-Welcome back to "Late Night." We're here with Alan Cumming.
I want I want to add something
to the last story, I feel like if I were Kristen
the rest of my life, I would do that for all funerals.
So that no one would know it was a mistake.
-That's we have a pact, she and I do.
Whoever dies first, the other one's going to send
a basket of muffins, no, it's definitely going to happen.
-That's a good, that's good.
-You guys are doing a Broadway cruise together.
-Yes, it's a we are. I don't know why I'm laughing.
But it's a cruise and Broadway fans get to go on
and meet the stars and we sing,
but I'm doing a concert in dry dock.
-Oh, gotcha. -I'm not going on the cruise.
-So you're going to go on that physical boat.
You're going to sing, perform, get lost.
-Yes, I'm going. And then they go to Bermuda or somewhere.
-And now is that because you don't --
this did not interest you to be on the high seas.
-Um, well, no, I'm quite a good sailor,
if that's what you're referring to, but no, I don't.
-You're quite a good sailor? -Yes, I do enjoy a sail.
-Really? -Yeah.
And I love going on a cruise.
I love -- I've been on across the Atlantic several times.
-Have you really? -I love it.
-To travel or for like vacation? Like have you ever done it,
like, "I need to go over there anyway."
-Well, like, if I -- I have actually.
If you have enough time and if the dates work,
I'd rather do that than take a plane.
-Yeah. -I've done it maybe
two or three times, but it's so,
it's so like another world you kind of get on
and the plane let you go for piano recitals.
And it's not like I mean
I think most people's perception of cruises
is kind of tacky and show biz
and lots of and COVID and everything, you know.
-Show biz and COVID. -Yes, show biz and COVID.
But this is it's very sort of like another
another world. -That's lovely.
Between the Cunards thanks. -This is very exciting.
You have your own place club coming,
which is a cabaret space, and it is open again.
And you actually did your -- were you went there
after your premiere.
-Yes. That's no doubt that's just about the premiere.
Cecily sang "The Man Who Got Away" beautifully.
-She just has a beautiful singing voice.
-And DeVoné lovely Dove Cameron, do you know her?
-I don't. -She's so nice.
She's like she's a young actress and singer
and she's been on all these Disney things.
And she's just she's fascinating, actually.
She's fascinating to me. And we have a little such.
I think she's got, like, a daddy crush on me,
which I quite enjoy. And I have a daddy crush back.
And we sang the "Part of Your World"
from "The Little Mermaid." -Great.
-Which I think is a great song to sing.
In a public setting. -Oh, no,
I think it always brings down the house.
-Because everybody -- it's one of these songs.
Everybody knows the words but often pretends not to.
You know, that's the thing I think in America especially,
people sort of don't want to admit
they know the sort of "perceived to be tacky" songs.
But what was hilarious at one size,
I always think that at Club Cumming
because also it's got a question and answer thing.
You know, "What's a fire and why does it, what's the word again?"
Like she can't remember, but and you go "Burn!" anyway.
So there was one time I was doing that
and there was one of later at Club Cumming
it's, you know, shows, but then it becomes
more dance-y and deejays. and so there was
a gogo boys and girls.
So there's a Google boy called Mariano, who's lovely.
He's moved to L.A. now, but anyway he was there
in his jockstrap waiting to start dancing.
And there's me like granddad singing "Part of Your World."
And when it got to that bit, I went, "What's a fire and
and why does it, what's the word again?"
And I gave him the mic, like that for him to go "Burn!"
But he thought I meant to introduce himself
so he went "Mariano."
So not so.
No now at Club Cumming, seriously,
every single time anyone ever sings "Part of Your World,"
all of the audience shouts out "Mariano."
-Oh, that's crazy. -And a girl sang it in Mandarin.
-I heard a girl singing it in Mandarin one night,
and everyone still shouted out "Mariano.
-That's fantastic. -I like it. I like tradition.
-You talked about, Kristen couldn't go
because she had to save her voice and had a show.
I heard you learned from Cyndi Lauper
a voice-saving trick. -Seriously saves my life.
Really? -I ain't gonna swear there,
but yes, it's well, it was I was doing The Threepenny Opera
with her my only other musical I've done apart from "Cabaret."
And it's very difficult playing Mack the Knife.
It's a really big singing part
and I was having -- I got a sore throat.
And so I went to her singing teacher
and she's this lady called Katie Agresta.
And her specialty is it's like rock stars
who scream in stadiums every night and she gets --
So what you do is you pull your tongue out
with a piece of paper towel
because basically when your horse is just means your tongue
is wound up to tightly at the bone at the back of your throat.
It's a game changer. -Really?
-Yeah. -How long do you pull it out?
-When you pull out and you go get these different things,
you pull it, you smile, you gi-hee-hee, gi-hee
up and down the scale, and then you go gi-i-i.
And then you giii, up a third and down about 20 minutes.
I know it's funny and crazy. I'm sensing your cynicism.
I said I liked it without the audience.
Now I want the audience back, they would be cheering at this
-They'd be like look what he does for us!
-Right? -But this crew.
-I know. -Ugh. Trust me.
-A little snicker that was. -You have an advantage over me
when this is over, you get to leave.
-You've got to stay and be mocked mercilessly
by those little people in the dark.
-Oh, they won't give us their name.
-That's right. -So, uh --
-So anyways, it's a good like 20 minutes of that.
I've been like some mornings, you know, wake up in a hotel,
think "Oh, [bleep] the voice is not so good."
Got to do a concert tonight. 20 minutes. Boom.
-Wow. -Yes. It's excellent.
-Um, I think of one thing that a lot of people turn to
during this pandemic were podcasts.
You've got a couple. -Yes.
-You have one that's about shelves
and what people have on their shelves.
-Well, it's about my shelves. -Your shelves?
-Called Alan Cumming's Shelves. -Okay.
-So I have all these shelves with I'm slightly hoard-y.
I kind of take weird things that I, you know,
not always like memento, but momentous for me,
random little things and I and I --
So I was in the, in the, the beginning of the pandemic.
I was thinking, oh, I remember that story
that I thought that would be a really good podcast.
So I take something from the shelves
and then I talk about it and then I get someone
who's involved in my memory of it,
so it's always people I know.
And I then tell the story and then so I did --
I've done, I've done about 12 now that have gone out.
And I did one my friend, Monica Lewinsky,
she gave me this award. And so it was about the awards.
I was clinking the awards you could hear.
But we were laughing because it was Emmy weekend
and it's just when she was just kind of coming back
into life again, into society. And it was really lovely.
Anyway, that night went to this party at our agents' at CAA,
one of those ones, and one with three letters.
And they, and it was in a restaurant
and they didn't bring food.
You had to go into the kitchen to get food yourself.
It was like, you know, whatever happened to waiters.
And so we were really hungry and there was no pizzas left,
but they had these baguettes.
So I said, could I have this baguette?
And the man was like, "Sure."
So Monica and I, I got a baguette.
She didn't take one. And she went to the loo
and I went to the bar and I was I hold up my baguette
so you can see me. So I did that.
Then we were leaving and trying to go out
and I was bopping people
on the shoulder with my baguette to get them out.
And it was really useful.
And then when we got out to the thing, it was all valet's
and everyone's car coming it was a mess.
And there was police there and everything.
And I could we could see Monica's car,
but he couldn't see us. So I went up and I bopped
my baguette on the window of the car
and the policeman with a loudhailer
who has a loudhailer anymore? I went, "Sir, sir,
would you stop hitting that car with your breadstick?"
-I was going to be shocked. If the cop had said baguette
I would have been like "This story's not real."
-That was yeah. I just I was like, really?
I thought, gosh, I'm going to get arrested
for hitting a car with with some French bread.
-I mean, if there's any crime that we should look
the other way on, it's hitting a car with bread.
-I'm ready for that. Yeah. -You have a show coming out on
is what is it, HBO Max? -HBO Max.
Yes, it's another it's called "The Prince."
-"The Prince." That's really exciting.
-It's an anima-- It is. It's hilarious.
It's an animated show written by Garry Gianetti
and it's about started off on Instagram,
him sort of doing these sort of witty things
about Prince George, Little Prince George.
I know it's an animated thing
and I play Prince George's valet.
-Oh, fantastic. -Yeah, it's it's it's biting
and hilarious. -So I can't wait for that.
-Yeah. -Congrats on "Scmigadoon."
It's so lovely to have you here. Thanks for making the time.
-Yeah. It was really nice. -I really appreciate it.