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Cyndi Lauper
(Gavin Bond)
For Alan Cumming’s turn guest hosting Studio 360, his
first-choice interviewee was one of the great pop stars of our time, his
friend Cyndi Lauper. They got to know each other when they starred in The Threepenny Opera
on Broadway in 2006 (he was Mack the Knife, she was Pirate Jenny). Like
the rest of us, he’s been amazed by the many turns Lauper’s life and
career have taken.
Lauper broke very, very big with her debut album in 1983, She’s So Unusual. It came out at the same time as Madonna’s self-titled debut and the two were pitted against each other as rivals by the record companies. Lauper hated being thrown up against Madonna. “First of all, I liked her,” Lauper tells Alan, “and, second of all, it’s another woman. Sisterhood is a powerful thing.” The rivalry left Lauper even more insecure. “I always tried harder because I didn’t think it would be good enough,” she explains. “I always felt like The Little Engine That Could.”
That sense of insecurity has followed Lauper throughout her career. She had to bite her tongue when Dick Clark told her that a female pop star’s career was over in 10 years. She was never asked to do MTV’s Unplugged, so when her label asked her to record a best-of album, she decided to do it acoustically, saying “Let’s do that Unplugged thing I was never allowed to do!” She’s keenly felt that her chirpy voice and New York accent colored what people expected of her. But she’s been undaunted. “Every time you’re stopping me with your gatekeepers, I’m gonna show up some place else and say ‘Ooo look now I’m here! Think you can stop me now?’”
Her records have hit on everything from synth pop to acoustic music to electronic dance to blues. Last year, she became the first woman to win the Tony Award for Best Original Score for the musical Kinky Boots. And she’s been a longtime champion of LGBT rights, organizing concert tours and starting her own foundation, the True Colors Fund.
At 61 years old she shows no signs of slowing down. “I guess, in a lot of ways, I like to be alive,” she says.
Bonus Track: Alan Cumming’s extended conversation with Cyndi Lauper
Lauper broke very, very big with her debut album in 1983, She’s So Unusual. It came out at the same time as Madonna’s self-titled debut and the two were pitted against each other as rivals by the record companies. Lauper hated being thrown up against Madonna. “First of all, I liked her,” Lauper tells Alan, “and, second of all, it’s another woman. Sisterhood is a powerful thing.” The rivalry left Lauper even more insecure. “I always tried harder because I didn’t think it would be good enough,” she explains. “I always felt like The Little Engine That Could.”
That sense of insecurity has followed Lauper throughout her career. She had to bite her tongue when Dick Clark told her that a female pop star’s career was over in 10 years. She was never asked to do MTV’s Unplugged, so when her label asked her to record a best-of album, she decided to do it acoustically, saying “Let’s do that Unplugged thing I was never allowed to do!” She’s keenly felt that her chirpy voice and New York accent colored what people expected of her. But she’s been undaunted. “Every time you’re stopping me with your gatekeepers, I’m gonna show up some place else and say ‘Ooo look now I’m here! Think you can stop me now?’”
Her records have hit on everything from synth pop to acoustic music to electronic dance to blues. Last year, she became the first woman to win the Tony Award for Best Original Score for the musical Kinky Boots. And she’s been a longtime champion of LGBT rights, organizing concert tours and starting her own foundation, the True Colors Fund.
At 61 years old she shows no signs of slowing down. “I guess, in a lot of ways, I like to be alive,” she says.
Bonus Track: Alan Cumming’s extended conversation with Cyndi Lauper
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