- [Kelly] Oh my God. No, it's so cute.
- It's actually literally from the closet, my closet.
- Oh my God. I love it.
My favorite part of the little button's down there center.
It's very cute. - Yeah.
- I love it.
She walked in and I was like, "I love your dress."
She was like, "Easter when you were five, were you..."
I was like, "I was not that cool on a Easter."
My dress probably had a lot of tool going on.
It was very weird probably
- That's what I wanted.
- You wanted. (laughs)
Damn it. (laughs) - That's what I coveted
when I was five.
- So wait, I was told that this was your first trip away
from your kids in a year.
- Yeah.
- How are you? Do you need help or anything like-
- You know, I-
- It's hard.
- It's a lot of anticipatory dread.
Like the week before I go, I have crazy migraines
and I mean, I'm just...
It's like it's really, really hard.
And all of a sudden, I'm gone.
I'm sitting on the plane and I have six uninterrupted hours
to perche.
And like watch- - Or just do nothing.
- Or all the things I wanna do all the time that I never do.
I watched Ocean's Eleven.
I listen to Kelly Clarkson.
- Good taste, good taste.
- I know.
- No, that's the that's awesome.
I was gonna say, I have that dread.
It is anticipatory 'cause you're like,
"Oh my God, something's gonna happen to them.
I'm not gonna be here."
Like I start dreading everything
and then I get on the plane and I'm like, "This is amazing."
- It is. And it's sad.
I'm heartbroken.
Like I was in contact within the whole flight on WiFi,
but I...
And there's no guilt.
You know, shouldn't have guilt
when we like finally have time for ourselves.
And I had a margarita. - Yeah, you did.
- At like, I don't now, 1:00 PM.
- Yeah. Five o'clock somewhere.
- Exactly. And it was great.
- Yeah. I love that for you.
And I actually do appreciate it
and know what you're talking about.
It's very nice.
So wait, last time you were here,
we talked about your farm and it's in the middle of nowhere.
I love middle of nowhere. That's where my ranch is.
I think it's amazing.
So how are things?
- No, it's fine.
I mean, listen, it's wintertime.
Yesterday it was 61 when I left,
tomorrow there's gonna be a foot of snow.
So the problem is, if there's wind and ice,
everything shuts down, nobody gets power.
And we have two generators.
I am a lucky person.
We have two generators and our one generator blew weeks ago
with a huge ice storm.
I mean, you couldn't even leave your house.
I just have two small kids and in the middle of the night,
have no heat.
Like we ended up having to like walk outside
in a five-degree weather to the barn and sleep there
because we had the generator ran for that
'cause it runs for the horse barn
and then the extra guest barn.
And the house is- - So animals were good.
Y'all were just cold?
- No, the animals are fine.
It's just there's like a tack room where the cat lives
and you know, the cat at night goes in
and you know, you have warmth for that and water
and running water.
So we were fine, we were very lucky,
but it was like one of those things where like,
this is what you do, this is what you give up.
You sacrifice these things when nature happens.
You know what I mean?
And it's just- - But I love it.
Do you love it?
- The running water situation is like, it'll kill me.
(Kelly and Audience laughs)
2:30 in the morning walking
with my one and a half year old awake up.
And my five year old who's like, "What's happening?"
It was just like, no thanks. But I really love my farm.
- I will say this has happened to...
But I'm really happy I live there.
- I love my mom. It's really great.
- No, but I love it because sometimes it's cool
because then stuff like that happens
and like something goes out,
I love putting on a farm were all like camping out
in the living room, like in sleeping bags.
Like I lean in.
- If it's 3:00 in the afternoon.
- My toilet broke on our ranch like in the pandemic,
I just went to the forest with all the other animals.
- Was it summer?
- It was like... Yeah, it was not...
No, no, no, no. There was snow. I was in snow.
I wanna say this, that we have wild animals at my ranch.
Like we have bear, like mountain lion, everything.
Do you ever get afraid?
We have everything, wolves with everything. It's awesome.
I love it.
Where are they supposed to live?
They have to have somewhere to live.
- This is another reason it's great to live where we live
because you get to see mother nature walk in, walk out.
- Yeah, we have it. Yeah. - Moose.
- So wait, do you have animals that get near?
'Cause you have young kids.
So I do get a little worried about that part.
- Well, at night. Yeah.
I mean, and also apparently my dog last night
and a possum just kind of like went nose to nose.
And my mom tried to get between them
and I was like don't worry about it.
It's fine. My dog's big.
But there's a bear that hangs around.
I mean, there's a bear that lives in the woods behind us
and it has- - Like black bear?
- Yeah. Little, tiny black bear. It's fine
- Yeah. Still a bear, but yeah.
- And my husband and my daughter just were like walked out
to the front yard one day
and all of a sudden the bear was there
and he's like, "What's up?"
And my daughter's like, "Huh."
It's almost like she fell in love.
- Like Whitney the Pooh.
- There's just no fear.
- Oh, that's scary.
And that was a clip
from her new Hulu series called The Dropout.
The Dropout is the story of Elizabeth Holmes.
Can you tell us about the story?
I think a lot of people know about it
but were you excited to play this character?
- Uh-huh. Yeah.
- That scene is amazing.
It looked like your foot loose moment.
- Yeah, it was the most pain I've ever been in,
day after filming 'cause it was just a lot of moving.
I don't move like that.
No, it was amazing. It was a dream role, really.
This woman, Elizabeth, who's, you know,
my age and our age, like she's living among us.
She's just really smart.
She started like a health tech company
that didn't...
She didn't really...
She wasn't able to build what she wanted to build
and she got a lot of investors
and you know, she's now been convicted of fraud,
but yeah, no, this is...
It was like a dream role.
And I'm still learning about this woman, still, you know.
She's like an enigma.
- I know. It's one of those things when you see...
Whenever it came out on the news, I was like,
"Who will play her in the movie?"
I was like, "This has gotta be a movie.
- Oh, yeah, I mean, everything's being made into a show
and so why not?
- And it's such a fascinating story that's like,
you unbelievable.
So that's why I was like...
I kept wondering and I'm so glad that you're playing her
and I love that scene.
So did you watch a lot of videos of her like
to nail like her mannerisms or?
- I crammed like a mad woman.
I never was acade... Academics were not my thing.
And so when I got this role, I was like,
"Wow, I wanna study.
Get me like... Where do I start?"
And I was given this big file with all these videos
of her deposition, especially her deposition,
and all the interviews she had done.
And I just studied.
I kept watching and listening and learning
and trying to get her mannerisms.
We absorb, we're human beings.
Like even if we're not acting actors,
we absorb other people's mannerisms.
I know I did that when I was a kid with my friends.
Like I would speak like them and move like them sometimes
without even knowing.
So I consciously took her on 'cause it's my job.
And it was so fun.
- That's so cool.
- I know nothing about her.
- What a cool job though. I love that. I love it.
So wait, what was the trick to figuring out?
Because her voice was pretty deep.
It was different than yours.
- Yeah. Very different.
I mean, as a singer, I like-
- Like I'm a soprano, it's hard for me to go low like that.
- Well, so I think we naturally sit
at an above average levels.
There's like a measurement.
- It's like higher the frequency of... Yeah, yeah.
- Yeah. And she, at her deepest spoke, just insanely low,
and it's impo...
It's physically impossible for us to speak that low.
But, you know, I have a version of it.
My lowest is what I used and I try to protect myself
with my voice coach.
Like she really helped me try to protect my voice,
so I wouldn't ruin anything in my vocal cords.
- Or get laryngitis. Yeah.
- Get anything. Yeah.
- 'Cause talking is worse than singing.
People don't realize that.
- Interesting.
- Yeah. Talking is way harder on your voice than singing.
That's why people are like,
"Oh, this singer got laryngitis and missed her concert."
I'm like, probably wasn't from singing.
Was probably doing a billion interview she didn't wanna do.
- Exactly. Have you ever gotten like a really bad-
- I had it during Idol.
I got laryngitis at the very end of the very (indistinct)
like 20 year.
They just had us doing interviews nonstop.
- Never were singing.
- It was not because of the singing.
- When you're belting?
- The singing isn't the problem, it's all the talking,
and I am a talker.
What? They gave me a show.
- I Know. - Yep.
- Same, I get it.
- Yeah. - I get it.
- But that's hard though when you're trying
to like force something that your voice isn't normal.
- Yeah. It's like, I'm like even... It's physical.
You know what I mean? And it's also...
There's like a roundedness to it. There's all this stuff.
It's taxing, but great.
- Yeah. It's what a fun job.
- It a big part of it.
- So Elizabeth dropped out of school.
And I wanted to ask about this photo that you posted
'cause this feels like you're back in school.
Is this your school? - I went back.
I went back to Allentown.
I made a point.
I kept having these dreams, you know, since I graduated,
which was, I don't know, many years as ago.
- Yeah, just like a couple. Yeah.
- And I was like, you know what I think?
I'm just gonna go back and see the school
and see if they'll let me go.
And it took me a while to get somebody to call me back.
I was like, "I think this is going
to change something in me."
I think the anxiety that I get,
the anxiety dreams that I get,
I will no longer have if I go and see it in person
and see what's changed and support it and whatever.
And I did and they were awesome.
I went to my husband's a theater guy
and I was never in the theater department in school.
I did not act in school 'cause I was intermediate.
- That's ironic.
- I know it's weird. It was weird.
I was only singing though.
And I went and I saw this guy, Mr. Sackler,
who's like local famous theater director.
And he was talking to me.
He was like showing us the black box
and showing us all these cool things.
He's like, "This is the show we're doing next."
And my husband's like,
"Wow, what a cool school you went to?"
And I was like, "I was never a part of any of this."
And he had no idea.
And he mentioned me and I had my mask on.
- Wait, the teacher?
- The teacher mentioned me.
He's like, (indistinct)
And I pulled my mask down and I was like,
"I should probably...
I feel like I'm lying to you."
And I took my mask down and he screamed
and ran across the room.
And it was like the most amazing thing I'd ever seen.
Most amazing like reaction.
And I realized that like-
- Oh, I love that he didn't know.
- Yeah. And it was amazing for him.
And I was like, "I'll come back
and talk to your theater students."
'Cause like-
- Even if you have a mask on,
you have like the most recognizable eyes
on all of the lands.
- I think he's just super busy in his head.
- Okay. I was like, he is not observant.
- No. And I think he knows that.
And it was so cute.
He was like, ah!
I was like, "Oh my God, thank you."
- Oh, I love that.
- And so he lives with us now
because it was very flattering (indistinct)
- He lives with us now.
- No, but it was at school.
Go back to high school if you can.
If you were traumatized in high school, try to go back.
It might help.
- What was traumatizing? I wasn't traumatized.
I just didn't wanna be there.
- I didn't wanna be there. It was girl stuff.
- Oh, girls are mean.
See, that's why...
I had a few like good, solid, like girlfriends. Yeah
- I did too. I'm still best friends with my girlfriend.
We have a company together.
Like we really talk every day.
- No people are mean, girls are mean, I will say that.
Girls are really mean. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
- And now if I run into them in town, we'll be like,
"Oh, Hey, how are you doing?"
But like in high school, it was like-
- I know, but here's the best part, girl.
You don't even need to run into them.
They could just watch you.
Hey!
(Audience applauding)
Oh, but you are about to go to college though
when Mean Girls happened, right?
Like you were at college, right?
You were going to college and then-
- I was enrolled in Fordham. Yeah.
- Oh my gosh. Was that a hard decision to like..
"Cause nobody knew what it was gonna be.
- Nobody knew. No, no.
I will tell you, it wasn't a decision I made.
I did not make that decision.
- Wait, who made it?
- Mark Waters who directed Mean Girls made the decision
to cast me as Karen.
And I was like, "Oh, I guess, I can even go to college."
I mean, I missed my first class anyway 'cause I was late
because of the audition.
It was all fate.
Guys, the universe was screaming at me
that I did not belong in a college setting.
And I appreciate that.
- Thank you universe.
- The luck of getting Mean Girls, like what?
- Well, and the luck, you got it though for a good reason.
You were amazing.
It's such a funny just movie to watch for all of us.
So we related to..
It's so relatable, such a big huge pop culture moment.
And it was like 18 years ago, right?
- It was 18 years ago. - It was 18 years.
Do you still talk to all them?
- Yeah, I do. - That's cool.
- Yeah. I mean, especially Lacey.
- She's been here a few times. She's lovely.
- She is who she... Like just like you.
- She's so nice.
- The same as she present.
- Like on and off? Oh that's nice.
Yeah. I know you look like a little baby.
- We had the best time.
- Yeah. I love that.
- It was the best. - I love that you have...
That was your first like big experience, right?
In the industry? That's awesome.
- Listen, I'm still...
I think I'm just not jaded.
I think I'm just like- - That's amazing.
- That was the best thing.
- Stay there. Yeah.
- I mean, I'll try.