013 Stubbled Pop Star Transcript (George Michael)

Listen to the full episode and see show notes at this link.

Michael: This person died in 2016 at age 53

Friend: towns, van San.

Michael: not towns, van San. His death was described as quote unexplained, but not suspicious.

Friend: Uh, yeah. Let's see carrot tops alive, right? um,

Michael: he won a Grammy in 1988.

Friend: Uh, Kenny G

Michael: I forgot how good you are at trivia. Not Kenny G. He grew increasingly uncomfortable with a superficial and relentless promotion of his 1980s style pop stardom. He turned away from video clips and live shows.

Friend: Rick Ashley. No, he? Uh, God, this is hard

Michael: in Britain. He was showered with awards and in 2004 Britain's radio academy said he had been the most played performer on British radio from 1984 to 2004.

Friend: What these are, why? How was this easy?

Michael: In 1998, he came out as gay.

Friend: I mean, Elton John's alive, British. Yay.

Michael: He was a handsome, smiling teen pop idol, making lighthearted singles, like wake me up before you go, go with wham. And arriving as

Friend: a, oh my God, George Michael. Really?

Michael: Today today's dead. Celebrity is George Michael.

Welcome to famous and great I'm Michael Osborne. My name is Amit Kapoor. And on this show, we go through a series of categories about multiple aspects of a famous person's life. We want to figure out the things in life that we would actually desire and ultimately answer a big question. Would I want that life today?

George Michael died 2016 age 53. Category one first line of the obituary, George Michael, the creamy voiced English songwriter who sold tens of millions of albums as a member of the duo wham and on his own was found dead on Sunday at his home in Goring and Oxfordshire, England. Amit, what do you think of that obituary?

I mean, we have to talk about

Amit: creamy. I know

Michael: I don't like it.

Amit: I don't like it either. Are they trying to do a sexual Innu? Sure feels that way in the obituary.

Michael: I don't care for this obituary on a lot of fronts. I

Amit: mean, I, what don't you like about it? Other than this word in question.

Michael: Okay. They sold tens of millions of albums.

That's not a number that has meaning to me. He was a bestselling pop artist, right? Platinum I'm. Sure. Yeah, but the word pop is not in here. And I think it really needs to be, I think that referencing both wham. and his solo is appropriate. And this is a clue that I only know cuz since you and I started this show, I've started paying attention to obituaries.

When you hear the words was found dead, that's usually because it's suspicious circumstances and not to skip ahead too much. George Michael, as best we know died of natural causes. The words was found dead are usually a suicide or an overdose. Was

Amit: that known

Michael: at the time of the obituary? I don't think so.

Okay. Which is why that's in there, which is, I think, why that couches the whole first line thing. Yes. You only say so much when somebody's died under premature and. Perhaps suspicious circumstances. I don't love it either, because

Amit: as you said, it didn't mention pop, it used creamy for some reason, but it, it seemed to purposely Dodge the idea that he was a sex symbol.

Yeah. And that his sexuality was a very huge part of his life and his public life. Right.

Michael: And I think. I don't know when he, when all you say is the guy sold tens of millions of records, like that's kind of all you're saying, is he sold records? Not that he like deserved

Amit: to sell the records or he was this celebrated international

Michael: superstar.

Exactly. It doesn't point to any quality other than financial success.

Amit: I don't think it gives him credit as the megastar that he was. There is like five names to represent that level of stardom at the period of time that George Michael was peeking. But I, I mean, I think this is a grander question is do you remove it from the context, the fact that you don't know the cause of death, does that change the way that you should remember the person?

Michael: I don't know. I think it's a good question. What is hard about that question is, are you. Saying something about how they should or should not be remembered based on the nature of their death. I think I want the first line of the obituary to tell me how I should feel about their life, not how I should feel about their death.

Does that make sense? Very well put and so on this score. He had a creamy voice, I guess. And he sold ins of millions of records and he was with wham and then he was solo. That's all I learned. I don't know. I started at a low score. I've talked myself to a slightly higher score. I think I give this a three.

I think it's man to three or four. You thinking that low before? Yeah. I'm gonna bump it up to a four because I do think it's actually comprehensive.

Amit: Yeah. I'm not gonna be that harsh on it. I'm gonna go five. I don't think it was too much of an. But I think it really undersold his stardom,

Michael: like sensational or some other kind of synonym of the word.

Sensational. Yeah. You wanted one of those. Exactly. I mean it, you know, cuz there is a like stratospheric success and peak for him, even if it's not sustained. Yeah. Okay. You're going five. I'm going four. Yep. Category, two, five things. I love about you here. Amit and I work together to come up with a list of five reasons.

We wanna be talking about this person and why we are impressed with their life's work. I got one I'm kind of excited about here. Okay. I wrote fulfilled childhood dream of starting a band with a friend. Ooh. I feel like it's somewhere like late grade school, middle school, you might go to a friend and say, we should start a BANT.

Yes. And George Michael started wham with his friend from grade school. Like they made good on that dream. I love that. That is an excellent one. Thank you. I thought you might like that one.

Amit: Yeah, that really is wonderful. Cause I'm thinking like the kids are in the upstairs or in the basement or whatever, playing around with the band and mom comes down and brings some tea.

Yeah. And it's like, oh, you boys are gonna be rock stars one day. And then she goes back upstairs and it's like, ah, they're never

Michael: gonna be rock stars. Yeah. Did you do this when you were a kid?

Amit: Definitely. I think we were gonna be rappers more likely than a band. Sure. I

Michael: could say that. Why? No, I just, I know how much you love rap and hip hop.

Oh,

Amit: it wasn't a skin tone. No, God, no Indians. Don't why didn't you have to make it app. I did again, Indians don't Excel at rap actually. No, we do. We're a hip hop centered. Diaspora

Ah, okay. I didn't mean to, I

Michael: always make it racial with you. No, no, that's good. That's good. I need to squirm. Yeah. It's

Amit: sort of my role to remind you. Yeah. Anything you do say wince or look at could possibly offend me. Yeah, sure. I want you on the edge of your seat at all

Michael: time. All right. So that's my number one.

I think that's a fantastic one. Thank you. What did you have for number two? This

Amit: is something that I didn't learn until I did the research, but I won't say he invented, but he was integral in starting the phenomenon known as carpool karaoke, you know, James cord in the late night show. So the very first one was not on a show.

It was part of comic relief and it was James Gordon with George Michael in 2011. Call me

Michael: good. Ah-huh call me in bad. Call me anything you want be bear Georgia. I know Uhhuh that you say, come. That is wonderful. Do you have a favorite carpool karaoke video that you've seen? The Paul McCartney one was fantastic.

Oh, I haven't seen that one. Oh, really did. Oh, I'm all over that. I love where Paul McCartney shows up. I saw one with Michelle Obama. That was pretty great.

Amit: Yeah. I think that's like one of the most

Michael: shared ones. Yeah. All right. Can I take number three? Yeah, go number three. I wrote down positivity, glam and showmanship.

I'm lumping all of these together. Let me start with this moment. I don't care for George Michael's music for a number of reasons. Some I'm aware of some. I'm not. I'm really worried about my unconscious bias when it comes to George Michael. Sure. I grew up in a environment where. Gay men were readily ridiculed.

And in preparing for this episode, I've been really looking at how much of that unconscious bias I'm bringing to the table here. Right? So positivity, glam and showmanship. His music is very upbeat. It's very happy. And there is a sort of like, Attitude around what he cranks out, even if I don't care for it.

I wanna, I wanna

Amit: unpack this a little bit. So you're saying that you don't like the music because it's poppy and perhaps you have an unconscious bias from the environment you grew up in, not

Michael: just poppy annoying to me.

Amit: Annoying and potential unconscious bias. We're right. However, you, you respect it. The positivity and the glam so much so that it wants to be one of the five things.

That you love about

Michael: George Michael? Yeah. I, because I think that I want to try and take the position that this is not for me, but that his music and his art and his persona are worth admiring. Even if I'm not the market for it. I think you said

Amit: it very well, that it is not for you. I still don't understand why it was not for you.

But what you're saying is that you can admire the creation without. Liking it. Yeah, essentially. Yeah. That's good. That's self-aware yeah. From you. I didn't get that at first when you first started talking, but I see it. I get your point now. And I like it I'll own

Michael: my own shit here, cuz I don't wanna blame culture for any kind of residual prejudice.

I have. I don't remember having a conscious thought at age 12, 13, 14 or 15. Is he a closeted homosexual? that wasn't something that I really thought about, but I don't know how else to talk about this. The salient

Amit: point, I think, is that what you say has built in your perhaps unconscious bias is the fact that for you to be a superstar, closeted or not rising at that time, it is going to color a lot of your life and your perception.

Michael: Are you talking about me or George? Michael, George, Michael.

Amit: It could be a hard fucking time to be gay. Yeah. To be gay period. That's all worse thing. Yes. However, I would like to make this point. I firmly disagree with you in the quality of the music.

Michael: You love his music. I

Amit: don't know if

Michael: I would say love. You said firmly disagree.

Amit: Yeah. Cuz you said like hate, I mean, if it's freedom or like wake me up before you go go. Wow. Not all of it, but I, a few

Michael: of them, I love that you can feel this way about his music and also be a big fan of hip hop. Like, was that at the same time, were you flipping back and forth between NWA and George Michael and you know, 1980?

Yes.

Amit: Wow. Yeah. Okay. Good

Michael: stuff. okay. Is that your number four? No.

Amit: Okay. So number four, I'm gonna take, okay. And that is the comebacks. So you had the wham years, which were mostly followed by the solo career of

Michael: faith. Yeah. I went right into it.

Amit: Then he disappeared from the public eye, slightly didn't release, any major hits and then.

1996 Jesus to a child. Yeah. Massive hit again, goes slightly out of sight for a little bit and comes back in 2004 with patience and he's playing like Wimble stadium again.

Michael: Hmm. I'm happy to sign off on that. Number four, there is a bifurcation that happens. I think though where his. Stardom crosses into America and it's all out part of one straight upward line for both the UK and for the us through faith and through the nineties years.

But I think that he plummets in the us, or maybe not plummets, but certainly tapers off in a way where he, his a sentence he keeps rising in the UK. Yeah. I, I think that's, I think you are

Amit: right about that. So I'm saying that, I guess, purely from the perspective that I saw living in America, those entire

Michael: decades, was it kind of down and up and down and up pattern?

Yeah, but

Amit: I'm not even, but it's like down and then way up.

Michael: Yeah. Okay. So are we at number five? Four was the comeback. So we're at five. All right. I got one. I put these two together. Are you aware of the song outside and the video that surrounded the song outside? I'm

Amit: very aware of the song. I'm aware the time it came out the video?

No.

Michael: Okay. So this was in 1998 after George Michael had gotten arrested for a lude act in a public bathroom at Roy Rogers park in LA. How about the accident

Amit: on

Michael: April? 1998 at approximately 1648 hours. Beverly Hills police officers arrested the singer known as George Michaels. Mr. Michaels was arrested for a violation of 6 47, a of the penal code, engaging in all LD act.

I've heard different accounts of what exactly happened, but it was like a police sting. Yeah. That was an entrapment that, yeah, totally. Right. This whole thing pisses me off. Like who are the cops who are like trying to like bust gay men in, in a public bathroom the whole 1991,

Amit: just go back 1998. 98 is when he was busted.

Yeah. 98. Still, not

Michael: that hard to believe. It's still not that hard to believe, but it's sort of infuriating and it clearly like they're excited to bust a celebrity. Yeah. So it is extremely infuriating. He writes this song outside and has a music video that parody the whole thing where there's a man in a bathroom and he turns around and like the urinals spin around and turn into like mirrors and there's disco balls in the bathroom.

And he. Like making fun of the whole thing. Years later in 2012, he also does a segment on, uh, did you ever watch extras? The Ricky VE thing? I did. I don't remember the George Michael episode. There is a George Michael episode that I came across in the research where Ricky VES is doing some sort of community service.

And George Michael comes out of the. Bushes and sits on a bench is like, yeah, I'm doing community service. He's laughing at these public acts of rudeness. I like that quality. I wouldn't ever wanna

Amit: correct your language. I don't think he's laughing at the public acts of rudeness. He's laughing at the public humiliation and the suffering and the entrapment and all that.

Yes,

Michael: absolutely. So that's a good number five. Yeah. Okay, well, let's move on. Category three, Malkovich Malcovich. This category is named after the movie, Bing John Malkovich, in which people take a little, uh, portal, a tube. It's like a water slide into John Malkovich mind where they wake up and they can see the world through John Malcovich she's eyes.

Malcovich Malcovich Malcovich Malkovich Malkovich. The point is to imagine what it might be like to be this person. Amit. What's your Malkovich moment for George Michael.

Amit: So my Maich moment that I, I most want to be behind the eyes for, he was known for doing these random acts of generosity. Yes. And there was one that he, I was talking to a bartender.

She revealed she was in student debt. And so he tips her in pounds, but the equivalent of over $6,000. Yeah. I've often like really fantasized about that. About like reasons to be rich. I can't come up with a bunch of 'em, but the ones I often think about are like, okay, I could fly like business class or first class.

Yeah. I could order appetizers more. Sure. And three, I could get, wait,

Michael: wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. order appetizers more. Yeah. You order fewer appetizers because of you're worried about a big bill. Uh, huh. Okay. Just wanted to sit with that for a second. Okay. Number three,

Amit: variable outlandish

Michael: tips. Uh, yes. I, I, I have fantasized about this

Amit: too, and I'm suspecting, there's a feeling behind it and maybe it's not even getting the person's reaction.

Maybe it's just signing a $10 bill and adding $6,000 to it. Yeah. The feeling you get when you sign that bill, and I'm not saying it's necessarily the feeling of joy when the person receives it. Yeah. The feeling of you. Doing it. Yeah. That's my Milkovich movement.

Michael: That's good. Have you ever come close to that?

You must have. I probably tipped

Amit: like 22% 23. Maybe.

Michael: What about another random act of kindness? That's a lot. That's really impressive. Thank you. yeah, so I would get a chuckle, but I didn't

Amit: have I ever done a complete and

Michael: total random act of kindness. Well, or one that actually is financial in order, like have you ever dropped a big wad of cash into somebody's?

And they didn't know it not gigantic. Yeah. Nothing like a $6,000 to like take care of it. Well, but you didn't have it. I mean, it's all relative to whatever wealth you have.

Amit: Correct. I mean, I'm fretting about the potato skins. Yeah. Great.

Michael: yeah. I love that. Appetizers is what you do with excess wealth. That's great.

It's one of the three

Amit: things. Yeah, no, I just said more of them.

Michael: I allow myself to have them. Yeah, no, I think it's perfect. yeah. Maybe I'll send over to another table. I think , I think we need to figure out a way to get you a lot of money. So all this love can come spilling out.

Amit: I think I'm supposed to have a lot of money by this point in my life, considering opportunities in education.

Yeah,

Michael: well, we're working on that. all right. Shall I give you my Malcolm moment? Yes, I had a couple. I was very tempted to go with when the movie seven came out by David Fincher because David Fincher directed freedom 90, the George Michael. Music video that had all the supermodels in it. Yes. And I just, would've loved to have seen George Michael's reaction and he's like, that's the same guy he worked on and he made this fucking movie, but I'm not gonna go with that.

Are you aware of the letter that Frank Sinatra wrote in a very public way in 1992, George Michael? No, but I'm very excited to hear this. Well, he. Basically lambasting George Michael for complaining about fame. George Michael had grown very weary of all the scrutiny and the sort of like paparazzi and all of the attention.

Basically the gist of it is you're lucky to have this people don't have talent the way you do enough whining, get up there and perform. And based on what we know about George Michael's life, I think he was a pretty sensitive. to get this from fucking Frank Sinatra of all people. Like now he's coming after me.

Yeah. But I also think it hit a. I think a very central part of George Michael's life is that he struggled to make peace with his fame. I think that this is Frank Sinatra piling on. I wonder if in that moment he realized I've gotta figure out how to make peace with this, or I'm gonna be buried. Yeah. And

Amit: it's also fuck you, Frank

I mean, Frank,

Michael: totally

Amit: fuck you. Frank. It's 1990 and George Michael is not public about his sexuality. So it's like Frank, you know, nothing for your style of fame, Frank and your style of public machismo has nothing to do with me. Ping my talents and

Michael: complaining. I also gotta say maybe this Mavi moment is really for me about Frank Sinatra.

Cuz I wanna be in Frank Sinatra's eyes, as he's saying, you know what I gotta do. I gotta write this letter. Yeah. What an

Amit: asshole anyway. And that's just eras by God. I mean, I don't think Frank Sinatra could understand,

Michael: obviously not. What I really wonder about is is there self-reflection in. I

Amit: mean, here are somebody.

Oh, it's like, do I listen to Frank? Or do I just say, fuck you, Frank. That's right.

Michael: That's exactly right. He's such an unlikely spokesperson for this message. I kind of want to know if it got through to George, Michael or not. Yeah. Well, that's my Malcovich moment. Okay. Frank's ATRA writes you a letter saying stop complaining about fame.

Category four. How many marriages also, how many kids and is there anything public about these

Amit: relationships? There's a lot of public things about relationships. I mean, there's not marriages cause he didn't live in a time that was

Michael: except or under the deal. Yeah. Yeah. And there was, uh, also no children, no.

I mean, which

Amit: could have

Michael: been done. Yeah, no, he was, I mean he was having sex with women in the wham

Amit: days. Yeah. But even, even from an adoptive perspective. Yeah.

Michael: So I don't know. We should go through what we do know about. Relationships. I mean, we're in a difficult category here, right, right. Because of who we're dealing with.

Yeah. All right. So let me go through this. So he did come out to Andrew Wrigley, his wham co-partner when he was 19 and Andrew was apparently totally fine with it, but also said, don't come public with this. So he fell in love in 1991. This is the first for him, the first like true feeling of love. And Selmo who ended up dying in 1993 from aids related.

Brain hemorrhage, a brain hemorrhage. Yeah. And they were six months into the relationship. When he found out he was HIV positive. And there was a moment there where George Michael thought he might have been HIV positive. Sure. Okay. George was 28. When that relationship began in 1996, he started dating Kenny GOs and in 2005, they did almost have a civil union.

So not a marriage, but they came close to sort of tying a knot. He's the guy from. That's correct. They ended up splitting up in 2009, but this is the longest relationship, single relationship for George Michael. And that he is age 33 to 46. And then in 2012, George Michael started dating fat Fawaz and that's who found him dead.

George Michael started that relationship at age 49. What do you wanna say about this? Well, a lot of what I heard

Amit: is the relationship with Selmo the guy that died of aids related causes was his. One true love that he'd never got over. Yes. And that, that

Michael: was, I think subsequent partners knew that too.

Amit: Yeah.

The downward slope of drug abuse and arrests and all started with his death. Yes. So that's, I mean, that's one thing to note, I think is that the man experienced deep love and deep loss. Pretty soon after

Michael: deep love, kind of back to back.

Amit: Yeah. I mean, that's the, like, it's the question? Is it better to have loved and

Michael: lost than to have never loved at all?

Like that's where do you come down on this? Is it better to have loved and lost or better to have never loved at all? It's I's

Amit: so hard to, it's such a general statement. I would say better to have loved and lost. It's so much of an ingredient of vitality of. Understanding why we're even here. Yeah. But it's, it's also just cruel that if you are experiencing it for the deepest level on the first time, and that partner is taken from you after two years, I mean, you gotta think what a cruel fucking world.

Yeah.

Michael: I don't know, Ahed, I don't know how much to make this, the sort of central fact of his life. I mean, I think there's two things that are easy to know about George Michael. One is that he was gay and didn't come out until 1998 and two that he became famous basically as a teenager and rode a rocket ship to stardom throughout the 1980s.

And yeah, had some comebacks along the way, but basically kind of peaked up, I think, 1990. Those two things, his sexual orientation and his experience of fame, they just shape everything. And I feel like there is more to know, but is there, I mean, I read a biography of George Michael and the author seemed to, you know, be really excavating what could be known about this man.

And I'm not sure he got anywhere because it all started for him at such a young, confusing age. I've been wanting to talk about this. And this is, I feel like this is important. Are you familiar with the term emerging adulthood? I am not

Amit: familiar with the exact term. I can take a guess what it means, but go ahead.

Michael: Well, the way it was explained to me is that it's actually debated whether it's a, a stage of life or not. And it's similar in between adolescent and young adulthood or early adulthood, emerging adulthood. And it's worth reading up about it may be a cultural fabrication, but there is some sort of like brain development.

Pieces that go along with it. If it exists as a stage of life, first of all, it tends to exist in more privileged societies, but it's like 18 to 25 where you are figuring out a lot of things. You're figuring out your political views. You're figuring out your values, you're figuring out what kind of people you want to hang out at.

Some of the tribal sorting happens in emerging adulthood. I feel like. George Michael's emerging adulthood experience was kind of robbed from him. He chose to become famous and played the game to become really famous first with wha then as a solo artist. And it just set him so far into the stratosphere that there was never any like backtracking.

Never any opportunity for reflection? Never any like time trading. Yeah. Normal, healthy, sorting it out. I kind of feel like George, Michael got a little fucked over in that, by his own choices, but by his own choices before he understood the choices he was making. Yeah. I mean, it's the whole

Amit: child know what it's a whole child star theory, but what you are making the point is

Michael: that.

It gets more complicated with the

Amit: sexuality. Yeah. With the sexuality in those emerging adulthood, years. That's right. Like it can really complicate things really

Michael: complicated to the point where friendships and intimacy and love, you know, it's hard to figure out. And then he does fall in love with somebody.

And then six months later that person gets an HIV diagnosis and then dies, dies shortly thereafter. Yeah. And not even couple years, it's less than that. It's like a year later and you know, everything about this is tragic. Yeah, it is. And it's like the poster child example of why fame would

Amit: suck. Well, why fame would suck if you are living in a world that doesn't accept you.

There's no welcoming world around you. Yeah. For what you are sensing inside and what you're attracted to. There's just a dangerous world, you know, we are at really peak aids time. Yeah. There's this homophobia that you're hearing on stage yet you are a rising superstar. I think it sucks to be famous at a young age in terms of being able to sort yourself out later.

Right. And I think it would really, really suck to be doing that while harboring

Michael: a secret. A secret driven by a deep instinctual drive that you really don't have any power or control over. Like you can pray and wish yourself a way to not be gay and good luck. Right. I don't believe that's possible.

Amit: I don't think there is anybody at

Michael: all that would agree with that.

I think that there's absolutely people out there that believe that you can be re or that you can pray it away or yeah, fucking a, or that you can into enter a sexual reeducation camp. I mean, there's absolutely.

Amit: I guess that does still exist. Yes.

Michael: Fucking a I wish it didn't. I mean, we're not there, there are, are networks that our guests are dedicated, goddamn.

Right. And it may be more mainstream than you realize. I mean, I don't know. I don't know how far we've come on. This.

Amit: My point is. It sucks. Yeah, it's hard. And I think the whole reason for. all of the civil rights work. We do all of the, the emotions of progress. All of those agendas is exactly for this to be yourself and feel safe.

Yeah. Feel accepted and do not feel singled out for any

Michael: respect. Sure. Okay. But that's sort of like, that's what we want out of culture in society. If you are George, Michael, and. Are gay and you are writing the rocket ship to stardom throughout the 1980s. I guess what I'm trying to get to is choices. Given the constraints.

If one of the things that we're interested in this show is desirability. And what are the choices someone did or did not make given the context and the environment and the situation in which they're making those. What is to be learned here. Cause I'm, I'm more, I'm certainly more mad at society than I am at George Michael's decisions.

But I don't know that that tells me anything about desirability of his

Amit: life tells you about quality of his life. Not about, it's not necessarily about the choices that he made. He's a talented person. Yes. He wanted to be famous. He pursued this career. Did he know how challenging that would be and what that would do to potentially a later life of substance abuse and so forth?

No, he was what, 19 when he started. So no, it doesn't at all speak to choices. So

Michael: what conclusions are you and I to draw about? That

Amit: sometimes there's not a conclusion that we can extract and say, okay, this is how I would make a decision, or this is how I would educate my children to make their decisions.

Sometimes I think what you can just draw from it is this sucks. And this is why we make grander changes as a society.

Michael: Well then maybe that is the desirable thing is that I want to be doing that for other people.

Amit: Yeah. But it doesn't speak to any desirability of George Michael's life. It does not. So yeah.

I mean, maybe that's the, the lesson learned could only maybe is just intrinsic for

Michael: the rest of us. Category five category, five net worth. I'll just say 200 million. It's a lot of money. Wham. that is a big number, but it makes sense. I'm so good with it. Superstar. I'm so good with it. I mean, he actually was intentionally wanting to compete with Michael Jackson, Madonna and prince, but that was his peer set.

Oh, absolutely. It is his peer set and therefore I am very comfortable with 200 million for George. I have no conclusions to draw from this. Other than that's more money than I'm comfortable with,

Amit: it would allow you to make $6,000 tips. Yes, it's a lot of money and he was a international megastar,

Michael: his stature and his success, and his ability to turn out hits is incredible.

And I, he was well compensated for it in terms of desirability, way more money than I desire. But I do like the idea of appetizers.

Amit: Yes. But I, I can just only guess, but I don't think it did

Michael: much for him. I think he's pretty clear that it didn't do a lot for him. I think he'd be the first to tell you that.

All right. Category six Simpson siren night live or hall of fame. This category is a measure of how famous a person is. We include guests appearances on SNL or the Simpsons as well as impersonations. I'll take this first with the Simpson. There's one random reference to something called Ned's list of laudable lefties.

The left

Amit: auditorium had have been in the left auditorium episode. Ned opens a store that is just goods for

Michael: left-handed people. Oh, that's hilarious. Laud audible lefties. I was thinking of it in political context then of course. Okay. Shall we go? That's the only thing I could find, he never, um, he never gets hoisted.

He never gets voiced. I never even saw an SNL that he was ever, either him or wham was on. Did a musical act, which I, I know shocking. I could be wrong. I might have missed it. I was shocked as well. And I did not find it. He was pard data. Carvery did a pretty funny impersonation.

Look at it, accept it. Look at it. Dennis, look at my, but the worst thing you can do is try to ignore it. It's a total circle.

Amit: Don't you

Michael: see? And then I saw a still image. I couldn't actually find the video for it. Robert Downey Jr. In the short years that Lauren Michaels was away. And Robert Downey Jr. Was on the cast for one year.

He did a George Michael impersonation. Hey, you don't know the skit. I don't know this kid. I'm afraid. I don't feel like we can let the TV thing go without calling out George Michael from arrested development. I, I wrote that down here. Yeah. Your uncle job seems to think that he saw you down at the docks today.

Was that you? No, no. Maybe it was the other George Michael, you know, the, the singer

Amit: songwriter. Yeah, that makes sense. Yeah. Yeah. But it actually, and it plays into the plot line later because George Michael blue. Yeah. When he later learns about the criminal record of the real George Michael is when he wants to change his name.

I forgot about that. Yeah.

Michael: Oh, that's uh, that's funny. Uh, and then finally, hall of fame, George Michael did make it into the rock and roll hall of fame in 2019 as he should have, as he should have category seven over. In this category, we look at the life expectancy for the year. They were born to see if they beat the house odds.

Amit, I am sorry to say this is our first under. Yeah. Yeah. He was, I was 53 years old. He was born in 1963. Life expectancy for men in the UK was 67.9 for what it's worth. It's 66.6 in the us. For some reason UK men are living longer. If they're born in 1963, I don't

Amit: smaller

Michael: soda size, I guess. So anyway, George Michael died at 53, our first under on famous and gravy.

So yeah, I don't,

Amit: I'm, I'm a little silent cuz I don't know what to, I mean it's sad. All it points to is just sadness. I think. Yeah, I agree. He did outlive his

Michael: mother at least. Yeah. And natural causes. I was definitely wondering if there was more to the story. Fatty liver doesn't speak to good health. Yeah.

But yeah, George, Michael's under pause on that for a sec. It's time for a word from our sponsor.

Amit: So Michael, we each do our own set of research as we prepare for these shows. Mm-hmm I notice you always reference a biography and you have like a paperback biography with you as we come to studio. Yeah. So I am to assume that you're getting these from some online mega Mart, is that correct?

Michael: No. Not at all the first thing I do when you and I decide on our next dead celebrity, is I go and find out, is there a biography on this person?

And is that biography available at half price books? There's a store right up the street from me, an actual brick and mortar store where I can walk in when I go there to find out. Do they have a biography for our next dead celebrity, but I always wind up picking up more books. I go through the children's section.

I'm a sucker for a good page Turner. So I go through the murder mystery section. They also have rare collections. They have sign stuff. I don't know how this sounds to you, but I actually, I love the smell. Of half price books. It's got that

Amit: old book smell. I do. I like that too. Isn't that a great smell? Yeah.

And you know what? Half price books is currently celebrating 50 years of buying and selling books, movies, and music. There are more than 120 stores and you can find out more about half price books@hpb.com.

Michael: All right. The first of the inner life categories, man in the mirror. Did he like his reflection in the. I'm gonna say

Amit: no. Yeah. He said, I mean, he was, he was universally attractive to all sexes and genders, but such an identity struggle of not being able to be who he wanted to be. I don't even know that I have an articulate way to say it, but, well,

Michael: he explained about his hair a lot to his friends.

Yeah. And how unruly it was. And he didn't know what to do. Andrew Wrigley also did say that, that when he saw the image that George Michael had after wha you know, the leather jacket, the sunglasses, the blue jeans, he was like, that's not the George. I know, I do think that he was extremely conscious and deliberate about cultivating an image for the moment that in as much as you and I have talked about how.

Fame selects for certain qualities. George Michael plays to those qualities in the early eighties, he coming out of a very depressive 1970s era. It's what the audience wants at that moment with wham in 82 and then all the way through to faith in 87. Yeah, but I do not think he liked his reflection all throughout.

Yeah.

Amit: I mean, there's just there's signs of mental health struggle. Yes. Right? With the, the substance abuse, he was even openly as late as 2010 saying he still goes out like cruising for anonymous sex. Yeah.

Michael: In the early hours of the 4th of July this year, George Michael's range Rover crashed into this branch of snappy snaps in Hamstead.

The police arrived to find the 47 year old slumped over his steering wheel. Blood tests proved he'd been smoking cannabis. The word wham now marks the car's point of

Amit: impact. Like there is a lot of destructive habits happening there and I don't see how you can look at the mirror and be like, okay.

Michael: Everything's okay. Next category is this outgoing message you have reached the voicemail box

Amit: of

Michael: the creamy voice. I assume he liked it. I think so. I feel like if there's anything he likes about himself, it's probably his voice. He is a singer. Yeah. Is

Amit: this just a, a redundant question? When we talk about singers?

Michael: That's a great question. I mean, like Tom waits, for example, or Dylan, I think there are singers who like are going to sing, but it's not the main thing that they're doing with their music. Like they drag themselves to it. I don't know. I guess the other side of the coin

Amit: is there are some people that sing so well because they think they talk so poorly.

Michael: I don't think that's true here though. I think he like his speaking voice is just as nice. Yeah.

Amit: Yeah. I, I would agree with that. So yeah, we're, we're thumbs up on outgoing

Michael: message. All right. Next category, regrets, public or private. I'll start with public mentioned earlier. Wham goes to China. I don't think he regretted going to China.

He did regret a little bit, his attitude going into China. They hired a documentary filmmaker who had done like political work in the past. And they put together this film at the end of wha's tour. And. China and wham was barely involved cuz this person was like shooting Chinese people, you know, in everyday life and contrasting it against wham.

So I think, don't think he liked how the publicity around it was fashioned. Another regret. His first solo single after wham was, I want your sex, which was. Kind of misinterpreted. I heard the biographer extremely misinterpreted, extremely misinterpreted. The biography. I read likened it to the way born in the USA was misinterpreted as a patriotic song.

Yeah. Where it's actually like a Vietnam war protest song. I want your sex is about monogamy. Yeah. Well, it's mono about not promiscuity, correct? I think it's a regret. It might be a regret. This actually probably should have been in.

Amit: Because I, yeah, well, I, it's got to be just regret that it was so misconstrued that you had what you thought was probably a great idea for a message.

Yeah. In, in a catchy refrain while it did lead to record sales, probably the publicity helped all of that. The intention was never really talked about. Yeah.

Michael: Other one I had in the publicly known was 18 year hiatus from tour. He did not tour really from 1990 to 2008. And when he came back to it, he loved it.

He was like, I was making a big deal out of it. I wish I'd started. I'd come back. Cuz I liked being on stage, but he had gone through the loss of his lover. His mother died. He was dealing with a lot of grief in a lot of mental health for many of those years. So I think he actually regretted being away from the states for the 18 years.

Cause that's a pretty long time. Yeah. So that's what I got in the public front. The only private one I have is when he got famous. All the stuff I said earlier about emerging adulthood. I think that if he could go back in time, I think he probably would not have wanted to have become famous as a result of wham.

Yeah.

Amit: That's kind of what I wrote too. It's just that it's living a public life that young in, at that time. You've gotta wonder, cuz I mean, he was suffering. Crippling depression in, in the late eighties. Yes. Even when he was on these world stages and doing diet Coke ads and stuff like the, the man writes and talks about crippling depression.

Do you

Michael: think that's part of the reason he was so successful? Like, I mean, I do wonder if maybe we all had an intuition that there was something beneath the surface. There was a deeper pain, you know, I wonder if that's like his superpower in, in the eighties and nineties. Does that make sense? That theory of fame.

Yeah.

Amit: I don't know. Yeah. I mean, it's a, it's a theory of, of artistry in general. Right, right.

Michael: That you, I dunno. There's something that you read beneath the art. That's

Amit: what I mean. Yeah. For pop stars. It's a tougher thing to say nowadays. It is. I mean, you look at Taylor swift. Who's a great example. Yeah. Who outwardly is.

Super poppy. But now that we know so much more about the private lives and at least their perspectives on things we know are heard to be

Michael: somebody who struggles a lot. Yeah. Well, I do think that the contract with the public has shifted over the last 30 years.

Amit: Absolutely. There is an injection of humanity into it a little more

Michael: now, but I just, I wonder if, because the pain is so deep with George Michael.

I wonder if that doesn't make the audience want to love him a little bit more and by just a few more albums, It's a, it's a theory. All right. Next category. Good dreams. Bads. How could it not be bad? It, yeah.

Amit: Okay. I, I would agree. I mean, I think they were, they were probably good for a while, but then the depression starts at a pretty young age.

You lose your first true love. I mean, you

Michael: mentioned substance abuse a lot here. It really doesn't get bad for him until the nineties with wham. Andrew Rigley is the one who's party on correct. But the nineties is still his thirties. I oh yeah, yeah, no, he's young. He's young. What I'm saying is he's not some addict alcoholic who like.

At age 15 has his first drink and is off to the races in terms of being self-destructive. It really doesn't get bad until he achieves a level of stardom and wealth and notoriety and all that. And is still got this giant void inside. I don't

Amit: think the story I'm hearing you say is he's. Achieve so much financially he's extraordinarily wealthy.

He's known around the world, played concerts in China has millions of fans yet. Somehow still feels like shit. Yes. And that is, I think, where you just. Turn and just need to feel something

Michael: else, but it's even begun, engaging in relationship, meaningful relationships with men and then tragically. His first love dies.

So it's not even about that anymore. I don't know. Like at, at that point, I guess he's just accumulated too much pain, I think that's right. Bad dreams. All right. Second to last category, cocktail, coffee or cannabis. Which one would we want to partake with our dead celebrity? I wanna a

Amit: one on one. Drinking session.

I wanna talk about all the things that you and I just talked about, you know, just how did you see the ride? Yeah. What advice would you give for somebody else? Like on the frontier of that, knowing everything, you know? Yeah. I guess that can be a coffee conversation, but I think there, it needs to be a little

Michael: inhibition, loose thing.

I had the exact same thing on, I was trying to think what drink. I was like maybe a gen and tonic. It needs to be faster than beer. Like we need to get to a kind of tipsy spot pretty quick. So that can get to an honest place. Yeah. But for all the reasons you just outlined, I like what you said, the British made you go.

Yeah, that's probably it. I think you and I are kind of agreed on, you know, what it all means for him. And I think we recognize a kind of tragic figure here. One thing that's been funny about all this is how many people I talked to in the lead up to this episode who didn't realize he'd even died for all the attention, for all the wealth, for all the fame, for all the success.

I don't wanna say forgettable necessarily, but like, he's not gonna be viewed 10 years from now as a pioneer, even though he was gay before it was quote unquote. Okay. To be gay. E even though he wrote some of the most successful songs of all time and was one of the most played British acts on, on BBC radio, you know, ultimately like, huh, what does it all mean?

We can go right into the Vander. Beke if you don't mind, I wanna, I

Amit: wanna make a comment about what you said of, okay. You know, he, wasn't a pioneer. Maybe he was, I'm

Michael: saying he won't be

Amit: remembered as a pioneer. He won't be remembered as a pioneer, but perhaps pioneers can't happen without him. Right. So I'm giving you a picture of a red brick wall.

All right. Okay. That red brick wall is the constraints that we as a society with built in prejudices have against certain people. Okay. Okay. A pioneer may be the one that breaks through the wall, but there's another type of person who could just be one of the first few swings against it to loosen the bricks.

Yeah. And maybe that's. His role was, and it's hard, but you don't necessarily have to be the one to break through the walls in order to loosen to the cement.

Michael: Okay. I agree with that, but I don't think history is gonna like give him the credit that maybe he deserves, but this is

Amit: also the point. Like history has no place for this, for the people that are making the early swings at the brick wall.

There's no story to tell there's no remembrance. To be had and your sadness and your pain may just be a pure and total sacrifice for the future. All

Michael: right. So we're gonna get to the VanDerBeek right now, because that is the perfect segue into the question. Amit, would you want this life? Because the question I have for you about all of that, this is a resounding no, for me, I can't come up with a good case for it, but I always ask you to make a good case for it.

And let me contextualize that this time and say, If you don't know that you might have made that contribution, if you don't get the sense of peace or resolution, does it influence the Vander big for you?

Amit: Yeah, it does. It does, but let me, let me talk it all through. Okay. So there's a lot. To desire, right? If you just freeze frame the public life of the eighties and the sold out arenas and the Grammys and the Coke commercials and who your contemporaries were, there is a lot to be wanted there.

We know how the whole story played out. Yeah.

Michael: There's also this linger on that. That's that there's a lot to be wanted there because it's fun. Cuz it's validating like what's good about.

Amit: Sure. Just take fun and validating. Okay. Don't even don't don't dig any deeper. Okay. There's also a case we made for charity, right?

He gave a lot to causes. I love this $6,000 tip. That was not the only time that he did that. Like he, he had these other random acts of extreme generosity, like playing concert for the nurses at the place where his mother died. So he. John Lennon's piano in which he wrote, imagine around the world to sites of various places of human tragedy.

So he used money in kind of this Willy Wonka type of

Michael: charitable way. Well, and it came out just to pile on that. It came out after that he did it anonymously way more than people have knew and understood. Yeah, there was one

Amit: story that he called in to like deal or no deal because one of the contestants on there.

Said that she wanted to have a baby, but she couldn't afford IVF treatment. And he paid, so he called into the show and found out who she was and sent her like $15,000. That,

Michael: that that's one of many stories where he did something that he paid for some like Christmas tree or something in his hometown that nobody knew that he was funding for every

Amit: Christmas.

Yeah. And there was no publicity, these stories all come out later. Right. And that is honorable as anything, but I'm, I'm also a no on do I want his life. Okay. Okay. So. The pain is deep. The pain is obvious. You have a complicated life. It leads to death at 53, which was not a suicide, but it's clearly a result of a mistreatment and abuse of body.

Yes. So to your point, like, what is it all for? You're not gonna be remembered for being that first few strikes against the brick wall. I don't think anybody's ever gonna give credit for it. I don't think he's ever gonna remember it. I don't know that. He was at peace with it, or could even make that argument to himself at the deathbed.

It's just an act of your pain is a sacrifice for that. And it's a tough question. Do I want that? No, I don't want that.

Michael: Well, okay. Wait a sec. Let me ask what, if you did get to learn that on your deathbed. You know, if a voice descends upon you somewhere and says, you've done more than you realized. And, and I, some anonymous, vague, higher power.

I'm grateful to you for what you've contributed to the stream of life and to the society at large in the world at large. Like if you get that message, does it change anything? If it, if you only get that one moment with it right before the.

Amit: For me. No, for me it wouldn't, it doesn't, it does not take away decades of pain.

Very, very, very few things to me as I see life. Yeah. Very few things can be worth decades of pain. Nothing to me that I've experienced would be worth that pain

Michael: me neither. But I also wonder if that leaves me as a little. Chicken shit about pursuing a spiritual life.

Amit: It does. It's it speaks to both of us being a little chicken shit about it.

I mean, everything is the story you tell yourself. Yeah. And so maybe some part of him near the end was telling that story to himself. And so maybe he can see that he was a. Part of that and it's a greater good, right. That's the spirituality part of

Michael: it. Well, but yes, but the consciousness of the story, that's the thing I'm curious about, you know, like you're right.

It is a story we're telling ourselves, like his awareness and the grace with whether he lives in proximity to that story or not. That's what I wonder about to heavy one. Well, so we're both now. Yeah.

Amit: We're both now. It's a lot of pain. It's

Michael: a lot of sacrifice. I don't think I got the stomach for the pearly gates.

Do. Yeah, I can do it.

Amit: Okay. So here we are. I'm with St. Peter. I am not George Michael, cause that wasn't even my birth name, my birth. Did

Michael: you remember the birth name? Yeah, I can pronounce it. It's great. It's Greek. It's Yogi or yo, Ardio something. Yeah, it's very

Amit: Greek. Yeah. Anyway, so here's the story. I had a dream to create music and be a rock star with my best friend as a teenager.

And. I did that. We sang feel good music. We sang the type of music that was played at proms that was played at weddings. It was festive music. We were bringing the party, my life behind that was extremely difficult and storied, but I still brought the party and I did that through a musical career. That spanned several decades, my music changed, but those original songs and the spirit behind the later ones were still bringing the party.

I also brought the party to places that no one knew I was bringing the party I was giving. Money. I was giving gifts. I was giving performances as pure acts of generosity, party and generosity. Let me in,

Michael: thanks so much for listening to this episode of famous and. If you're enjoying our show, please go to apple podcast to rate and review us. It really does help new listeners to find the show. We would love to see you on Twitter. Our Twitter handle is at famous and gravy. We've got lots of fun stuff there on our Twitter feed.

Also, please sign up for our newsletter on our website, famous and gravy.com. Famous and gravy was created by Amit Kapoor and me Michael Osborne. This episode was produced by Morgan Han. Original theme music by Kevin Strang. And thanks also to our sponsor half price books. Thank you for listening. We'll see you next time.