Name: Boy George on Letterman, June 29, 1983
Uploaded: 2016-06-22T23:52:19.000Z
Description: Watch the stand-up comedy video 'Boy George on Letterman, June 29, 1983' from Don Giller on Comedy Buff. Published 2016-06-22. Transcript available. George O'Dowd's first of two appearances on Late Night.

Watch the stand-up comedy video 'Boy George on Letterman, June 29, 1983' from Don Giller on Comedy Buff. Published 2016-06-22. Transcript available. George O'Dowd's first of two appearances on Late Night.

Welcome back to the program, ladies and gentlemen.
With his band, Culture Club, my first guest had a tremendously popular hit
called Do You Really Want to Hurt Me?
Their latest recording is called I'll Tumble for You, and we have a moment of
that to listen to and watch right now do so, won't you?
I'll Tumble for You, I'll Tumble for You, I'll Tumble for You, I'll Tumble for
You, I'll Tumble for You, I'll Tumble for You.
Please welcome, ladies and gentlemen, the founding member of Culture Club, Boy
George.
That looked very nice, that video, as they say.
Thank you.
Before we go any farther, I was leafing through one of New York City's finest
daily newspapers today, and you must be familiar with the post, right?
Yeah, I spoke to them.
Oh, you did?
Yeah, it's my post.
Oh, and there's a little article about you in here, Looks of Dread greeted
British rock star boy George in his dreadlocky braids when he arrived at a
hotel here in town.
It was certainly not a Dunphy classic, let me assure you of that.
But you had trouble checking in, didn't you?
Yes.
And what happened?
Well, they didn't think I was Barbra Streisand, they weren't sure who I was,
you see.
And they knew I was beautiful, but they wasn't sure, you know, quite how famous
I was.
So they said that we didn't have any rooms, and it gave us a lot of hassle, and
eventually somebody asked my autograph, and they said, you can stay here.
In fact, they phoned us up about five minutes later and asked if we wanted to
stay longer.
So, you know, that's the way it goes.
So they were, until they realized who you were, they were not having any part
of this, huh?
Well, they thought we were going to sort of throw the TVs out the window, I
think.
Have you ever done anything like that?
Oh, no.
Would you ever do anything like that?
No.
Also here on page six, just, Hervé Villachez is writing a new book to be out
soon.
It's in the post today.
Oh, and this one.
Oh, no, I can't, oh, I won't even go into that.
That's, anyway, welcome to the show, and I'm glad you got your hotel straightened
out.
Let me ask you about your hair.
Is that, those do appear to be dreadlocks, don't they?
Sort of.
Is that your actual hair?
Yes.
And you had, somebody obviously braided that for you, didn't they?
Yes, a friend done it.
Now, when you go places like we just mentioned in the hotel, do people, are
they puzzled by
the way you look?
It depends where you go, you know.
Obviously, if you go to a country where you're very popular, you know, where
you've been number
one, then they're very polite.
But if you go somewhere where people aren't aware of your kind of presence,
then they are
a bit rude, yes.
For an example, what would be an experience like that that you've had?
Well, America.
Yeah, that's right.
That's right.
Just one hotel, though.
Not all the hotels are that bad.
Does it trouble you a little bit?
No, I like arguing.
It's nice when somebody kind of gets in your way.
What do they say to you?
They don't really say anything.
They just kind of look, you know.
It's like getting in a hotel lift with sort of three old ladies and a man, you
know, in
a suit.
They kind of look at you and get all kind of scared in case you're going to mug
them, you
know.
But logically, nobody dressed this way would be doing any mugging because you'd
be too easy
to describe.
But what do you say to them?
I don't say anything, really.
I just say have a nice day, you know.
I'll give them a nicer look back, you know.
I kind of kill people with kindness in a way, you know.
It's the best thing.
How old a person are you?
I'm 22.
22.
And how long have you been appearing this way?
Since birth.
Since birth.
You know.
What do you mean?
My hat?
Well, yeah.
You're obviously.
No, I mean, you're obviously.
Beautiful.
You're, yes.
Yes, you are.
That was the word.
But you know what I mean.
At what point did you decide that this is the way you wanted to look in public?
I don't know, really.
I just did it.
It's a natural thing for me, you know.
I think maybe people look very boring in the street, you know.
There's a lot of fat people about and kind of people with big noses.
And I just didn't want to be another person with a big nose, you know.
I wanted to be someone with a big nose and a bit of style.
So that's why I do it.
And what kind of reaction did you get from your family?
Tell me about your family.
What kind of folks do you have?
Well, my family are very intelligent.
And they don't laugh at people when they're in studios, you know.
Ah, see.
And they're basically, you know, my parents couldn't give a damn, really, you
know.
I mean, they love me and I love them.
I think most parents love their children, whether they look weird or not.
I don't think it's really relevant to say, you know, ask what one parent thinks
they don't care.
They must be very happy with your success, also.
Yes, you know.
Now, do you have brothers and sisters?
Five brothers and one sister.
And what kind of things do they do, your brothers?
My oldest brother is a welterweight boxing hero.
And he does that.
And they're all quite very sort of like regular kids, really.
They're not kind of any different to anyone else, you know.
But they have personalities, which I suppose is what prevents them from being
rude to other people, you know.
I think if you have a personality, then you don't have to worry about what
other people are like.
And they're kind of just like normal kids, you know, very nice.
Well, sure.
And I think people probably, well, obviously, are always threatened by
something a little bit different.
And you, no getting around it, you appear to be different from, well, in New
York, though, I would guess you wouldn't stand out that much.
I think, yeah.
I was going to say that myself, yes.
Yeah, yeah.
You go to Muncie, Indiana, though, and we're going to pause here.
I want to talk about your music and the group and so forth.
And we'll do that with boy George when we come back.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Boy George is here.
Tell me about the group, the culture club.
What's the philosophy behind the group and the name?
I think basically to present things that maybe would have raised a few eyebrows
ten years ago in a very domestic way.
I think that the music we play is very acceptable.
Lots of people buy our records.
We've had two number twos here.
And a lot of housewives buy the records.
Although a lot of people maybe don't associate the way I sing with the way I
look, which is a good thing, I think, because, you know, I'm probably a little
bit more honest than most performers.
I actually admit to doing this because I enjoy doing it.
So the philosophy behind culture club really is to create good classical type
pop songs, you know, and we've just had Rita Coolidge recording one of their
songs.
So we're doing pretty well.
Oh, no, no question about that.
But the culture club, isn't there also the theory that you're taking from
several different cultures and melding it into a...
Well, the idea is that, you know, plagiarism in music is very kind of, you know,
it's very strong.
But I think now that we've come to a stage where we have to admit that we steal
ideas, you know, like Rhythm and Blues was taken from black people and it's
kind of been adopted into rock.
And now we're kind of being honest about it and saying, yeah, we do listen to
other people's records and we do steal ideas, but we present it in our own way,
in a very multiracial way.
You know, and also in America, there's a very big kind of black and white
separation, which is now dying.
You know, I think people aren't really just playing, black stations aren't just
playing white and black acts and white stations aren't just playing white acts.
They're all molding together.
I mean, some people probably won't like this, but I think it's a good thing on
the whole for everybody.
Yeah.
What were your early musical influences?
Who did you like?
What did you listen to?
Aretha Franklin, Marvin Gaye, Smokey Robinson, Gladys Knight, Gene Pitney, Dolly
Parton.
Tell me about Gene Pitney.
Now, here is a guy who I listened to also when I was younger, and then suddenly
he's gone, but he's not gone, is he?
Well, I think there are certain records throughout the history of mankind that
kind of stick in your subconscious, you know.
I think if a song has a good melody line, it doesn't really matter who makes it,
you know.
I mean, it's really important that it's just kind of strong.
Well, my question here is, he was very popular in the United States, and I don't
know what...
what year exactly, and then he just left, he quit, but he didn't quit, he moved
to Europe, right?
Yeah, but I don't know, he's not so popular in England anymore, you know, it's
just kind of nostalgic.
People remember those songs, you know, there are kind of certain songs that you
remember all your life, you know.
Does, so you're under the impression that he's probably not recording anymore?
I don't think he is, no, I haven't heard about him.
What about your name, Boy George, what's the significance of that?
Well, again, this is, you know, one of the reasons why people laugh, because
they're not kind of sure of the gender.
And I call myself Boy George because, basically, I'm a very masculine person.
I'm more of a man than any of you, anyway.
And, basically...
Outside.
And, basically, I've just said that because, it kind of, I like things not
being what they seem.
I like people to kind of look at me and say, that guy's a jerk.
And then they hear the song.
I like people to hear the song and kind of add another dimension.
So, I call myself Boy George because most people thought I was Brooke Shields.
And, uh, I'm kind of trying to sort of, you know, confuse people a bit.
Yes.
Now, can I ask you a personal question regarding gender?
Yes.
I guess you answered it, though, didn't you?
This is not by any means to suggest that you're, uh, oh, let's forget it.
I just wanted something else.
Uh, now, tell me, what do you do for fun?
You probably don't have a lot of fun, you know.
I come on this kind of show because, you know, it's a lot of fun.
Well, that's good.
I mean, this is, you know.
But, if you have time off, you probably don't have a lot of time off now, do
you?
No, not really.
I think that if you're a businessman and you want your business to succeed,
then you probably dedicate 24 hours a day to that, which is what I do.
Sure.
Uh, the last time you had a vacation or went anywhere, what'd you do?
I've never been on holiday in my life.
Uh-huh.
And, uh, if you continue with this, uh, hot success, uh, you would like to take
a vacation?
Any thoughts where you'd go?
No, not really.
The main thing, I suppose, I want to do is write songs to other people.
I just really don't want to have holidays and things.
I want to keep working and be successful.
Well, you're 22.
What the heck?
Kind of stop people from laughing at me.
Now, now, but you must, you must know that you, you, you, I mean, when you put
this stuff on,
you must know you're, like you said, you like people to call you a jerk.
Yeah, I know, but I mean...
I mean, you know that they're going to laugh if you go out.
Yes.
I know they're going to laugh.
But, uh, but the fact is they should also respect you as an individual and, and
certainly
in addition to that, a fine musical talent.
I think the main thing, yeah, is the music and if you're, if you're talented,
like Liberace
is a brilliant pianist.
So, whether you may think of him as a person, he's good at what he does and you
can't knock
talent, you can't knock success.
Well, that's certainly true.
And you, uh, have had much already.
Yes, thank you.
And, uh, uh, thank you very much for being here.
It was, it was actually a lot of fun meeting you.
Thank you.
And I'm, uh, and I'm sorry, I hope you're not upset.
You're not upset, are you?
No, no, no.
Uh, we'll be right back, ladies and gentlemen.
Don't you worry about nothing.