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I'm grateful, and I know everyone in New Orleans
is grateful, for all the work.
You put so many hours into New Orleans.
Are you happy with the progress?
I don't think anyone's happy with the progress.
It's been really slow and there's been a lot of failures
at the state and local and federal level.
But the spirit of the city is there and I urge people to go.
And on vacation I go there, and it's just a great city.
You can have the best meals of your life there.
Yeah.
I mean, there's a real spirit there
that has been brought back.
And you travel everywhere and you see so much sadness.
I mean, you report on what's going on in the world.
Is it hard to escape from that when you come home?
I mean, do you watch The Bachelor?
Do you watch shows like that, to just go I can't deal with--
I gave up The Bachelor long ago.
Oh, you did?
Yes, I did, although I did see the finale,
where he chose none of them.
Yeah.
Which I at least kind of appreciate because--
I haven't watched it, so I don't know anything about him.
But all the other ones like faked it.
They all pretended to choose someone
and then two months later you'd read
they're actually not together.
Right.
But he-- well, I'm not going to get into it with you, Anderson.
Was he a jerk?
Yeah.
You said he was a jerk.
Well, he clearly did have feelings for her.
Not really.
And if he didn't, he shouldn't have flown her father
in for the finale.
Why would he fly her father in--
Well, that's not good.
--the day before.
Why get her hopes up?
Right.
Exactly.
And I did see the finale.
I think I saw it on The Soup maybe--
I didn't actually see the finale--
where he said to her like, I ditched the other girl.
And then she got all excited, and he said,
and I'm ditching you, too.
Right.
No, there were so many levels of deceit there.
There was so much subtext to that.
So what do you watch?
I do watch a lot of junk TV.
I mean, I was addicted to, for a while, My Super Sweet 16.
Do you ever watch that show?
Oh, yes.
You've seen that show?
It's incredible.
I mean, I watch it and I don't understand.
I don't understand how parents think
it's OK to spend like $300,000 on a child's sweet 16 party.
Right.
And give their kid like an Escalade, and I mean--
Yeah.
Who are these people?
And they're proud to be on there.
They're proud to be on there.
Yeah.
Frankly, after the first season I stopped watching.
And then I was watching a show called Tiara Girls for a while.
You ever seen that?
No.
What's that?
Oh my god.
It's like low-rent beauty pageants.
It's like the Miss Fillet of Steak Pageant
from Philadelphia.
Uh-huh.
But literally, kids parents are pushing them
into these pageants.
It's like young teenage pageants.
And their mothers are wanting these children
to get liposuction and collagen injections in their lips,
and these are like 16-year-old girls.
That's horrible.
It's crazy.
Yeah.
Like the Sweet 16, have you seen Daddy's Spoiled
Girl, or something like that.
You know what I'm talking about?
That sounds like a porn film, to be honest.
Oh, no.
I haven't seen that one.
And it's not just teenagers.
It's girls that are like in their 30s.
Oh, yeah.
And asking for everything and demanding everything
and getting everything.
I was addicted to Paula Abdul's reality show, I will admit.
Oh, yeah, that was good.
Yeah.
That was really good.
Yeah, I watch all that.
For me, that's how I kind of unwind.
I go home and I watch other people and go,
oh, I'm not so bad.
Yes.
You know?
I think that's what everybody does, you know?
Well, for me, TiVo is like the greatest--
I mean, forget the internet.
TiVo, to me, is the greatest technological revolution
of this century.
It really is.
It's life-changing.
You can watch it any time.
Absolutely.
Any time, because you can't always
be home when something's on.
Absolutely.
Yeah, I love all that stuff.
That and the George Foreman grill, to me,
are revolutionary.
The two revolutionary--
Yes.
Yeah.
I agree.
And the shredder.
I think the shredder is the coolest thing.
Because the shredder makes you feel like you're important,
like you have secret documents that need to be shredded,
you know?
So I just sit in my home, this can't
fall into the wrong hands.
Yeah.
It's like my water bill.
The things that come out of a magazine.
Exactly.
Perfect, I'll shred it.
Thanks for being here.
The last few times I've talked to you, it was over Zoom.
Yeah.
So I appreciate it.
It's my last season.
I get to say goodbye to you.
I know.
Congratulations.
I can't believe it.
Thank you.
Yeah.
It's real.
It's over.
Yeah.
It's not over, it's just beginning.
That's true.
It's just beginning to be over.
But you have made so many people laugh.
And I remember seeing you first.
It must've been like '93 or '94.
It was a concert.
I was like just coming out as gay to my friends and family,
and you were such an inspiration and are such an inspiration.
Well, thanks.
Where was this?
It was in LA.
It was some--
I don't know if it was a--
I can't even remember what it was for.
I think it was around the time of the Don't Ask Don't Tell.
And yeah, you appeared on stage, and it was just awesome.
Yeah.
Oh, well, yeah, I remember that.
Yeah.
I don't know what it was.
But anyway, I'm glad.
Yeah.
And I like that we've become friends.
Yeah, me, too.
Because you're a fantastic guy.
And look at this, you and your son
on the cover of People magazine.
How precious is he?
Yeah.
He is so sweet.
Tell me about him.
He's Wyatt.
He's 17 months old.
And he's just delicious.
In the book, also, it turns out you have
a family chock full of gays.
That's what's so interesting.
Yeah.
Who knew?
Yeah, I mean, it's so interesting.
My mom was taken away from her mom as a child by courts
and given to an aunt.
One of the reasons the court ruled to take my mom
away was that her mother was seen
kissing a woman in bed, who she was having a relationship with.
And she had been married to a man,
but she also had relationships with women.
My mom's aunt, who she was given to,
also had a whole secret gay life.
And the Commodore Vanderbilt, one of his sons, who he hated,
was secretly gay.
Yeah, it didn't end well, but he gave his house
to his male lover.
Wow.
Yeah.
I know, I was like, wow it's chock full of gays.
Yeah.
You could have called the book Chock Full of Gays.
Yeah.
That's your next book.
That is.
That's the sequel.
Yeah.
That's the Netflix series.
It's the spin I'm going to put on it.
If you and Mr. Cooper win $10,000 to donate,
I'm going to ring these bells and someone
is going to get water dumped on them in our splash tank.
Oh, OK.
Do you want to get in the splash tank, Dave?
I do not.
My bells will rust.
You know what?
I'll do this, because my mother is actually a breast cancer
survivor.
So I will do that.
So I'm down.
All right.
Is it dripping?
Sure.
I can't hear you.
OK.
All right, let's see how this goes.
Underhand?
I think if you--
Well, I don't know.
Yeah, don't throw overhand.
Come on, Ellen.
Oh, I see.
Oh.
Oh, OK.
Is there a time limit?
No.
Oh, OK, good.
You got nothing but time.
Oh.
Sorry.
It's very hard.
It is.
All right.
There's no way you can really--
Oh.
My god, you're amazing.
Oh.
I'm rooting for you, Mr. Cooper.
Oh.
Oh my god.
It's really hard.
It's really-- oh.
Thanks to Anderson and tWitch for donating $15,000
to RAD-AID.
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