sentence you to death, which is barbaric and shocking. Who is ever going to go and get an AIDS test in Uganda? I know for a fact the turnout rates at HIV clinics in Uganda now it's basically dropped through the floor. Nobody's going to get AIDS tests anymore because they're petrified. Yeah, they're terrified. The association we never, ever make judgments. We're all linked by our common humanity. You know the Republicans Ronald Reagan, that administration judged the gay community when AIDS, HIV, AIDS first arrived, they just sort of said, Oh, this is God's retribution for living a, you know, an evil lifestyle. And they ignored the community. They turned their back on it. And HIV ended up becoming and AIDS became the greatest disease, you know, affecting our planet. We are all linked together. We are all God's children. We all deserve equal rights, dignity, respect, care and love. So

34:43  
as a parent of a gay child, I a couple of years ago, I never saw angels of America on Broadway, but I watched on TV Tony Kushner, and literally tears streaming down my face like I could barely watch it, the thought of my. Son going through that and the stigmatization of it. David, I couldn't get through it. The pain was so deep. I was just heartbroken. It

35:09  
was a horrendous, horrendous time. It was like, you know, people were being treated like lepers. They were fired from their jobs, they were thrown out of their homes, their insurance was canceled, and many, many families you know, just cut kids off. There were health professionals that you know, before they knew what they were dealing with, refused to treat them. You know, thankfully, we've moved on so, so far from then, and the credit lies with the gay community itself, when they kind of galvanized, and they were amazing, amazing heroes, and a charity called act up, where they realized that nobody was going to help them, that they had to help themselves, and they pulled together, and they really worked closely and put a lot of pressure on the pharmaceutical companies and the governments to make the initial advances that have led to the successful treatments that exist today. It is, it is the power of a marginalized community, pulling together and literally changing the path of health. And those medicines have gone on to save millions of lives. You know, if there's a lesson in all of that, it's like no matter how downtrodden or, you know, marginalized you feel, if you pull together with with other like minded people, it's amazing the things that you can achieve and the things that you can do, and Elton and I both feel a great sense of shame, because during the 80s, when it was so bad, I was terrified and still in the closet, I was too scared to come out at all. I thought I would die and I would be, you know, ostracized. And Elton was an addict, and he did the odd fundraiser, he did some singles, you know, did. That's what friends are for with Dionne Warrick and Gladys Knight and Stevie Wonder. And, you know, he raised money, but he said, as a permanent gay man in the 80s, you know, he looks at someone like Larry Kramer, who wrote The Normal Heart, you know, who is such a such an amazing, angry, angry, outspoken voice and an advocate for change, out and said, I should have done more. And so we both, you know, in the 90s, we set up the foundation, and then I started seeing him in 93 it's like, Okay, here's the opportunity to make up for lost time and to make a difference. And we will not stop until it's over. We will not stop until, you know, and we think we can, we can end it by 2030 the science is so good if we can, if we can deal with these marginalized communities and get access to testing and treatment, uh, break down some stigma barriers, affect some positive social change, we can stop new infections. It's optimistic, but we can't take our foot off the accelerator.

37:35  
And it's a collective talking about the collective. It was a normal heart, I think that I saw, that's Larry's play, yeah, one of your quotes, I love. One of your quotes. One person will get there quicker, but many people will go farther. So it is a collective consciousness and being connected, because we're all connected. You know that quantum physics thing?

37:51  
That's an old African proverb which I love, which was shared with me in work I've done in Africa with the foundation. And I think of the great political divide in America right now, and it breaks my heart, because as an AIDS activist, I look at the tremendous success of the PEPFAR program, which was started by George Bush Junior and has been continued by every president, Republican and Democrat over the last 20 years, and it is a phenomenal success. But Elton and I were in Johannesburg with a co delegation of American senators to talk about, let's keep going. And Elton stood up and he said, you know, this is the stuff that makes your country great, like when you do actually pull together, when you do cross the aisle, when you do unite over a common there's nothing you can't do. America is unstoppable, and it's just so bloody heartbreaking now to see this petty squabbling and this, you know, obsessive focus on differences and othering people and and you know, this, this political extremism, which I don't believe in my heart reflects the majority of of Americans you know, across the country, I think they're much kinder, compassionate and more united people than the politicians that represent them and the media that drive those divides and make money by perpetuating that gap, as opposed to you know, you and I grew up In a world where we went home every night and the entire world watched the same six o'clock news. It was news. It was 30 minutes of the same news, whether it was one network or the other, it was news, and now it's 24 hours of bullshit.

39:33  
It's entertainment, it's money making. Yeah, yeah. And that's all it is.

39:37  
It's It's ripping society apart, and the people at the people at the heart of it don't seem to have any sense of moral responsibility or decency in relation to, you know, the divide and the discord that they're creating. And it makes me so angry.

39:53  
Well, it comes down to the bottom factor is $1 it's actually all about entertainment. It's about making money. Me, right, and about manipulating stories and targeting and algorithms, and it's so complicated and your brain could blow off. I mean, your head and so, you know, obviously what you're doing with your foundation is, I mean, you know, grassroots the most important thing you can do as a collective. That's really, first of all, it starts, it's an inside job. It's, you know, loving yourself and all that stuff we spend decades trying to do, and then it's all about putting that out into the to the universe, you know, one day at a time, one step at a time, like you said. I mean, that's, that's the most important thing you can do.

40:34  
And I, I try to do that every day, you know, to just, just keep the hope and the perspective, you know that the world is actually a really beautiful, wonderful place,

40:44  
but I want to ask you, what is the beauty in aging? For you,

40:49  
it's a gradual process of accepting yourself and appreciating yourself. It has nothing to do with outer anything. It's just about feeling comfortable with yourself and kind of not giving a shit anymore, you know, like it's that thing that you and I felt so outraged about, you know, when we were, we were in our teens, where there was just this sense that you're not this and you're not that and you're not you know, and part of you just desperately sought that approval and that validation. And the thing that's so great about aging is just you don't care anymore. You don't give a shit. You don't give a shit.

41:27  
I actually know shit now. I call this part of life the curiosity landscape. So I feel like a 12 year old, I'm up for learning and engaging. It's easier for me to say yes, but it's easier for me to say no. It is

41:40  
really empowering to let that go. Don't lose your empathy, though, but it's just the not giving a shit what people think.

41:48  
I'm so thrilled to have reconnected with you and to continue this lovely friendship and to see all the amazing work that you're doing because you're you're just your heart is as big and wonderful as it was when you were 14, and I just wish you all the best in your next phase, when Elton gets off the road and I'm making up

42:04  
the spare room, I'll look forward to it. You'll have fresh flowers.

42:08  
Hope you enjoyed this replay of my conversation with my childhood bestie David furnish as always, follow and subscribe on your favorite podcast app and join me as I dare to age because I'm going to be older in a few weeks. So please come back. You.