LARRY KING LIVE 2002 - Seite 1

CNN LARRY KING LIVE
Interview With Barry Manilow
Aired May 17, 2002 - 21:00 ET


THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.



LARRY KING, HOST: Tonight, he writes the song that make the whole world sing. The amazing Barry Manilow. A Brooklyn boy who's made it very, very big. You've got a free front-row seat for a terrific entertainer next on LARRY KING LIVE.

Good evening. We have a special treat for you tonight on this edition of LARRY KING LIVE. Barry Manilow is our guest. Based on charts, he is the No. 1 contemporary adult artist ever. Two albums out now, "Ultimate Manilow" and "Here at the Mayflower." He stars in a CBS special which will air tomorrow night. He is on tour, called "Manilow Live 2000." It's a smash hit.

He is a Grammy, Emmy and Tony winner and a past Oscar nominee. Thank you for joining us, Barry. And show's over, we have given you all the credits. We're out of time.

BARRY MANILOW, MUSICIAN: Thanks, Larry.

KING: What is it like, I guess the only way to put this is being popular again?

MANILOW: Well, you know, it is stunning. And I think it's sweeter the second time around. I didn't -- none of us expected this kind of explosion to happen. It was an explosion when this greatest hits album came out. It was called "The Ultimate Manilow." Nice title, right? And, you know, I've had greatest hits albums before, and none of them...

KING: So, why now, why this one, do you think?

MANILOW: I've been trying to figure it out. I think it's another generation. I mean, my concerts also, or the reception, it's always -- I've been on the road for like 20 some-odd years, and making albums as long, every other year and promoting. And I have had a wonderful time and a wonderful career.

This year, something flipped over. And I don't know exactly what to attribute it to except it might be a new generation that is discovering the music that has meant so much to me over the years.

KING: The only thing similar might be the return in the '80s -- in the '90s of Tony Bennett. Happened to Bennett, happened to you. Kind of second career, MTV, kids digging him, et cetera.

MANILOW: I've heard of this happening. I didn't think -- I didn't really expect it. I just didn't expect it.

KING: You have sold over 60 million recordings. You've been on charts in four decades.

MANILOW: Yes, I know. You know, when you mention things like that, it always surprises me because I just don't think of those things. I just, you know, it's straight ahead.

KING: And over the years, yet a lot of people have been ticked at you for some reason. The "New York Times" once said your songs were processed cheese. What do you make of that? I mean, I always loved your singing. What do you make of -- why were there knockers? There are knockers of you. Neil Diamond has knockers, people who like to knock you.

MANILOW: I know. And I think it's so cruel that they do that. It is.

KING: Why do that to Barry?

MANILOW: Well, you know -- or to Neil or to Michael Bolton or to any of us guys. You know, but I look back on the stuff that I did and I can't figure it out myself. I listen to "Weekend in New England" and I say that's great. That's a great record. It's a beautifully written song by Randy Edelman (ph). I think I did a beautiful record. I don't know what anybody had trouble with that or "Trying to Get the Feeling" or any of these great songs. I got a feeling I was annoyingly popular for a while.

KING: Annoyingly popular? Maybe it's also that you were vulnerable, right? So macho guys get mad at you.

MANILOW: I think maybe because I'm not from the rebellious rock n' roll. I come from a little bit more romantic, I come from a little bit more vulnerable, like you say. And I think it's easier.

KING: But you grew up in a rebellious neighbourhood. You grew up in Williamsburg, New York. Trust me, folks, it's a tough neighbourhood. Eastern District High School, tough school.

MANILOW: I was never a tough guy, but, you know, what you learn, and you know, what you learn coming from Brooklyn, New York or from Brooklyn or from New York at all, you learn honesty. You can't fool around, man. You know what is real and you know when they're full of baloney.

KING: And they're going to know it if you're...

MANILOW: And they are going to know it too. And I don't think I've ever -- I think because I was raised like that, I don't know how to fake it. I am, you know, what you see is what you get. And that's what you get in New York.

KING: Speaking of Brooklyn, is that what "Here at the Mayflower" is about?

MANILOW: Well, the Mayflower is an apartment building on the CD, but it was actually an apartment building in Williamsburg, Brooklyn called the Mayflower.

KING: Did you live in it?

MANILOW: Yes, my family lived in it. When I was writing this album, I had this idea of writing an album about people's lives in an apartment building, and that every cut would be about a different life behind an apartment door.

And so, you know, I started writing original songs and story songs. And I kept envisioning this apartment building that I spent so much time in and I wasn't going to call it the Mayflower. But I did. And it's about, you know, not literally about those people, but it's my memories.

KING: By the way, Barry is going to be -- the last half of this program will be Barry singing at the piano. So you have a real treat in store. How did this special come about that airs tomorrow night?

MANILOW: Wonderful CBS people, Leslie Moonbas (ph) and Jack Sussman (ph), you know, said let's do it.

KING: Great guys. Now, how is it going to work?

MANILOW: We did it at the Kodak Theater, which I opened, by the way, a couple of months ago.

KING: Your first performance?

MANILOW: I was the first human being, I think. And on the stage, I did a sound check.

KING: Is it songs from all eras?

MANILOW: It's a lot of the hits and some of the stuff from the Mayflower?

KING: Was your childhood tough?

MANILOW: No. I don't say it was tough. No.

KING: Your parents were divorced?

MANILOW: Parents were divorced. I was raised by my mother and my grandparents and a lot of relatives around this Williamsburg, Brooklyn, Mayflower...

KING: Jewish neighbourhood?

MANILOW: Jewish neighbourhood, Jewish, Puerto Rican. It was very ethnic. I loved it.

KING: But your stepfather though was Irish, right?

MANILOW: Yes. I just saw him. He lives down in...

KING: You close?

MANILOW: Well, we're not close. He lives in Florida and I don't. But he was the guy that turned my musical motor on.

KING: Really?

MANILOW: Well, before Willie Murphy (ph) came into my life, I was playing the accordion, and "Have Nagila" and all of the folk songs that my grandparents loved.

KING: Worked at bar mitzvahs?

MANILOW: Well, I should have been so lucky. I wasn't even up to bar mitzvahs. I was just playing folk songs on the accordion.

KING: (UNINTELLIGIBLE)

MANILOW: You got it. And I wasn't bad, believe it or not. But that would have been it, had Willie not come into my life.

KING: What did he do?

MANILOW: He came into my life with a stack of albums that turned my musical motor on. He brought a stereo system in that I never had and a stack of albums that had people like Stan Kenton and June Christy and Broadway show music like "The Most Happy Fella" and "Kismet" and "Kiss me, Kate" and on and on. It was a stack of gold.

KING: We'll be right back with more of Barry Manilow. His concert is tomorrow night on CBS. We have got him tonight. Don't go away.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KING: Our guest Barry Manilow has been resurrected, not that he ever really went far - you've always worked.

MANILOW: I've always been working, I've been touring, making albums...

KING: You briefly married, got divorced. Are you married to your work?

MANILOW: I am married to my work.

KING: Does that harm other aspects of your life?

MANILOW: No. I have beautiful friends, beautiful people that surround me all the time

I have a studio in my house. I shouldn't have done that.

KING: You live in L.A., right?

MANILOW: I live in Palm Springs now. And I built this studio, and I shouldn't have done that, because I never leave. I mean, have you ever seen all of these wonderful instruments that you can make music with these days?

KING: Computer things?

MANILOW: There are these modules that sound like anything you can imagine. And for an arranger like myself, a musical arranger, it's like going to heaven. It's like going to a candy store. I just never leave. I never leave. I have no hobbies.

So many people ask me what do you do to relax? I go up to the studio and I make music. It's my life. The hard part is travelling.

KING: Don't like travelling?

MANILOW: Well, it's a young man's business.

KING: How old are you?

MANILOW: I'm 75 years old.

KING: How old are you, Barry?

MANILOW: I'm in my late 50s.

KING: You look amazing. I'm sure everybody tells you that.

MANILOW: Well, it's good genes, I guess.

KING: You are not kidding me. Did your natural father live a long time?

MANILOW: Yes. And so did my mom. My whole family lived to 75, 76.

KING: Up above the...

MANILOW: Yes.

KING: Now, the first time I saw you...

MANILOW: When?

KING: You were playing piano for about Bette Midler.

MANILOW: Where, New York or L.A.?

KING: It was New York. You played a song, she'd sing, you'd stand up. OK, band, finish.

MANILOW: I was conducting.

KING: (UNINTELLIGIBLE) conductor and arranger, Barry Manilow. When did you come front on the stage?

MANILOW: On the third or fourth year that I was with Bette, I got an offer to make my own album. Don't ask me how. I wasn't pushing myself as a singer.

KING: You didn't sing with Bette.

MANILOW: Not at that time. But I was pushing my song writing. I wanted other people to record my songs. And I got an offer to record my own songs as a singer. And I did, I accepted it, because nobody else seemed to be recording my songs.

And I made this first album. They said, we'll give you the first album deal if you go out and promote it, like on a tour, like put a band together and actually go out on the road. And I was conducting for Bette, so I asked Bette if I could open her second half, and then I could conduct for her, for the whole show, but I would also be able to promote this album as singing three songs before her second act.

She graciously said that I could.

KING: It was nice, by the way. Didn't have to do that.

MANILOW: It was beautiful of her to do that. It was the beginning. I thought these people would go out for orange juice when I came on. They should have. They really should have. Bette was so unbelievable.

To have her piano player come out and say now I'll do three songs, they shouldn't have stayed. But they did, and they were so beautiful to me, always. They were so gracious. They never heckled, you know, never yelled we want Bette, they were great.

KING: Are you a writer who sings?

MANILOW: I'm a writer who sings. That's great. Although I have made quite a career as a performer, and I think I have gotten better at it, but I was never really comfortable doing it. I'm still comfortable behind the piano as a musician.

KING: When you do an album, since you are also an arranger, do you work well with arrangers, or do you arrange your own?

MANILOW: I lay out all the songs that I sing. Then I ask the orchestrator/arrangers to write it out for the musicians. I used to do that for Bette, but I stopped doing it for myself.

KING: You performed for Princess Di, didn't you?

MANILOW: Yes.

KING: Where?

MANILOW: In Britain, at the Royal Festival Hall the first time, and then -- I forget.

KING: Is it more nervous when someone very famous is out there, like a president or princess or a king?

MANILOW: I usually don't want to know that there is anybody out there. I don't want to know who is out there until I'm done.

KING: Did you know she was there?

MANILOW: I did. I did know she was there.

KING: Does it affect performance?

MANILOW: Yes, I was better. I was better because I knew she was there. For some reason it didn't bother me. I just was so thrilled they were there.

KING: Did she come backstage?

MANILOW: She did. She was so young. They were young and in love then. It was
like - must have been...

KING: She was with the prince?

MANILOW: Yes. Must have been the first couple of months. She was a fan, you know, and she had trouble talking to me. Both of us, like, stumbling over our words. It was great. Then I saw her, frankly, I did the royal, everything is royal, and I did the royal something performance over there, and she and Prince Charles were there, and we met again, and the next morning they announced their divorce.

So I guess I met them at the beginning and met them at the end.

KING: Where were you when she died?

MANILOW: I was home.

KING: Were you performing that night?

MANILOW: No.

KING: It was a Saturday night.

MANILOW: I was home. We all remember that night. I'm sure you do.

KING: As we all remember 9-11. Where were you?

MANILOW: I was home that morning, too. And I spent the morning, just like everybody else, with my hand over my mouth not believing what I was watching.

KING: Were you scheduled to work anytime right after that?

MANILOW: Yes, I was going to do a benefit for Dick Gephardt. But everything was canceled. Two days after that, I was to do a benefit for Congressman Gephardt. But they whisked him away.

KING: Are you a politically involved person?

MANILOW: Not really.

KING: You were scheduled to do it, you were going to do it...

MANILOW: I did it because I think that he is a good guy.

KING: We'll be back with more of Barry Manilow. And do not forget you will be entertained by his voice as well.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)


... Fortsetzung siehe "Larry King Live 2"