All my gowns have trains on them. I make a train that goes on forever. I love long trains and then I stand there and twirl around and wrap myself up in it.
I try to choose the songs that really are basically coming from my heart. I think that through the songs that I select, people know what’s going on in my life.
My father worked hard, but we were still very poor; and I didn’t want anybody arguing about money, so I became the entertainer, the one who wanted everyone to be happy. I didn’t want there to be any problems.
So I’m not worried about the emotions I carry with me, because I’m happy that I have them; I think it’s good for the work I do. The emotions that are not healthy are the ones you hold inside, like anger.
I want to live in Paris for a couple of years. I’m dying to do the Josephine Baker story. I really want to be there and do it. It’s certainly my intention to do it.
It’s easier for me to sit with the producers and the writers and I give them my feelings and my thoughts and what I think I feel like singing about and then they go away and write it.
I really don’t think that Detroit was any different than New York of Boston or Philadelphia. Kids always wanted to listen to music outside because that’s where they hung out with their friends.
I don’t judge people by their sexual orientation or the color of their skin, so I find it really hard to identify someone by saying that they’re a gay person or a black person or a Jewish person.
