May 6, 2024 • 43 mins
They once competed against each other as American Idol finalists, now they lean on each other as brothers from another mother.
While it's been 20 years since Clay Aiken and Ruben Studdard found fame on the reality show, what they really found was family.
In this episode, the sort-of siblings talk about the early days on idol, the behind the scenes shenanigans, and the really raw moments taking place backstage.
Plus, we 'unmask' their most recent project and what's next for both of them.
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:05):
Hi.
Speaker 2 (00:05):
I am Kate Hudson, and my name is Oliver Hudson.
We wanted to do something that highlighted our relationship and
what it's like to be siblings. We are a sibling revelry. No, no, sibling,
you don't do that with your mouth. Revelry. That's good. Hello,
(00:39):
and welcome back to sibling revelry. And I say welcome
back because I'm alone again, and so I'm welcome you,
welcoming you back to sib revelry because the Ling is working.
You understee what I'm saying. I'm the sib and Kate
(00:59):
is the ling. The Ling is working. She's she's she's
doing a gig at Netflix. And I'm here to just
make this shit hot. I'm here to, you know, throw
coal into the into the fire so this train just
keeps moving. Would I like to be doing a Netflix
show with incredible actors and laughing and playing and making
(01:21):
a ton of money every day? No, I wouldn't. I'd
rather be here speaking to you everyone who's listening right now.
And you know what, there's a good chance that our
audience doubles right now. There's a good chance I have
a feeling and I don't mind going solo. You know why,
(01:45):
because I get to just speak what comes into my mind,
and if anyone could crawl into my head, it would
be a funny, a scared, an anxious, a dangerous place
because this brain just does not stop. We have some
(02:06):
fun guests on today. I do Klay, Ake and Ruben started. Now,
this is American Idol and its infancy. This is when
I was obsessed with American Idol. We have two unlikely
best friends. They're brothers from another mother, and that's how
we're tying this whole thing into the sibling aspect. They
(02:28):
are going to be on the mass singer. They have
got all kinds of shit going on, and I'm just
excited to hear about their friendship, how it all started,
what American Idol meant to them, and then also the
pitfalls of it. I hope that they are okay with
my line of questioning, because again, I don't have Kate
to sort of keep me on the rails. I'm going
(02:50):
to go off the rails. Enough about me, Let's get
to Ruben and Clay bring him in. Let's see. Let's
see how they react to the solo Hudson ex Press. Hello, Hello,
where's our Ruben. I'm here so I know my sister
was supposed to be here. There might be some disappointment,
(03:11):
you know, from you guys, But I promise that I'm
better looking than my sister. I'm cooler, how much funnier
than she is. She doesn't add what I add. You
know what I mean. She doesn't do what I do.
Speaker 1 (03:24):
Okay, that's just what I say about That's what I
say about Ruben. Every time together, you do you do.
I just want to make that clear. I'm happy to
have you guys on. I mean, I really am. I've
watched you from the beginning, and that's that's no bullshit.
You know, I was a crazy, crazy.
Speaker 2 (03:40):
American Idol fan, and it's really an honor to sort
of have you guys on and talk about your experience
and your friendship and your brotherhood. Honestly. So let's start
with Clay, shall we, you know, and then we'll bring
Reuben in and then we'll converge and meet and smash
in the middle. You know what I'm saying.
Speaker 3 (04:03):
You have to you have to give.
Speaker 4 (04:05):
You have to say, Dard, this.
Speaker 2 (04:11):
Is your this is your issue. You're taking everything as
a sexual innuendo. Now you are you are, so you know,
just get that, get get that out of your head.
You know, he makes.
Speaker 5 (04:26):
Himself very easy to pick on, but he's he's a
good guy. He makes it easy for men.
Speaker 2 (04:32):
Mean smash can mean many things.
Speaker 4 (04:35):
All right, I don't make myself he's the pick mothers
just like.
Speaker 3 (04:42):
That's fine. I'll be.
Speaker 5 (04:46):
So I usually lay off after a while.
Speaker 2 (04:50):
So, uh yeah, Clay, just just give us your sort
of you know, your moment, your rise, your you know,
from childhood sort of up. You don't gotta we don't
got to get in of the entire into the weeds,
but just your story a little bit.
Speaker 5 (05:04):
We both we both wrote Ruben and I grew up
in southern homes. We grew up in church. We grew
up and we had very similar upbringings. And uh, and
I mean the rise, I think it's it's kind of
crazy to think, Ruben, it's been twenty years and people,
you know, it's it's been so long that now we
are part of the Idol history, right. But you know,
I think for everyone they recognize us both from American
(05:28):
Idol twenty one years ago now since we did the show.
And uh, and I don't know if it's because our
season was so new. It was because it was so
new for everyone. They didn't have the same sort We
didn't have the stakes going into it that that I
think other people in later seasons had. We didn't realize
how big it was going to be and how big
(05:48):
it would become. But for that reason, we all kind
of went into it thinking it'd be a great summer
camp experience, and and we didn't go in with this
competitive edge against each other. And so Ruben I just
became really good friends, in large part because of our
kind of shared similarities loving music and our backgrounds in
(06:09):
our home states that we both loved and we stayed
friends since. And so, you know, at least for me,
Ruben's been performing himself solo for the past twenty one years.
For me, I stepped away for a long time and
the only way I was willing to come back was
to perform alongside him. Oh really, we've spent we've spent
the last he's finally been free of me for how
(06:31):
many months two months now, But prior to.
Speaker 2 (06:34):
Dude, Ruben, that's a lot of that's a lot of pressure.
Clay's like, I have the voice of an angel, but
I've sort of put it on the shelf, and the
only way that I'm coming back is if you do
it with me. You know, well't no, don't go there again, bro, I.
Speaker 5 (06:49):
Had to say, I could only sting with someone who
was as good, That's why.
Speaker 2 (06:56):
And when did you guys sort of meet on Idol? How?
How soon in the process?
Speaker 3 (07:04):
Pretty pretty pretty early on?
Speaker 4 (07:07):
Like, I mean we were well, we we hadn't made
the top twenty years.
Speaker 5 (07:12):
I don't know we had made the top anything. Yeah,
we were in that hotel and Ruben so I was
surrounded by I was surrounded by ladies. Uh for different
reasons than Ruben likes to be surrounded by ladies. But
he saw he saw me with a group of girls,
and he was and he thought I had game, so
he was gonna come over and flirt with him.
Speaker 2 (07:32):
Also, you thought he had game? Is that where you were?
Speaker 3 (07:37):
I really did? I didn't like, I mean we because
you don't. We don't.
Speaker 4 (07:40):
None of us really knew one another, so you know,
you're only getting to see the way people interact with
one another from afar.
Speaker 3 (07:47):
And for some reason, this particular.
Speaker 4 (07:50):
Guy had like a room full of women talking to him.
I was like, oh, let me go see what this crag?
What's going on over here?
Speaker 2 (08:01):
That is funny? That is funny, And then boom, you
guys met And that was that.
Speaker 4 (08:07):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (08:08):
And to be and to be.
Speaker 4 (08:11):
Clear, like I think everybody that was on our our season,
that was on the season proper, we all for some
reason like had a relationship with each other before the
before they chose us. Like it was a weird kind
of like gluing together of the people that made the
top ten on our season, Like we we had each
(08:34):
other because they gave us cell phones we made and
we and everybody that was on the top ten I
had their number before we were in the house together,
and it was it's just with it.
Speaker 3 (08:45):
I think I might even had Josh's number, Clay.
Speaker 5 (08:49):
I think we all. I mean it was really it was.
It's really interesting to kind of we both gone back
to the show in recent years and to see the
dynamic between the contestants now that they don't get along.
They do, but there's just not there's not this sense
of camaraderie. I mean, it's a machine, right, It's this
huge machine now and it runs smoothly like a machine.
(09:10):
But for that reason, the contestants. They don't have the
family atmosphere that we did. I mean, we actually ate
dinner together, we lived in a house together, we did
everything together, and that has not happened in decades.
Speaker 2 (09:23):
At this point, I think you're probably there's probably you know,
more of a societal technological sort of just you know,
evolutionary shift in our culture that probably brings that on
as well, you know what I mean, Like when you're
thinking about twenty years ago, you know that's a long
time ago. I mean, things were much different than they
(09:45):
are now.
Speaker 6 (09:46):
Right, we didn't have cell phones to occupy our time, right,
there was no And not only that, but I think
you know, it's just even as far as brain capacity goes,
you know, we're more thinking and inclined to be a
part of a community.
Speaker 2 (09:59):
That's how we get our dopamine, by actual human interconnections,
you know, rather than worrying about TikTok or how I
look or my appearance or you know, all of these
things that come into play. You know, to sort of
be a cog in that machine, a successful cog in
that machine, you kind of lose yourself in that rather
(10:20):
than sort of sitting down across from someone at the
dinner table, you know, just generally.
Speaker 4 (10:26):
And I think I think it was really genius too,
in the way that they made those our responses to
people leaving the show. It wasn't like a put on,
like we were really jacked up when somebody would leave,
simply because they made us have dinner together. It wasn't like, oh,
(10:49):
today is at Tuesday. You guys can like either go
have sit here or go to the Beverly Center. No,
at seven o'clock, everybody was made to be at the
table having dinner, having conversation with I mean like we
could not we had and we also had to have
our sail phones.
Speaker 3 (11:08):
That was a rule.
Speaker 4 (11:09):
We couldn't have sail phones at the dinner table like
they were. They called us kids everywhere we went. Come on, kids,
Come on, guys, like I'm freaking twenty four years old,
Like stop calling me that, you.
Speaker 5 (11:22):
Know what I mean.
Speaker 4 (11:24):
What they were doing was programming us to, uh act
like family. So when they got us on camera, all
those responses the people leaving were real. And that's why
I think that was the genius part of the production.
Speaker 2 (11:41):
So you think that there was actually psychology behind that,
there was science.
Speaker 4 (11:45):
Yeah, I think that's just and that's me and my
conspiracy theory I think.
Speaker 5 (11:53):
But I mean, they don't they could get that done now,
and I don't think they, you know, they don't necessarily
have it anymore. I think that part of it was
that they did not want They didn't know what they
I mean, honestly, they didn't know what they were doing
when we were on the show reader they were still
figuring it out. The show had become enough of a
hit season one that they got renewed, and season two
it did not. It became a huge hit episode one,
(12:16):
you know, all of a sudden, they were dealing with
twenty million viewers. They hadn't had that the season before,
and they were figuring it out. Actually, after our season
was over, they came up with a whole bunch of
rules about whether or not producers and staff and production
team could be could fraternize and be friends with the contestants,
and they cut all that out. We're still Ruben and
(12:37):
I are still good friends with the showrunner now who
and other producers who are still there twenty years later.
We're still good friends with them. They never had those
same types of relationships with later seasons because they kind
of became a number one production after we left. They
didn't know how to do it, so there were different
rules when we were on the show.
Speaker 2 (12:58):
I'm thicker, thankful, Yeah, what was that? What was that house?
Speaker 5 (13:01):
Like?
Speaker 3 (13:01):
You know what I mean?
Speaker 2 (13:02):
Like were you living all living in the same house?
Like what's the behind the scenes ship?
Speaker 1 (13:06):
Like?
Speaker 2 (13:06):
What were you guys doing?
Speaker 4 (13:09):
You know when we were rehearsing, there wasn't There wasn't
a lot of time when we weren't rehearsing like they
were always because we were we were recording things for
different people that were a part of the show. So
when we weren't doing American Idol stuff, we were doing
old Navy stuff. We weren't doing old Navy stuff. We
were doing Coca Cola stuff, and we weren't doing coc
(13:31):
Cola stuff. And for the most part, all the time
Ford Ford Ford stuff all the time, So we were
uh and and the girls had to do Herbal Essence
commercials like we were always.
Speaker 5 (13:44):
I'm going I'll give you the dirt. Ruben's nicer than me.
I'll tell you. I dated one of the people on
the show who worked on the behind the scenes. My
very first boyfriend ever was someone who worked on the show.
I won't tell you more than that, but but yeah,
we there were there were some relationships. You didn't get
any wited relationships on the show. I know I did.
Speaker 3 (14:05):
I was not the only one who did.
Speaker 5 (14:09):
At all, So there there were there were a few
things behind the scenes. Nothing seleacious or dirty, anything wrong.
Speaker 2 (14:15):
But this was your first, your first boyfriend.
Speaker 5 (14:18):
Yeah, I was.
Speaker 3 (14:21):
Wow.
Speaker 2 (14:21):
And how long had you had come out?
Speaker 3 (14:25):
I had not.
Speaker 5 (14:25):
I came out to him, No, yes, on the show. Uh, Reuben,
I didn't come out to you to win right, not
too long after that.
Speaker 3 (14:35):
It was it was a while after that.
Speaker 5 (14:36):
It was like tour on tour afterwards. Yeah, I didn't
come out to anybody and teleb we were on the show,
so uh till I didn't come out to myself till
I was on the show. So for for me, I
can't speak for Reuben or anybody else. For me, leaving
North Carolina going to Los Angeles alone for the first time,
to Ruben, you lived alone before before we did Idle,
(14:59):
you were working. I was. I had not moved out yet.
So for me, it was this very it was a
very eye opening experience in general, and I'm not saying
that in some sort of I'm very boring, but but yeah,
it was. It was the It was the first time
I had been around people who enjoyed the same things
that I did. Liked music. That's where where the school
(15:21):
I went to, the place I grew up. People knew
I would like to sing, but I didn't have a
group of friends who were like that. So it was
a very eye opening experience for me in that way.
Speaker 2 (15:42):
Would you say that moving there and being a part
of Idol and sort of finally finding your tribe so
to speak, allowed you to sort of feel more comfortable
with who you are your sexuality to then come out.
Speaker 5 (15:57):
It certainly didn't hurt. I mean I still didn't come
out till after the everyone until after the show, but
you know, getting out there and recognizing that there are
people who enjoy the same thing you do, and we
were all supportive of each other. I mean, that's the
other thing Ruben was talking about too. I mean, I
think in later years after our season, people realized this
(16:18):
show was a hit. There were forty million people who
watched our finale, and so everyone who auditioned the next season.
Fantasia auditioned, and her season They all knew what they
were getting into. They knew Holy crap, Ruben and Clay
just had forty million viewers. Everyone's watching this show. We're
on the cover of every magazine. They went into it
(16:38):
knowing I want to win, I'm going to compete. We
all went into it having no idea it was going
to be big, and so we're really supportive of each other.
He's right. When people left, we we were. I mean,
I was happy that I didn't go home, but I
didn't want to see anybody else go home. There was
just never this competitive nature at all.
Speaker 2 (16:55):
Oh really none?
Speaker 5 (16:57):
Did you feel You didn't feel competitive at all? Did you?
I mean you just with yourself.
Speaker 4 (17:01):
I mean, I only was trying to be the best version.
I really came into the show trying to learn the
business of music. And it's because you know, I've been
singing and trying to be a professional for so long,
Like American Idol was my first real shot. Like I've had,
(17:22):
you know, had several record contracts given to me before Idol,
like several opportunities that just always fell flat. It's and
I always used to say, well that's what you get
in Alabama, you know what I mean? Or that's what
I'm gonna get around here, and I was like I
needed an opportunity to see, like what the real business was.
And so for me, I was always just trying to
(17:44):
pay attention to what was going on, Like I was
very focused on what all the people, the musicians behind
the scenes were doing with us, like this is why
I created the American Idol with like being the reason
why I'm so great in the studio. Not to like
toot my own harm, but like we like I really
learned how to be a professional recording artist on that show,
(18:09):
and for me, it was it was an invaluable experience,
Like if I wouldn't have won the amount of experiences
that you cannot pay for, like to say that I
was in the studio recording a song.
Speaker 3 (18:23):
With Bert Backrack, Ye is you can't pay for that,
like they.
Speaker 4 (18:28):
There's no amount of money that you could offer somebody
to say if you could have a day in the
studio with Burt Backrack, who you know has made a
million stars, Like how much would you pay for that?
Speaker 3 (18:42):
We didn't have to pay anything. All we had to
pay was our time and effort.
Speaker 2 (18:45):
Yeah, and then.
Speaker 5 (18:46):
Beyond the show too, Ruber I mean, it wasn't just
we worked with Bird on the show, right, but then
after the show, as as as complicated as it may be,
we both had albums made by Clide Davis, you know,
and write they are towards the end of the end
of his the peak of his career. He's still obviously working.
But yeah, I mean we we just did a tour together,
(19:07):
like I said last year, and we would talk about
the experience with working with Clive every night on the stage,
and every night we'd both kind of just think, Wow,
how many people our age can say that they got
to make an album with Clive Davis. I mean they're
they're three me Ruben Seller crazy and and that's and
that's kind of that's something that no one else around
(19:32):
us is able to do.
Speaker 2 (19:33):
So, I mean I forgot, did you guys have mentors
on that show? You know how like later on in
the seasons they had like the mentors each week, And
did you guys have that? I don't remember we did?
And was everyone in that season pretty big time?
Speaker 3 (19:47):
Wait for us?
Speaker 4 (19:49):
For us?
Speaker 5 (19:50):
Everybody was big time everybody.
Speaker 2 (19:51):
Well, what I'm getting at is like, because I you know,
you watch these shows, you watch Idol, you watch other
you know, where they bring in someone to men tour
and and you're looking at at the contestants and wondering,
but does that person they know who that is? And
they're like, we didn't have in their interview. They're like,
I'm so, I cannot believe so and so is here.
And you're like, dude, this is no clue that.
Speaker 5 (20:14):
We knew because we didn't just get mentors. I'd argue
we got legends we didn't get we didn't even get
current pop stars Gladys Knight, O Living Neon, John Lionel Ritchie.
I mean they were they were.
Speaker 2 (20:26):
Huge, huge legends. Everyone was cool. No one was a
dead god ya, nobody but me?
Speaker 4 (20:36):
You were?
Speaker 2 (20:37):
Were you the diva Clay? Were you the this whole?
Speaker 5 (20:40):
But not not not on the show. Maybe afterwards, not once.
Speaker 2 (20:45):
You tasted a little fame. You're like, all right, now
we got.
Speaker 5 (20:48):
But we got to work. We not We went in
the studio, recorded a single with Burt Bachara paul Anka
was on our season.
Speaker 2 (20:56):
I mean there was no one who didn't know crazy
I was.
Speaker 4 (21:00):
I think I think I was like I passed out
more on the month those are because everybody was like
that was the one that everybody was like, well who
is I was like, man, y'all reread the back of
these records, that should all be singing like because you know,
all of us are huge mot everybody that was on
our show was a huge of course a huge Motown man,
and like to not know that this guy is the
(21:20):
guy that like created the Motown sound because you know,
Smoky and Barry were the face, but this guy was
the one that was really you know, putting that work in,
you know, and so we had the opportunity to sing
his songs in front of him. Was just like, you know,
you can't you can't buy those you know, those moments.
Speaker 2 (21:41):
Yeah, amazing. So when going back just to your friendship
and how that kind of blossomed throughout this experience, you know,
and when you were homies with Clay and then Clay
comes up to you and that moment that he tells
you that he is gay?
Speaker 1 (21:58):
Right?
Speaker 3 (21:58):
Did that?
Speaker 2 (21:59):
How did that works? Were you nervous even doing that?
Speaker 3 (22:02):
Clay?
Speaker 2 (22:03):
You know, no, I don't think I was play out
And Ruben, were you just say all right, cool whatever?
Speaker 4 (22:10):
Yeah, gosh, I mean yet that's actually pretty much what
I said.
Speaker 5 (22:16):
I think God listen, I probably built it up to
be far bigger than it was, and he looked he.
If I remember correctly, he and my actual brother both
responded the same way. If I'm not mistaken. I don't
want to put a quote into your mouth, Ruben, but
I may be quoting you wrong. But if I remember correctly,
it was something along the lines of I'm straight enough
(22:36):
for both of us. So it was either you or
bred who said that. I can't remember, but I mean,
you know. I think what makes has has made continues
to make our friendship strong is not only all the
stuff we have in common, but the fact that we
because we are all so different. I mean, we do
have a lot of interest in common, we have a
(22:58):
lot of background in common, but we also are different
enough that we both don't have unreasonable expectations for each other.
I don't expect Ruben to like all the stuff that
I like. He doesn't expect me to know all the
stuff that he knows. I mean, he'll he'll teach me
about sports because I'm dumb about him, and you know,
(23:20):
if he's looking to see what Broadway show to go to,
he'll ask me for recommendations. But we don't necessarily expect
the other to agree with us on anything. Even still,
and I think that there is a there's a great
benefit and a strength to not having unreasonable expectations for
(23:40):
the people who you are friends with or family with,
because it tends to be when you know, if I
expected Ruben to agree with me, or to want to
do our show a certain way, or to have the
same opinion of me, then when he didn't, I'd be disappointed.
But because we are different enough, we know, okay, he
(24:01):
knows that I'm probably going to come out at something
a different way than he does, and it doesn't upset
him when I do. He just goes, well, that's playing.
Speaker 2 (24:10):
So where do you guys, where would you say your
deep connection stems from? And then you know, the flip
side of that question is where do you guys sort
of butt heads? And has it gotten to a point,
especially when you're working together, you know what I mean,
Like when you're in close proximity like that, it can
go two ways. You know, it can be bang bang
or you can be all love or what I.
Speaker 3 (24:31):
Think our deep connection stems.
Speaker 4 (24:34):
Just like for me with any of my friends, there
are shared experiences like you know, like my best friend
and from childhood is our shared experience is church, so
that is you know, we like we uh everything our
friendship is based on happen in my home church. For
(24:54):
our deep connection is the experience that we nobody in
the world other than the other maybe twenty people that
have gone through the experience that we have and made
it to the end of that show together like the
way that we did.
Speaker 3 (25:11):
But I'm just like with my own brother got rest
in peace.
Speaker 4 (25:16):
He and I bumped hands on all kinds of stuff
and he's still my brother like that, Like us, having
differences of opinion doesn't change.
Speaker 3 (25:25):
The familiar feeling that we have for one another.
Speaker 4 (25:28):
Like I'm you know, I'm sure you and your siblings
have blowouts all the time and we will still go
to bat for them regardless.
Speaker 3 (25:37):
Like that's just you know, like and and.
Speaker 5 (25:42):
I am.
Speaker 4 (25:42):
And this is one thing that I will say that
Clay and I are different in like I am a
I am a musician's artist.
Speaker 3 (25:51):
Clay is a production artist.
Speaker 4 (25:54):
Right, so most of the things that I care about
happen on the level of musician, and the things that
Clay cares about happen on the production level of show.
So whenever we are bumping heads about a show is
usually always how to deal with music or music or
(26:15):
how to deal with production or something of that.
Speaker 2 (26:18):
Next, right, so you on, you wan like a beautiful
stand up based solo, and then Clay wants pyrotechnics, it
would be something along.
Speaker 5 (26:27):
Those lines, or or for example the last tour, you know,
just budgeting. I'm very nitpicky on those types of things,
and Ruben is very extra generous, and I'm like n
sot me. We have had some arguments that have been
heated over those types of things usually, but again I
(26:47):
go back to the fact that because Ruben's expertise is
in music, if it's musical, nine times out of ten,
I will eventually just say, you know what, that's his department.
And nine times out of ten he'll look at me
and say, well, you know what Clay handles, you know,
will handle the budget stuff or whatever that is the technically,
you know, the logistical stuff, and we'll eventually just agree
(27:10):
to disagree at some point, you know. I mean, it
comes to down to it comes down to the fact
that you can I mean, you can't make old friends. Right.
We're getting to an age now where we are seeing
some people who we care about pass away. We are
we're watching as family and friends who we've had for
(27:32):
years moved to another place or or whatnot, and it
just it becomes so much more important, I think, to
all of us as humans. I mean, I think we
all have sort of a homing device in us. At
some point, we want to get to an age where
all of a sudden, we care about going to our
high school reunions which we never cared about going to before.
We care about finding out talking catching up with that
(27:52):
person from church when we were a kid who we
haven't spoken to in thirty years. And I think for
Reuben and I it's just and not just a but
so many other people. I think when you get to
a place, you realize they're only, like you said, so
many folks who remember what it was like twenty one
years ago to experience what we experienced, to go through
those things. And I have neither one of us have
(28:15):
any interest in losing the ability to reminisce about those things. Right,
So we'll call each other up sometimes because we have
it and I just remembered such and such, or I
just talked to so and so from twenty years ago,
can you believe this? And after a while, there are
few people in your life who you can go for
I mean, Reuben and I haven't gone for that long
(28:36):
a time without speaking to each other. But there are
people who you can go for weeks without talking to,
but when you pick up the phone it's like you
hadn't been away out.
Speaker 2 (28:46):
Those are like all my friends.
Speaker 5 (28:48):
We are at that point. You know.
Speaker 2 (28:58):
What about vulnerability? You know what I mean? Like, are
you guys able to like be very vulnerable with each
other and emotional and talk about those kinds of like
deeper feelings or issues that are going on in your
lives or your wives or your husbands or whatever it is.
You know what I mean, because you know I deal
with that. Just to preface that question. As a male,
(29:21):
vulnerability has always been difficult for me, especially with females,
Interestingly with my mother, with my sister, with my wife,
It's been difficult for me to just talk about how
much I love them and how I feel about them.
If I had to say, hey, you know, I just
want to tell you how much you mean to me
(29:42):
and how grateful I am for you and all of
these things, I feel like I want to go away
hide under a rock. Now that goes into my own psychology,
you know, which if we had another podcast episode I
could get into. But you know, learning to be vulnerable
and opening up was dea only something difficult, you know
for me as a man.
Speaker 4 (30:04):
I don't think I've ever had an issue with telling
the people that I care about how much I care
about them. And I say this because I was around
very masculine men that were cool with being that way.
Speaker 3 (30:19):
My grandfather.
Speaker 4 (30:22):
When he loved you, he loved you like I mean
like and I mean he wanted to hug you, you know,
shake your hand like. My grandfather was, you know, that way,
and subsequently it made all of his sons that way.
Speaker 3 (30:35):
So like my uncles will.
Speaker 4 (30:41):
They will beat your tail period. But if the love you,
you will know it, you know what I mean, Like,
if my uncles would love you like, you're going to know.
And I feel like all of us boys that have
grown up around that have have benefited from being able
to tell our friends and family members, everybody that is
(31:05):
close to us how much because you know, like I
remember a moment before my brother passed away, he.
Speaker 3 (31:12):
Said, you know it's it. Uh.
Speaker 4 (31:14):
It was always refreshing to to know, like always know
how we felt about one another, you know what I mean.
And the great thing about having a sibling like him
is because you know, I'm my mama's baby, and so
I always had everything I wanted, never really forced to share.
And my brother was like, oh, no, like you gonna
(31:36):
you're going to share with me. You're going to like,
I'm going to make you do the thing. And he
and I told him this before. I said, you made
me better like he made me in every aspect because
even like in football, having him as my older brother
made me more competitive because I was always trying to
(31:57):
beat him, so nobody around me like like that was playing.
I never felt like I would lose to them because
I was always not competing with them.
Speaker 3 (32:08):
I was really trying to beat my brother.
Speaker 4 (32:11):
Honestly, what made me want to beat Clay even more
is what my brother said, ain't no way.
Speaker 3 (32:18):
You beating that white boy. That's exactly what my brother said.
Speaker 5 (32:24):
He thought he Kevin was definitely my biggest fan. I
appreciate it.
Speaker 2 (32:29):
Oh my god, that's so funny.
Speaker 4 (32:33):
And it was like and I could and now that
I look back on it, maybe that was like my
brother like little brother psyching me out.
Speaker 3 (32:40):
M h.
Speaker 2 (32:41):
He knows like he knows your competitives. You have a competitors.
How you're a baller, right, you've played football?
Speaker 3 (32:46):
Yeah, anything he ever told me, I wasn't gonna do.
Speaker 2 (32:49):
I ended up doing when you lost. Was it even
a thing?
Speaker 3 (32:53):
You know a little bit.
Speaker 5 (32:55):
I had seen the card before we walked out on stage,
so I knew you did. Yeah. Ryan had turned around
and I had seen the name. Was I mean, Ruben stuttered.
It's a lot longer than Clay.
Speaker 3 (33:07):
I can.
Speaker 5 (33:08):
But if you go back and look, I'm actually staring
at Ruben so intently in that moment. But I know
he was like, what the hell is wrong with you?
Because I wanted to see his reaction. I knew that
he had won, and I wanted to see it.
Speaker 3 (33:19):
And so no, no, no, you said it's you and
I said shut up.
Speaker 5 (33:25):
Oh I did tell you. Yeah, I ruined.
Speaker 3 (33:29):
And I said shut up.
Speaker 5 (33:30):
I ruined these.
Speaker 2 (33:35):
He couldn't hold it in anything you don't want no, no, no, Well,
let me get into the masked singer and then I'm
gonna let you guys go. But before we get into that,
I just want to get into that. How the living
situation more like, were you guys and where were you living?
Was it close quarters? Was it you know house? He
did a big house and so and everyone got along.
Speaker 5 (33:59):
Yeah, I mean did you just as as siblings would.
I mean we simply bickered. I mean once in a while,
but no, everyone not only didn't. I wouldn't say they
were clicks.
Speaker 1 (34:09):
No.
Speaker 5 (34:10):
There was a hallway of dressing rooms that had three
dressing rooms on it, and they tended to just we
tended to kind of group together. Reuben and Ricky and
Charlie would hang out in the and would hang out
in the front when some of the girls would hang
out in the middle, and me and kim Lock would
sit in the back and we'd all watch Young and
the Restless being taped on the others on the other set.
(34:32):
But they were never they were there. Really weren't any
clicks at all. I mean we we all kind of
shelled together. Obviously. There were some people Ruben and I
stayed in touch completely. Kim Berley Locke and I where roommates,
became roommates after the show was over, and there were
some people who probably had a stronger bond, But there
was no one who didn't get along or and I
(34:54):
would tell you because I ain't got trouble spilling spilling tea.
But so nobody didn't get along. We got along and
and and we really were I think it was just
like drinking from a fire.
Speaker 2 (35:05):
Hose, right, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 5 (35:07):
We didn't have tom to get into fights with each other.
Speaker 2 (35:09):
Look, you can't. It's hard to seeing what Idle has
given you, guys, you know what I mean, just as
far as experience, as far as situations to work with
some of the greatest legends of all time, you know,
advancing your careers, bringing your friendships close. You know, you
can't really knock Idle for anything. But I mean, was
(35:31):
there any dark side to it in the sense of like, man,
they're they're running us ragged, or like this, you know
this is too much? Or you know, was there anything
like that? We didn't know to know that it was
too much, Right, You're like this, I guess this is
just how it's done.
Speaker 3 (35:50):
Yeah, Like we didn't. We didn't know, Like we just
thought it was par for the course.
Speaker 4 (35:55):
Honestly, like having other experiences on other shows, I was like,
oh man, they chilling over here, right, I did?
Speaker 1 (36:01):
We did?
Speaker 7 (36:02):
We now look at people complain about things and I'm like, wait,
we didn't even have an union then.
Speaker 2 (36:06):
Right, Okay, so this I've had friends who've been on it.
It looks fun as hell. I've actually asked. I've been
asked to do it and I said yes, But then
I was doing a show. I was doing a series,
and they couldn't clear COVID protocols at the time. But
I was very excited because if you guys don't know,
I have an incredible.
Speaker 5 (36:26):
Voice, we can tell.
Speaker 2 (36:28):
Yeah it's you know, I could I could like let
me just let me, let me, let me break something
out like ooh yeah, oh baby, paper baby. Yeah, Okay, ready.
Speaker 5 (36:42):
He does have a voice.
Speaker 2 (36:43):
Lately, I've had the strangest feeling.
Speaker 5 (36:49):
Having a strange feeling right now.
Speaker 2 (36:52):
When I asked you all the thoughts you're keeping, you.
Speaker 4 (36:55):
Probably would you probably would win math Finger because they
have no idea.
Speaker 2 (37:00):
Yeah, I wouldn't be able to guess, right, no, exactly.
So you know, it's an instrument that I just keep
quiet because honestly, no one wants to hear it. But listen,
masked singer.
Speaker 3 (37:09):
What was that like?
Speaker 2 (37:11):
You guys get to do your ship together, which is
I'm probably super fun, and then more importantly putting on
those outfits, like, holy shit.
Speaker 5 (37:22):
It was cool.
Speaker 4 (37:24):
I will say that it was cool other than you know,
somebody I know, getting on everybody's nerves.
Speaker 5 (37:35):
How in the world did I get on anybody's nerves?
Speaker 3 (37:39):
I mean, we're getting cut, that they are were.
Speaker 5 (37:46):
That's because I have experience getting cut and you don't.
If you had experience getting cut, you would have known it,
you would have sensed.
Speaker 4 (37:53):
It like me.
Speaker 2 (37:54):
But I'm were you were you being the negative Nelly
where you're like, oh, we're done, we're never going we're
not getting well.
Speaker 5 (37:59):
It wasn't negative. I knew exactly when we were going home.
I could tell. I just smelled it on that end,
and it was that day. I know, I drove him
up the wall. But I was just trying to prepare
you because I was an expert. I knew I did
you know. I just I could just I could smell.
I could feel it in the air. There's something you know,
like when it's about the rain and your ankle starts hurting.
I could feel it.
Speaker 3 (38:18):
It was like that.
Speaker 7 (38:20):
Although I will say we both were probably tired of
those costumes, it was it was It's a very weird experience, right,
And like I mean every other TV activity, anytime anything
else you film, there's a community, right, But with this
you have your You have one producer that is yours,
You have a vocal.
Speaker 5 (38:39):
Coach type you know, helper to that is yours, and
you have dressers that are yours. And you don't see
nor do anyone else see you the entire time you're there. You,
I mean, it is, it is sort of I'm I'm
so happy that we did it together because otherwise it'd
be very lonely. I would imagine anyone else at all.
Speaker 2 (39:01):
I have a friend was completely Yeah, I have a
friend who did it. I guess. The dressing rooms was
there's a curtains and shit right like where you can
kind of hear. And this person made it and the
other person kind of didn't. Who's a singer, an actual singer.
And she went off like crazy about my my friend
(39:21):
making it and she and he can hear the whole thing.
You know, it's very very very well.
Speaker 5 (39:28):
They've changed those rules now now now those stress rooms
are stared up apart. You don't even get to hear
or see anybody. Oh really, yeah, who's around you?
Speaker 3 (39:34):
Yeah?
Speaker 5 (39:34):
We couldn't hear anything at all.
Speaker 4 (39:36):
Oh good, Okay, I still don't know, but I could
kind of feel that though, because, like you, I got
a little tight when I.
Speaker 3 (39:45):
Heard like some of the singing.
Speaker 2 (39:46):
I was like, oh, we got cut. Yeah, well so
so I'm.
Speaker 5 (39:50):
Going to tell you. I mean, since this is airing aftwards,
I know exactly. I know why we got cut. I
knew why. I could see it coming. We were beats, right,
we were the beats. We had these huge beats over us.
And these costumes were cumbersome, to say the very least.
They were. They were not the easiest things to get
around in. And and we had done We've done very
(40:12):
well as vocalists. I would argue Reuben that we might
have been the better singers of everyone. However, that last
that last showdown at the end was so much about performance,
and we couldn't see where we were going. We had
no I couldn't. We couldn't see our feet. And even
if we could see our feet, you can't dance when
(40:34):
your entire body is a beat, just orbs. There was nothing.
We could move our hands a little bit and nothing more.
The other the other person who who made it past
us in that round, you know, had this pop and
lock thing going on, I would have voted for him too,
because they were you know, we just got we got
screwed into our into our big old beat.
Speaker 2 (40:54):
Well because its voices, right, it's not all about voices.
It's about the whole performance. And you're right, see here here,
here's the thing. If I was choreographing you, I'd play
into that, meaning I wouldn't try it. I'd be bumping
into each other on purpose. You know, we get that
even on accident. Yeah, that's what I'm saying.
Speaker 3 (41:11):
Like the cost and we need.
Speaker 5 (41:13):
To put him in a beat and see how much
he could choreograph. You couldn't move around this feat. Then
you couldn't move at all.
Speaker 2 (41:20):
And that's what I'm saying.
Speaker 5 (41:21):
Our eyeballs, the eye holes for the beats were down
at our stomachs, so we couldn't see out. It was.
It was. It was a brilliant experience and I don't
don't think either one of us would complain. It was
fun to do.
Speaker 2 (41:33):
But uh, but well the other thing. The other thing too,
though is you know you get paid as you move on, right,
so so there's a monetary you know, reason why you
want to keep going. And that's where the competitive nature
comes in as well, you know where it's like, well
fuck man, if I if we move on, we get
we get a little more cash.
Speaker 5 (41:51):
Well, fortunately for Reuben and I, we left that show
the night we got cut, and we flew directly to
our back to our tour. So we were we went
right back to work. We were all the whole time
we were. It didn't it didn't hurt us too much,
but it would have been been fun. And and poor Ruben,
I've dragged him down because, like I said, I'm I've
lost two shows now three now, but I lost Idle
(42:13):
and I lost came in second on Apprentice also, and
it was just a matter of who's whose luck is
going to rub off on the other? Is my bad
luck going to rub off on Ruben? Or is his
good luck? You guys stronger, I'm sorry.
Speaker 2 (42:27):
You one life, You one life, buddy.
Speaker 3 (42:29):
You know.
Speaker 2 (42:30):
Look, I'm I'm uh look, I'm an actor and approser
I need a job, all right, this this acting world,
in this world after the strikes and everything else. Man,
I'm I'm hustling money. We're gonna get out of here.
I'm gonna let you guys, go I appreciate you, and
you know, keep it rolling. Are you guys done with
your tour?
Speaker 5 (42:49):
By the way, we are, Ruben's promoting an album. Tell
him the album named Ruben?
Speaker 2 (42:53):
Oh yeah, yeah, give me what you got going the
way I remember it, he wrote some life. Oh really,
baby girl. Congratulations, congratulations. All right, guys, I appreciate you.
Thank you so much. Maybe we'll hang out down the road.
Speaker 5 (43:13):
Thank you.
Speaker 3 (43:14):
Okay, Well there we have it.
Speaker 2 (43:17):
Solo interview by Oliver Hudson. Kate, what do you think
about that? Oh my god, I thought it was so funny,
Like Ruben was so great.
Speaker 3 (43:24):
I know, I know.
Speaker 2 (43:25):
Isn't it amazing? How you know, how they became friends
and how you know, Clay came out the room and
he wasn't even know I know. I mean, oh my god,
like in the room and I winter, I wonder what
that must have been like. It's like probably so crazy.
Like anyway, Oliver, that was so fun I know. Good
to see you, Kate, Yeah, good to see you too, Oliver.
(43:46):
Oh my god, I just changed characters in the middle
of my boys
Hi.
Speaker 2 (00:05):
I am Kate Hudson, and my name is Oliver Hudson.
We wanted to do something that highlighted our relationship and
what it's like to be siblings. We are a sibling revelry. No, no, sibling,
you don't do that with your mouth. Revelry. That's good. Hello,
(00:39):
and welcome back to sibling revelry. And I say welcome
back because I'm alone again, and so I'm welcome you,
welcoming you back to sib revelry because the Ling is working.
You understee what I'm saying. I'm the sib and Kate
(00:59):
is the ling. The Ling is working. She's she's she's
doing a gig at Netflix. And I'm here to just
make this shit hot. I'm here to, you know, throw
coal into the into the fire so this train just
keeps moving. Would I like to be doing a Netflix
show with incredible actors and laughing and playing and making
(01:21):
a ton of money every day? No, I wouldn't. I'd
rather be here speaking to you everyone who's listening right now.
And you know what, there's a good chance that our
audience doubles right now. There's a good chance I have
a feeling and I don't mind going solo. You know why,
(01:45):
because I get to just speak what comes into my mind,
and if anyone could crawl into my head, it would
be a funny, a scared, an anxious, a dangerous place
because this brain just does not stop. We have some
(02:06):
fun guests on today. I do Klay, Ake and Ruben started. Now,
this is American Idol and its infancy. This is when
I was obsessed with American Idol. We have two unlikely
best friends. They're brothers from another mother, and that's how
we're tying this whole thing into the sibling aspect. They
(02:28):
are going to be on the mass singer. They have
got all kinds of shit going on, and I'm just
excited to hear about their friendship, how it all started,
what American Idol meant to them, and then also the
pitfalls of it. I hope that they are okay with
my line of questioning, because again, I don't have Kate
to sort of keep me on the rails. I'm going
(02:50):
to go off the rails. Enough about me, Let's get
to Ruben and Clay bring him in. Let's see. Let's
see how they react to the solo Hudson ex Press. Hello, Hello,
where's our Ruben. I'm here so I know my sister
was supposed to be here. There might be some disappointment,
(03:11):
you know, from you guys, But I promise that I'm
better looking than my sister. I'm cooler, how much funnier
than she is. She doesn't add what I add. You
know what I mean. She doesn't do what I do.
Speaker 1 (03:24):
Okay, that's just what I say about That's what I
say about Ruben. Every time together, you do you do.
I just want to make that clear. I'm happy to
have you guys on. I mean, I really am. I've
watched you from the beginning, and that's that's no bullshit.
You know, I was a crazy, crazy.
Speaker 2 (03:40):
American Idol fan, and it's really an honor to sort
of have you guys on and talk about your experience
and your friendship and your brotherhood. Honestly. So let's start
with Clay, shall we, you know, and then we'll bring
Reuben in and then we'll converge and meet and smash
in the middle. You know what I'm saying.
Speaker 3 (04:03):
You have to you have to give.
Speaker 4 (04:05):
You have to say, Dard, this.
Speaker 2 (04:11):
Is your this is your issue. You're taking everything as
a sexual innuendo. Now you are you are, so you know,
just get that, get get that out of your head.
You know, he makes.
Speaker 5 (04:26):
Himself very easy to pick on, but he's he's a
good guy. He makes it easy for men.
Speaker 2 (04:32):
Mean smash can mean many things.
Speaker 4 (04:35):
All right, I don't make myself he's the pick mothers
just like.
Speaker 3 (04:42):
That's fine. I'll be.
Speaker 5 (04:46):
So I usually lay off after a while.
Speaker 2 (04:50):
So, uh yeah, Clay, just just give us your sort
of you know, your moment, your rise, your you know,
from childhood sort of up. You don't gotta we don't
got to get in of the entire into the weeds,
but just your story a little bit.
Speaker 5 (05:04):
We both we both wrote Ruben and I grew up
in southern homes. We grew up in church. We grew
up and we had very similar upbringings. And uh, and
I mean the rise, I think it's it's kind of
crazy to think, Ruben, it's been twenty years and people,
you know, it's it's been so long that now we
are part of the Idol history, right. But you know,
I think for everyone they recognize us both from American
(05:28):
Idol twenty one years ago now since we did the show.
And uh, and I don't know if it's because our
season was so new. It was because it was so
new for everyone. They didn't have the same sort We
didn't have the stakes going into it that that I
think other people in later seasons had. We didn't realize
how big it was going to be and how big
(05:48):
it would become. But for that reason, we all kind
of went into it thinking it'd be a great summer
camp experience, and and we didn't go in with this
competitive edge against each other. And so Ruben I just
became really good friends, in large part because of our
kind of shared similarities loving music and our backgrounds in
(06:09):
our home states that we both loved and we stayed
friends since. And so, you know, at least for me,
Ruben's been performing himself solo for the past twenty one years.
For me, I stepped away for a long time and
the only way I was willing to come back was
to perform alongside him. Oh really, we've spent we've spent
the last he's finally been free of me for how
(06:31):
many months two months now, But prior to.
Speaker 2 (06:34):
Dude, Ruben, that's a lot of that's a lot of pressure.
Clay's like, I have the voice of an angel, but
I've sort of put it on the shelf, and the
only way that I'm coming back is if you do
it with me. You know, well't no, don't go there again, bro, I.
Speaker 5 (06:49):
Had to say, I could only sting with someone who
was as good, That's why.
Speaker 2 (06:56):
And when did you guys sort of meet on Idol? How?
How soon in the process?
Speaker 3 (07:04):
Pretty pretty pretty early on?
Speaker 4 (07:07):
Like, I mean we were well, we we hadn't made
the top twenty years.
Speaker 5 (07:12):
I don't know we had made the top anything. Yeah,
we were in that hotel and Ruben so I was
surrounded by I was surrounded by ladies. Uh for different
reasons than Ruben likes to be surrounded by ladies. But
he saw he saw me with a group of girls,
and he was and he thought I had game, so
he was gonna come over and flirt with him.
Speaker 2 (07:32):
Also, you thought he had game? Is that where you were?
Speaker 3 (07:37):
I really did? I didn't like, I mean we because
you don't. We don't.
Speaker 4 (07:40):
None of us really knew one another, so you know,
you're only getting to see the way people interact with
one another from afar.
Speaker 3 (07:47):
And for some reason, this particular.
Speaker 4 (07:50):
Guy had like a room full of women talking to him.
I was like, oh, let me go see what this crag?
What's going on over here?
Speaker 2 (08:01):
That is funny? That is funny, And then boom, you
guys met And that was that.
Speaker 4 (08:07):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (08:08):
And to be and to be.
Speaker 4 (08:11):
Clear, like I think everybody that was on our our season,
that was on the season proper, we all for some
reason like had a relationship with each other before the
before they chose us. Like it was a weird kind
of like gluing together of the people that made the
top ten on our season, Like we we had each
(08:34):
other because they gave us cell phones we made and
we and everybody that was on the top ten I
had their number before we were in the house together,
and it was it's just with it.
Speaker 3 (08:45):
I think I might even had Josh's number, Clay.
Speaker 5 (08:49):
I think we all. I mean it was really it was.
It's really interesting to kind of we both gone back
to the show in recent years and to see the
dynamic between the contestants now that they don't get along.
They do, but there's just not there's not this sense
of camaraderie. I mean, it's a machine, right, It's this
huge machine now and it runs smoothly like a machine.
(09:10):
But for that reason, the contestants. They don't have the
family atmosphere that we did. I mean, we actually ate
dinner together, we lived in a house together, we did
everything together, and that has not happened in decades.
Speaker 2 (09:23):
At this point, I think you're probably there's probably you know,
more of a societal technological sort of just you know,
evolutionary shift in our culture that probably brings that on
as well, you know what I mean, Like when you're
thinking about twenty years ago, you know that's a long
time ago. I mean, things were much different than they
(09:45):
are now.
Speaker 6 (09:46):
Right, we didn't have cell phones to occupy our time, right,
there was no And not only that, but I think
you know, it's just even as far as brain capacity goes,
you know, we're more thinking and inclined to be a
part of a community.
Speaker 2 (09:59):
That's how we get our dopamine, by actual human interconnections,
you know, rather than worrying about TikTok or how I
look or my appearance or you know, all of these
things that come into play. You know, to sort of
be a cog in that machine, a successful cog in
that machine, you kind of lose yourself in that rather
(10:20):
than sort of sitting down across from someone at the
dinner table, you know, just generally.
Speaker 4 (10:26):
And I think I think it was really genius too,
in the way that they made those our responses to
people leaving the show. It wasn't like a put on,
like we were really jacked up when somebody would leave,
simply because they made us have dinner together. It wasn't like, oh,
(10:49):
today is at Tuesday. You guys can like either go
have sit here or go to the Beverly Center. No,
at seven o'clock, everybody was made to be at the
table having dinner, having conversation with I mean like we
could not we had and we also had to have
our sail phones.
Speaker 3 (11:08):
That was a rule.
Speaker 4 (11:09):
We couldn't have sail phones at the dinner table like
they were. They called us kids everywhere we went. Come on, kids,
Come on, guys, like I'm freaking twenty four years old,
Like stop calling me that, you.
Speaker 5 (11:22):
Know what I mean.
Speaker 4 (11:24):
What they were doing was programming us to, uh act
like family. So when they got us on camera, all
those responses the people leaving were real. And that's why
I think that was the genius part of the production.
Speaker 2 (11:41):
So you think that there was actually psychology behind that,
there was science.
Speaker 4 (11:45):
Yeah, I think that's just and that's me and my
conspiracy theory I think.
Speaker 5 (11:53):
But I mean, they don't they could get that done now,
and I don't think they, you know, they don't necessarily
have it anymore. I think that part of it was
that they did not want They didn't know what they
I mean, honestly, they didn't know what they were doing
when we were on the show reader they were still
figuring it out. The show had become enough of a
hit season one that they got renewed, and season two
it did not. It became a huge hit episode one,
(12:16):
you know, all of a sudden, they were dealing with
twenty million viewers. They hadn't had that the season before,
and they were figuring it out. Actually, after our season
was over, they came up with a whole bunch of
rules about whether or not producers and staff and production
team could be could fraternize and be friends with the contestants,
and they cut all that out. We're still Ruben and
(12:37):
I are still good friends with the showrunner now who
and other producers who are still there twenty years later.
We're still good friends with them. They never had those
same types of relationships with later seasons because they kind
of became a number one production after we left. They
didn't know how to do it, so there were different
rules when we were on the show.
Speaker 2 (12:58):
I'm thicker, thankful, Yeah, what was that? What was that house?
Speaker 5 (13:01):
Like?
Speaker 3 (13:01):
You know what I mean?
Speaker 2 (13:02):
Like were you living all living in the same house?
Like what's the behind the scenes ship?
Speaker 1 (13:06):
Like?
Speaker 2 (13:06):
What were you guys doing?
Speaker 4 (13:09):
You know when we were rehearsing, there wasn't There wasn't
a lot of time when we weren't rehearsing like they
were always because we were we were recording things for
different people that were a part of the show. So
when we weren't doing American Idol stuff, we were doing
old Navy stuff. We weren't doing old Navy stuff. We
were doing Coca Cola stuff, and we weren't doing coc
(13:31):
Cola stuff. And for the most part, all the time
Ford Ford Ford stuff all the time, So we were
uh and and the girls had to do Herbal Essence
commercials like we were always.
Speaker 5 (13:44):
I'm going I'll give you the dirt. Ruben's nicer than me.
I'll tell you. I dated one of the people on
the show who worked on the behind the scenes. My
very first boyfriend ever was someone who worked on the show.
I won't tell you more than that, but but yeah,
we there were there were some relationships. You didn't get
any wited relationships on the show. I know I did.
Speaker 3 (14:05):
I was not the only one who did.
Speaker 5 (14:09):
At all, So there there were there were a few
things behind the scenes. Nothing seleacious or dirty, anything wrong.
Speaker 2 (14:15):
But this was your first, your first boyfriend.
Speaker 5 (14:18):
Yeah, I was.
Speaker 3 (14:21):
Wow.
Speaker 2 (14:21):
And how long had you had come out?
Speaker 3 (14:25):
I had not.
Speaker 5 (14:25):
I came out to him, No, yes, on the show. Uh, Reuben,
I didn't come out to you to win right, not
too long after that.
Speaker 3 (14:35):
It was it was a while after that.
Speaker 5 (14:36):
It was like tour on tour afterwards. Yeah, I didn't
come out to anybody and teleb we were on the show,
so uh till I didn't come out to myself till
I was on the show. So for for me, I
can't speak for Reuben or anybody else. For me, leaving
North Carolina going to Los Angeles alone for the first time,
to Ruben, you lived alone before before we did Idle,
(14:59):
you were working. I was. I had not moved out yet.
So for me, it was this very it was a
very eye opening experience in general, and I'm not saying
that in some sort of I'm very boring, but but yeah,
it was. It was the It was the first time
I had been around people who enjoyed the same things
that I did. Liked music. That's where where the school
(15:21):
I went to, the place I grew up. People knew
I would like to sing, but I didn't have a
group of friends who were like that. So it was
a very eye opening experience for me in that way.
Speaker 2 (15:42):
Would you say that moving there and being a part
of Idol and sort of finally finding your tribe so
to speak, allowed you to sort of feel more comfortable
with who you are your sexuality to then come out.
Speaker 5 (15:57):
It certainly didn't hurt. I mean I still didn't come
out till after the everyone until after the show, but
you know, getting out there and recognizing that there are
people who enjoy the same thing you do, and we
were all supportive of each other. I mean, that's the
other thing Ruben was talking about too. I mean, I
think in later years after our season, people realized this
(16:18):
show was a hit. There were forty million people who
watched our finale, and so everyone who auditioned the next season.
Fantasia auditioned, and her season They all knew what they
were getting into. They knew Holy crap, Ruben and Clay
just had forty million viewers. Everyone's watching this show. We're
on the cover of every magazine. They went into it
(16:38):
knowing I want to win, I'm going to compete. We
all went into it having no idea it was going
to be big, and so we're really supportive of each other.
He's right. When people left, we we were. I mean,
I was happy that I didn't go home, but I
didn't want to see anybody else go home. There was
just never this competitive nature at all.
Speaker 2 (16:55):
Oh really none?
Speaker 5 (16:57):
Did you feel You didn't feel competitive at all? Did you?
I mean you just with yourself.
Speaker 4 (17:01):
I mean, I only was trying to be the best version.
I really came into the show trying to learn the
business of music. And it's because you know, I've been
singing and trying to be a professional for so long,
Like American Idol was my first real shot. Like I've had,
(17:22):
you know, had several record contracts given to me before Idol,
like several opportunities that just always fell flat. It's and
I always used to say, well that's what you get
in Alabama, you know what I mean? Or that's what
I'm gonna get around here, and I was like I
needed an opportunity to see, like what the real business was.
And so for me, I was always just trying to
(17:44):
pay attention to what was going on, Like I was
very focused on what all the people, the musicians behind
the scenes were doing with us, like this is why
I created the American Idol with like being the reason
why I'm so great in the studio. Not to like
toot my own harm, but like we like I really
learned how to be a professional recording artist on that show,
(18:09):
and for me, it was it was an invaluable experience,
Like if I wouldn't have won the amount of experiences
that you cannot pay for, like to say that I
was in the studio recording a song.
Speaker 3 (18:23):
With Bert Backrack, Ye is you can't pay for that,
like they.
Speaker 4 (18:28):
There's no amount of money that you could offer somebody
to say if you could have a day in the
studio with Burt Backrack, who you know has made a
million stars, Like how much would you pay for that?
Speaker 3 (18:42):
We didn't have to pay anything. All we had to
pay was our time and effort.
Speaker 2 (18:45):
Yeah, and then.
Speaker 5 (18:46):
Beyond the show too, Ruber I mean, it wasn't just
we worked with Bird on the show, right, but then
after the show, as as as complicated as it may be,
we both had albums made by Clide Davis, you know,
and write they are towards the end of the end
of his the peak of his career. He's still obviously working.
But yeah, I mean we we just did a tour together,
(19:07):
like I said last year, and we would talk about
the experience with working with Clive every night on the stage,
and every night we'd both kind of just think, Wow,
how many people our age can say that they got
to make an album with Clive Davis. I mean they're
they're three me Ruben Seller crazy and and that's and
that's kind of that's something that no one else around
(19:32):
us is able to do.
Speaker 2 (19:33):
So, I mean I forgot, did you guys have mentors
on that show? You know how like later on in
the seasons they had like the mentors each week, And
did you guys have that? I don't remember we did?
And was everyone in that season pretty big time?
Speaker 3 (19:47):
Wait for us?
Speaker 4 (19:49):
For us?
Speaker 5 (19:50):
Everybody was big time everybody.
Speaker 2 (19:51):
Well, what I'm getting at is like, because I you know,
you watch these shows, you watch Idol, you watch other
you know, where they bring in someone to men tour
and and you're looking at at the contestants and wondering,
but does that person they know who that is? And
they're like, we didn't have in their interview. They're like,
I'm so, I cannot believe so and so is here.
And you're like, dude, this is no clue that.
Speaker 5 (20:14):
We knew because we didn't just get mentors. I'd argue
we got legends we didn't get we didn't even get
current pop stars Gladys Knight, O Living Neon, John Lionel Ritchie.
I mean they were they were.
Speaker 2 (20:26):
Huge, huge legends. Everyone was cool. No one was a
dead god ya, nobody but me?
Speaker 4 (20:36):
You were?
Speaker 2 (20:37):
Were you the diva Clay? Were you the this whole?
Speaker 5 (20:40):
But not not not on the show. Maybe afterwards, not once.
Speaker 2 (20:45):
You tasted a little fame. You're like, all right, now
we got.
Speaker 5 (20:48):
But we got to work. We not We went in
the studio, recorded a single with Burt Bachara paul Anka
was on our season.
Speaker 2 (20:56):
I mean there was no one who didn't know crazy
I was.
Speaker 4 (21:00):
I think I think I was like I passed out
more on the month those are because everybody was like
that was the one that everybody was like, well who
is I was like, man, y'all reread the back of
these records, that should all be singing like because you know,
all of us are huge mot everybody that was on
our show was a huge of course a huge Motown man,
and like to not know that this guy is the
(21:20):
guy that like created the Motown sound because you know,
Smoky and Barry were the face, but this guy was
the one that was really you know, putting that work in,
you know, and so we had the opportunity to sing
his songs in front of him. Was just like, you know,
you can't you can't buy those you know, those moments.
Speaker 2 (21:41):
Yeah, amazing. So when going back just to your friendship
and how that kind of blossomed throughout this experience, you know,
and when you were homies with Clay and then Clay
comes up to you and that moment that he tells
you that he is gay?
Speaker 1 (21:58):
Right?
Speaker 3 (21:58):
Did that?
Speaker 2 (21:59):
How did that works? Were you nervous even doing that?
Speaker 3 (22:02):
Clay?
Speaker 2 (22:03):
You know, no, I don't think I was play out
And Ruben, were you just say all right, cool whatever?
Speaker 4 (22:10):
Yeah, gosh, I mean yet that's actually pretty much what
I said.
Speaker 5 (22:16):
I think God listen, I probably built it up to
be far bigger than it was, and he looked he.
If I remember correctly, he and my actual brother both
responded the same way. If I'm not mistaken. I don't
want to put a quote into your mouth, Ruben, but
I may be quoting you wrong. But if I remember correctly,
it was something along the lines of I'm straight enough
(22:36):
for both of us. So it was either you or
bred who said that. I can't remember, but I mean,
you know. I think what makes has has made continues
to make our friendship strong is not only all the
stuff we have in common, but the fact that we
because we are all so different. I mean, we do
have a lot of interest in common, we have a
(22:58):
lot of background in common, but we also are different
enough that we both don't have unreasonable expectations for each other.
I don't expect Ruben to like all the stuff that
I like. He doesn't expect me to know all the
stuff that he knows. I mean, he'll he'll teach me
about sports because I'm dumb about him, and you know,
(23:20):
if he's looking to see what Broadway show to go to,
he'll ask me for recommendations. But we don't necessarily expect
the other to agree with us on anything. Even still,
and I think that there is a there's a great
benefit and a strength to not having unreasonable expectations for
(23:40):
the people who you are friends with or family with,
because it tends to be when you know, if I
expected Ruben to agree with me, or to want to
do our show a certain way, or to have the
same opinion of me, then when he didn't, I'd be disappointed.
But because we are different enough, we know, okay, he
(24:01):
knows that I'm probably going to come out at something
a different way than he does, and it doesn't upset
him when I do. He just goes, well, that's playing.
Speaker 2 (24:10):
So where do you guys, where would you say your
deep connection stems from? And then you know, the flip
side of that question is where do you guys sort
of butt heads? And has it gotten to a point,
especially when you're working together, you know what I mean,
Like when you're in close proximity like that, it can
go two ways. You know, it can be bang bang
or you can be all love or what I.
Speaker 3 (24:31):
Think our deep connection stems.
Speaker 4 (24:34):
Just like for me with any of my friends, there
are shared experiences like you know, like my best friend
and from childhood is our shared experience is church, so
that is you know, we like we uh everything our
friendship is based on happen in my home church. For
(24:54):
our deep connection is the experience that we nobody in
the world other than the other maybe twenty people that
have gone through the experience that we have and made
it to the end of that show together like the
way that we did.
Speaker 3 (25:11):
But I'm just like with my own brother got rest
in peace.
Speaker 4 (25:16):
He and I bumped hands on all kinds of stuff
and he's still my brother like that, Like us, having
differences of opinion doesn't change.
Speaker 3 (25:25):
The familiar feeling that we have for one another.
Speaker 4 (25:28):
Like I'm you know, I'm sure you and your siblings
have blowouts all the time and we will still go
to bat for them regardless.
Speaker 3 (25:37):
Like that's just you know, like and and.
Speaker 5 (25:42):
I am.
Speaker 4 (25:42):
And this is one thing that I will say that
Clay and I are different in like I am a
I am a musician's artist.
Speaker 3 (25:51):
Clay is a production artist.
Speaker 4 (25:54):
Right, so most of the things that I care about
happen on the level of musician, and the things that
Clay cares about happen on the production level of show.
So whenever we are bumping heads about a show is
usually always how to deal with music or music or
(26:15):
how to deal with production or something of that.
Speaker 2 (26:18):
Next, right, so you on, you wan like a beautiful
stand up based solo, and then Clay wants pyrotechnics, it
would be something along.
Speaker 5 (26:27):
Those lines, or or for example the last tour, you know,
just budgeting. I'm very nitpicky on those types of things,
and Ruben is very extra generous, and I'm like n
sot me. We have had some arguments that have been
heated over those types of things usually, but again I
(26:47):
go back to the fact that because Ruben's expertise is
in music, if it's musical, nine times out of ten,
I will eventually just say, you know what, that's his department.
And nine times out of ten he'll look at me
and say, well, you know what Clay handles, you know,
will handle the budget stuff or whatever that is the technically,
you know, the logistical stuff, and we'll eventually just agree
(27:10):
to disagree at some point, you know. I mean, it
comes to down to it comes down to the fact
that you can I mean, you can't make old friends. Right.
We're getting to an age now where we are seeing
some people who we care about pass away. We are
we're watching as family and friends who we've had for
(27:32):
years moved to another place or or whatnot, and it
just it becomes so much more important, I think, to
all of us as humans. I mean, I think we
all have sort of a homing device in us. At
some point, we want to get to an age where
all of a sudden, we care about going to our
high school reunions which we never cared about going to before.
We care about finding out talking catching up with that
(27:52):
person from church when we were a kid who we
haven't spoken to in thirty years. And I think for
Reuben and I it's just and not just a but
so many other people. I think when you get to
a place, you realize they're only, like you said, so
many folks who remember what it was like twenty one
years ago to experience what we experienced, to go through
those things. And I have neither one of us have
(28:15):
any interest in losing the ability to reminisce about those things. Right,
So we'll call each other up sometimes because we have
it and I just remembered such and such, or I
just talked to so and so from twenty years ago,
can you believe this? And after a while, there are
few people in your life who you can go for
I mean, Reuben and I haven't gone for that long
(28:36):
a time without speaking to each other. But there are
people who you can go for weeks without talking to,
but when you pick up the phone it's like you
hadn't been away out.
Speaker 2 (28:46):
Those are like all my friends.
Speaker 5 (28:48):
We are at that point. You know.
Speaker 2 (28:58):
What about vulnerability? You know what I mean? Like, are
you guys able to like be very vulnerable with each
other and emotional and talk about those kinds of like
deeper feelings or issues that are going on in your
lives or your wives or your husbands or whatever it is.
You know what I mean, because you know I deal
with that. Just to preface that question. As a male,
(29:21):
vulnerability has always been difficult for me, especially with females,
Interestingly with my mother, with my sister, with my wife,
It's been difficult for me to just talk about how
much I love them and how I feel about them.
If I had to say, hey, you know, I just
want to tell you how much you mean to me
(29:42):
and how grateful I am for you and all of
these things, I feel like I want to go away
hide under a rock. Now that goes into my own psychology,
you know, which if we had another podcast episode I
could get into. But you know, learning to be vulnerable
and opening up was dea only something difficult, you know
for me as a man.
Speaker 4 (30:04):
I don't think I've ever had an issue with telling
the people that I care about how much I care
about them. And I say this because I was around
very masculine men that were cool with being that way.
Speaker 3 (30:19):
My grandfather.
Speaker 4 (30:22):
When he loved you, he loved you like I mean
like and I mean he wanted to hug you, you know,
shake your hand like. My grandfather was, you know, that way,
and subsequently it made all of his sons that way.
Speaker 3 (30:35):
So like my uncles will.
Speaker 4 (30:41):
They will beat your tail period. But if the love you,
you will know it, you know what I mean, Like,
if my uncles would love you like, you're going to know.
And I feel like all of us boys that have
grown up around that have have benefited from being able
to tell our friends and family members, everybody that is
(31:05):
close to us how much because you know, like I
remember a moment before my brother passed away, he.
Speaker 3 (31:12):
Said, you know it's it. Uh.
Speaker 4 (31:14):
It was always refreshing to to know, like always know
how we felt about one another, you know what I mean.
And the great thing about having a sibling like him
is because you know, I'm my mama's baby, and so
I always had everything I wanted, never really forced to share.
And my brother was like, oh, no, like you gonna
(31:36):
you're going to share with me. You're going to like,
I'm going to make you do the thing. And he
and I told him this before. I said, you made
me better like he made me in every aspect because
even like in football, having him as my older brother
made me more competitive because I was always trying to
(31:57):
beat him, so nobody around me like like that was playing.
I never felt like I would lose to them because
I was always not competing with them.
Speaker 3 (32:08):
I was really trying to beat my brother.
Speaker 4 (32:11):
Honestly, what made me want to beat Clay even more
is what my brother said, ain't no way.
Speaker 3 (32:18):
You beating that white boy. That's exactly what my brother said.
Speaker 5 (32:24):
He thought he Kevin was definitely my biggest fan. I
appreciate it.
Speaker 2 (32:29):
Oh my god, that's so funny.
Speaker 4 (32:33):
And it was like and I could and now that
I look back on it, maybe that was like my
brother like little brother psyching me out.
Speaker 3 (32:40):
M h.
Speaker 2 (32:41):
He knows like he knows your competitives. You have a competitors.
How you're a baller, right, you've played football?
Speaker 3 (32:46):
Yeah, anything he ever told me, I wasn't gonna do.
Speaker 2 (32:49):
I ended up doing when you lost. Was it even
a thing?
Speaker 3 (32:53):
You know a little bit.
Speaker 5 (32:55):
I had seen the card before we walked out on stage,
so I knew you did. Yeah. Ryan had turned around
and I had seen the name. Was I mean, Ruben stuttered.
It's a lot longer than Clay.
Speaker 3 (33:07):
I can.
Speaker 5 (33:08):
But if you go back and look, I'm actually staring
at Ruben so intently in that moment. But I know
he was like, what the hell is wrong with you?
Because I wanted to see his reaction. I knew that
he had won, and I wanted to see it.
Speaker 3 (33:19):
And so no, no, no, you said it's you and
I said shut up.
Speaker 5 (33:25):
Oh I did tell you. Yeah, I ruined.
Speaker 3 (33:29):
And I said shut up.
Speaker 5 (33:30):
I ruined these.
Speaker 2 (33:35):
He couldn't hold it in anything you don't want no, no, no, Well,
let me get into the masked singer and then I'm
gonna let you guys go. But before we get into that,
I just want to get into that. How the living
situation more like, were you guys and where were you living?
Was it close quarters? Was it you know house? He
did a big house and so and everyone got along.
Speaker 5 (33:59):
Yeah, I mean did you just as as siblings would.
I mean we simply bickered. I mean once in a while,
but no, everyone not only didn't. I wouldn't say they
were clicks.
Speaker 1 (34:09):
No.
Speaker 5 (34:10):
There was a hallway of dressing rooms that had three
dressing rooms on it, and they tended to just we
tended to kind of group together. Reuben and Ricky and
Charlie would hang out in the and would hang out
in the front when some of the girls would hang
out in the middle, and me and kim Lock would
sit in the back and we'd all watch Young and
the Restless being taped on the others on the other set.
(34:32):
But they were never they were there. Really weren't any
clicks at all. I mean we we all kind of
shelled together. Obviously. There were some people Ruben and I
stayed in touch completely. Kim Berley Locke and I where roommates,
became roommates after the show was over, and there were
some people who probably had a stronger bond, But there
was no one who didn't get along or and I
(34:54):
would tell you because I ain't got trouble spilling spilling tea.
But so nobody didn't get along. We got along and
and and we really were I think it was just
like drinking from a fire.
Speaker 2 (35:05):
Hose, right, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 5 (35:07):
We didn't have tom to get into fights with each other.
Speaker 2 (35:09):
Look, you can't. It's hard to seeing what Idle has
given you, guys, you know what I mean, just as
far as experience, as far as situations to work with
some of the greatest legends of all time, you know,
advancing your careers, bringing your friendships close. You know, you
can't really knock Idle for anything. But I mean, was
(35:31):
there any dark side to it in the sense of like, man,
they're they're running us ragged, or like this, you know
this is too much? Or you know, was there anything
like that? We didn't know to know that it was
too much, Right, You're like this, I guess this is
just how it's done.
Speaker 3 (35:50):
Yeah, Like we didn't. We didn't know, Like we just
thought it was par for the course.
Speaker 4 (35:55):
Honestly, like having other experiences on other shows, I was like,
oh man, they chilling over here, right, I did?
Speaker 1 (36:01):
We did?
Speaker 7 (36:02):
We now look at people complain about things and I'm like, wait,
we didn't even have an union then.
Speaker 2 (36:06):
Right, Okay, so this I've had friends who've been on it.
It looks fun as hell. I've actually asked. I've been
asked to do it and I said yes, But then
I was doing a show. I was doing a series,
and they couldn't clear COVID protocols at the time. But
I was very excited because if you guys don't know,
I have an incredible.
Speaker 5 (36:26):
Voice, we can tell.
Speaker 2 (36:28):
Yeah it's you know, I could I could like let
me just let me, let me, let me break something
out like ooh yeah, oh baby, paper baby. Yeah, Okay, ready.
Speaker 5 (36:42):
He does have a voice.
Speaker 2 (36:43):
Lately, I've had the strangest feeling.
Speaker 5 (36:49):
Having a strange feeling right now.
Speaker 2 (36:52):
When I asked you all the thoughts you're keeping, you.
Speaker 4 (36:55):
Probably would you probably would win math Finger because they
have no idea.
Speaker 2 (37:00):
Yeah, I wouldn't be able to guess, right, no, exactly.
So you know, it's an instrument that I just keep
quiet because honestly, no one wants to hear it. But listen,
masked singer.
Speaker 3 (37:09):
What was that like?
Speaker 2 (37:11):
You guys get to do your ship together, which is
I'm probably super fun, and then more importantly putting on
those outfits, like, holy shit.
Speaker 5 (37:22):
It was cool.
Speaker 4 (37:24):
I will say that it was cool other than you know,
somebody I know, getting on everybody's nerves.
Speaker 5 (37:35):
How in the world did I get on anybody's nerves?
Speaker 3 (37:39):
I mean, we're getting cut, that they are were.
Speaker 5 (37:46):
That's because I have experience getting cut and you don't.
If you had experience getting cut, you would have known it,
you would have sensed.
Speaker 4 (37:53):
It like me.
Speaker 2 (37:54):
But I'm were you were you being the negative Nelly
where you're like, oh, we're done, we're never going we're
not getting well.
Speaker 5 (37:59):
It wasn't negative. I knew exactly when we were going home.
I could tell. I just smelled it on that end,
and it was that day. I know, I drove him
up the wall. But I was just trying to prepare
you because I was an expert. I knew I did
you know. I just I could just I could smell.
I could feel it in the air. There's something you know,
like when it's about the rain and your ankle starts hurting.
I could feel it.
Speaker 3 (38:18):
It was like that.
Speaker 7 (38:20):
Although I will say we both were probably tired of
those costumes, it was it was It's a very weird experience, right,
And like I mean every other TV activity, anytime anything
else you film, there's a community, right, But with this
you have your You have one producer that is yours,
You have a vocal.
Speaker 5 (38:39):
Coach type you know, helper to that is yours, and
you have dressers that are yours. And you don't see
nor do anyone else see you the entire time you're there. You,
I mean, it is, it is sort of I'm I'm
so happy that we did it together because otherwise it'd
be very lonely. I would imagine anyone else at all.
Speaker 2 (39:01):
I have a friend was completely Yeah, I have a
friend who did it. I guess. The dressing rooms was
there's a curtains and shit right like where you can
kind of hear. And this person made it and the
other person kind of didn't. Who's a singer, an actual singer.
And she went off like crazy about my my friend
(39:21):
making it and she and he can hear the whole thing.
You know, it's very very very well.
Speaker 5 (39:28):
They've changed those rules now now now those stress rooms
are stared up apart. You don't even get to hear
or see anybody. Oh really, yeah, who's around you?
Speaker 3 (39:34):
Yeah?
Speaker 5 (39:34):
We couldn't hear anything at all.
Speaker 4 (39:36):
Oh good, Okay, I still don't know, but I could
kind of feel that though, because, like you, I got
a little tight when I.
Speaker 3 (39:45):
Heard like some of the singing.
Speaker 2 (39:46):
I was like, oh, we got cut. Yeah, well so
so I'm.
Speaker 5 (39:50):
Going to tell you. I mean, since this is airing aftwards,
I know exactly. I know why we got cut. I
knew why. I could see it coming. We were beats, right,
we were the beats. We had these huge beats over us.
And these costumes were cumbersome, to say the very least.
They were. They were not the easiest things to get
around in. And and we had done We've done very
(40:12):
well as vocalists. I would argue Reuben that we might
have been the better singers of everyone. However, that last
that last showdown at the end was so much about performance,
and we couldn't see where we were going. We had
no I couldn't. We couldn't see our feet. And even
if we could see our feet, you can't dance when
(40:34):
your entire body is a beat, just orbs. There was nothing.
We could move our hands a little bit and nothing more.
The other the other person who who made it past
us in that round, you know, had this pop and
lock thing going on, I would have voted for him too,
because they were you know, we just got we got
screwed into our into our big old beat.
Speaker 2 (40:54):
Well because its voices, right, it's not all about voices.
It's about the whole performance. And you're right, see here here,
here's the thing. If I was choreographing you, I'd play
into that, meaning I wouldn't try it. I'd be bumping
into each other on purpose. You know, we get that
even on accident. Yeah, that's what I'm saying.
Speaker 3 (41:11):
Like the cost and we need.
Speaker 5 (41:13):
To put him in a beat and see how much
he could choreograph. You couldn't move around this feat. Then
you couldn't move at all.
Speaker 2 (41:20):
And that's what I'm saying.
Speaker 5 (41:21):
Our eyeballs, the eye holes for the beats were down
at our stomachs, so we couldn't see out. It was.
It was. It was a brilliant experience and I don't
don't think either one of us would complain. It was
fun to do.
Speaker 2 (41:33):
But uh, but well the other thing. The other thing too,
though is you know you get paid as you move on, right,
so so there's a monetary you know, reason why you
want to keep going. And that's where the competitive nature
comes in as well, you know where it's like, well
fuck man, if I if we move on, we get
we get a little more cash.
Speaker 5 (41:51):
Well, fortunately for Reuben and I, we left that show
the night we got cut, and we flew directly to
our back to our tour. So we were we went
right back to work. We were all the whole time
we were. It didn't it didn't hurt us too much,
but it would have been been fun. And and poor Ruben,
I've dragged him down because, like I said, I'm I've
lost two shows now three now, but I lost Idle
(42:13):
and I lost came in second on Apprentice also, and
it was just a matter of who's whose luck is
going to rub off on the other? Is my bad
luck going to rub off on Ruben? Or is his
good luck? You guys stronger, I'm sorry.
Speaker 2 (42:27):
You one life, You one life, buddy.
Speaker 3 (42:29):
You know.
Speaker 2 (42:30):
Look, I'm I'm uh look, I'm an actor and approser
I need a job, all right, this this acting world,
in this world after the strikes and everything else. Man,
I'm I'm hustling money. We're gonna get out of here.
I'm gonna let you guys, go I appreciate you, and
you know, keep it rolling. Are you guys done with
your tour?
Speaker 5 (42:49):
By the way, we are, Ruben's promoting an album. Tell
him the album named Ruben?
Speaker 2 (42:53):
Oh yeah, yeah, give me what you got going the
way I remember it, he wrote some life. Oh really,
baby girl. Congratulations, congratulations. All right, guys, I appreciate you.
Thank you so much. Maybe we'll hang out down the road.
Speaker 5 (43:13):
Thank you.
Speaker 3 (43:14):
Okay, Well there we have it.
Speaker 2 (43:17):
Solo interview by Oliver Hudson. Kate, what do you think
about that? Oh my god, I thought it was so funny,
Like Ruben was so great.
Speaker 3 (43:24):
I know, I know.
Speaker 2 (43:25):
Isn't it amazing? How you know, how they became friends
and how you know, Clay came out the room and
he wasn't even know I know. I mean, oh my god,
like in the room and I winter, I wonder what
that must have been like. It's like probably so crazy.
Like anyway, Oliver, that was so fun I know. Good
to see you, Kate, Yeah, good to see you too, Oliver.
(43:46):
Oh my god, I just changed characters in the middle
of my boys
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