Richard Kirshenbaum, ROUGE
[0:09]I'm Zibi Owens, and you're listening to the Webby-nominated podcast.
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[0:39]I'm really excited to be interviewing Richard Kershenbaum today.
[0:42]He is an ad man, author and entrepreneur.
[0:45]His latest book, Rouge, A Novel of Beauty and Rivalrey, has already been optioned by Sony
[0:49]Pictures.
[0:50]He also wrote a book called Isn't That Rich, Life Among the 1% based on his columns
[0:54]for the New York Observer.
[0:55]It's sold to ABC Studios.
[0:57]He also wrote, Under the Radar, talking to today's cynical consumer, closing the deal
[1:02]to married guys reveal the dirty truths to getting your man to commit, and mad boy beyond
[1:06]mad men.
[1:07]And he's an accomplished playwright.
[1:09]He founded Kershenbaum Bond and Partners at Agency when he was just 26 years old, and is currently
[1:13]the CEO and founder of NSG slash SWOT, a high-profile boutique branding agency.
[1:19]He is also the co-founder of Black Well Fine, Jamaican Rum.
[1:22]Richard co-founded SWOT Equity, which invests in emerging consumer brands.
[1:26]A graduate of Syracuse University, he currently lives in New York with his wife and three
[1:29]children.
[1:30]Welcome, Richard.
[1:31]Mom, so no time to read books.
[1:33]Thanks so much for coming.
[1:34]I'm so delighted.
[1:35]So nice to be here in your amazing library, by the way.
[1:39]And this is like really sort of a mitzvah that you're doing by being here on a Friday
[1:42]afternoon to June.
[1:43]So I'm particularly grateful that you made the time for this, so thank you.
[1:48]I'm so happy to be here.
[1:50]So your latest book is called Rouge and Novel of Beauty and Ravelry, which was really
[1:54]just delicious and wonderful.
[1:56]Tell me about what inspired you to write Rouge and what it's about.
[2:01]Well Rouge is really about the women who created the cosmetic industry.
[2:08]The first multi-billion dollar category founded primarily by women.
[2:13]And I have to tell you that I was surprised that there wasn't really a major novel
[2:18]about the book before, you know, and I being an ad man and having run everything from
[2:24]Avon to Revlon, you know, as accounts and having worked with many, many, many well-known
[2:30]female entrepreneurs.
[2:32]I thought this was the book that I needed to write.
[2:34]It's really an homage to all the amazing female entrepreneurs who founded this incredible
[2:40]category.
[2:41]Amazing.
[2:42]But why not?
[2:43]Why this book right now in your life?
[2:45]What made you do it?
[2:46]What made you say, okay, this is the story.
[2:48]I really want to tell it and I've got to get this one out.
[2:50]It's about growth and it's about evolution.
[2:52]I had a column that I was writing for the New York Observer, which got a lot of attention.
[2:58]What it was called, isn't that rich, life among the 1%, and I wrote that for a number
[3:01]of years and it turned into a book and the book I told to ABC.
[3:05]It was a book of essays, but I always wanted to do a novel and I always wanted to do
[3:10]a novel of the ilk that I grew up with, you know, with these amazing authors like Sidney
[3:16]Sheldon and Judith Krantz and Dominic Dunn and Truman Capote and, you know, Philip Roth
[3:23]and all these people.
[3:24]I mean, they're all very different, but those were books you couldn't put down.
[3:28]and I love to read, I'm a voracious reader, but people aren't writing those kind of books
[3:33]today as much anymore, you know?
[3:35]And so I really, really wanted to do a juicy, beat read, but that also, you know, hopefully
[3:41]was well written.
[3:42]It definitely was well written.
[3:43]It was great.
[3:44]It was amazing.
[3:46]There in one description is that it was sort of based on real life rivals Elizabeth
[3:51]Arden and Helena Rubenstein, true, not true.
[3:53]Well, I used a lot of source material.
[3:55]I mean, when I write, when you do a based on novel, personally, I like to do composite
[4:01]characters.
[4:02]So yes, those women I researched and they're amazing and the character of Josephine is
[4:08]a little bit more based on Helena who is amazing, but you know, for the most part, they're
[4:13]compilations.
[4:14]And there are also people.
[4:15]I always, when I write a book, I always think about or create characters, think about
[4:20]who the person is in my head.
[4:23]And then I have a visual of a person, and then I can create the character better about
[4:29]that.
[4:30]Interesting.
[4:31]Yeah.
[4:32]Yeah, I was trying to think, I know this is an option by Sony already.
[4:33]Congratulations.
[4:34]Thank you.
[4:35]So I was trying to think of who I would cast, so in case you want to make me your casting
[4:38]director, I was thinking, and you tell me what you think, I was thinking Charlize
[4:41]there on for Cobsons Gardner and Rachel Weiss as Josephine.
[4:45]I mean, it's great casting choices.
[4:47]Thank you.
[4:48]I'll tell you, they really are perfect.
[4:50]And I think the question really is how Wendy Feinerman, who's the legendary producer of
[4:57]Forrest Gomp, and when the Academy Award for that, and the devil worst product, I mean,
[5:02]she may have, I'm sure she would consider those people to be perfect.
[5:07]But you know, at the end of the day, I have the saying, I know what I know, and I know what
[5:10]I don't know, and I've never done a film before.
[5:13]So I have been saying 20 a lot, this is my quote that I say to her, whatever you want
[5:20]to do.
[5:21]Yeah.
[5:22]I'm just happy to be working with you.
[5:23]Yeah.
[5:24]Well, you don't have to force these down her throat.
[5:25]It's fine.
[5:26]I'll defer to her.
[5:27]But you're perfect.
[5:28]It's just how I had the time to start the role.
[5:31]Yeah.
[5:32]What you had written.
[5:34]So one of the two women who starts off with the name Josiah and Poland, who then re-brands
[5:39]herself Josephine later in the book, she starts working at her uncle's store in Melbourne
[5:43]after she's forced to flee from Poland due to Jewish persecution at the time.
[5:48]So she learns a lot on the sales floor, including, and I quote, that the lady customers
[5:52]all had a version of the same gripe.
[5:54]Their husbands had wandering eyes and too many women to wander too.
[5:57]So much so their souls were withering because of the atrophy and the competition.
[6:02]So I was wondering if you think, is this what inspires women to shop for makeup even
[6:07]now?
[6:08]Or what part of shopping for makeup and beauty do you think is for other women?
[6:12]You know, it's a wonderful, wonderful, insightful question.
[6:16]I think that, well, first of all, when the period that we're talking about is sort of
[6:22]pre, you know, mass makeup and so, you know, and changing roles of women in society.
[6:29]So in many ways, this is a whole generation of most women who didn't work and were homemakers,
[6:35]you know, for the most part, except for these women who really stood out.
[6:40]And so, you know, perhaps makeup may have had a different role in their lives at that
[6:46]time.
[6:47]Today, I don't view it that way as much.
[6:49]I mean, I think that, you know, I'm the first generation of men to have work for the
[6:53]first generation of female executives and entrepreneurs.
[6:57]And I think that really makeup and the fascination with makeup is really about being the
[7:03]best version of yourself.
[7:05]And in some ways, it's armor.
[7:08]And at the end of the book, and I don't want to say what happens at the end of the book,
[7:10]but there's one line that I really, I don't know.
[7:12]When I wrote it, I was really, and when I reread it, I was, I thought, yeah, that makes
[7:17]sense.
[7:18]When they're certain women are taking out their compacts, I use the word artillery.
[7:24]And so I think that today, working women who, and also homemakers who are working, and
[7:29]I've worked for so many and with so many, you know, I think that they are forced to confront
[7:36]different issues in terms of both social, both running your businesses, the balance between
[7:41]family life and business life in a different way, and then perhaps their parents or grandparents
[7:47]did.
[7:48]So, you know, perhaps makeup serves a different function for them, you know?
[7:52]And I think that, you know, I've talked, and I've been in focus groups with, you know,
[7:56]all across, you know, when I was running these major, you know, cosmetic counts, and women
[8:01]would talk about what, how they used makeup and how they perceived makeup.
[8:06]And in many ways, it's not as much for the other, it's in many ways, it's for themselves.
[8:12]And it also, and for other women too.
[8:14]I mean, that's really interesting, you know, I hear that all the time, you know, sometimes
[8:18]women will say that they dress for other women, where it was men think they dress for them.
[8:22]And so that's a great insight, I think.
[8:26]Who knows what these ladies had in mind?
[8:28]I don't know.
[8:29]So, Constance's need for success comes with the expense of her own true soul, basically.
[8:35]Her own sexuality, even, her own relationships is very extreme, sort of what she's willing
[8:40]to put aside to achieve what she wants to professionally.
[8:44]Even when she starts working for Dr. Osborne when she's only 22, he writes, Constance was
[8:48]no stranger to the unwanted advances of young men, but she had learned to tune out the effects.
[8:53]And sacrifices were necessary to achieve one's goals.
[8:56]So I wanted to know which sacrifices you think are most often sacrificed for success.
[9:02]And also maybe what some of yours have been along the way.
[9:04]Yeah.
[9:05]I think it's another incredible question, very insightful.
[9:08]I mean, I really writing it a different time.
[9:10]I'm not even on the show every day.
[9:11]No, no.
[9:12]No, no.
[9:13]It's a different time period.
[9:16]And it's when very few women, and this is 1920s during Prohibition, when very few women
[9:21]first entered the workforce during the war years, it was different because men went
[9:26]off to war and women failed those roles.
[9:29]But this is a time when there were fewer women who did that.
[9:33]So I think that some of the ideas of how, in some ways I wanted to create these complex
[9:40]characters and put them into situations where they expose the truth of whether they had
[9:46]to go through at that time.
[9:48]So there's no judgment about it.
[9:51]And I think that's interesting today, especially.
[9:55]These are women who were pragmatic, who did what they had.
[10:00]to do in order to succeed.
[10:01]And so when we say sacrifices,
[10:04]the sacrifices may have included unwanted advances, you know?
[10:08]But they persevered.
[10:10]And I have spoken with women of that generation
[10:13]who've told me that that's how they dealt with it.
[10:15]So I didn't want to, let's say, gloss over it
[10:20]or make it romantic because that would be inauthentic
[10:22]to what they had to go through.
[10:24]And so I wanted it to be real.
[10:27]And I wanted there, let's say, experiences, you know,
[10:32]to be real.
[10:33]So when we talk about things like LGBT issues in the book
[10:36]or racism or antisemitism, I did not sugarcoat it.
[10:40]And I think that I wanted to, you know,
[10:44]the language that's used, the way that people
[10:46]talked about other people.
[10:48]I mean, it was in some ways hard to write,
[10:50]but I thought it was important.
[10:52]Well, Kameh across is very, like,
[10:53]you just felt like you were in the room at all those times.
[10:56]Especially that police station scene with her brother.
[10:58]And Kameh's, anyway, that was really good.
[11:00]Anyway, oh, I have a question about that.
[11:02]You have a scene set in 1929 in New York City
[11:06]when Kameh's is bailing her brother James out of prison.
[11:09]He was caught in what you called a lewd act
[11:12]and you said how at that time, police raids on bathhouses
[11:15]and bars and were much more common.
[11:20]I mean, obviously now they're not really common at all.
[11:23]So Constance doesn't disclose to her brother
[11:26]that they have the same sort of sexual proclivities,
[11:29]which I also thought was really an interesting decision.
[11:31]How do you think something like that might go down these days?
[11:34]Like what, or what do you think that did to her sort of,
[11:37]how do you think somebody functions
[11:39]when they're going through life,
[11:41]not sharing with even like their closest family members?
[11:43]What's going on?
[11:44]Well, I also-
[11:45]That's a rambling question.
[11:46]I mean, I think that, you know,
[11:47]certain people are expressive
[11:48]and certain people come from cultures that are very closed.
[11:51]So the character of Constance who is essentially,
[11:54]you know, turns out to be the bell of New York
[11:57]and Palm Beach society, the blonde goddess, you know.
[12:00]She, you know, I'm just married to one of the great old families
[12:05]in New York that has the name and the social position.
[12:08]She is secretly a lesbian
[12:11]and so there was tension there, right?
[12:14]And I thought characters write the book
[12:18]what would Constance do?
[12:19]Well, Constance really wouldn't talk about it.
[12:22]I mean, that's really it is.
[12:23]It's sort of like this old.
[12:24]And again, you know, having friends of all different
[12:30]ilks and religions and backgrounds, you know.
[12:33]And being close with them, you know,
[12:35]I also ask people, you know, within their culture, you know,
[12:39]do, you know, you talk about that
[12:40]in sort of like the West by society, you know, blue blood culture.
[12:44]And it's really, you know, during that period of time,
[12:47]it was really not talked about.
[12:49]So that's one of the reasons why Constance,
[12:51]as a character, doesn't share with her brother.
[12:54]And so again, you know, would it be different today?
[12:57]Of course it would be different today.
[12:58]But at that time, I wanted to show what women went through
[13:04]and what everyone is complex in the book
[13:07]and everyone has to deal with certain things.
[13:09]You know, and the inside versus the outside persona.
[13:12]And I want to go back because I feel like you dodged the question
[13:15]about any sacrifices you may have made yourself
[13:18]or maybe I just skipped over it.
[13:19]But I feel like everybody in their career
[13:21]has to put something aside maybe that they,
[13:23]I don't know, do you have any that you want to share?
[13:25]If not, I'll skip it.
[13:27]Have I had sacrifices?
[13:28]Yeah, what do you think?
[13:29]What has your success come at the expense of?
[13:32]Yes, I mean, I think when I was a young young man growing up,
[13:37]everyone in my culture, my background,
[13:40]was raised to be doctors, lawyers, accountants.
[13:42]And so I was raised in that culture.
[13:45]And so being a creative person,
[13:48]I was heavily criticized.
[13:50]People didn't understand me.
[13:53]I think that within the world and the social structure
[13:57]that I grew up in, you know,
[13:58]I did not have a lot of positive reinforcement.
[14:01]And so, and the criticism continued.
[14:04]So, you know, I was always sort of like the freaky creative guy,
[14:07]like, you know, with the long hair.
[14:08]And so people, you know, I heard, you know,
[14:12]horrible insults about me,
[14:14]that people just, you know, would assume it could be anything,
[14:19]you know, because people just didn't understand creative,
[14:22]people, especially creative men.
[14:23]So I was always the person who was the oddity.
[14:27]And so, you know, I would say that that definitely
[14:31]had an effect on me.
[14:32]And so, living in this world uptown,
[14:34]which is in New York City with, you know,
[14:36]in a very investment banker, New York City,
[14:39]in a certain sense, the New York City, you know, elite,
[14:41]if you will.
[14:42]I think only now with a certain level of success
[14:45]am I truly accepted by the other men.
[14:47]Jared I'm saying it's really interesting
[14:49]because they were very quick to be dismissive.
[14:53]So I find that so interesting
[14:54]because I feel like advertising has been so glamourized.
[14:57]Like, you started an ad agency when you were 26,
[14:59]I would think that all the done Draper-esque people
[15:02]would just have been, you know,
[15:04]any other feats about that.
[15:06]Certain people.
[15:07]I always had a great relationship with the women.
[15:11]I always got the best seat at the dinner party
[15:13]because, you know, I always, you know,
[15:15]they always wanted to sit next to me.
[15:16]But in many respects, you know,
[15:19]some of the men were very dismissive.
[15:20]I'm not going to lie.
[15:22]Although, and then recently, people have said,
[15:24]well, I really respect you.
[15:25]And I really, if I had to do it all over again,
[15:28]I would, you know, have liked to have been
[15:30]in a creative industry.
[15:31]And now there's a whole generation of these parents
[15:34]who are raising, quote, creative kids,
[15:36]because everyone wants creative kids.
[15:37]But, you know, I'm only saying at the time,
[15:39]I, you know, came up.
[15:41]It wasn't as well received or as well respected.
[15:45]So what do you think it was that made you keep persevering?
[15:48]Like, why?
[15:49]So you kept doing what your heart believed in,
[15:51]despite everything.
[15:53]Well, I couldn't do anything else, you know?
[15:55]I mean, I wasn't suited for anything else.
[15:57]That's the thing, you know, I couldn't,
[15:58]you can't be what you can't be, you know?
[16:01]So, you know, a bird can't be a fish, you know?
[16:03]I mean, I think that the thing is that, you know,
[16:05]for me, it was always about, you know, my creative gene
[16:08]and reveling in writing.
[16:10]And, you know, I started out as a comedy writer,
[16:13]selling jokes for John Rivers, you know, at $8 a joke.
[16:15]And that was never gonna pay my bills.
[16:17]So I went into the advertising business
[16:19]because, you know, I had a job in security
[16:21]and in health insurance and things like that.
[16:23]Wait, how did you get a job writing
[16:25]John Rivers as jokes?
[16:26]So you were just out of college?
[16:28]Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
[16:29]Well, there was a circuit of people
[16:32]who would in the comedy circuit in those days.
[16:35]And, you know, many of the older comedians
[16:38]would hang out at the Carnegie deli.
[16:39]And if you were interested in that, you know, yeah.
[16:42]And you'd go pitch your jokes
[16:44]and, you know, corn beef would be falling out of their mouths.
[16:45]And it would all take that one.
[16:46]And, you know, it was hysterical.
[16:48]You know, through people, you know, and friends,
[16:50]someone would say, oh, this comedian's looking for some material
[16:54]or someone would say, oh, that person, you know,
[16:56]we should be that person.
[16:56]So it was sort of organic in that sense.
[16:59]And then a few years later, since I knew her,
[17:02]I did this sort of semi-famous campaign in, you know,
[17:05]the 80s for a jeans company called No Excuses,
[17:08]jeans which I went with Gary Hart.
[17:10]And I mean, sorry, Gary Hart's power more than a rice.
[17:14]And the second person to be in the, you know,
[17:17]in the campaign was Joan.
[17:19]And it was at a sad time in her life.
[17:22]But Edgar died and everything like that.
[17:23]But she was fantastic and really, you know, wonderful person.
[17:26]She taught me a great lesson about writing.
[17:28]It was really interesting because Joan had these filing
[17:31]cabinets of jokes, you know, and so,
[17:33]and she really understood the craft of how to tell a joke.
[17:36]Today, you know, people like Amy Schumer
[17:38]and things like that.
[17:38]I mean, they do more monologues in a certain sense.
[17:41]I mean, sort of their storytelling and their hysterical, of course.
[17:44]But in that period of time,
[17:46]people actually told a well-crafted joke, you know.
[17:48]And so I think I had written a joke and Joan took me aside
[17:52]and said, you know, something to the effect of Richard,
[17:54]I just want to say, you know, this is a lesson, you know.
[17:58]A joke, on a joke, a punchline and a punchline,
[18:01]cancels itself out.
[18:03]She said, you know, you have to have one punchline.
[18:05]It has to sing. You know, I was layering all this
[18:07]on these punchlines on top of each other.
[18:09]And she really helped me understand the idea of editing.
[18:13]That was the first time I really understood
[18:15]the surgical editing is really important in writing.
[18:18]And had you always liked to write your whole life?
[18:20]Yes.
[18:22]When other young men were playing soccer and football,
[18:25]you know, of course, I was the worst athlete.
[18:27]I was sat down in front of the manual typewriter
[18:29]and thought, this is for me.
[18:30]And then, did you, when was the first time you published anything?
[18:33]My first published piece, I think, I mean,
[18:37]it was sort of in the school paper.
[18:39]And then when I went to college, you know, of course,
[18:41]I was the editor of the paper and things like that.
[18:44]So I mean, it was sort of like a little slow-built, you know.
[18:47]And now you've written fiction, nonfiction,
[18:50]written advice books about dating, business,
[18:53]this like fiction, this novel throughout decades
[18:57]of inside women's lives.
[18:59]And you're just like multi-talented in this life.
[19:02]Did you ever get formal writing training?
[19:05]Is there a particular type of writing you like the most?
[19:08]I never got formal writing training.
[19:09]I mean, I think I just am a voracious reader.
[19:12]So I love reading.
[19:13]And I think when you're a storyteller,
[19:15]a natural storyteller, when you love to tell stories,
[19:17]you know, it's just within you to want to tell those stories.
[19:20]But I think that I really hooked into something
[19:24]which was special with a column,
[19:28]which was really about social observation.
[19:30]And so that's when I knew I had hit my calling
[19:33]and hit my stride because I was living in this world
[19:36]and talking about, you know,
[19:38]I did my first column for us in that rich
[19:40]was called entitled Drivers or the New Dads.
[19:43]And it was really about how many families in the upper east side,
[19:46]you know, hire, you know, private drivers.
[19:48]And then when the parents were away,
[19:50]the drivers are sent into parents
[19:52]or to go to go with the children's clubs.
[19:55]And I caused an enormous controversy in scandal that, you know,
[19:59]I had revealed this.
[20:00]thing. And so people were upset about it. And so at the time, because I was criticized
[20:06]and people were telling me that I shouldn't write about things like that and exposed that
[20:11]world, I went to my wife and I said, you know, you know, I think we're being cut socially,
[20:16]like do you have an issue with this? Should I stop? And luckily, you know, I married to a really
[20:20]strong woman and she said, you know, nothing ever great happens if you're going to compromise.
[20:24]So she said, you know, don't change your word for anyone. And that really was wonderful for me.
[20:28]So that's why the book is really dedicated to my wife, Dana.
[20:31]That's a great decision. Advocate.
[20:33]Yeah, she's great. And the second thing she told me was, I, you know, when I started writing the
[20:39]column, I said, do you like it? And she said, you know, we write it. And I said, why? And she said,
[20:44]pretend you didn't go to Syracuse, although circus school should pretend you went to,
[20:49]you know, you are the, you know, the narrator and the great Gatsby and you went to Princeton,
[20:52]yeah, you know, and if you can create that persona, she said, I think it would be better for you
[20:57]and you won't be as criticized. And she was right. You know, so I reread the great Gatsby and,
[21:01]you know, I sort of up my language game a little bit and, you know, my art, you know, creating sort of
[21:06]more artful sensibility and I think she was right. I feel like there's such a, I don't want to say
[21:14]discrimination against the wealthy of these days, but I feel like the wealthier constantly getting
[21:19]bashed for some reason or another. Do you feel like your columns added to that or not?
[21:25]I think I've always tried to have a balance between old money and new money. And I thought that
[21:30]was really interesting because I think that that was important. You know, I never tried to only
[21:35]sort of cast it at against one group of people. I would say that I just hit a, let's say, the
[21:41]cultural zeitgeist in a certain sense. And so, and I expose behavior. And so, I don't think there's
[21:47]anything wrong with that. As an example, I created a word for people who took selfies but did it
[21:54]in front of private planes and things like that and coined it the wealthy. And so,
[22:00]the New York Times picked up about it. And you know, I think they wrote this article about it and
[22:04]then it sort of got international press. So, but it's true. I mean, you know, people want to,
[22:08]you know, like make up. They want to give the present the best version of themselves. And so,
[22:13]you know, they'll snap a photo in front of, you know, if they're playing, you know, flying private
[22:18]or they'll try to do some ridiculous thing by like, you know, trying to, trying to portray this,
[22:23]you know, wonderful, idyllic world. So, I think that's funny. So, did I add to it perhaps, but
[22:30]I think it's funny. So, back to the book a little bit. Yeah. This, this one. How long do you take
[22:36]you to write Rouge? And like, where in when did you write? You already run a whole branding boutique
[22:41]firm and a private equity firm, this is where you invest in companies. So, it's not like you're
[22:46]sitting around all day with tons of time to have your creative outlets. So, when do you do everything?
[22:53]I mean, I'm sort of a mad person, you know. So, I, you know, I go to bed at two. Okay.
[23:00]Or two, 30. And then I wake up at six, 30. And then I write from six, 30 to eight. Then I'll go to
[23:08]work. Then I'll work. And then, you know, one or two days a week, I'll do a writer's lunch by myself.
[23:13]I usually go to Irish bars and, you know, fun places like named like the thirsty scholar or
[23:18]something. Which, which, you know, motivate me. And then I'll do a private lunch or in a good restaurant
[23:23]or, you know, uh, and then- A private lunch with yourself and then you're left up. Yes,
[23:27]yes, you guys are my laptop. And then I'll go back to work. And then I'll have a client dinner,
[23:32]then I'll come home and generally, you know, 12 to one. I'll write again in the bathroom. I always
[23:36]write in the bathtub. I'm like, the bathtub is where I write. No way. Yeah, completely.
[23:41]I didn't read that about you. That's awesome. I love it. Um, and you have kids too.
[23:46]I have three children. Are they grown kids now? I have my youngsters 14. My twins are 19.
[23:54]I have twins. Oh, you do. They're worth days today.
[23:56]Jimennally, as they say in this house. Right. Right. Right. How old are they?
[24:00]They're 12 today. Wow. Yeah. You really have your hands full. Boys or girls?
[24:03]Um, I have four kids, but they're my oldest kids. Um, they're a boy and a girl. Wow. So we know how
[24:10]it goes. But 19, oh my gosh. Yeah. I can. Anyway, so you feel like you don't need the sleep.
[24:15]You're not tired. When I first had the twins, I was complaining and a friend of mine
[24:18]said something to my second wife, Jamie said to me, which I love. I loved what she said. She said,
[24:22]Richard, you'll never get sleep again until they, you know, essentially are all out of the house.
[24:27]Just get used to it and fuck up. And so I sort of then I at that moment like a light bulb went on and I
[24:32]said, you know, yeah, I'm not going to get sleep and it's not going to happen. So I might as
[24:36]well just make the best of it. And now you don't even need it. Well, you know, I do need it.
[24:40]It's really hard in the mornings, but I sort of, I just have to adapt it to it. It's crazy,
[24:45]you know, but you know, and then when you have children who come, my children came home from the
[24:49]first year on college and they're coming in at three and four o'clock in the morning. And so the
[24:52]dog barks and like, I'm not getting any sleep. It's really hard. You know, I read on the most successful
[24:59]people, the one thing they have in common, like super uber successful people is that they don't
[25:03]sleep that much. Is that true? Well, maybe I'll hopefully be in that group. I mean, it's like,
[25:09]I can try that group. I feel like you're in that group, but okay, I think you need some,
[25:15]I feel like you need to work on the self confidence part here. So I just had a question about
[25:21]Constance and Josie, based on the book. If you were putting them in sort of the one percent today,
[25:27]yes, describe their lives to me, where would they live? And okay. Well, let's, you have to see who
[25:32]these women are. I mean, Constance, as I said, is the, you know, sort of the high was, you know,
[25:37]Belle of a New York and Palm Beach society, the horse woman, the blonde beauty, who has a secret,
[25:43]you know, her lesbian life. Josephine is the Polish Jewish emigrate who is a more voluptuous,
[25:51]you know, dark brunette, but beautiful in her own way and commanding as she's written in the book
[25:58]and more international. And so I would say that in many ways, I see Constance living in a,
[26:06]you know, Constance strives for social acceptance and to create an old money persona. So I would
[26:11]really see her living, you know, in a, if she were living in New York, which I placed her,
[26:17]she'd be living, you know, in a townhouse, you know, red brick, the federal, you know, townhouse,
[26:22]you know, in the seventies between fifth and Madison. And she, she would like the privacy. And it
[26:26]would be, you know, done by one of the, the interior designers who could give it an old money look.
[26:31]And she would like the privacy. And, um, and she would create the illusion that it's been in the
[26:36]family for years and years. Even though she's not from that background, but her husband is,
[26:40]Josephine would absolutely be living in the penthouse because she needs to be at the top.
[26:46]And she wants the view. And she, as the outsider who's conquered New York society with her
[26:52]husband's, uh, she wants to bring in, you know, kind of this cafe society. And of course,
[26:58]she would have a terrace and she would be entertaining. And so she probably live, you know,
[27:02]in Park Avenue building, um, um, in the sixties at that time would probably would be the ultimate
[27:08]for her. Um, in the books, she actually, when she's rejected from the co-op board, she actually
[27:12]buys the building, which is kind of a fun fact, um, which is actually based on a true story
[27:17]with that happened to Helena Rubenstein, who at the time was the richest woman in the world.
[27:22]And so I think, um, that's where Josephine would live. And I think that they would see
[27:28]each other but not see each other. So that is, you know, they would intersect somewhat socially.
[27:32]So, you know, that's also part of the book as well. So I feel like it's kind of a small town
[27:37]New York city in some circles. And I feel like with the two of them being
[27:42]the heads of their industry. Yes. And they do intersect. They do. I know. Yes. Um, um, would you ever
[27:49]launch the brands that you wrote about in the book as actual makeup brands? Like would you
[27:52]collaborate with a makeup company? Well, I actually, here's the really hard thing about writing
[27:57]this book. And maybe the reason why some other people never did it is that you actually, if you're
[28:03]writing a book about the cosmetic industry and you're writing about the first mass market mascara,
[28:08]you can't, you have to have a product name and the product name cannot be, let's say,
[28:12]great lash because it already exists. So it was very true to what I do in my real career,
[28:18]which is, you know, my working career, which is about product and naming and advertising.
[28:22]So I needed to actually create the products, create the campaigns. I actually had to find a name,
[28:27]that was available. I did trademark the name. Um, mascara is lashmatic, which is very true to
[28:34]the period. And you actually went and patented. And I, yes, that's so funny. Just like in the book.
[28:39]Yes. Yes, I did. It was, it was available and I did, I did trademark it. So I don't know. We'll see
[28:45]if someone wants to do it. But, um, but yeah, and then I had to come up with the advertising
[28:50]campaigns, you know, around each of the launches and things like that. So that was easy for me
[28:54]because that's what I do. But I could see where, if someone were writing a book like this,
[28:58]it would be somewhat more challenging for them because it's quite difficult. Yeah. It's a gift.
[29:03]It's awesome. Um, do you have any parting advice to aspiring authors? Yes, I certainly do.
[29:11]Great. I certainly do. I have one of the best things that I learned through this process and
[29:15]was really an epiphany is that if it's going to be hopefully great, the characters, if you have
[29:21]well defined characters, write the book in a certain sense, you're writing the book. But in some
[29:27]senses, the characters write the book. So if you create these defined characters and you place them
[29:34]in certain part of history, or let's say it's a modern day book, if they're well defined and they
[29:39]have a motivation. And I'll give you an example of that. Then the characters will tell you
[29:46]how they want to solve that chapter or where they want to go. So I'll give you a really
[29:51]fun example of this. Okay. And I think you might not to be in discrete. But let's say you're writing
[29:56]a sex scene. Okay. And I was writing a sex scene for these women. And there is-
[30:00]One man in the book who also founded a cosmetic company
[30:03]and he did it in a brothel in LA in the 1930s
[30:06]and that's a whole other story.
[30:07]But if you, let's say you're writing a sex scene
[30:10]for a character and you're writing about these amazing,
[30:13]powerful, incredibly dominant female entrepreneurs.
[30:19]Well, how would they act in a sex scene?
[30:22]So there's really only two ways to play it.
[30:24]So let's say I was writing Josephine's sex scene.
[30:28]You know, can I say this on here?
[30:30]Is this fine?
[30:31]I mean, either, you know, she would go against type
[30:35]and she would be submissive,
[30:36]but that's not Josephine's personality
[30:38]or she would be on top.
[30:40]And so, which is how I wrote that sex scene.
[30:43]And so for me, you know, she was calling out orders
[30:47]and telling the man what she wanted and how to do it.
[30:49]And that was Josephine's personality.
[30:51]Now, again, that was very clear to me
[30:55]on how Josephine needed to write that.
[30:58]Josephine actually wrote that scene
[31:00]because I had developed this very dominant female personality.
[31:05]Excellent.
[31:06]That makes sense?
[31:07]I said women on top.
[31:08]That's the secret.
[31:09]That's the secret to writing.
[31:10]No, it is the secret to always.
[31:13]Yeah, of course, if it's the character.
[31:15]Well, thank you so much for coming on mom's.
[31:17]Don't have time to read books.
[31:18]I really appreciate it.
[31:19]Xavier, you're the best.
[31:19]I love your name, by the way.
[31:21]Oh, thank you.
[31:23]Okay, thanks for having me.
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[31:39]Thanks for listening to mom's.
[31:40]Don't have time to read books.
[31:41]You can follow me on Instagram at mom's.
[31:44]Don't have time to read books and at zibby Owens
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[31:50]Thanks so much to Steve and Ryan at texture sound
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[31:59]Thanks for listening.
[31:59]You can always email me at zibby at zibby Owens.com.